Personal Woes and Advice 3

[WarKitty]

What do you mean?

I mean that's a classic depression/anxiety line. Your friends care about you. They see good in you and they don't believe you're a failure. Unless you're about to confess to some horrible crime, your problems aren't going to reveal you as a failure. That's just not how it works.

[Pyromancer999]

I mean that's a classic depression/anxiety line. Your friends care about you. They see good in you and they don't believe you're a failure. Unless you're about to confess to some horrible crime, your problems aren't going to reveal you as a failure. That's just not how it works.

My friends do care, but they are also extraordinarily blunt about situations as they see them, and some have called other friends failures before, and then offered no better advice than to "just do better."

Also, each of the problems I'm dealing with have major life-changing potential(some more than others), and a couple do most certainly make me at the very least a bad person, which is not something one would like to admit when one's friends have already confessed some deep problems of their own, which aren't necessarily of the same impact.

[WarKitty]

My friends do care, but they are also extraordinarily blunt about situations as they see them, and some have called other friends failures before, and then offered no better advice than to "just do better."

Also, each of the problems I'm dealing with have major life-changing potential(some more than others), and a couple do most certainly make me at the very least a bad person, which is not something one would like to admit when one's friends have already confessed some deep problems of their own, which aren't necessarily of the same impact.

Not sure how much I can say without more details. Feel free to PM me if you like.

[zlefin]

Does anyone know a good way for making difficult decisions?

So here's the deal. Four months ago, me and my girlfriend started up school again. We'd been living together for a while, and we figured out we would be able to still work and pay rent while in school, it would just be very difficult. Because of this, my parents very generously let us move back in for zero dollars a month while we're in school, which is helping quite a bit.

Now, last week actually, my Mom got offered a promotion and a chance to move back to her home town (or very nearly close to it. St John's, Newfoundland, for the record. I currently live in Edmonton, Alberta.). Which is fantastic, and I'm really happy for her. Now we, me and my girlfriend, have to make a decision. Do we stay here or go?

We need to choose between staying where we grew up (and where everyone we know is) but having to support ourselves while in school, and moving across the country to a new city, but free room and board (and also substantially cheaper schooling). Both options are good and bad for us, and we have been wanting to move, but it's not quite where we were thinking of.

If anyone has any advice on what to do, that'd be great, but what I'm really looking for more is advice on how to make a decision. Cause right now just thinking about the pros and cons of both has left my anxious and worried and paralyzed by indecision. Any help is greatly appreciated.

There's a fair bit of research on decision making. On some types of problems, it's better to do pro/con lists and weight the values and analyze carefully the details. On other problems it's more important to get a sense of all the various factors as a gestalt, and then take some time to mull it over, and go with your gut.
Yours is the type of issue where it's better to go with your gut.

Also, as a classic trope I may as well ask: is there a third option?

What do you do when you have problems, but you can't talk to your friends or really anyone about them because talking about them would just show you to be as bad and/or failure of a person as you suspect yourself to be?

talking to a doctor/therapist/psychologist works for some. They're getting paid to listen and try to help, and some of them have heard some pretty bad stuff.
You can also try talking to various supports on the internet, like here, or in other places, wherein the people are far enough from your life that what they find out really doesn't matter.
I concur with warkitty, that what you're saying is a classic symptom, and it's almost never as bad as the person thinks it is.

[dehro]

Does anyone know a good way for making difficult decisions?

So here's the deal. Four months ago, me and my girlfriend started up school again. We'd been living together for a while, and we figured out we would be able to still work and pay rent while in school, it would just be very difficult. Because of this, my parents very generously let us move back in for zero dollars a month while we're in school, which is helping quite a bit.

Now, last week actually, my Mom got offered a promotion and a chance to move back to her home town (or very nearly close to it. St John's, Newfoundland, for the record. I currently live in Edmonton, Alberta.). Which is fantastic, and I'm really happy for her. Now we, me and my girlfriend, have to make a decision. Do we stay here or go?

We need to choose between staying where we grew up (and where everyone we know is) but having to support ourselves while in school, and moving across the country to a new city, but free room and board (and also substantially cheaper schooling). Both options are good and bad for us, and we have been wanting to move, but it's not quite where we were thinking of.

If anyone has any advice on what to do, that'd be great, but what I'm really looking for more is advice on how to make a decision. Cause right now just thinking about the pros and cons of both has left my anxious and worried and paralyzed by indecision. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Make a list of pros and cons... Make it together and/or compare separate ones.
Ask both your parents for an informed opinion.
Check at least 1 or 2 cheap housing solutions if available and compare to the various alternative scenarios.
Also consider that moving to different countries/states is not the end of Life. You might be surprised and like the new place better... Or just go back once you're done with school/financially independent, should you not

[Comissar]

Update time again, I guess?

Spoiler

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So, back at uni after the christmas break and I'm now two weeks into a mood boost course. It's largely dealing with CBT and methods of handling negative thought patterns. Not sure if it's had a whole lot of impact on me yet, probably still too early to say for sure.

Had a few rough weeks this month, too. Attended the funeral for one of my old school friend's Dad. It's not the first funeral I've been to, but this one felt almost a little surreal. It's the first I've been to that wasn't directly my family, I don't know whether it's that, my medication or just plain being a bit older now, but I didn't find myself as upset as the family ones I've been to. I was there mainly for my friend, he was, of course, pretty upset through it, and I've made sure he knows I'll give him whatever help I can to help him get through it all.

Being at uni's gotten kind of... odd recently too. On the one hand, I'm socialising a lot more with people outside of what had been my immediate friendship circle, so that's good. I'm heading out to a friends fairly regularly just to hang out, it's nice to just get my geek on while I'm there. On the other hand, I find myself feeling a lot more guarded around everyone down here. After the fiasco with the friends birthday party last November (previous update), I've not felt very comfortable letting my guard down as much. I'm still talking to a few people over the internet, and I greatly appreciate their support, but it's not really the same as being able to do so face to face.

Not really too sure what else to say, so I guess I'll leave it there.

[Astrella]

Psychiatrist visit went well. Talking about anxiety, exams, my parents, cutting. Talked about using different coping methods instead of cutting and how to avoid the thought patterns. Talked a lot about my mom, she's going to try and arrange bringing my mom along to my anxiety therapist sometime. She's really nice and understanding and very good about me being trans, she was even a bit annoyed at my parents not using my name / pronouns yet. (My mom called her to confirm the appointment a few days ago, used my given name, and my psych didn't know who she meant. )

However:

Spoiler: Warning: self harm

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I did cut again today mew... I let everyone down again. I was talking with a friend about presenting full time next term and it just, I got all scared and sick to my stomach and I don't even know why I do it but the desire is just there....

[FinnDarkblade]

So this is pretty minor but I still want to vent. Last week I spilled cranberry juice on my Alienware laptop. It was still sort of working when I brought it into a repair shop. It wouldn't start most of the time but when it did all my files were there and everything worked. It would; however, freeze several minutes later. The repair shop said I'd get it back some time this week so I just called them today to see how the repairs were going. They told me that they got done with it days ago but just forgot to call me. They also told me that now my laptop is completely broken. It tries to turn on as soon as it's plugged in but there's no booting at all. The screen just stays blank and everything is gone. When I asked what happened(since it was kind of working when I brought it in) the employee on the phone said "Well, you spilled cranberry juice on it and we tried to fix it." They're going to give me a price estimate on how much it would cost to replace the motherboard but since it's an Alienware laptop the CPU and GPU are soldered to the motherboard and would have to be replaced as well. All of this with no guarantee that replacing said parts would fix the issue. I might just bite the bullet and buy a new one but Alienware discontinued the 11X model a while ago.

[Aedilred]

Can't remember the last time I posted here, and it's not a super-major problem but this is a realisation I've come to over the last few months. Don't really know how to go forward from here.

Spoiler

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I have nothing with which to motivate myself. When I was younger, from the age of c.7-18, my goal was to get into a particular university, which I did. While there I met the girl who I believed was the love of my life, and that became my motivation. I still really struggled to get out of bed in the morning, but everything I did was for the future of that relationship. I got - and kept - a job I hated, so that I could save money for a future with her. Then we split up, and my motivation became to get her back, so I got a new house, a new (better) job, smartened myself up and turned myself into a Proper Person rather than the shiftless bum I had been for the preceding years. Over time I realised that she wasn't going to come back and eventually that I didn't even want her to.

And since then... nothing. For the last couple of years I've been effectively drifting. I'm supposed to be embarking on a new career (or, rather, taking steps to ensure I can). It's hard and competitive and my heart just isn't in it. It isn't because it's the wrong career, I think: realistically I don't want to do anything else. But the disappointment that would amount from failing to do this isn't enough to motivate me to push on, because the only person who it'll affect is me and I don't care enough for that to act as any sort of meaningful incentive. I have no idea why I'm doing anything any more. I wake up in the morning and don't see the point in getting out of bed. I don't even know what I want.

I'm not utterly miserable; I enjoy things in the present. I have a number of good friends and have good fun with them. But it's all ephemeral. I feel like everything I have is just stuff.

A friend of mine last year compared me to the protagonist in Parade's End; I watched it and can see what he means. Somewhere along the line I've somehow substituted principles for accomplishments in my self-analyis. If I can look in the mirror and feel like I'm a decent human being then I'll never hate myself, even if all I've done that day is loaf about on the internet (which is most days). These principles are largely arbitrary and inexplicable. I feel like even my closest friends would place no value on them, if I were able to explain them.

Spoiler: Parade's End clarification/spoilers

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F'r instance, Tietjens (protagonist of the series) believes in monogamy, and as such declares at an early point that he will remain married to his wife despite her repeated infidelity (indeed, he will shoulder the social responsibility for the separation himself rather than publicly shame her), and endure in a loveless marriage forever, rather than compromise his principles and get a divorce or take a lover himself (having fallen in love with a young woman himself). In the end, when he finally abandons his principles on that score, I found it rather sad.

There is perhaps a "good money after bad" thing going on; I've been the way I have for sufficiently long now that to go back on it would be to admit I've wasted years of my life. Maybe it would be better to write that time off and try a new tack. But equally, I know that if I make any alterations to... the way I am, and it goes wrong, I won't even have the knowledge that I did the right thing by my standards to fall back on.

I can take practical, financial, risks, because I don't care enough about the consequences of failure, and I don't care about failure because I don't care about success. I can come across as spontaneous and fancy-free which is largely because I try to avoid commitment and routine and therefore can act on impulse. But internally I'm very tightly-wound and risk-averse, and those who know me best can see that and I can't explain why that is and why I'm not trying to change it. I can't do anything that I feel endangers my... soul, if I can use that word in a kind of non-spiritual sense.

So I feel like I'm drifting, endlessly. I'm not doing anything important, because I daren't. But equally I don't care enough about that to do anything about it. I'm just in a sort of limbo. And I think that also makes me kind of personally unimpressive and... unattractive. I know (at least a few) people like me, but I don't think anyone really admires or respects me. I'm not going anywhere, I'm not doing anything, I'm not doing anything to change that, and I don't give the impression that I care about that. I just am.

I'm not happy. But I'm not unhappy either, and I'm wary of doing anything to upset the apple-cart for risk of straying into the territory of outright unhappiness. In fact, so long as attention doesn't get drawn, whether inadvertently or not, to my general listlessness and the apparent futility of my existence, I can convince myself I am happy.

I don't know what to do about this. I don't know if there is anything that can be done. I don't know if it's worth trying in the event that there is. I'm just drifting... onwards, in the hope that eventually I come across something that makes me care again, but I feel that the longer I remain like this the less likely that is.

[The Extinguisher]

There's a fair bit of research on decision making. On some types of problems, it's better to do pro/con lists and weight the values and analyze carefully the details. On other problems it's more important to get a sense of all the various factors as a gestalt, and then take some time to mull it over, and go with your gut.
Yours is the type of issue where it's better to go with your gut.

Also, as a classic trope I may as well ask: is there a third option?

Third option? I guess just move somewhere else and have the worst of both of them

Make a list of pros and cons... Make it together and/or compare separate ones.
Ask both your parents for an informed opinion.
Check at least 1 or 2 cheap housing solutions if available and compare to the various alternative scenarios.
Also consider that moving to different countries/states is not the end of Life. You might be surprised and like the new place better... Or just go back once you're done with school/financially independent, should you not

It's not like we don't want to move (we both do. I don't want to live here for the rest of my life), so that's not the big deal. It's just, earlier then we were expecting and also not where we wanted to go.

Thanks for the advice though. I do appreciate it.

[zlefin]

re: Astrella
finding an alternate habit that causes less complications will certainly help.
Try stretching, in particular holding a stretch that's near your limits for an extended period of time (several minutes). That might provide the physical pain to distract from the psychological pain, while having far less health consequences (as long as you don't pull something, so follow normal stretching protocols).


re: Aedilred
I think there's quite a few people who have something similar to what you have, I'm not sure of the exact classification though. It rather sounds like apathy, which can show up for a variety of reasons.
There's a fair chance something could be done about it should you choose to try. A doctor could run tests for some of the physical conditions that could cause it.


re: Extinguisher
It'd depend on details of your financial situation; are there friends who'd be willing to go in on a deal on a place. If you choose to stay in the area, there might be ways to have costs less than the normal cost of renting a place. It'd also depend on where you're living with your parents, is it a house, apartment, owned, rented? Just a question of how much you've assessed the details of what staying/moving would look like, and whether we can find ways to optimize those.

[Astrella]

re: Astrella
finding an alternate habit that causes less complications will certainly help.
Try stretching, in particular holding a stretch that's near your limits for an extended period of time (several minutes). That might provide the physical pain to distract from the psychological pain, while having far less health consequences (as long as you don't pull something, so follow normal stretching protocols).

Mhm. I've been tweezering as an alternative.

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also told my brother about the cutting, he reacted alright about it. Apparently he had a talk with my mom about my fears about their reactions with regards to my grades, cause she brought up that she wouldn't be angry... so I'm hoping that will be the case.

[WarKitty]

I want help and I don't know where to turn.

That's the problem. I want to be off meds, not because they aren't helping, but because I don't want to have to stay in touch with a doctor to get them. I know far too well where that can lead. I know what it's like to have no rights because someone who barely knows you made a snap judgement - even the rights you legally have don't exist, because there's no way to enforce them unless you have a lot of money and can prove everything that went on. And a mental health professional can just say you said or did something.

That's part of what gets me. Once you're in the system, any resistance to anything is liable to get a label slapped on you. I've lived with that. Not liking a doctor is "trust issues." Trying to protect your privacy is "threatening." Trying to get a different treatment is being "uncooperative." (These were from three different professionals!) It's like being a small child, where you're expected to just obey the adults. The lesson is that, for the most part, trying to actually work with people and expecting rights is treated as further evidence of how sick and unable to take care of yourself you are.

But I really do want help. That's the thing. I want someone who will talk and answer my question and have good advice on how to manage. I just really don't want what seems to actually happen in "therapy." It's too cold, too clinical, too worried about liability, too concerned with boxes. And far, far, far too imbalanced when it comes to power.

And the thing with keeping on trying therapists? Is that you can get pretty badly hurt if it doesn't work. And every time you're running this risk if you're really open, that they won't like something, or you'll set off some stupid alarm bell with something that should be innocent, and it's going to be a huge mess all over again.

I'm a bit overwhelmed though. I don't get how people manage in a world that seems so dangerous and insecure. I don't always know how to handle my own memories. I really do want help - I just don't want all the baggage that comes with it.

[zlefin]

Tough situation; I dont' think there are any good answers.

Finding someone who can advocate for you, and try to dispute some of those labels in your medical records might help. Perhaps there's some kind of ombudsman to deal with that. Or someone in the patient advocacy area.
Depending on your income, there may be some free legal help you could talk to that might be able to do something.


You can always keep talking to people here, hopefully that helps a little; there may be other online groups you could talk to as well. Online people would have little to no actual power over you, so it should be safer that way.

Clergy and life coaches may be able to provide some good advice in a way that's more to your liking.

As to how most people manage, while I can't say for certain, my general impression is that most people haven't been hurt by the system as much as you have, so they tend to simply not feel insecurity from it. Often, regardless of what the actual danger level is, people's feeling of the danger is level is more based on how much they've had troubles themselves.

[WarKitty]

I guess...the thing for me is I don't need a place to vent or let things out or just talk or whatever. I need actual, real, concrete solutions. I need a concrete answer to why do all these bad things happen, and how do I survive in a world where I've had very bad things happen repeatedly and I don't see any good reason to believe that's going to change. And like I've posted before, I feel like even the "good" therapists get so hung up on do it yourself and let's talk about feelings and what not.

I want stability. I want to know there's going to be food on the table and a roof over my head, and it's not going to come with having to put up with harassment and threats as the price. I want to know I can develop relationships and work on my career without looking over my shoulder for the next person who's going to try to derail it because they don't like me. I want to know I can live and express myself in my own way without worrying about being labelled insane because of it. Hell, I want to know that if something bad does happen, I have a reasonable shot at being taken seriously when I say that. And if that's not going to happen (which seems likely enough), I want a solution to how to live without it.

[WarKitty]

Here's how I see the problem right now:

(1) My experience justifies a very high level of suspicion. Or to put it another way, in a typical case someone anticipating bad things happening at the rate they have in fact been happening to me would be considered paranoid.
(2) The level of caution and suspicion needed to match my experience and the likelihoods derived from it are very exhausting and get in the way of life.

Both (1) and (2) need to be addressed. My frustration with treatment is that it seems to only address (2), while pretending (1) isn't there. Whereas the way I see it, (1) is the real problem that needs to be addressed. Why do these things keep happening so frequently, and what can I do to fix it that won't be so long-term intensive?

[zlefin]

I've suggested numerous concrete solutions before, have any of those helped?


Lowering expectations might be able to help. It can reduce the stress of unsatisfied expectations.

Some of the less kind philosophies of life may be able to help strengthen resolve, focusing on the self and self-strengthening.

How much literature do you read of other people who have had similar issues? Reading of similar types of issues can help some.


I could elaborate on any of these or try to think of others.

[WarKitty]

I've suggested numerous concrete solutions before, have any of those helped?


Lowering expectations might be able to help. It can reduce the stress of unsatisfied expectations.

Some of the less kind philosophies of life may be able to help strengthen resolve, focusing on the self and self-strengthening.

How much literature do you read of other people who have had similar issues? Reading of similar types of issues can help some.


I could elaborate on any of these or try to think of others.

I can't really find much to read, you know? And a lot of the problem for me is that each crisis situation seems to be different. And even if one's solveable it's a huge mess, and there's no good way to anticipate when they're going to happen and take preventative steps. Like the current crisis situation, I get that I can start recording things and there's legal solutions and whatnot - but that doesn't change it's a huge hassle and taking lots of time I don't really have, not to mention I don't have the most important evidence because I don't customarily walk around with a recording device on my person and have security cameras inside my own place.

And I feel like the trouble is my expectations are already lower than what I feel like I can be happy with. Like, I don't expect to be able to live and work without putting up with criminal or near-criminal harassment. Or, if I get attacked again, I don't expect to be able to protect myself, or to have the police and legal system to anything. I don't expect to be able to seek mental health treatment and not be treated like a criminal or a disobedient child. Because my experience is you don't reliably get those things. The expectation is that most people will treat you like an object to be used, and if you don't have money or power you will generally not have any way to stop them. That doesn't mean I see any value in living like that.

[zlefin]

I don't have experience with spy cams myself, but from what I hear they're quite cheap and small these days. Carrying one and/or leaving one at your place might be worthwhile for peace of mind as well as evidence. (make sure to find out what local laws are about that of course).

For books, the things you've experienced are rather similar to what a mistreated minority can experience, so perhaps something about how people managed under apartheid might help?

Having problems that you can't readily afford to deal with is a fairly common occurrence from what I hear; nothing can really change that some things are a huge hassle. Increasing frugality to lower expenses may allow more leeway in dealing with other things, if that's an option, there's a lot of ways to save money.

I'm sure the thread has asked about self-defense classes before, but I can't recall the answer.

And for sappy advice - focus on whatever joys you can find to live for. Maybe volunteer somewhere. Working to change the system can be good for people dissatisfied with it, i'm sure there's volunteer opportunities there.

[WarKitty]

I don't have experience with spy cams myself, but from what I hear they're quite cheap and small these days. Carrying one and/or leaving one at your place might be worthwhile for peace of mind as well as evidence. (make sure to find out what local laws are about that of course).

The point I'm trying to make is that most of the really bad stuff happened so quickly and unpredictably that unless I were taking incredible measures already, it wouldn't help. In this current case, unless I were in the business of habitually recording everything of my interactions with other people, it wouldn't be much use. Think about that. Now think about that just about every situation has required a different sort of safety measure to protect against. Think about just what the cost of that is - and not just in money.

For books, the things you've experienced are rather similar to what a mistreated minority can experience, so perhaps something about how people managed under apartheid might help?

Maybe.

Having problems that you can't readily afford to deal with is a fairly common occurrence from what I hear; nothing can really change that some things are a huge hassle. Increasing frugality to lower expenses may allow more leeway in dealing with other things, if that's an option, there's a lot of ways to save money.

I'm sure the thread has asked about self-defense classes before, but I can't recall the answer.

And for sappy advice - focus on whatever joys you can find to live for. Maybe volunteer somewhere. Working to change the system can be good for people dissatisfied with it, i'm sure there's volunteer opportunities there.

It's not even just or even primarily monetary expenses though. In some ways money is the simplest resource to deal with. The main problem with the latest situation is time/energy resources. I'm finding I can either devote my energy to staying safe and dealing with these crises, or I can devote my energy to having life goals and doing things I enjoy. But the latter comes at a cost of basically having to ignore your own physical and emotional safety.

And working to change the system is very dangerous, too - see the previous bit about labels? Now what do you think happens when someone in those boxes starts complaining too much? That's right, it means you need more treatment!

Of the situations I've been in, one of them would have benefited from physical self defense. One. In some cases the primary threat was from treachery of some sort. In others - and this is my dominant fear - it was coming from some sort of sanctioned authority, or other outside pressure. A simple case for me is putting up with regular sexual harassment and being told that your sexual assault was completely ok, because that was the price of having a job for a bit. And that was mild for what I've dealt with.

[Finlam]

Of the situations I've been in, one of them would have benefited from physical self defense. One.

Self defense is a thing you hope never to have to use and I am sorry it would have been of help even once. However, there are a lot of indirect benefits to taking a self defense class. It generally makes you healthier, happier, and more coordinated. These seem like small things, and they just might be, but they tend to slowly spread to every aspect of life until all of life is full of more energy and joy than it was before. That was my experience.

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I don't know enough about your situation to create a solution that would be acceptable to you, but I'd like to share a short story from my past.

There was a time in my life when I was uber-paranoid, and I don't use that term lightly. Every day, every interaction both in person and online I found myself constantly on guard.

I encrypted my hard-drive (like I needed to), I only connected to the internet through my neighbor's routers (whose passwords I had cracked, after I booted one of their machine's off of the network and cloned its MAC address to my machine), I only used TOR after that, my password generation got crazy good, there were over a dozen other totally useless methods in place to protect me from...what, I don't even know. This was all just standard procedure.

My personal interactions fared no better. Every time I talked with a stranger I was constantly asking the questions what does this person want from me? In what way will they make my life worse? It wasn't any better with my roommates; I became too paranoid to let them know anything that was happening. Friends, family, it all became the same. I couldn't ever give out any information that could be used to harm me, no matter how mundane.

I developed bad habits, too. I'd lock doors as soon as I entered a room, even if it was some else's apartment! (I still have to catch myself doing this sometimes...habits die hard). I started skipping out on important events and commitments to avoid dealing with people. My life started to fall apart as I isolated myself from a hostile world; the one upside is that I became super good at reading body language and conversational subtext, but I'm still not sure that was worth the price...

After some time, I had become certifiable. I have no doubt that if I had walked into a shrink's office they'd have sent me off to a nice, sanitized, happy place. But I didn't. What drove me to that point was series of betrayals, from friends, from family, from people in positions of authority, all people I trusted, each one now a gaping knife wound in my back.

More than a couple of those wounds were from psychologists and therapists who had claimed they only wanted to help, and all they did was violate my trust and make me feel worthless. Incidentally, I will still never recommend seeing a psychiatric professional; in my experience 5 out of 6 are extremely harmful and you're much better off pursuing other options; such is my experience.

My life was in shambles; I had money enough, but that couldn't buy me happiness or solve my problems. I'd like to tell you that I woke up one day and everything was OK or that I had some kind of dream vision and awoke with the answer to bring my life back on course, but it didn't happen that way. It was years before it started to get better, and only after I'd hit that lowest, dark place from which not many return.

For me, my problem wasn't the people who actually did hate and try to destroy me, though they were academic advisers and a couple of professors at the university: they could help me to fail school, but in the grand scope of my life they were inconsequential. My problem wasn't the friends that lied to me, betrayed my trust, and tried to harm me for sheer amusement: they too were inconsequential in the story of my life. My problem wasn't even the family members who tried to extort me: my problem was me.

I couldn't control outside factors and I didn't know where the next knife would come from, but I knew I could control myself: mind, body, and spirit. I took self defense classes to improve my body and I found it also improved my mind. Without this, and a small miracle, I would have never returned from that dark place.

Though it took years, I came to understand myself and what makes me who I am and I came to realize one thing: other people will try to abuse me, or hate me, or even destroy me for what I am; but they cannot succeed unless I turn against myself. They can try (and sometimes even succeed) in inconveniencing me and making my life worse, but in the end they are no more than a footnote in my story.
Formula for our happiness: a Yes, a No, a straight line, a goal.
This last part sounds very abstract, but it is the most critical part of the story; the part that solved all my problems and continues to do so today. With my new mindset, I figured out what I wanted in life. Working tirelessly toward a specific goal; I am buffeted by the storms of life, beset by negativity of others on all sides, and stung by past betrayals, but I am the ship that does not sink; I can no longer go back to that dark place, and I will never return to the depths.

Once I found a goal, the solutions to my problems materialized as if from thin air. My life began to place itself in order and events that once drained me became as nothing more than minor trivialities. All that mattered was pursuit of the goal. The betrayals, the extortion, the literal knife wound (yes, but only one) no longer mattered, I am above and beyond their reach.

This is just a badly written story; it has no answers and even less questions. I never found the direct solutions to my problems until I found that the problem was me; and I never found a solution to the problem of me until I learned to love myself and direct myself mind, body, and spirit toward a single goal. After that, everything else flowed and all problems became conquerable.

I hope this helps, but I recognize that my mind still works at 90 degree angles to reality sometimes and this probably made no sense.

[WarKitty]

I couldn't control outside factors and I didn't know where the next knife would come from, but I knew I could control myself: mind, body, and spirit. I took self defense classes to improve my body and I found it also improved my mind. Without this, and a small miracle, I would have never returned from that dark place.

And this is the problem for me. What I've learned is that even such things are not under your control. Your mind is not your own so long as another can order you to take a medication that will change it. Your body is not your own as long as another can imprison it on a false charge, or hurt it because they are stronger. What real control do you have?

Though it took years, I came to understand myself and what makes me who I am and I came to realize one thing: other people will try to abuse me, or hate me, or even destroy me for what I am; but they cannot succeed unless I turn against myself. They can try (and sometimes even succeed) in inconveniencing me and making my life worse, but in the end they are no more than a footnote in my story.
Formula for our happiness: a Yes, a No, a straight line, a goal.
This last part sounds very abstract, but it is the most critical part of the story; the part that solved all my problems and continues to do so today. With my new mindset, I figured out what I wanted in life. Working tirelessly toward a specific goal; I am buffeted by the storms of life, beset by negativity of others on all sides, and stung by past betrayals, but I am the ship that does not sink; I can no longer go back to that dark place, and I will never return to the depths.

Once I found a goal, the solutions to my problems materialized as if from thin air. My life began to place itself in order and events that once drained me became as nothing more than minor trivialities. All that mattered was pursuit of the goal. The betrayals, the extortion, the literal knife wound (yes, but only one) no longer mattered, I am above and beyond their reach.

This is just a badly written story; it has no answers and even less questions. I never found the direct solutions to my problems until I found that the problem was me; and I never found a solution to the problem of me until I learned to love myself and direct myself mind, body, and spirit toward a single goal. After that, everything else flowed and all problems became conquerable.

I hope this helps, but I recognize that my mind still works at 90 degree angles to reality sometimes and this probably made no sense.

I want a goal that does not rely on others for its fulfillment. But how can that exist? How can that exist when your very ability to walk out of your room and not fear being arrested depends on the goodness and honesty of others - a quality they far too often lack? What do you do when you have set yourself on a goal and see it snatched away from you by things outside of your power?

[random_guy]

A simple case for me is putting up with regular sexual harassment and being told that your sexual assault was completely ok, because that was the price of having a job for a bit. And that was mild for what I've dealt with.

That sounds pretty disturbing. Can't you file a complaint with human resources? What about filing a complaint against your employer? No job is worth dealing with that.

If that is a simple case, then your are in a serious situation. I do not know enough to offer specific solutions. All I can say is, if you do not want to rely on others, focus on building confidence and self-reliance. Stand up to those who oppose you, and take action against them. I am not talking about physical action. I am talking about being proactive in seeking solutions. Actively seeking someone for help is better than waiting for help to arrive. Do not accept a price that someone tells you. Pay the price you choose.

[WarKitty]

That sounds pretty disturbing. Can't you file a complaint with human resources? What about filing a complaint against your employer? No job is worth dealing with that.

If that is a simple case, then your are in a serious situation. I do not know enough to offer specific solutions. All I can say is, if you do not want to rely on others, focus on building confidence and self-reliance. Stand up to those who oppose you, and take action against them. I am not talking about physical action. I am talking about being proactive in seeking solutions. Actively seeking someone for help is better than waiting for help to arrive. Do not accept a price that someone tells you. Pay the price you choose.

That was a past situation. But let's just say HR didn't care and the employer was in the "too big to fall" category.

The standing up part is what scares me. In a lot of the cases I feel like that's what triggered the major crisis. Someone else decided they had a right to get me to do things their way. I disagreed and tried to stand up for myself. All of a sudden I end up in a huge mess where someone else is trying (and generally succeeding) in making my life miserable because I had the gall to actually file a complaint or talk to the appropriate authorities or even just say no. That's definitely how I got into this current situation - I had someone who decided wrongly that I had to obey them, and then set about punishing me when I didn't do it.

[dehro]

Here's how I see the problem right now:

(1) My experience justifies a very high level of suspicion. Or to put it another way, in a typical case someone anticipating bad things happening at the rate they have in fact been happening to me would be considered paranoid.
(2) The level of caution and suspicion needed to match my experience and the likelihoods derived from it are very exhausting and get in the way of life.

Both (1) and (2) need to be addressed. My frustration with treatment is that it seems to only address (2), while pretending (1) isn't there. Whereas the way I see it, (1) is the real problem that needs to be addressed. Why do these things keep happening so frequently, and what can I do to fix it that won't be so long-term intensive?

Could there also be a third point?
3) i have reached such levels of distrust/suspicion that now even good intentions and reasonable assesments look like attacks and put downs and this turns in a self fulfilling prophecy whereby I'm actually both facilitating things taking a bad turn and seeing bad turns where there aren't any, at the first sign of things not being 100% how I expect or want them to be
Where point 3 is a direct consequence of the first two and in turn causes 1 to happen and 2 to be your default frame of mind, in a loop that doesn't leave much of a chance for a third party to ever be constructive or say the right thing

My perception may be completely off as it's based on not knowing anything much about the path that brought you where you are today... But I do get a feeling from the things you do describe that there is a possibility that you are, at least in part, somehow inadvertedly setting yourself up for bad things to happen or, more importantly, for help to be ineffective, by, possibly, miscomunicating the nature and circumstances of your problems at least when you're interacting with people in a position ( and with a reasonable degree of willingness) to help

[WarKitty]

Could there also be a third point?
3) i have reached such levels of distrust/suspicion that now even good intentions and reasonable assesments look like attacks and put downs and this turns in a self fulfilling prophecy whereby I'm actually both facilitating things taking a bad turn and seeing bad turns where there aren't any, at the first sign of things not being 100% how I expect or want them to be
Where point 3 is a direct consequence of the first two and in turn causes 1 to happen and 2 to be your default frame of mind, in a loop that doesn't leave much of a chance for a third party to ever be constructive or say the right thing

My perception may be completely off as it's based on not knowing anything much about the path that brought you where you are today... But I do get a feeling from the things you do describe that there is a possibility that you are, at least in part, somehow inadvertedly setting yourself up for bad things to happen or, more importantly, for help to be ineffective, by, possibly, miscomunicating the nature and circumstances of your problems at least when you're interacting with people in a position ( and with a reasonable degree of willingness) to help

I've definitely thought about it. At the same time, I can name several instances where things very clearly went crazy without me doing anything other than trying to stand up for myself. The abusive boyfriend in the first place. The school psychiatrist that decided he was going to try to get me to work on my "issues" while utterly ignoring my own report of the abuse, while making a huge deal out of my wearing black. The situation I mentioned where the only job I could find was one where putting up with harassment, sexism, and homophobia was just the price of having a paycheck. The other psychiatrist who tried to justify the first one and then got after me for not telling my ex that he was frightening me when he got violent. You get the picture.

Again, current situation. I thought something was wrong early on. But I went along because no one else seemed to agree, and tried to be nice, even when I had strong reason to believe I was being treated worse primarily because I was a young woman - and by the sort of guy who thinks that is nice behavior. And it got me in a lot of trouble, because it put me in a situation where I had to bear a major cost for it, either in following someone else's orders to the point of disrupting my own life, or enduring harassment and threats for not doing so.

[Chen]

I've definitely thought about it. At the same time, I can name several instances where things very clearly went crazy without me doing anything other than trying to stand up for myself.

This doesn't necessarily preclude what dehro said. The manner in which you stand up for yourself may be leading to this type of vicious circle. All the examples you just posted seem to have problems between you and people who have authority over you in some manner. While certainly not universal, people in positions of authority often do find people who are contrary to them as being threats to their authority. And this can lead to further increases in hostility which leads to more contrary behavior and so forth. There is a difference in how one disagrees with various people. A friend, a store clerk or you boss all require different subtleties.

The point dehro seemed to be making was that you have been burned in the past and it may be making your future interactions more toxic. People in positions of power have hurt you in the past, so it doesn't seem unreasonable to assume you would tend to act more forceful (directly or indirectly) to ensure it doesn't happen again. However, this can lead to the part mentioned before where the person now feels you a threat to their power and they start acting more in the manner that is bothering you to begin with. It can very easily lead to a vicious cycle that is difficult to get out of.

What can make this more difficult to see is that not everyone behaves in this way. As I said many people in authority don't like those kind of threats to their authority and can react poorly. Some don't act like this though. Worse however, is that some people are just jackasses. So there will very well be some cases where you do ABSOLUTELY nothing and the person still screws with you. This can make it much more difficult to isolate behaviors (yours or others) that might be contributing in some cases but that aren't really a factor (because the person is a jerk anyways) in others.

[random_guy]

But I really do want help. That's the thing. I want someone who will talk and answer my question and have good advice on how to manage. I just really don't want what seems to actually happen in "therapy." It's too cold, too clinical, too worried about liability, too concerned with boxes. And far, far, far too imbalanced when it comes to power.

I really do want help - I just don't want all the baggage that comes with it.

Let me start from the beginning. I don't know if I can help. I will do what I can to try.

I guess...the thing for me is I don't need a place to vent or let things out or just talk or whatever. I need actual, real, concrete solutions. I need a concrete answer to why do all these bad things happen, and how do I survive in a world where I've had very bad things happen repeatedly and I don't see any good reason to believe that's going to change. And like I've posted before, I feel like even the "good" therapists get so hung up on do it yourself and let's talk about feelings and what not.

I want stability. I want to know there's going to be food on the table and a roof over my head, and it's not going to come with having to put up with harassment and threats as the price. I want to know I can develop relationships and work on my career without looking over my shoulder for the next person who's going to try to derail it because they don't like me. I want to know I can live and express myself in my own way without worrying about being labelled insane because of it. Hell, I want to know that if something bad does happen, I have a reasonable shot at being taken seriously when I say that. And if that's not going to happen (which seems likely enough), I want a solution to how to live without it.

Let's talk about your situation, so I can provide concrete solutions. You say bad things happen repeatedly. What kind of bad things?

Looks like someone is trying to derail your career through backstabbing. You are surrounded by people who do not believe you, so they are not willing to help.

Here's how I see the problem right now:

(1) My experience justifies a very high level of suspicion. Or to put it another way, in a typical case someone anticipating bad things happening at the rate they have in fact been happening to me would be considered paranoid.
(2) The level of caution and suspicion needed to match my experience and the likelihoods derived from it are very exhausting and get in the way of life.

Both (1) and (2) need to be addressed. My frustration with treatment is that it seems to only address (2), while pretending (1) isn't there. Whereas the way I see it, (1) is the real problem that needs to be addressed. Why do these things keep happening so frequently, and what can I do to fix it that won't be so long-term intensive?

What were your experiences? Without knowing your experiences, there is not much that can be done to address it. It seems your dilemma is your therapists assume (2) is the real problem when you bring up (1). If you do not mind taking a leap of faith, you can share your experiences here or via PM.

Like the current crisis situation, I get that I can start recording things and there's legal solutions and whatnot - but that doesn't change it's a huge hassle and taking lots of time I don't really have, not to mention I don't have the most important evidence because I don't customarily walk around with a recording device on my person and have security cameras inside my own place.

And I feel like the trouble is my expectations are already lower than what I feel like I can be happy with. Like, I don't expect to be able to live and work without putting up with criminal or near-criminal harassment. Or, if I get attacked again, I don't expect to be able to protect myself, or to have the police and legal system to anything.

Recording and security cameras. Sounds like you have a situation with verbal harassment on an ongoing basis, and you do not feel safe in your own place. Who are the individuals who make you fee unsafe? Do you know anyone who can keep them in line?

The point I'm trying to make is that most of the really bad stuff happened so quickly and unpredictably that unless I were taking incredible measures already, it wouldn't help. In this current case, unless I were in the business of habitually recording everything of my interactions with other people, it wouldn't be much use. Think about that. Now think about that just about every situation has required a different sort of safety measure to protect against. Think about just what the cost of that is - and not just in money.

Everything of your interaction with other people? That costs you time, money, stress, and it will take a toll on you. You appear to be in a hostile environment. The first suggestion that comes to mind is to find a way to escape that environment. Gather the resources necessary to make that possible.

That was a past situation. But let's just say HR didn't care and the employer was in the "too big to fall" category.

The standing up part is what scares me. In a lot of the cases I feel like that's what triggered the major crisis. Someone else decided they had a right to get me to do things their way. I disagreed and tried to stand up for myself. All of a sudden I end up in a huge mess where someone else is trying (and generally succeeding) in making my life miserable because I had the gall to actually file a complaint or talk to the appropriate authorities or even just say no. That's definitely how I got into this current situation - I had someone who decided wrongly that I had to obey them, and then set about punishing me when I didn't do it.

What did this person try to get you to do? You mentioned harassment. Did this person make advances on you or try to set up a quid pro quo situation?

I've definitely thought about it. At the same time, I can name several instances where things very clearly went crazy without me doing anything other than trying to stand up for myself. The abusive boyfriend in the first place. The school psychiatrist that decided he was going to try to get me to work on my "issues" while utterly ignoring my own report of the abuse, while making a huge deal out of my wearing black. The situation I mentioned where the only job I could find was one where putting up with harassment, sexism, and homophobia was just the price of having a paycheck. The other psychiatrist who tried to justify the first one and then got after me for not telling my ex that he was frightening me when he got violent. You get the picture.

Again, current situation. I thought something was wrong early on. But I went along because no one else seemed to agree, and tried to be nice, even when I had strong reason to believe I was being treated worse primarily because I was a young woman - and by the sort of guy who thinks that is nice behavior. And it got me in a lot of trouble, because it put me in a situation where I had to bear a major cost for it, either in following someone else's orders to the point of disrupting my own life, or enduring harassment and threats for not doing so.

I think this brings us back to the situation where therapists do not believe you and bringing up you experiences only serves to convince them they need to help with your suspicions. No one deserves physical abuse. Not telling the ex he was scaring you is not your problem. It might provoke him if he is violent. As far as dealing with harassment at the only job you can find, what field do you work in, and is there a way you can look for another job outside of your geographical location if local options are limited?

Harassment and threats do not sound nice. How can the guy think it is nice behavior?

In summary, you had an abusive ex boyfriend who may have lived with you at some point in time, or at least visits regularly (hence the comment about security cameras at your own place). Seeking help with your situation led to victim blaming, and you did not receive any actual help. Since he is an ex, I am assuming the situation was resolved by breaking up with him. Has he continued to cause problems since then, or has the experience haunted you?

You also have a problem with workplace harassment. Since it is the only job you can find, you have no alternatives available. You tried to speak to people who can resolve the issue, but they did not care. You faced retaliation from the person(s) who had been harassing you as a result of speaking up. How many people are involved in the workplace harassment? How do their jobs interact with yours? Is there a way to avoid working with them while building the job experience necessary to get another job? How far up are they in the organization?

[WarKitty]

Spoiler

Show

Let me start from the beginning. I don't know if I can help. I will do what I can to try.



Let's talk about your situation, so I can provide concrete solutions. You say bad things happen repeatedly. What kind of bad things?

Looks like someone is trying to derail your career through backstabbing. You are surrounded by people who do not believe you, so they are not willing to help.



What were your experiences? Without knowing your experiences, there is not much that can be done to address it. It seems your dilemma is your therapists assume (2) is the real problem when you bring up (1). If you do not mind taking a leap of faith, you can share your experiences here or via PM.



Recording and security cameras. Sounds like you have a situation with verbal harassment on an ongoing basis, and you do not feel safe in your own place. Who are the individuals who make you fee unsafe? Do you know anyone who can keep them in line?



Everything of your interaction with other people? That costs you time, money, stress, and it will take a toll on you. You appear to be in a hostile environment. The first suggestion that comes to mind is to find a way to escape that environment. Gather the resources necessary to make that possible.



What did this person try to get you to do? You mentioned harassment. Did this person make advances on you or try to set up a quid pro quo situation?



I think this brings us back to the situation where therapists do not believe you and bringing up you experiences only serves to convince them they need to help with your suspicions. No one deserves physical abuse. Not telling the ex he was scaring you is not your problem. It might provoke him if he is violent. As far as dealing with harassment at the only job you can find, what field do you work in, and is there a way you can look for another job outside of your geographical location if local options are limited?

Harassment and threats do not sound nice. How can the guy think it is nice behavior?

In summary, you had an abusive ex boyfriend who may have lived with you at some point in time, or at least visits regularly (hence the comment about security cameras at your own place). Seeking help with your situation led to victim blaming, and you did not receive any actual help. Since he is an ex, I am assuming the situation was resolved by breaking up with him. Has he continued to cause problems since then, or has the experience haunted you?

You also have a problem with workplace harassment. Since it is the only job you can find, you have no alternatives available. You tried to speak to people who can resolve the issue, but they did not care. You faced retaliation from the person(s) who had been harassing you as a result of speaking up. How many people are involved in the workplace harassment? How do their jobs interact with yours? Is there a way to avoid working with them while building the job experience necessary to get another job? How far up are they in the organization?

You're rolling several situations into one.

- the ex boyfriend is one situation.

- the workplace harassment case is another separate situation, that was in the past. I'm in a field where a B.A. isn't worth anything except to get you into another program. I needed money to go to grad school, and that was literally the only place hiring unskilled work. Generally no one cared about us grunts.

- the current situation is separate even from that. Short version is, I live in a duplex where the landlord lives in the other half. He's been watching what I do way too closely and essentially trying to make up the rules as he goes along. We're talking down to the level of going into a fit about how I'm ruining his property because I left the bathroom fan on overnight once. He started out at what he apparently thinks was "nice" and I considered "patronizing crap," and then got mad when I didn't go along with his attempts to nicely correct me.

That's not even half of the situations I've been through. There's another one where when I needed some support a close friend basically freaked out on me, got his two best buddies to lie to the police and say I'd done a bunch of stuff I never did, and basically got me to a point where if I was seen around him I was being threatened with arrest. No court order and on a small rural campus - so basically I couldn't go anywhere except to work or class without risking arrest. And there was no indication beforehand, no one asking me to back off or anything.

The therapist stuff has more too, including one case where I ended up having to pay a fictitious bill. And there's other stuff as well, plus adding in all the stuff I've seen happen around me.

Basically, my frustration is I seem to get out of one unsafe situation and end up right in another unsafe situation, and I don't know why this keeps happening.

[zlefin]

a question to clarify about that fictitious bill;

Is it the case that they claimed you were present for something, and you have no recollection of that ever happening and do not believe you were present for it?
Any details about it you can recall would be helpful.