My depression & me

Shared experiences of life, and the path that has led you to where you are.

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Porg85
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Aug 29, 2018 5:15 pm

My depression & me

Postby Porg85 » Thu Aug 30, 2018 7:45 am

Suddenly you're sitting there, struck by life. What is all of this? Who am I and what is my purpose, why do I walk this earth?
I cried for hours... days when I realised I was stuck in this thing we call reality, realising there was only one way out.
I discovered I'm fighting a severe depression and lot's of anxieties. And although I'm not alone, I never felt so lonely in my life.

Hi, my name is Porg and I'm so glad I found this place.
The title of this section is "Your story", I do want to tell my whole story, but I know most people don't like to read so I'll make it as brief as I possibly can.
Also I always feel stupid about myself and my depression, because I read stories about people who have it so much harder in life.
Atleast I had a roof above my head, food every day and some education.

My only issue, as you can tell from my intro, is that I lost my way... but I mean completely.
I came to a point where you start to question everything in life... and where you start to see the beauty of the little things in life.

Short version:
- Childhood sucked
- School sucked
- Middle child syndrome: Parents didn't care as much for me if they did for my siblings
- Droped out of school
- Periods of unemployment and crappy jobs
- Went to school again
- Periods of unemployment and crappy jobs
- Went to university
- Grandfather and dog died in same month as finals
- Droped out of UV in my last year
- Periods of unemployment and crappy jobs
- 1,5y of unemployment because the unemployment rate was so high
- Started my own company
- Went bankrupt after the first year
- Lost money
- Depression

That was the short version and I left a lot of parts out, it are like the "highights".
My therapist thought it would work in a therapeutic way if I would write my story down, so this is the first time I did and I still left a lot of stuff behind, so it still is a short version, but the long version of this post. So thanks to everyone who manage to read it.
To make my post less intimidating to read, I'll just post the long story right beneath this.

Porg85
Posts: 2
Joined: Wed Aug 29, 2018 5:15 pm

Re: My depression & me

Postby Porg85 » Thu Aug 30, 2018 11:43 am

Long version

Childhood:
Of three children, I am the middle child, there we go, so I also have some middle child syndrome thing going on, for example:
My parents were always more bussy with my older brother and younger sister. My brother wanted to play soccer, so my parents went every sunday to watch him play soccer, I hated soccer, so every sunday I was sitting there bored. My sister always wanted a horse, so my mom went with her on a weekly base to horse riding school, I wanted to play some sort of music instrument like the violin, or guitar, or the piano, but I never did... no one ever cared about it. After years and years of asking nothing else but a guitar for my birthday or christmas, nothing more, my parents finally gave in and bought me a cheap toy piano.

My parents always were the kind of "aim low in life" people, don't aim to high, there's nothing wrong with a job as a ..... whatever, not that there's something wrong with certain jobs, but that's not what I wanted.

My brother and sister both went to a special school, I went to the nearest school where I've been bullied for 4-5 long years.
It started to get so severe that at the end of elementary school I didn't want to go to highschool because I heard from my brother he was getting bullied there, but I always did want to go to University, for me that was like the start of something big, life.

Unfortunately my brother and sister didn't care much about their future career, I always wanted to do something extraordinary like becoming a astronaut or work at a theme park, making cartoons,... I didn't know what exactly but I knew it had to be something more "creative". Because as I child I always played on my own so I developed a very lifelike imagination, and I love to read Alice in Wonderland, Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter when it first came out.
But my parents send my to the same highschool my brother went at, a school that was focust on teaching children how to work in a factory or something like a construction builder, not that there's something wrong with that, but that was like the complete opposite of what I wanted to do, this was so far away from becoming an astronaut or becoming the next Walt Disney... yeah I had big dreams as a child.

But I saw my dreams burn right infront of my eyes, I've spent 4 years in that school and got bullied from the first day I walked true that gate, for every single day of those 4 years. I've been robed multiple times, they stole my money, my bus pass... my pride. I got beaten up a couple of times, one time I couldn't lift my arms anymore for a whole week because there were full of bruises so I had to stay at home, they've burned my skin twice with a hot iron rod. And the bullying didn't stop once the schoolbell rang, it also was on the bus to or from school. I had no friends... I hated school.
At home at the dinner table my parents always asked how our day was. My brother and sister always took the time to tell there stories, but how much I tried, seldom someone was listening to me, to my stories, how I survived the day once again. Even if I had the chance to tell my story, my brother or sister would always interupt me and no one gave a d**n afterwards about how my day was or how my story ended. Soon enough I stopt talking to my family and the worst thing was I dind't even think they've noticed, I felt lonely.

After 4 years I refused to go any longer to that school, if they would drag my in, I would try to escape without a doubt in my mind.
So finally the decided I could go to another school, the school closest by that offered something "creative", but at that point everything was better than the alternative. It was a school were 90% were girls and I never got bullied again, there was 1 other boy in my class and we became friends, like really good friends, the first time in my life I finally found a friend! Someone to pull myself up to.
After the first year he suddenly decided he wanted to go into the army without a degree. I had that dream again about goin to university, but after he went into the army I suddenly discovered I couldn't do this anymore, he was the only person that got me true my 5th year. I came to a point I was so tired and fed up of going to school that I made a decision, a thing I would eventually regret for the rest of my life. I droped out of school.

Adult life:
The first year was a drag, I fell from the one crappy job into the other. Untill I found a place that would keep me, I worked as a museum guard. Yeah I know, 18y and sitting there on a chair for the rest of my life... I don't think so. But atleast it had something to do with art, history and creativity, but it was far away from what I had in mind.
Besides that my collegues bullied me the first year untill they separated the wheat from the chaff.
But I started to get new interests, my brain was itching because I wanted to learn again, actually I always liked learning new things, that was like the only thing I ever liked about school, learning new stuff.
As a kid I always wanted to know everything about anything and tried to figure out things on my own, like how does the universe work? Or remembering every name and detail about plants or dinosaur that used to live. I was a sponge as a child. And I decided I wanted new things again and make something out of my life.

So I signed my up to get my high school diploma, so I could go to university afterwards.
I met my girlfriend when I was 21... best thing that ever happened to me untill today.
She knew my plan, always supported me, after a few years I got my degree than another year came full of unemployment and crappy jobs or all sorts, but I needed money for UV. Eventually the day came and I had to choose between two universities, art academy or media.

I loved art, but I also liked movies, animation, games. It was the time that games became a huge thing. So I picked that UV (it was a new school) that teached how to get into creative media.
And later I would find out that this was the 2nd worst decision in my life.
Over the 3y I went there the school changed it's name every year, so 3 times, on top of that the study focus also changed 3 times, they went from 400 students to 20 in 3y of messing around. And I felt traped, because at that time it was to late for me to change. I was 29y at that point and me and my girlfriend had future plans that we didn't want to put on hold any longer. In that last year I lost all of my motivation I had left. The first 2 years I worked my butt off, I was often working at my school projects untill 3-4h in the morning. Every week there was atleast a day I didn't sleep at all and work true the whole night so I was awake for +40h. I gave them all I got.
Untill my grandfather and my dog both died in the same month... during finals... not that finales mattered at that point because I was devastated. My grandfather was more of a father for me than my real father was. And I got my dog before I met my girlfriend and considered him as the best friend I ever had.
I couldn't do it anymore, all this, I just couldn't do it... I droped out, once again.

Again I fell from one job into the other, McDonalds, cashier, cleaning, I did every "minor" job there is on the market.
Went working at a factory and I hated it, getting up every morning at 4am.
I between every job I had periods of being unemployed, after 1 full year of unemployment, I decided to start my own business. I failed in the first year, had to give up my business en we lost a whole lot of money, we were forced to go and live with my parents, again.

Depression:
I fell as deep as I never fell before, hitting rock bottom. And that's where I am today.

Doctor and my therapist both said the same, you're having a severe depression and I'm full of anxieties.
And it probably was going on for 4-5...6 years already (the year my grandfather past away), maybe even longer, maybe even from my childhood.
I didn't care much about my life anymore.
Suddenly I started to see things diferently, why would I keep on putting my energy to things in life I don't love? What happens when you lose your love for life?
I went into complete darkness, spend my days thinking about life and my past, the choises I've made, the people I've lost and I cried whole days long.
I just couldn't shut it down, get it all out of my head, couldn't sleep, I was begging for silence but my head didn't let me. Everyday things became a real task, eating, putting on clothes, brushing my teeth. Couldn't focus on conversations, movies, anything really. Because it all didn't matter, my life was a mess, I had enough.

Therapy:
I finally decided to go into therapy, according to my girlfriend not a day to late.
After 4 months of therapy I feel slightly better. But it's still hanging by a thread. Apparently I'm also highly sensitive.
My parents and siblings don't understand me. My girlfriend does for the most part, but there are times that it becomes to much for her.
I can't blame her.
We came to the conclusion that the most important thing I need is a lot of rest, a time to reflect upon life and when time comes thinking about the future again. Preferably somewhere in a new surounding, where I can find peace and quiet. But going on a journey is not as easy as it was for Bilbo Baggins. No people here need money and lot's of it to go on a holiday, even though I could use a whole holimonth.

But I'm stuck here, stuck at my parents place and they seem to make it worse. They're loud, all over the place, they interfere with everything, treat me as a child, talk about everything, they don't like the sound of silence, they rather talk 1h about what their cat did again during the morning than to hear the awkward sound of silence ... And from the day they know I was in a depression, they haven't changed a bit, they just don't care how I feel in this whole situation and they seem to refuse to make it easyer on me and give me some bl**** peace and quiet, that's all I'm asking for.

Meanwhile my girlfriend needed to put her studies on hold, so now she's doing a job that's asking a lot of her, I blame myself for the situation I brought her in. Because living with my parents on top of that sure isn't easy for her either.

Lately, because of the bad relationship with my parents, I'm starting to bother myself about everything they do, but at an extreme level.
My therapist told me we should get out of there as fast as we can. But we have no money, so where do we go, live on the street?
It was always our dream to go and live in America or Canada, because in our country (somewhere in Europe) there are to many people and not enough room. It's the country with the highest taxes in the world and one of the most expensive places to live in the world.
Having a own place to live, buying a house, is almost impossible for young people here. So right now there's no solution in getting out of here and the situation I'm now in will only slow down my recovery.
And basically me parents and girlfiend all hope I can get to work again as soon as possible, rather next week instead of next month.
But right now I'm in a situation where I can't find the energy to do anything, I just need to drag myself true most days. It really drains the energy I don't even have out of me, just thinking about getting back to one or the other crappy job out there saddens me.
So the pressure I feel from them pushes on me and that kind of stress on top of everything is the last thing I could use right now.

While the only thing I can think of is I want to live.
I've been true lot's of things my whole life and after I get true this mess I want to start living. I finally want to start and really enjoy life, see the world for once. And I do want to work for it, but only in the career I deserve! Because I'm 33y now and I have the feeling I haven't really lived before.

Yesterday I saw these two clips on Youtube, one from Will Smith and the other from Jim Carrey and it touched me so much, that when just thinking about it makes me tear all over again. And here you see that Jim Carrey didn't "lose it" like most people thought, he just got struck by life and I can so much relate to him right now.
I think these are well worth watching for everyone out there.

Jim Carrey: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-kaib_rXTQ

Will Smith: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRpi1NwHOac&t=5s


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