Lived Experience Forum

[MDT]

😔 

I feel sad. I feel depressed. Like I don't care about anything really.

Its all too much and everything is fake. 

Lockdown will end soon but I'm also not looking  forward to thag because it means I feel obligated to see people. 

I am hoping on starting small. Just bring back routines and such. Like my gym routine. 

I am feeling so overwhelmed by things. It feels like everyone around me is progressing in life and even people younger than me are. I feel  a failure. 

Don't care about much anymore

[MDT]

I feel like being sick

[Owen45]

I can identify, I have been particularly sad and depressed during this extended Sydney lockdown....no work, social groups, no mental health support groups, no churches, no nothing. 

[MDT]

Yeah @Owen45
I fear what it'll be like after it opens again. I feel I have adapted to a lot.

[MDT]

Gonna go buy something to eat for lunch

[cloudcore]

Hi @MDT ,

I've had similar anxieties around re entering society and interacting with people too, including my own friends. Despite how much I miss them, there is something safe about being in lockdown and having no expectations to watch out for anyone besides yourself. It is also reassuring that in lockdown, everyone may be just as stuck and lost as we are.

But feeling stuck and lost does not make you failure, and not everyone else we see are doing as well as they appear! I also think it's important to consider our strides in mental health as a way of progressing in life, which I have seen you take many times in the forums inspite of how challenging lockdown has been. That is admirable and worthy of acknowledgement too.

I can see you have the strength it takes to go where ever you want to go @MDT, take it one small step at a time and you'll get there

from cloudcore

[MDT]

@AussieRecharger over here today

[MDT]

Hi @cloudcore
I appreciate what you said.
Truly.

I just don't feel much atm

Please don't take this the wrong way

[AussieRecharger]

@MDT 

How do I just you on your life?  What are the metrics you would like me to use?

Is it money, fame, the stuff you have? Or is it the people you have helped, your ability to inspire others and acts to lift others up even when you are feeling down?

Please let me know the metrics you are using so i can use them too 🙂

Edit..  

A couple of years ago, I felt a bit like the way you are talking.. actually, a lot like you were talking.  In the end, it was about finding people who shared my values.  Sex, family and all that stuff is great, but finding people that talk your language, want to talk about the things your feeling and not just a football game, they are like diamonds.. rare and worth keeping close.  I have spent years wondering, why don't I get the joy out of the voice, the masked singer, the nrl, insert Aussie cultural thing that does not matter. It took ages to find people who don't care for this stuff either.. a lot of them are in here thankfully, that's why I keep returning but you need non digital people in your life as well. 

[MDT]

Hi @AussieRecharger
Thanks for your input

I agree with your second paragraph quite a lot.

I definitely find that to be the case. I have friends like this in real life. Who do indeed care and find things I find interesting as well. Perhaps being away from these groups has had this effect on me hey?

In terms of metrics I use - I would say this:

"Or is it the people you have helped, your ability to inspire others and acts to lift others up even when you are feeling down?"

But lately this isn't enough.
I don't know what is.

There's so much I feel is wrong and so much I feel is bringing me down but I am always struggling to describe it. To articulate it.

Some key themes that come up are:
- I feel pathetic and useless
- I feel annoyed at feeling pathetic and useless because I know I'm not
- I don't feel like I'm proving myself as competent and strong anywhere in life
- lockdown has changed my psychology
- I feel constricted by societal norms but also want to break free in my own way
- I am struggling to find motivation
- I am struggling to find direction because I know things can change so quickly and having such a rigid direction for life can throw you into chaos if it doesn't go well or according to plan
- I am annoyed that my uni course tis year taught me very little and I really wanted to learn a heap of new things and was keen to do it. The uni was utterly rubbish in teaching, marking and assessing.
- I am self conscious
- I feel overwhelmed