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condor View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Topic: Mental health support group
    Posted: January 19 2018 at 13:41
How are the mental health services in your area? My local psychiatric long-term ward ended up making me worse because I had to spend two days cooped up over the weekend, unable to concentrate on anything because of lack of exercise, because only the consultant could prescribe me leave.

I had to have meals in the freezing cold as the ward gardens where people smoked were accessed by big sliding doors next to the dining area. Inside I tend to blink less, and this ended up in watery eyes which I found humiliating and wretched.

Despite having emotional abuse and severe neglect as an adolescent, I receive no therapy, occupational or talkative, so I decided to start this thread, because sometimes some of you might prefer to talk in a familiar environment.

It also annoys me that recovery is centred around medication rather than OT or coping strategies.

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2018 at 13:47
Whenever a chain of thought slash query on the internet ends in a dead-end, I feel useless, that life is pointless and dark thoughts cloud my mind.

I am unable to unburden myself when it comes to philosophical or general matters to mental health workers, possibly because I feel even worse if I have to explain the second time and have a fear intellectual rejection when they tell me they don't understand.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2018 at 13:51
Also, I feel alienated from the internet. I am unable to solve chess problems online; some flash incompatibility, which I don't understand. Sometimes I need the flesh of a chess problem to contrast with the softness of posting a poem. Often I become alienated to the extent that I become bored with being myself and just dive into maximum productivity!
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2018 at 13:57
Basically, I wanted to start this thread for anyone who finds putting their thoughts about philosophy or general well-being in front of a keyboard easier, rather than the rigmarole of the end of a phone.
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condor View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2018 at 14:03
UK - UK has improved my mood. It's more difficult than Danger Money, but more more rewarding.
Danger Money just feels like lemon sherbet to the meat of the first album. Sorry for the cogency issues; I 'm getting tired.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2018 at 15:04
I'm getting out of a decades long habit and coping with nicotine withdrawal for exactly 2 months today.
My main support has been physical exercise 7/7, alternating jogging with gym workout.
The endorfins keep me happy and I end each session already longing and anticipating the next one.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2018 at 15:37
I wish that I could say that this thread is surprising, but it's not. I don't know anything about mental health or how to help someone like you. I wish I could.

But I can point out that most thread posting ends up a dead end. If people are not glaringly interested in a topic, they will not participate. This is not a fault of your's. It happens to everyone. Please keep listening to whatever music puts you at peace and know that many have used music for therapeutic purposes. Myself included. And the best of luck to you.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 22 2018 at 05:11
In answer to the question, "what are mental health services like in your area" They're proably better than in many areas of the UK. CPN appointments can be arranged fairly quickly, and the waiting lists for CBT or other therapies on the NHS is not quite as long as you'd expect. GP's also seem to advise talking therapies alongside or instead of medication, depending on the severity of the individuals condition.

I have this on reasonable authority from people who work in the services in this county.

As for my own experiences, these days I don't take meds and I see a private therapist when it suits me. In my experience, depression is a personal thing, and no one is really interested in hearing or talking about it. This is either because they just find the whole thing embarassing, don't know what to say and how to say it, or it makes them feel uncomfortable about their own state of mind. In any case, don't be surprised if there isn't a stampede of interest on a music forum to discuss mental health.

I wish you all the best. It is hard.

Ultimately bored by endless ecstasy!
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 22 2018 at 05:20
Originally posted by condor condor wrote:

Also, I feel alienated from the internet. I am unable to solve chess problems online; some flash incompatibility, which I don't understand. Sometimes I need the flesh of a chess problem to contrast with the softness of posting a poem. Often I become alienated to the extent that I become bored with being myself and just dive into maximum productivity!
Try lichess.org, doesn't require flash.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 22 2018 at 21:58
I've just signed up for 18 weeks of DBT (dialectical behavioral therapy) with my wife and child (all covered including materials). Well, I will get the final word on if we qualify tomorrow -- there is high demand and few spaces available. Should be interesting. Mindfulness is part of it, and although I already practice it irregularly, this will help me to do it regularly. I have done CBT before (cognitive behavioral therapy). I'd rather be taking university courses than this program, but this is for the family and it won't cost me. One of my regrets involves not becoming a psychologist, but I think that I'm too old to change career course (not that I have much of a career -- been too lazy/ lacking ambition, and let my neuroses get in the way of success).
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 23 2018 at 21:40
I'll say this much: we are in a millennial mental health crisis. As of 3 years ago, Canadian emergency department visits by patients aged 15-25 suffering from depression and anxiety had gone up 70% in a decade. Yes, SEVENTY percent--imagine if that was cancer or heart disease; we'd be freaking out as a society, and demanding to know what was causing it!

At colleges and university campuses (I teach at a college) most students registered with Accessiblity (disability) Services departments are now there for depression and anxiety (until recently it would be things like ADHD and learning disabilities).

I won't get into what is driving this huge increase in mental health problems among young people, but the problem is very real and frightening. Anecdotally, I can tell you that I and fellow college teachers are seeing more and more students come to us in serious crisis. Attendance and focus is well down, along with communication and interpersonal skills (like empathy) and the situation seems to be worsening each year. People are increasingly isolated.

Meanwhile, the resources are overstretched or non-existent, and we continue to discriminate against those who suffer from mental illnesses.

I wish the author of this thread, and all who come here to share, well, but we need to do better than that.

Edited by Peter - January 23 2018 at 21:47
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 23 2018 at 22:26
Monsters and Cowards 

Wash your bowl
Clean your room
Ask the moon,
"What needs fixed?"
Fix it soon
Nix the negative
Begin to groom
Feed your monster
Give him room
the sanest man 
an aggressive man
choosing civil
resisting doom

 better than cowards,
afraid to steal and kill
till tornadoes uproot
law, then the cowards loot and shoot

More honor in a monster who chooses peace
Than a lily livered coward who lies and sneaks.



Edited by omphaloskepsis - January 24 2018 at 09:02
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Blacksword View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 24 2018 at 01:26
Originally posted by Peter Peter wrote:

I'll say this much: we are in a millennial mental health crisis. As of 3 years ago, Canadian emergency department visits by patients aged 15-25 suffering from depression and anxiety had gone up 70% in a decade. Yes, SEVENTY percent--imagine if that was cancer or heart disease; we'd be freaking out as a society, and demanding to know what was causing it!

At colleges and university campuses (I teach at a college) most students registered with Accessiblity (disability) Services departments are now there for depression and anxiety (until recently it would be things like ADHD and learning disabilities).

I won't get into what is driving this huge increase in mental health problems among young people, but the problem is very real and frightening. Anecdotally, I can tell you that I and fellow college teachers are seeing more and more students come to us in serious crisis. Attendance and focus is well down, along with communication and interpersonal skills (like empathy) and the situation seems to be worsening each year. People are increasingly isolated.

Meanwhile, the resources are overstretched or non-existent, and we continue to discriminate against those who suffer from mental illnesses.

I wish the author of this thread, and all who come here to share, well, but we need to do better than that.


I think the evidence of crisis is clear throughout the UK too, and I'm sure, for all the same reasons as in Canada and the US, and all of western Europe.

I'd be fascinated to know the plethora of reasons behind it, and there will be reasons; dark, complex sociological reasons. I feel the twitch...the need to write down why I think it is, but it would be armchair social psychology at its worst, so I'll resist the temptation.



Ultimately bored by endless ecstasy!
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Peter View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 24 2018 at 05:55
Increasingly, Blacksword, there is agreement among mental health professionals as to the major cause, but I find that as a society we are not willing (or perhaps able) to come to grips with it yet, to admit "okay, this is a net bad, and it must change. I must change. I need help, and others need help. This is not sustainable. This vast experiment has had powerful, far-reaching negative consequences."

At this stage, most of us are still in denial (often angry denial), and don't want to hear it--because that involves looking at our OWN behaviour. Therefore, things will get worse before they (might) get better. But we humans CAN change major things that are "just the way things are," as we've done so many times before. It starts with seeing the problem (mostly done), ascertaining the major cause (increasingly done--and it is something specific we can grapple with), then fighting it, with frank talk, help from the major players involved, and political will.

Otherwise, the near future is scary in a society that is coming apart on a molecular/individual level, and we have almost an entire generation unable to step up, take over as we boomers age, and tackle the OTHER major challenges facing humanity and our planet. For that, they will need to be strong, not debilitated.
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.
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