Personal Woes and Advice 3

[TechnOkami]

Okay. So ... I really scared myself with a dream.

My college has something called Winter Term where we can pretty much do anything we want. I have this cool idea for a Studio Art/Art History Analysis thing, and I need my Art History prof. (who is amazing) to give me the sign. He's super nice and very energetic about what he does, so I don't know why, but I had a nightmare that when I went to meet with him (which should be tomorrow) that he shut me down and didn't even give me a chance to come up with a better idea.

(People have literally gotten away with "I want to go to Hawaii and do work" once they've gotten professors to help them flesh them out in to actual projects of merit.)

So yeah. I'm really scared to meet with my professor when, deep down, I guess I know I have no reason to. Hopefully this afternoon's class will put me straight.

So, I've had dreams like this, walking into class late or getting bad grades on a test. And then I wake up and the actual event hasn't happened.

Now, granted, I can be like "Oh... Ok." to most situations and be completely chill about most stuff (save for the breakdown I previously typed up) and be completely fine with it, but I'm not you, so... don't be scared, everything will be fine? Yeah, that sounds like advice.

[Castaras]

Update regarding me:

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Third freshers year seems to be going the best out of all of them. Much happier, and am recovering from my anxiety ridden bits. Getting better at taking care of myself and recovering my libido slowly but surely (anxiety sent it from very high to near nothing). Getting better at taking care of the house and keeping it clean (vaguely). And I have not had a panic attack in the last month. Still a little twitchy at times, and get worked up occasionally. However, doing much better.

However, I do know that after this year I'm never taking a student committee position again. This presidency of a 120+ member society is more than enough for the rest of my life.

[IronFist]

I can't take this anymore. I'm done. Thanks everyone for all the support.
I'm ending this.

[Moriwen]

I can't take this anymore. I'm done. Thanks everyone for all the support.
I'm ending this.

I'm probably not going to say this as well as I should, but:

The way you say this makes me worry about you. I hope you're OK. Please don't do anything rash. If you do do anything rash, have it be eating an excessive amount of chocolate.

Please check in again soon. I'll be waiting. I want you to be OK.

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Calming Manatee wants you to be OK too.

[IronFist]

I'm probably not going to say this as well as I should, but:

The way you say this makes me worry about you. I hope you're OK. Please don't do anything rash. If you do do anything rash, have it be eating an excessive amount of chocolate.

Please check in again soon. I'll be waiting. I want you to be OK.

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Calming Manatee wants you to be OK too.

Thanks a lot, Moriwen. This helped me so much, you have no idea. Thanks so very much. It's very good to know that even for a minute someone so distant, someone I have never met, could care enough to spend so much time being kind to me. Thanks a lot. I don't think it would be an exageration to say you have saved my life.

[TuggyNE]

Calming manatee is good stuff. Stay safe, Iron Fist.

[Form]

Thanks a lot, Moriwen. This helped me so much, you have no idea. Thanks so very much. It's very good to know that even for a minute someone so distant, someone I have never met, could care enough to spend so much time being kind to me. Thanks a lot. I don't think it would be an exageration to say you have saved my life.

Don't forget to see a professional about this if you aren't already, mmmkay? Seems like you could use one.

[Moriwen]

Don't forget to see a professional about this if you aren't already, mmmkay? Seems like you could use one.

This. Please. As a favor to me. You really, really need to talk to someone in person.

I have been there, I didn't want to go, but people who cared about me dragged me to see a therapist, and it helped more than anything. So consider this me dragging you there.

Hoping you're still feeling better. Many, many hugs. Hang in there.

[Kalmageddon]

So I'm not allowed to say "you don't understand", because that's offensive.
I'm also not allowed to explain it in increasingly simple terms until I basically have to resort to a little schematic, because that's apparently also offensive.

I'm very frustrated.
What am I supposed to do? Compliment someone on his "deductive skills" while letting them know that, gosh darn it, this time they got it wrong and gently nudge them in the right direction like they were children in need of encouragement?

[Castaras]

More detail is required before I can comment, but unless your tone of voice is condescending I don't see why saying someone doesn't understand is offensive.

[Kalmageddon]

More detail is required before I can comment, but unless your tone of voice is condescending I don't see why saying someone doesn't understand is offensive.

Because I should say "I haven't explained myself properly" instead.
Even when I did my absolute best to explain something, even when treated to an answer that is obviously missing the point by a mile. Repeatedly.

Because the realization of having been unable to understand a concept is apparently so terribile that no one should ever have to face it.
As for my tone of voice, there wasn't any, it was via text.

[rogueboy]

Because I should say "I haven't explained myself properly" instead.
Even when I did my absolute best to explain something, even when treated to an answer that is obviously missing the point by a mile. Repeatedly.

Because the realization of having been unable to understand a concept is apparently so terribile that no one should ever have to face it.
As for my tone of voice, there wasn't any, it was via text.

Depending on the context (who isn't understanding you, and who's saying you can't say they aren't understanding you?), you could be in a position where you're just stuck with babying them (if it's a supervisor, for example), or they may just be an oversensitive moron (if they're a student). Either way, you might be able to strike a balance between "you aren't understanding" (which blames them) and "I'm not explaining properly" (which puts the blame on you). Perhaps something along the lines of "something seems to be getting lost, let's try again" (which doesn't blame them, but also doesn't admit fault).

That being said, I'm not sure why going increasingly towards the most basic it can be isn't allowed, which is what makes me suspect it's someone being oversensitive (which, if it were me and they weren't a boss/supervisor, I'd completely ignore and just continue simplifying it and telling them that they're missing the point).

[Kalmageddon]

Depending on the context (who isn't understanding you, and who's saying you can't say they aren't understanding you?), you could be in a position where you're just stuck with babying them (if it's a supervisor, for example), or they may just be an oversensitive moron (if they're a student). Either way, you might be able to strike a balance between "you aren't understanding" (which blames them) and "I'm not explaining properly" (which puts the blame on you). Perhaps something along the lines of "something seems to be getting lost, let's try again" (which doesn't blame them, but also doesn't admit fault).

That being said, I'm not sure why going increasingly towards the most basic it can be isn't allowed, which is what makes me suspect it's someone being oversensitive (which, if it were me and they weren't a boss/supervisor, I'd completely ignore and just continue simplifying it and telling them that they're missing the point).

You know, I think this may be a cultural thing. I live in a country where it's never anybody's fault, no one ever has any responsability and arguing over something, no matter how important, is considered inappropriate and treated as an annoyance.

So obviouly everything is set at the lowest common denominator. If you are smart you need to make yourself stupid in order to avoid offending others. You are not allowed to know more unless it's your job. Otherwise everyone has to be equal.
And I hate it.

Everyone is NOT equal, everyone is different! Of course everyone has the same human rights, but other then that why should I fake being ignorant when I know something? Why should I talk like an uneducated imbecil when I can express myself more properly? Why do I need to speak dialect all the time just to avoid getting weird stares? Why is it expected that I cheat the law one time or another just because "everyone does"? Why do I have to neatly fit into a subculture? Why can't I just be an individual without scaring, angering or confusing people?!

I'm just rambling. But I'm sick of it.

[Taffimai]

@Kalmageddon I've had it said to me that I sound arrogant because I use words like "evidently" when I could have said "obviously". Some people seem to have a hard time facing their own limitations. I have found that it is much easier to get along with people who are genuinely dumb than with those who are slightly above average. Reason being that the former derive their sense of self-worth from other sources, whereas the latter desperately want to win the "smartest person in the room" contest.

I am surprised that you say people around you have a problem with arguing though, given that your location is Italy. We had a lot of italian immigrants in the street where I grew up, and their conversations were always so animated and their opinions so forceful, it felt like arguing was their main form of communication. None of them ever expressed discomfort to me about there being a difference of opinion. Must have been a different part of Italy

[Comissar]

So... I thought I should give an update on my progress since last time I posted here. Rest of the post spoilered for length.

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I'm now 6 weeks into counselling, things have been slow, but I think I'm starting to get to grips with what my problems are. Possibly even starting to work towards solving them. One of the issues I find with these things is that I'm seeing each step so I end up not being a very good judge of the progress I'm making. I tend to find it difficult to talk to people about myself, which is why it's been a bit slow, but my counsellor is very patient and I'm finding it easier to talk to her as time goes on.

My issues, as I understand them at the moment, are essentially related to the way I express myself. I struggle to express myself emotionally, particularly with things like anger or sadness. I end up bottling things up, anger gets turned inwards against myself whilst I keep quiet about any pain I'm feeling in order to 'protect' the people I care about. The reasoning there being that 'they shouldn't have to deal with my problems, they've already got enough to deal with'. I find it hard to forgive myself for mistakes I've made in the past, which in turn leads me to worry quite a lot about how I should be acting. I've got a very negative self-image because of it, something that I'm very much aware others don't share. In recent weeks I've been trying to be more open with friends and family about how I'm doing, which hasn't been easy. Still, I feel like I'm starting to make a bit of headway.

Of course, real life being what it is, it's not been completely smooth sailing. A few weeks ago I started to seriously think about whether it was worth continuing to live. It's not a state of mind I've been in constantly, but it did persist for the best part of a day. It's worth noting, I think, that I seriously doubt I would act on the thoughts. A fairly key part of my mindset is that I try to avoid hurting, or even inconveniencing, others as much as possible. I'm well aware that ending my life would cause a great deal of grief for many people, that thought often keeps me moving forward. In light of my attempts at being open, I did manage to tell my friends about this. They were, naturally, concerned for me and made me promise to go to the doctor's as soon as possible, something my counsellor agreed with. So I've now been put onto a course of anti-depressants (Sertraline) which I'm now nearly three weeks into.

I think the first thing I want to say about the anti-depressants is that I think I have been low less often, and for shorter periods of time. That said, the side-effects really suck. It's still early days for them, and I was warned that this was likely to happen, but I've been getting stressed really easily for the past few weeks. Little things can make me feel very agitated very quickly, and the feeling tends to last longer than it normally would. I try and keep it under control, but sometimes it just gets a bit much and I kind of close in on myself.

It was particularly bad a few days ago. We'd gone out for a meal with one of my friend's family to celebrate her birthday. Through the first hour and a half or so of the meal I was pretty comfortable, we had finished desert maybe ten minutes earlier. I don't personally drink, but my friends father, and my friends, were all having drinks. They were planning to do so until fairly late, which was fine by me. Then I started to feel a bit stressed. Not sure what triggered it, one of the waiter's was a bit short with my friends dad, so it might've been that. But it just kept building, I ended up barely saying anything and then feeling bad that I wasn't saying anything which was making me worse. Pretty soon it reached a point where I just didn't feel I could keep sitting in the restaurant. I kept trying to say something to excuse myself, but my throat kept seizing up when I attempted to do so. Eventually I managed it when my friend's dad was away from the table. As I left I just kept berating myself for upping and leaving like that, even though I hadn't felt like I could stay.

Come the next morning, I'm still feeling bad about leaving my friend's birthday meal before everyone else. I apologise to the dad pretty much as soon as I run into him, he's fine about it and even returns the money that I'd left to help cover my part of the bill, something I feel a bit guilty about (but then, that's parents). So I go back upstairs, run into another one of my friends (whos birthday it wasn't), apologise to her as well for leaving early, and she tells me that it was really rude of me to do so without even waiting to say thanks to the dad. Now, this is something that I'd essentially been telling myself for the entirety of my journey back the previous night, something that kept me awake for a few hours when I did get back and had me still feeling pretty anxious the following morning, so I'm pretty much entirely in agreement with her on this. Hearing it from someone else pushes me over the edge, though. I ended up having a breakdown in my room, feeling convinced that my friends were going to leave me following my behaviour the previous night and that I was, essentially, a terrible person.

The breakdown wasn't immediate, so my friend didn't see I was like this instantly, but did bring me tissues when she saw. She stayed at the door to my room for a good 10 minutes or so, but I (still) think she was more annoyed than sympathetic with how I reacted to that. I think it's worth noting that she was (and still is) fairly ill, she suffers from very bad migraines, and also has her own troubles with depression, so I think in large part she wasn't in a very tolerant mood anyway that morning. Through the day she didn't speak a whole lot with me, and it was usually in front of others when she did. I'm not one of the most conversational people to begin with, but I did end up feeling like she was annoyed at me for the whole day.

Something else that didn't help the stress levels was a presentation that was looming on the following day. It was a group presentation, and I was in a group with the friend I mentioned in the previous paragraph. We'd completed the vast bulk of the work over the last few days, but there were still a few details that needed ironing out. I think having that hanging over both of us, in addition to my early leaving and breakdown, were making tensions run very high. Following the presentation I've felt a lot calmer, I can kind of spot when I'm starting to grow stressed and just try and steer my thought processes away from what's causing it. I'm also speaking to my friends much more easily now, which is making me think I may have misinterpreted the lack of talking. That said, I've also kept much more to myself, so I've not had much in the way of extended contact with them.

I'm kind of hoping that I've gotten through the worst of the tablet induced stress now, I went to a 2-week follow up with my doctor a few days ago and they did say that the best option would be to just stick with it for now. Another follow up has been booked for 3 weeks from now. Having the presentation behind me is probably a large part of it, but I've felt a bit more able to handle the stress in particular better over the last couple of days. Hopefully the restaurant/breakdown event was the worst of it.

I've gradually made more people aware both that I'm having issues and that I'm now on anti-depressants. Both of my parents, some of my friends and my uni lecturers are aware now. I feel bad about putting this onto them, but I'm at the point where I can't just keep things to myself all the time anymore. I also keep feeling like I should apologise for getting stressed so easily since starting the tablets, and I have done so to my friends. I'm not sure if I should really be apologising, given it's not something that's entirely within my control, but... I still feel acutely responsible for my actions and decisions, especially when they're poorly thought through or hasty.

So, uh, thanks for reading through all of this. I'm not really sure if I'm putting this up for advice or just to get my thoughts down. Either way... Thanks.

[rogueboy]

You know, I think this may be a cultural thing. I live in a country where it's never anybody's fault, no one ever has any responsability and arguing over something, no matter how important, is considered inappropriate and treated as an annoyance.

So obviouly everything is set at the lowest common denominator. If you are smart you need to make yourself stupid in order to avoid offending others. You are not allowed to know more unless it's your job. Otherwise everyone has to be equal.
And I hate it.

Everyone is NOT equal, everyone is different! Of course everyone has the same human rights, but other then that why should I fake being ignorant when I know something? Why should I talk like an uneducated imbecil when I can express myself more properly? Why do I need to speak dialect all the time just to avoid getting weird stares? Why is it expected that I cheat the law one time or another just because "everyone does"? Why do I have to neatly fit into a subculture? Why can't I just be an individual without scaring, angering or confusing people?!

I'm just rambling. But I'm sick of it.

That... I'm not sure I could function in that culture. More power to you for doing so. On a more general note: yeah, cultural differences throw everything out of whack. And, unfortunately, make it really hard to provide useful advice

[Mono Vertigo]

Hah, casual racism.

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Went to see my boyfriend's aunt with his mother and him.
She's got big problems and a frustrating life, but the subject she complained about at that moment was some therapist who's himself pretty nuts and incompetent. He's also Jewish, and related to his nuttiness, tends to push it into his patient's face without care for relevance of comfort.
(As for me, I'm of Jewish descent. My Polish grandmother never got news from her family after fleeing the country during the Shoah; she's still alive and looking for information. Sadly, we've got a rather accurate idea of their fate. This is something I've already talked about with BF's aunt.)
The following dialog then happens:
Aunt: "He should have been deported to [concentration camp]! *laugh*"
Me: *awkward moment of silence, then waves hand and helpfully points out, though a little late:* "Huh, hi! I'm right here."
Then the conversation continues as if nothing has happened.

Oh yeah, concentration camps are funny.
I've got a pretty broad humor, and have laughed at jokes related to WWII, but there's a difference between mocking the Nazis and implying, even for a laugh, that concentration camps were a good idea and that anyone deserved to go there.
Yeeeeah. Not the first time I heard antisemitic jokes and insults, but this one is the worst I've heard in years. That crap doesn't even offend me, it just makes me kinda antsy. Because I can't be 100% sure the wheel will turn again and they'll feel that, actually, yes, they'd be better off without Jews. Not like it hasn't happened dozens of times throughout history.

Of course, I'm not actually Jewish (as it was my father who was Jewish, not my mother), I'm not religious, and I'd damn myself for my one and only god, Bacon.
But the problem when you're not a religious Jew is that you still inherit heavy baggage with very little good. You inherit the knowledge of centuries of oppression, culminating only several decades ago (in my case, I got to learn about the showers before I was twelve, and let me tell you that while it does wonders to forge your character, there's a reason most kids aren't taught about the details of the Shoah); you inherit the subconscious, not-so-ancestral fear; and you inherit the last name that justifies the paranoia. Because, let's be fair, when Jews are targeted, the name alone is enough for anyone to identify you as such, even if you're neither ethnically or religiously Jewish.

So I'm in the great position where people forget you have anything to do with Jews, and throw casual antisemitism at you, including the classic conspiracy theories. And then, there are some complains that Jews are talking about the Holocaust too much, that they're taking advantage of their status as victims, why don't they let go. Gee, I don't know, maybe because racism levels are rising and there's always someone to spout hateful or ignorant crap in the media?

This is a crap position. You only identify yourself as Jewish long enough to feel all the bad that comes with it. But you don't get the comfort of belonging to their community, of having a rich culture and religion, of having your unease acknowledged for a second.

And now I've got to fetch some mail at the post office, but seeing how these blubbering morons have spelt my name (while having my name properly written on all their other documents!), I might have trouble proving I'm not trying to steal someone else's mail. "No, that is my name you tried to write there, you just made it look kind of British-sounding because you're frakking morons for unfathomable reasons."

P.S. : this aunt would have probably ended up in a concentration camp as well, for being part of another, though non-hereditary, minority.
Come on, have a little consistency here.

[Kalmageddon]

I am surprised that you say people around you have a problem with arguing though, given that your location is Italy. We had a lot of italian immigrants in the street where I grew up, and their conversations were always so animated and their opinions so forceful, it felt like arguing was their main form of communication. None of them ever expressed discomfort to me about there being a difference of opinion. Must have been a different part of Italy

I didn't mean arguing as "discussing animatedly", I meant arguing as "presenting a contrarian opinion supported by facts". Here, it's really fronwed upon, no matter how polite you are and how strong a case you make in support of your ideas. You disagree when some vague authority figure makes a decision, you are just being annoying.

[dehro]

Hah, casual racism.

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Went to see my boyfriend's aunt with his mother and him.
She's got big problems and a frustrating life, but the subject she complained about at that moment was some therapist who's himself pretty nuts and incompetent. He's also Jewish, and related to his nuttiness, tends to push it into his patient's face without care for relevance of comfort.
(As for me, I'm of Jewish descent. My Polish grandmother never got news from her family after fleeing the country during the Shoah; she's still alive and looking for information. Sadly, we've got a rather accurate idea of their fate. This is something I've already talked about with BF's aunt.)
The following dialog then happens:
Aunt: "He should have been deported to [concentration camp]! *laugh*"
Me: *awkward moment of silence, then waves hand and helpfully points out, though a little late:* "Huh, hi! I'm right here."
Then the conversation continues as if nothing has happened.

Oh yeah, concentration camps are funny.
I've got a pretty broad humor, and have laughed at jokes related to WWII, but there's a difference between mocking the Nazis and implying, even for a laugh, that concentration camps were a good idea and that anyone deserved to go there.
Yeeeeah. Not the first time I heard antisemitic jokes and insults, but this one is the worst I've heard in years. That crap doesn't even offend me, it just makes me kinda antsy. Because I can't be 100% sure the wheel will turn again and they'll feel that, actually, yes, they'd be better off without Jews. Not like it hasn't happened dozens of times throughout history.

Of course, I'm not actually Jewish (as it was my father who was Jewish, not my mother), I'm not religious, and I'd damn myself for my one and only god, Bacon.
But the problem when you're not a religious Jew is that you still inherit heavy baggage with very little good. You inherit the knowledge of centuries of oppression, culminating only several decades ago (in my case, I got to learn about the showers before I was twelve, and let me tell you that while it does wonders to forge your character, there's a reason most kids aren't taught about the details of the Shoah); you inherit the subconscious, not-so-ancestral fear; and you inherit the last name that justifies the paranoia. Because, let's be fair, when Jews are targeted, the name alone is enough for anyone to identify you as such, even if you're neither ethnically or religiously Jewish.

So I'm in the great position where people forget you have anything to do with Jews, and throw casual antisemitism at you, including the classic conspiracy theories. And then, there are some complains that Jews are talking about the Holocaust too much, that they're taking advantage of their status as victims, why don't they let go. Gee, I don't know, maybe because racism levels are rising and there's always someone to spout hateful or ignorant crap in the media?

This is a crap position. You only identify yourself as Jewish long enough to feel all the bad that comes with it. But you don't get the comfort of belonging to their community, of having a rich culture and religion, of having your unease acknowledged for a second.

And now I've got to fetch some mail at the post office, but seeing how these blubbering morons have spelt my name (while having my name properly written on all their other documents!), I might have trouble proving I'm not trying to steal someone else's mail. "No, that is my name you tried to write there, you just made it look kind of British-sounding because you're frakking morons for unfathomable reasons."

P.S. : this aunt would have probably ended up in a concentration camp as well, for being part of another, though non-hereditary, minority.
Come on, have a little consistency here.

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Yeah, I agree that it stings when it's casual like that. Mostly because people who think nothing of it will probably agree the wildest accusations and claims, in the comfort of their living rooms, and still think of themselves as upstanding citizens and fundamentally good people, oblivious to the ignorance in which their "views" are steeped.
I identify as jewish and was brought up with in depth knowledge of the faith (or as in depth as a bunch of non-believers with a hint of survival guilt bothered to go), its culture and such. I don't believe in any of the faith-based aspects of it all and have several opinions that don't mesh well with the current politics in israel... Net result is I get the casual and the not so casual racism from one side, whilst the other side is trying to guilt- trip me for betraying the home-team or somesuch. Luckily very few people in my family have strong religious convictions and half of them are catholics anyway, so, not really involved in that particular debate...And I have a combination of cruel sense of humour and a thick skin, so I laugh at most themed jokes..
And then you are out for drinks and a friend of a friend who sits at your table starts a drunken tirade on the latest Conspiracy theory... Kinda makes you want the theories to be true

[dehro]

I didn't mean arguing as "discussing animatedly", I meant arguing as "presenting a contrarian opinion supported by facts". Here, it's really fronwed upon, no matter how polite you are and how strong a case you make in support of your ideas. You disagree when some vague authority figure makes a decision, you are just being annoying.

I do find that surprising, and I Live in Italy. These days authority figures have lost a lot of street cred...including the religious ones... Could it be you're talking about the nail in our coffin, bureaucracy and its many obnoxious faces?

[Mono Vertigo]

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Yeah, I agree that it stings when it's casual like that. Mostly because people who think nothing of it will probably agree the wildest accusations and claims, in the comfort of their living rooms, and still think of themselves as upstanding citizens and fundamentally good people, oblivious to the ignorance in which their "views" are steeped.
I identify as jewish and was brought up with in depth knowledge of the faith (or as in depth as a bunch of non-believers with a hint of survival guilt bothered to go), its culture and such. I don't believe in any of the faith-based aspects of it all and have several opinions that don't mesh well with the current politics in israel... Net result is I get the casual and the not so casual racism from one side, whilst the other side is trying to guilt- trip me for betraying the home-team or somesuch. Luckily very few people in my family have strong religious convictions and half of them are catholics anyway, so, not really involved in that particular debate...And I have a combination of cruel sense of humour and a thick skin, so I laugh at most themed jokes..
And then you are out for drinks and a friend of a friend who sits at your table starts a drunken tirade on the latest Conspiracy theory... Kinda makes you want the theories to be true

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I like to joke that my cousins - who are Jewish and religious, but also happen to be people I don't like very much - do believe in that conspiracy, for a variety of reasons. I'm not that good a person.
More seriously now... it feels a bit weird coming across another Jew who's not part of my family or a (middle-)aged celebrity. Always feels a little lonely, as being Jewish/of Jewish descent is rarely something one advertises (despite what some people seem to think). I already feel a little better there's someone else out there!
Sometimes, when I hear ignorant statements or hateful jokes, I want to reply scathing sarcasm that will force the offender to think back on what they just said... but l'esprit de l'escalier is a persistent nemesis of mine.

[Kalmageddon]

I do find that surprising, and I Live in Italy. These days authority figures have lost a lot of street cred...including the religious ones... Could it be you're talking about the nail in our coffin, bureaucracy and its many obnoxious faces?

I'm referring to the overuse of the word "polemica" to define a divergent opinion. It's thrown around a lot, as if expressing one's opinion is acceptable only when it's the same as everyone else's.
It's something embedded in our culture and it drives me crazy.

Haven't you noticed this? Every time someone talks about someone else's opinion he will use that hateful word. Just because it carries a strong negative meaning it makes the opposition look like childish idiots that like to be contrarian for its own sake.

Discussing, expressing opinions, ideas, it should be treasured and instead we formed our culture around just following the easiest idea. And every time someone doesn't agree we think it's because he just want to cause problems when instead we should be listening and learning.
Not all italians do that, but most of them do. It's certanly reflected in our politics and in our society at large.

[dehro]

In my experience, people who overuse that word (and to misquote the princess bride "I do not think it means what they think it means"), often have very few other arguments and aren't really worth arguing with to begin with, because they aren't going to change their minds anyway... So it's best to ignore them when possible
Non ti curar di loro...

[TechnOkami]

"(and to misquote the princess bride"

The technical term for what you did (not quoting something verbatim, but changing some of the wording around while getting the same message across) is paraphrasing, if I'm not mistaken (I could be).

[Haluesen]

Well, before getting into the speaking, I want to say that Moriwen, should you ever read this, that I consider you a true hero. Way to be a good human being, and setting a nice example for others.

You know, I think this may be a cultural thing. I live in a country where it's never anybody's fault, no one ever has any responsability and arguing over something, no matter how important, is considered inappropriate and treated as an annoyance.

So obviouly everything is set at the lowest common denominator. If you are smart you need to make yourself stupid in order to avoid offending others. You are not allowed to know more unless it's your job. Otherwise everyone has to be equal.
And I hate it.

Everyone is NOT equal, everyone is different! Of course everyone has the same human rights, but other then that why should I fake being ignorant when I know something? Why should I talk like an uneducated imbecil when I can express myself more properly? Why do I need to speak dialect all the time just to avoid getting weird stares? Why is it expected that I cheat the law one time or another just because "everyone does"? Why do I have to neatly fit into a subculture? Why can't I just be an individual without scaring, angering or confusing people?!

I'm just rambling. But I'm sick of it.

It sounds like you have a pretty solid reason to ramble, so ramble away. It isn't unfair to want to be able to express a differing opinion, and it sounds rather annoying that it isn't an easy thing to do over there. I would just encourage you to say to heck with the culture (not like I care about my own very much) and say what is on your mind, but I do not know what it is like in Italy very much, and that could cause you much more harm than good I suppose.

So I do say that I am sorry for your situation and don't really know what you can do for it directly. I guess at least yay for the internet, where you are absolutely free to express whatever opinion or thoughts you want to?

So... I thought I should give an update on my progress since last time I posted here. Rest of the post spoilered for length.

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I'm now 6 weeks into counselling, things have been slow, but I think I'm starting to get to grips with what my problems are. Possibly even starting to work towards solving them. One of the issues I find with these things is that I'm seeing each step so I end up not being a very good judge of the progress I'm making. I tend to find it difficult to talk to people about myself, which is why it's been a bit slow, but my counsellor is very patient and I'm finding it easier to talk to her as time goes on.

My issues, as I understand them at the moment, are essentially related to the way I express myself. I struggle to express myself emotionally, particularly with things like anger or sadness. I end up bottling things up, anger gets turned inwards against myself whilst I keep quiet about any pain I'm feeling in order to 'protect' the people I care about. The reasoning there being that 'they shouldn't have to deal with my problems, they've already got enough to deal with'. I find it hard to forgive myself for mistakes I've made in the past, which in turn leads me to worry quite a lot about how I should be acting. I've got a very negative self-image because of it, something that I'm very much aware others don't share. In recent weeks I've been trying to be more open with friends and family about how I'm doing, which hasn't been easy. Still, I feel like I'm starting to make a bit of headway.

Of course, real life being what it is, it's not been completely smooth sailing. A few weeks ago I started to seriously think about whether it was worth continuing to live. It's not a state of mind I've been in constantly, but it did persist for the best part of a day. It's worth noting, I think, that I seriously doubt I would act on the thoughts. A fairly key part of my mindset is that I try to avoid hurting, or even inconveniencing, others as much as possible. I'm well aware that ending my life would cause a great deal of grief for many people, that thought often keeps me moving forward. In light of my attempts at being open, I did manage to tell my friends about this. They were, naturally, concerned for me and made me promise to go to the doctor's as soon as possible, something my counsellor agreed with. So I've now been put onto a course of anti-depressants (Sertraline) which I'm now nearly three weeks into.

I think the first thing I want to say about the anti-depressants is that I think I have been low less often, and for shorter periods of time. That said, the side-effects really suck. It's still early days for them, and I was warned that this was likely to happen, but I've been getting stressed really easily for the past few weeks. Little things can make me feel very agitated very quickly, and the feeling tends to last longer than it normally would. I try and keep it under control, but sometimes it just gets a bit much and I kind of close in on myself.

It was particularly bad a few days ago. We'd gone out for a meal with one of my friend's family to celebrate her birthday. Through the first hour and a half or so of the meal I was pretty comfortable, we had finished desert maybe ten minutes earlier. I don't personally drink, but my friends father, and my friends, were all having drinks. They were planning to do so until fairly late, which was fine by me. Then I started to feel a bit stressed. Not sure what triggered it, one of the waiter's was a bit short with my friends dad, so it might've been that. But it just kept building, I ended up barely saying anything and then feeling bad that I wasn't saying anything which was making me worse. Pretty soon it reached a point where I just didn't feel I could keep sitting in the restaurant. I kept trying to say something to excuse myself, but my throat kept seizing up when I attempted to do so. Eventually I managed it when my friend's dad was away from the table. As I left I just kept berating myself for upping and leaving like that, even though I hadn't felt like I could stay.

Come the next morning, I'm still feeling bad about leaving my friend's birthday meal before everyone else. I apologise to the dad pretty much as soon as I run into him, he's fine about it and even returns the money that I'd left to help cover my part of the bill, something I feel a bit guilty about (but then, that's parents). So I go back upstairs, run into another one of my friends (whos birthday it wasn't), apologise to her as well for leaving early, and she tells me that it was really rude of me to do so without even waiting to say thanks to the dad. Now, this is something that I'd essentially been telling myself for the entirety of my journey back the previous night, something that kept me awake for a few hours when I did get back and had me still feeling pretty anxious the following morning, so I'm pretty much entirely in agreement with her on this. Hearing it from someone else pushes me over the edge, though. I ended up having a breakdown in my room, feeling convinced that my friends were going to leave me following my behaviour the previous night and that I was, essentially, a terrible person.

The breakdown wasn't immediate, so my friend didn't see I was like this instantly, but did bring me tissues when she saw. She stayed at the door to my room for a good 10 minutes or so, but I (still) think she was more annoyed than sympathetic with how I reacted to that. I think it's worth noting that she was (and still is) fairly ill, she suffers from very bad migraines, and also has her own troubles with depression, so I think in large part she wasn't in a very tolerant mood anyway that morning. Through the day she didn't speak a whole lot with me, and it was usually in front of others when she did. I'm not one of the most conversational people to begin with, but I did end up feeling like she was annoyed at me for the whole day.

Something else that didn't help the stress levels was a presentation that was looming on the following day. It was a group presentation, and I was in a group with the friend I mentioned in the previous paragraph. We'd completed the vast bulk of the work over the last few days, but there were still a few details that needed ironing out. I think having that hanging over both of us, in addition to my early leaving and breakdown, were making tensions run very high. Following the presentation I've felt a lot calmer, I can kind of spot when I'm starting to grow stressed and just try and steer my thought processes away from what's causing it. I'm also speaking to my friends much more easily now, which is making me think I may have misinterpreted the lack of talking. That said, I've also kept much more to myself, so I've not had much in the way of extended contact with them.

I'm kind of hoping that I've gotten through the worst of the tablet induced stress now, I went to a 2-week follow up with my doctor a few days ago and they did say that the best option would be to just stick with it for now. Another follow up has been booked for 3 weeks from now. Having the presentation behind me is probably a large part of it, but I've felt a bit more able to handle the stress in particular better over the last couple of days. Hopefully the restaurant/breakdown event was the worst of it.

I've gradually made more people aware both that I'm having issues and that I'm now on anti-depressants. Both of my parents, some of my friends and my uni lecturers are aware now. I feel bad about putting this onto them, but I'm at the point where I can't just keep things to myself all the time anymore. I also keep feeling like I should apologise for getting stressed so easily since starting the tablets, and I have done so to my friends. I'm not sure if I should really be apologising, given it's not something that's entirely within my control, but... I still feel acutely responsible for my actions and decisions, especially when they're poorly thought through or hasty.

So, uh, thanks for reading through all of this. I'm not really sure if I'm putting this up for advice or just to get my thoughts down. Either way... Thanks.

Well, I will admit that is quite a story there. But I'm glad you decided to write all this. It sounds like at least for the most part, you are improving. So I give you major cheers for that!

I can sympathize a little bit with your thoughts. I also tend to not express myself a lot, and definitely hate the idea of burdening friends and family with my worries or stresses. I've gotten better over recent years. It is probably because I have realized that most of the time not telling them these things worries or hurts them more than just outright telling them.

Anyway, I don't wish to go on about myself right now. I just want to say that it is good that you have been getting better, other than a couple incidents, but no one is perfect, we all still have trouble. I wish you the best that things continue to improve here for you.

Hah, casual racism.

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Went to see my boyfriend's aunt with his mother and him.
She's got big problems and a frustrating life, but the subject she complained about at that moment was some therapist who's himself pretty nuts and incompetent. He's also Jewish, and related to his nuttiness, tends to push it into his patient's face without care for relevance of comfort.
(As for me, I'm of Jewish descent. My Polish grandmother never got news from her family after fleeing the country during the Shoah; she's still alive and looking for information. Sadly, we've got a rather accurate idea of their fate. This is something I've already talked about with BF's aunt.)
The following dialog then happens:
Aunt: "He should have been deported to [concentration camp]! *laugh*"
Me: *awkward moment of silence, then waves hand and helpfully points out, though a little late:* "Huh, hi! I'm right here."
Then the conversation continues as if nothing has happened.

Oh yeah, concentration camps are funny.
I've got a pretty broad humor, and have laughed at jokes related to WWII, but there's a difference between mocking the Nazis and implying, even for a laugh, that concentration camps were a good idea and that anyone deserved to go there.
Yeeeeah. Not the first time I heard antisemitic jokes and insults, but this one is the worst I've heard in years. That crap doesn't even offend me, it just makes me kinda antsy. Because I can't be 100% sure the wheel will turn again and they'll feel that, actually, yes, they'd be better off without Jews. Not like it hasn't happened dozens of times throughout history.

Of course, I'm not actually Jewish (as it was my father who was Jewish, not my mother), I'm not religious, and I'd damn myself for my one and only god, Bacon.
But the problem when you're not a religious Jew is that you still inherit heavy baggage with very little good. You inherit the knowledge of centuries of oppression, culminating only several decades ago (in my case, I got to learn about the showers before I was twelve, and let me tell you that while it does wonders to forge your character, there's a reason most kids aren't taught about the details of the Shoah); you inherit the subconscious, not-so-ancestral fear; and you inherit the last name that justifies the paranoia. Because, let's be fair, when Jews are targeted, the name alone is enough for anyone to identify you as such, even if you're neither ethnically or religiously Jewish.

So I'm in the great position where people forget you have anything to do with Jews, and throw casual antisemitism at you, including the classic conspiracy theories. And then, there are some complains that Jews are talking about the Holocaust too much, that they're taking advantage of their status as victims, why don't they let go. Gee, I don't know, maybe because racism levels are rising and there's always someone to spout hateful or ignorant crap in the media?

This is a crap position. You only identify yourself as Jewish long enough to feel all the bad that comes with it. But you don't get the comfort of belonging to their community, of having a rich culture and religion, of having your unease acknowledged for a second.

And now I've got to fetch some mail at the post office, but seeing how these blubbering morons have spelt my name (while having my name properly written on all their other documents!), I might have trouble proving I'm not trying to steal someone else's mail. "No, that is my name you tried to write there, you just made it look kind of British-sounding because you're frakking morons for unfathomable reasons."

P.S. : this aunt would have probably ended up in a concentration camp as well, for being part of another, though non-hereditary, minority.
Come on, have a little consistency here.

Wow..hate when people are so racist like that, like it's just no big deal. I've never really been the target of racism, so I really don't know what you're going through, but still I'm sorry that you have to suffer with all that. Those thoughts can't be easy. I hope at least that you have to have as little dealings with that woman as possible. That might be at least a little bit easier on you. I give you a thumbs up, and a hoping for the best, and a hoping that someone can think of something more meaningful to tell you than my rambling.

[Comissar]

Well, I will admit that is quite a story there. But I'm glad you decided to write all this. It sounds like at least for the most part, you are improving. So I give you major cheers for that!

I can sympathize a little bit with your thoughts. I also tend to not express myself a lot, and definitely hate the idea of burdening friends and family with my worries or stresses. I've gotten better over recent years. It is probably because I have realized that most of the time not telling them these things worries or hurts them more than just outright telling them.

Anyway, I don't wish to go on about myself right now. I just want to say that it is good that you have been getting better, other than a couple incidents, but no one is perfect, we all still have trouble. I wish you the best that things continue to improve here for you.

Thanks, I do feel like there's been a bit of improvement. And yeah, I've come to much the same conclusions about talking to people vs. not talking, it's just still tricky pushing myself to actually get to the talking bit.

[Haluesen]

Thanks, I do feel like there's been a bit of improvement. And yeah, I've come to much the same conclusions about talking to people vs. not talking, it's just still tricky pushing myself to actually get to the talking bit.

I get that. But you're trying, that's something at least. Keep on improving.

And on a side note, love that avatar. Very well done.

[Comissar]

I get that. But you're trying, that's something at least. Keep on improving.

And on a side note, love that avatar. Very well done.

I'll try to, and thanks. It was good fun to make.

[dehro]

The technical term for what you did (not quoting something verbatim, but changing some of the wording around while getting the same message across) is paraphrasing, if I'm not mistaken (I could be).

You're right. The actual misquote is the bit in italian, which is a "quote" from Dante's Inferno which everybody thinks goes that way, when the actual quote is quite different in wording amd meaning. Still, a supposed quote is popularly used in italian, despite being utterly wrong.

[ArlEammon]

My emotional stock market has crashed. It's 1929. My heart is a dust bowl.