MouthyHooker

You’re welcome. I empathize with the struggle.

I also saw your reply that you are pretty sedentary. I know everyone says this and it’s annoying but silly little walks for your mental health do help a bit. I recently started exercising again and am devastated to report that it does actually improve my mental health 😭 I know how hard it is when you can barely get out of bed, but if you can even make yourself just do some light stretching on a mat or go for a 10 minute walk, you might notice a bit of improvement in your symptoms. It’s okay if you can’t 🩷

Oh they love co-opting our language. A lot of anti-SW activists call themselves “abolitionists” which makes me wanna set things on fire.

It’s WAXY!

(I still fuck with it though)

Avoidant attachment definitely tracks with not wanting to form relationships with others. There’s a fair amount of good info online that you could dig into and see if it resonates. This Reddit reply has 3 different quizzes to choose from.

I agree with the other reply that said it sounds like dissociation and/or depersonalization. Are those terms a therapist has discussed with you at all? Do you have a past history of trauma? (Obviously no pressure to disclose details, but a lot of what you are describing could be consistent with PTSD and/or C-PTSD, which have a lot of symptom overlap with ADHD, autism, and borderline personality disorder aka emotionally unstable personality disorder.)

IMO, talk therapy can be kind of useless for more complex mental illnesses. I feel like if you’ve been going for years and aren’t noticing improvement, that’s a sign that you might want to consider a different modality. I have been doing EMDR with somewhat mixed results but overall I’d recommend giving it a try. Some other potential modalities to try include somatic experiencing therapy and hypnotherapy. If you go on Psychology Today’s website, you can search for therapists by modalities offered and insurance accepted. It might be worth it to go outside the box a bit since you’ve tried quite a bit and are still really suffering.

Sorry you’re going through this. Mental illness sucks and we live in a sick society that makes it hard to heal or find happiness. I hope you are able to get some answers and/or find treatment that helps. 🩷

It could just be straight up depression but severe insecure attachment could be a contributing factor. Are you familiar with attachment theory? Do you know your attachment style? Can I ask which modalities of therapy you have tried?

Might be worth investigating an ADHD and/or autism diagnosis as well just to rule those out. I had terrible depression from age 16-29. I got diagnosed with ADHD at 29 and got on stimulant medications and it greatly improved my depression symptoms. I think it was a combo of increased dopamine from the meds and finally understanding how my brain works and why certain things are hard for me.

I am still on SSRIs and probably always will be, but the dark thoughts are so much less frequent and intense these days.

Thank you!

Thank you!

Thank you this is helpful. Is there a list of common content warning labels used here? Do people block/ban certain CW keywords so they don’t see those posts, or do they just look at the post title and not click the post if they don’t want to see that type of content?

I honestly couldn’t be more thrilled that velour tracksuits are back.

I used to dance at a strip club with a woman who was on work release from jail. She’d spend Monday-Friday in the jail, then get out on the weekends to strip, then report back to jail for forced labor during the week. This was maybe 2008-ish. (Thanks Obama)

When will Xi Jinping liberate us from our oppressors?!