coping
Life presents variables; learning how to cope in order to master, minimize, or tolerate what has come to pass.
Starting Over
Three words you never want to hear... "You have cancer." Those three words will change everything in your life. They can make you better, or they can make you insane. How you handle it will determine which way it goes. Have you ever heard the song from Tim McGraw, "Live Like You Were Dying?" For me, it was just a good song...for a while. But when I got that diagnosis and heard that song, my entire world spun off its axis. Everything was suddenly different in vivid ways. I knew that I had one last shot to make life matter.
By Bethany Orr5 years ago in Psyche
Having An ADHD-Diagnosed Spouse
“Help! My husband has ADHD!” These words were the cries of wives with husbands suffering from the said mental disorder. If the one you love has attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, living with them and raising a family is going to be challenging. But you love them, nonetheless, and falling for someone with ADHD does have its perks. They can be super intelligent, imaginative, and hilarious to be with. If you’re with someone with ADHD, life is going to be interesting, to say the least. If you are in the situation where you are dealing with an ADHD Diagnosed Spouse who has tendencies that you can’t take, then follow the advice provided by the wife of one of our patients. Throughout her 15-year married life with her ADHD-diagnosed husband, she has had her fair share of challenges, but she combatted it with some strategies that she managed to pick up along the way.
By Cynthia Dean5 years ago in Psyche
Connecting Subconscious Dots
A few years ago, when I was working on a degree in English, I had class assignment to analyze a dream using Freud's method of interpretation. I have some pretty crazy dreams, some of which I don't need (or want) to consider longer than necessary. I figured this weird, but seemingly benign, dream about a couple of baby squirrels would be safe enough. As I moved along the analysis, however, it started to become increasingly, and uncomfortably, personal. It was too close to the due date for me to hope for another dream and even if I did have something else I could remember clearly, would it just turn out the same way? I figured I was in it to win it at that point, I felt bad for traumatizing my teacher. To be fair, he did come up with the assignment, so I am guessing I wasn't the first - or the last - to end up breaking into delicate territory.
By Rebecca Tkacs5 years ago in Psyche
Mental Disorders
I want to help and provide value to ones who suffer from mental and neurological disorders like myself. It is among the most challenging things that a human has to fight to combat and overcome each day. I hope my story can help educate, comfort, or heal in anyway whoever may read this.
By Jacob Pool5 years ago in Psyche
Better Off Without Them
My set of parents were born in the "Boomer" era, or so it's coined. The discussion around mental health in my house was infrequent and poorly sourced. The irony was that, not only did both of my parents have their own mental health issues, they also had personality disorders... neither of which were acknowledged. That's a story for another time.
By Felicia P.5 years ago in Psyche
Dear Mental Illness
Dear Mental Illness, Why do you always seem to creep up on me when I feel like things are falling into place? Are you unsettled when I start to smile? I wonder if you think I shouldn’t be happy. I wonder if you want to watch me suffer. Some days I wake up and it feels like something is crushing my chest. I roll out of bed and start my day. Do you wish I couldn’t get out of bed? I fight the urge to stay but the world is calling me. I go through the motions at work. I can hear the kids laughing but it doesn’t effect me because there you are. You’re burning my eyes with tears I refuse to let out. You never want to give me a day to feel happy. As the trees begin to change, I can feel more than before. Summers are usually when you vacation away from my mind. Sometimes I think you won’t return but here you are. You’re always there. I fight through your power with everything i’ve got but some days I fall short. Some of the days you get the best of me and on those days, I let you win. When you win I fight back more tears. I hear voices in my head saying this will never be over, you will always be sick. I roll over on my side while I lay in bed and I cry real tears. It doesn’t help. I tried to hide you for so long that I can’t cry most of the time, and when I do I feel weak. I feel like I’ve lost, but now I know it’s not the tears that make me feel that way. It’s the people who look down on me. The people who don’t believe I’m good enough because I have a war to fight each day. They don’t like how I behave even when I try. They call me a freak, I agree. Even when they say they love me they don’t listen. They don’t listen, I yell but they don’t hear me. I listen to my voice screaming in my head, why can’t anyone hear me? Can they see me? Can they see who I am behind the illness? I used to think I was a lot more. I used to think this was only a small piece of me but is that true? My in-laws don’t think I’m enough for their daughter, but they don’t even know me they only see you. Does anyone actually know me? My family pretends that ever since I got out of the hospital for the second time that all these demons are gone. I tell them they aren’t but they don’t hear me so I lie and say I’m fine. They think there is a cure for the beast inside but the truth is medication can only do so much. I swallow the handful of pills that don’t even work anymore, pretending that it’s all going to work out. I act like its going to go away but the truth is that it’s always there, it just depends how well I can hide it today. I try to stay strong for everyone but I never let them know when I need them to be strong for me. On these days I don’t feel like I deserve it anyway. My stomach hurts, but I force myself to eat. I don’t enjoy eating anything. I don’t enjoy anything, but I try. Why do you enjoy this? You give me flashbacks of things I never want to see again. You make me shake with discomfort and hate everything about myself. I never feel worthy enough to feel better. I beat myself up so I can feel something but it never works. You never let anything soothe me when you have your way with it. I hate you. I hate you more than anything in the world. I wish I could be better than you, or stronger. I act like I can take it but I can’t anymore. I’ve had enough of you. Someday I wish it would be possible to beat you, but I know I never will. You will always be a part of me mental illness, and someday I hope you let people get to know me, because id rather be mentally ill than lonely.
By Emily Noonan-Phillips5 years ago in Psyche
Simple Method To Minimise Anxiety and Fear
I want to start by pointing out that this is not a cure for anxiety, nor is it a replacement for any responsible therapy you may be undergoing for similar conditions. I am not a doctor, of any kind, nor do presume to understand the complexity of any situation that may induce anxiety. Chronic anxiety is a problem that requires the focus of experts - I only offer you a technique that has helped me (and many of my students) cope with fear and panic whenever I have experienced them. And I must admit that I have not felt anxious too often, but I have seen how detrimental it can be to people's lives.
By Peyton J. Dracco5 years ago in Psyche
Are You Okay?
This first piece about mental health that I am about to dive into comes as a forward jump (also as personal experience. Not scientific). I am not starting at the beginning, but I suppose I will one day. This piece is for those who are in the in-between stage. The stage of more highs than lows but having mass amounts of guilt for having lows in the first place. That is not to say that this isn't for those who are looking for a light.
By Analesia Giammusso5 years ago in Psyche
Alone
Yes it’s me again, laying in bed, prisoner in my own mind. I never knew how real depression and anxiety are. I thought it would never hit me. Oh it did! I am in a spiral of the same thoughts, screaming silently. I am in a house full of people but alone in my mind. No one understands, no one reaches out abs no one catches me when I fall!
By Evelyn Gebele-Baker5 years ago in Psyche
Three Stressors Some People Are Experiencing at This Time
There are at least three issues going on at this time that are causing tremendous stress for people, including this writer. Those things affect many people instead of being reserved just for people with mental illness. Physicians and therapists say they are treating people who are going through three main public stressors without counting their own personal stressors.
By Margaret Minnicks5 years ago in Psyche
