Topic: Confession time: I am seriously depressed and I feel alone

[Oblivion]

It's not exactly been diagnosed by a professional, but I feel immensely depressed. Its been creeping on me for the last few years, but now its finally crashing down on me like a wave.

I broke up with my long time girlfriend recently, and all of my friends seem to act as if I'm a burden to be around. I'm extremely apprehensive of my future and whether or not I can survive the future and (so far) imaginary hardships.

I was feeling pretty suicidal a few weeks ago and told someone on here, who thankfully contacted the admins so they could contact my local police department. Seeing the cops at my door wanting to talk to me sure was a wake up call at the time, but that shock is starting to wear off. I still thank those who were involved for what they did.

I know this is just the stupid angst of an angry 18 year old who's problems are probably less severe than what you are facing, but it's all I know. Please understand that.

Even though it's very sad that I have to admit this to a bunch of internet strangers who don't give two shits about me, I feel like this is the only place I can publicly admit something like this without everyone I know trying to make me feel better and only making it worse.

I just needed to write it down and get it out of my system. I feel a little bit better after writing this so maybe that's a good sign.

[ThePerm]

I don't know what to say except life is tough, but ultimately it is worth living.

There was a time I was stuck on the side of a cliff while hiking, which in Arizona is no fucking joke. I was stuck there for a good 30 minutes. I couldn't crawl up. My only choice was to slide down and grab some trees before falling off the cliff and then pull myself up and shimmy to more manageable ground. I'm lucky i didn't break my limb in the process. My life flashed before my eyes a series of times in the process. **** was real. I wasn't thinking about any of the bullshit that depresses me on a regular basis. I was thinking about the "Now". In those moments of survival I felt great  for escaping my danger.

Right now I work for a call center. It is miserable. It is not the first time I've worked in a call center. I look up from my cubicle and the colors are muted. I work 14 miles away from where I live. So normally it takes me an hour to get to work. I waste my time driving to a place I hate, where I'm rated like I'm some RPG character. I have to play games with my schedule. I try to get out of staring at the computer screen as much as I can. I get voluntary time off every once in a while. My time has become more valuable to me then money, because it is a fleeting resource. Usually I get VTO for 30 minutes, which speed along fast. If I can get an hour and a half than great, because then I have enough time to leave and get something to eat that isn't terrible. If I dont get much time in my shift to eat I have to resort to eating the terrible food in the vending machine. I get paid 9 dollars an hour for all of this. I have the option of a bonus, but only if I make a perfect stats.

Most of the time my job consists of reviewing bills with my clients customers. The company is a telecommunications network of which I wont name. You probably have their services if you live on the east coast. A lot of customers I would rate as illiterate because their bills are clear as day. The ruminate of petty things. I can check what they pay, when they pay. Often I credit customers who have legitimate problems with their bills. A good third of the customers are just plain dumb. I find myself in heated arguments. I stay calm most of the time, but on occasion everyone will get pissed the **** off. I feel like an actor sometimes. I really want to rip their heads off, but I can't swear, I can't tell them off. I have walked out of work after 3 calls in the past 6 months. I don't get paid for this bullshit.  I think to myself, if I can do this **** I can do anything.

One of my disappointments in life was that my going to college didn't get me anywhere. They call them starving artists for a reason. On my days off I don't spend a lot of time consuming entertainment. I have been trying for a couple of months to work on projects in my spare time. Most likely I have a case of adhd. Which makes it hard for me to keep to one project at a time. I have a bloodbath of projects in my wake that have gone nowhere. I think they are all great, but I probably need two or three other people to work on them with me. During my week I only have 2 days of freedom from the cult of money. They speed fast. I try to make the best of my day.

of which I have found people to be generally unreliable. Most people seem to be passively wasting their lives away at work. I avoided this for a number of years, but it was inevitable I would need to do it to make some sort of progress in my life. I can't seem to find a good group of collaborators. Everyone seems to think that I am going to do all the work for them, and that they can just latch onto my coattails. Which is why as friends in a group we've just managed to stay in our static state within Danté's cold circle of hell. I'm just annoyed I have little support on anything. I think about moving myself to see if I can find an egalitarian system of altruistic development. Maybe I just know the wrong people and need to rid myself of their toxicity. I have friends who want to start a project, but if they are just going to sit at home and smoke weed every 22 minutes then we're going to get nowhere. I try to initiate stuff, but they find excuses to hold it off and not do anything. It is even their idea originally. I try to take initiative, but I feel like I'm the strongest link in a pathetically weak chain. In any case I want to be the weakest link for a change. I do have some friends who have potential and talent though, but we haven't figured out what to collaborate on. I feel like I'm in some crazy metal band.

As far as relationships go, my biggest problem is I am picky. Ultimately, the opposite sex is picky as well. Every once in a while I fool around with someone who is unattractive just to temporarily satisfy some natural need. Ultimately I have little time for them and I really don't want to waste my time with fickle drama. I do desire a good steady relationship, but it has been a while and I must be permanently scarred from the last time. I've also been scarred from potential relationships that went nowhere. My quantity has been much greater than my quality. Relationships don't get me down anymore though. They are the least of my worries.

Very often while I am in my waking life I think about 1984, Metropolis, and dystopic future. In some way I feel like this is already the reality. I feel like I am part of some gross mass manipulation.

Recently, I got into a car accident. I was just driving and  a car got out of nowhere. The other driver was making a left turn into a hotel parking lot across 2 lanes. My vision of the other car was obstructed by another lane of cars. Ultimately the other drive should have made sure he was absolutely clear of my lane before he darted out. Thats what the cop said. That sounded right to me as well. The accident didn't shake me up, I  wasn't in shock. I didn't have a flashback. It was nothing to me, just some regular **** that everyone goes through.  I'm 29 and had never been in an accident, but you think it would shake me up. The thing I was more worried about was if I would get fired from work for being late.

Still, I have an optimistic outlook that I will one day pull myself out of this meager existence and climb up to greatness.

[RABicle]

[Tlon]

[Tlon]

[Tlon]

High Def : http://www.nfb.ca/film/necktie/

[UncleBob]

I don't have much to add to the OP, but for those who don't know RABicle's post, Ally did a wonderful err... "essay" on depression that perfectly captures what depression is.  People who haven't actually suffered from depression (like the real, overpowering depression) seem to have a complete misunderstanding of what it is like.

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2013/05/depression-part-two.html

The dead goldfish analogy is pure genius and I really feel that Ally should win some kind of award for her ability to put depression into words (and pictures) that anyone can comprehend.

[Ceric]

Well I'm going to chime in.

I'm 30 and no where near where I wanted to be by this time.  I have a "Good" Job, as in statistically speaking I make about double the median income which I have no idea how.  In all reality I dread coming to work because its not interesting and I'm treated worst than a piece of liver on the plate of a 6 year old.  The funny thing is that company doesn't realize it as all.

Even though I make "good" money and the Misses works as well I live in a terribly designed house, its like wearing shoes all the time that are 1 size to small, because that is what I can afford.  Comparatively speaking I'm suppose to be Upper Middle Class but, can only afford a Lower Middle Class life. 

My Family is more of a burden then a joy.  I'm fairly sure I married wrong.  Married too similar to me in the ways that I should have found an opposite and found an opposite in the ways that should probably have been similar.

I have to many pets so its a burden to go places.  My Son is strong willed and stubborn.  I have mixed feelings on culling that because in the Real World he is going to need those skills to make it up the corporate ladder unlike his father.

On the social side I don't have any real friends.  Though my threshold for going from Good Acquittance to Friend maybe is too high.  It boils down to if I was moving and I asked for some help would they say yes.  I didn't think that was too high but I am mistaken.  My natural state of being seems to burn bridges.

Recently went to church and the Pastor asked a question about the Tone of the speaker in the lesson this week.  I answered and was immediately asked by the Pastor what I did for a living.  My Answer seemed to indicate that my view of the world was so different that it had to have been trained.  I have a hard time finding like minds.

My luck runs weird.  I'll get the drop I need in a game first time sometime but mostly I'll get it way after I should.  I once killed about 40 monsters to get 2 of an item with 40% drop rate.  RNG doesn't err to my favor but, thats pretty common.  My luck tends to pull my Life slightly below the middle.


I tend to start projects and have them well planned but, despite my best effort fate seems to come into play and they don't get finished.  It seems the closer I am to finishing the less inclined I am too.  Though thats just me.


I am talented at what I do at work.  I'm not talented at anything really practical for the world outside of work and at that only the non-social aspect of the in-work portion.  Even though I'm talented doesn't equal success because its not in the social graces.

In the end though I trace most of my issues to only 1 constant and that's me.  I am the one who made the decisions.  I am the who made the plans.  I am the one who did the actions.  Unfortunately despite my best efforts I am the one that can't seem to effect change.


Probably the most frustrating thing of all of it is on paper I am doing well.  So why am I not truly successful?  What makes it so that I can't keep my house from looking like its 3 people, 4 pets, and a Mini Tornado living there?  Build up enough good will and respect that one event wouldn't blow it away?  Be Interesting? I can take comfort in knowing that out in the world their are other people like me.   Well maybe...

[RABicle]

I tend to start projects and have them well planned but, despite my best effort fate seems to come into play and they don't get finished.  It seems the closer I am to finishing the less inclined I am too.  Though thats just me.

That's everyone, or more accurately, that's me too. The 80/20 principle. My life.
I do it with university assignments. It's the ultimate in self sabotage. I am 26 and still have not completed the undergraduate I began in 2006.

Anyway a video from the exiled Ty arrived on my desk this morning. In addition to decapitating an effigy of TJ Spyke and calling for more militant action in Ankara he suggested that Oblivion get off the pit of unnhappiness that is NWR, get some vitamin d in him and possibly consider moving to Japan or South East Asia.

[Ceric]

Yeah in college I had an English essay to write and I literally got distracted by being bored.

[Oblivion]

Why Japan or Asia?

[RABicle]

Because the American dream is dead. Just look at Ceric and ThePerms' stories. It doesn't get better, it gets worse. Former PGC regular Deguello has a Psychology degree with honours and can't get a job selling slushie.
I think Ty only likes Japan because he's a weeaboo, but you can live a life of relaxation (mentally) and comfort in Laos or Thailand jsut by being white and male.

[Ceric]

Personally like to go to Germany or Canada.

[ThePerm]

I was going to post the "this is water" video when I woke up. I saw it shortly before the accident. I was thinking had I been 19 I would have been crying and freaked out in this situation. But we just sort of waited around for the police to come and sat in  the sun and chatted. We joked about how you always just see people waiting around in these situations and it was glad insurance companies handled these situation. We were just glad everyone was ok.

[Ceric]

You'd be surprised.  My first Wreck was when I was 16-17.  I was driving home from school when the person in front of me suddenly stopped, ironically I actually knew them.  I swerved to the open lane to my right but, then I get bumped by the person behind me.  I was literally an inch away from being totally out of the path of everyone.  My car was the one that received the most damage in the end the bumper went like this \___/.  Since all are cars were drivable we pulled the whole assembly to the Ingles parking lot besides us while we waited for the police.  Good thing too.  The Police officer came down from Sevierville to Farragut which is about an hour or so.  You don't want to block a lane of Kingston Pike for an hour. (Be like stopping a 1 lane of a 2 lane Interstate.)  I continued to drive that car like that through most of college.  Until being lent a Probe and then I bought the Neon.  Great car but I got Swindled when I bought it.  I tried to return it the next day but they wouldn't let me.  Now I know that that was illegal.

[Caterkiller]

Life is tough man. I certainly don't know real depression but the last 2 years have been really tough for me.

Thank goodness I have a great wife and daughter or man I don't know where I'd be right now. When I was 18 I had all these big dreams! I just started training in Wushu and I just started as Spider-Man. I was on top of the world! Still not much has happened in between now and then that I feel really propelled me forward. I'm going to start name dropping so bare with me. Wu Bin, Jet Li's only teacher was so proud of me, a foreigner, for teaching high quality wushu and sticking to a system that didn't rely on tricks. He used to stand in the balcony of my school and just looked so proud. Jacky Chan walks in say's similar things before we all go work on Rush Hour 3. I taught the son of a man named Scott Ma, he was in and choreographed Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. He would leave work early to come and watch me teach, he was always telling me what a great a teacher I was and one day I would do these great things. You know just people filling my head with grand ideas.

I trained with Marc Dacascos often before he left and got a little bigger. Used to train with Ray Park, Darth Maul, before Heroes and GI Joe took him away. Michael J White was always in and out the door talking about this big project he wanted to do and I was promised a trip to china to go work on it. I wasn't good enough to go and it turned out to be crap anyway.

My personal students, Tiphany Pham, is Piper on that Nick show Bucket and Skinner's Epic Adventures. I watched her grow her skill and career right before my eyes. Another student of mine Brian F, his wife is Nancy Gribble, he is in every commercial known to man, and was recently the Lawyer who ate poison frogs in Grimm. I mean it goes on and on like that.

I watch these people, some of which are good friends of mine and I feel like I can never be as successful as they are. It's very depressing to me. Then when I finally get a bone thrown to me and I get hired for what ever movie, commercial or what ever, I ultimately get cut. I swear it's a curse. Now when I get a job I don't even like to talk about it to my wife because I feel like even if I shoot something when it actually airs i'll be left on the editing room floor.

Then 2 years ago we lost our wushu school/production studio. I was the right hand man to my head coach and he moved back to china for a while. We always knew I would inherit the school, but not like that. I rented out of raggedy little places, until I found a place decent enough. But it's so hard to gain new students with out a place of my own. They walk in and see some multi racial black guy and wonder if I'm really the teacher. They don't see flipping and tumbling and assume what I teach isn't authentic. All the while my guys who finally earned their black belts after about 5 years just got too busy with school/work/life and are gone. It was like $500 a month just gone cause they finally passed that mile stone. They had only just joined the club to really try and make it to greatness and then just gone. I love my intermediate guys and my beginners, but I love my advanced guys so much and it's like a dagger through my heart to just have them gone.

Then last week I learned they are auctioning off everything in my old school. Pictures, weapons, all things sentimental, what ever it was to be sold off.
http://www.fleetwoodauctioncenter.com/cgi-bin/mnlist.cgi?fleetwood5/category/ALL

It took me 3 days to get things out of there and every time I walked in the building I just wanted to cry and wushu chop every competitor and rival that showed up. There were people in there just being so disrespectful to my personal history it was rage inducing. Still, I felt if anyone got things out of there I was glad it was more wushu people. Look at 633 and you can see what the inside of the school looked like. It took us so long to build it up that way.

In the last 3 years I do my taxes and just notice with each year I make less and less. It's extremely depressing and sometimes I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel. Thankfully though my family, friends and students are super supportive and I know i'll climb out of this hole eventually. In the middle of it all I know how hard it is.
Add into that a chronic injury that keeps me from moving to hard or too fast and I just feel like i'm failing at life.

Oblivion I don't know what to tell you personally. I'm no doctor and my depression certainly doesn't go that far. But I will tell you this, with women, or men, who ever you decide to date and ultimately break up with, there will be another some day. I remember how hard it was to take being dumped when I was like 19. Man I thought i'd never get it over it. Makes you feel sick to your stomach just thinking about her right? Yeah, but it will pass. Just trust me. And tomorrow darn it, you never know who you're gonna meet. I'm dead serious, man there is always tomorrow.

I was never the type that was as angry as you would come off as sometimes here on the forums, but I remember just kind of taking a personal philosophy of "well, it always works out in the end." I swear that has calmed me down a million times over, cause when I really thought about everything that stressed me way the heck out, by the time it was all said and done, everything was just fine and I lived on. 

Thinking about it now. I realized I don't listen to the music that I used to listen to when I was upset. Be right back, if your a child at heart like me, maybe these will help.

[Ian Sane]

There was one point in my life where the idea of suicide entered my thoughts.  It was after a relationship ended, one where we would talk of "when" we got married, not "if".  The pain was so great and overwhelming I didn't know how I could continue with life.  But one thing truly pushed suicide aside for me permanently and it was pretty selfish and somewhat immature, but it worked.  It appealed to my rebellious side.  If I killed myself, "they" won.  "They" could be my ex-girlfriend specifically, society, the world, God, the devil, the universe, whatever.  For whatever was making me depressed, I was not going to let it win out of sheer spite.

A few years later I went though several years of depression, due to relationship problems and a crisis of faith.  I would like to say that things will get better and you won't be depressed any more.  I figured that was the cure to what ailed me; my life wasn't going so well so naturally if things got better I wouldn't be depressed anymore.  That still makes sense to me and seems completely logical.  However it didn't work like that.  My life is really no different than it was then.  It seems like I just got used to things, like how scratching your knee made you cry as a child but not as an adult.  While I would prefer if things just got better, at least I can handle things as is.  I guess I have adapted emotionally.

So while I would love to say "don't worry things will get better", I can't and the people who would tell me that stuff drove me nuts because they seemed so full of **** at worst and at best just did not relate to my situation because for them things just luckily always have gotten better (my life worked like that until I was about 25; I thought it was normal but now I know it's just blind luck).  What I can say is that for me I adapted emotionally where depression was not dominating my life anymore.  So maybe things will get better, maybe they won't, but you won't feel this way forever.

[Caterkiller]

The Bear Necessities.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08NlhjpVFsU


Find Your Voice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNoZRjXPtQE


How do I post the video directly in the comments?


Any way, yeah, these songs honestly put a 27 year old like me in a good mood. I have an itunes play list with a lot of songs like these titled "inspirational" for just such an occasion.


It's obvious that everyone else goes through crap but it's nice I suppose to know that you aren't alone. Misery loves company right? 

[Oblivion]

What Ian Sane said near the end of his last post is something I never thought about before. Comparing this to a scrape on the knee as a young child versus an adult is quite similar to how I'm feeling right now. Maybe right now it feels like the worst pain in the world, but I might start to get "used" to it have and a higher "pain tolerence" as I get older.

Also, I'm less pained by my breakup, and more pained with the realization that she was my only friend. I relied on her for friendship, so when she was out of my life, I had (and still have) no one else to confide in. I'm most certainly an extrovert, but a shy one. I have trouble making friends even though I crave it.

And yes, Bear Necessities always gets a smile out of me. I feel the same way with certain other songs too, thanks.

[Ceric]

Ian's right.  Things don't get better naturally.  They just change.

[Pixelated Pixies]

Personally, I do feel that it can sometimes be a comfort to hear that other people have similar anxieties and inhibitions. I certainly appreciate where many of you are coming from and think that discussions of this kind don't happen nearly enough.
 
I myself am a crippling introvert who has no friends, no career prospects and no money, and unfortunately feelings of depression are not uncommon to be. The only advice I can give you is to try to do something that you enjoy, something that you love. It doesn't have to be a career and it doesn't have to save your life. I'm also not talking about dulling your senses with video games, tv or alcohol (although, let's be honest, those can help too), but rather something that you value and makes you feel constructive. For my father it was making models. For me it's playing guitar (albiet poorly) and running. Many people will find that their heads are invariably dragged back to places they'd prefer not to go, but all you can do is try to enjoy the small things and take the big things as they come.
 
Sometimes I also find it useful to tell myself
 
"F*** this S***!"
 
Sometimes being angry at something, or nothing, helps focus the mind and pull you out of that place.
 
Well, that's my platitude for the day. I can never talk about this kind of stuff without coming off like a self help book, lol.

[ShyGuy]

I was depressed a long time ago for about six years over a broken heart and I didn't even realize it until it was over. I snapped out of it when I saw that my friends had worse lives and were in a more positive state of mind.

Now I'm a lot less stress than I used to be. Heck, I've almost died twice in the last year and a half and it doesn't bother me.

Two key components of my philosophy of living:

1. There are more important things for me to do with my life than work towards personal happiness.

2. I do not fear death.

[Caterkiller]

Freakin Shy Guy. Now that is a real man talking.

[TJ Spyke]

I am glad you aren't feeling suicidal again. Wish I could add more, but I think it's been covered by now. You will be OK. As much as people here like to sometimes rag on each other, you are always free to talk about serious stuff like here and get real answers.

[lolmonade]

Oblivion, it's unfair to dismiss how you're feeling because you're " an angry 18 year old who's problems are probably less severe than what you are facing".  That age is a difficult transitioning period for a lot of people, and just because there are people "worse off than you" doesn't mean your struggle is insignificant. 

Being 18 can suck really hard, especially given your circumstances (I had similar experiences at that age).  I don't know enough about your personal situation to provide detailed suggestions, but I can offer input that once you're able to move on from it, so many of the struggles you had in the past will not only seem trivial in retrospect, but provide you with much-needed experience and perspective going into future hardships/struggles down the road that will make those future challenges much more manageable.

I don't know your living situation or if depression is a true representation of what you're feeling, but even if you don't have health insurance, there are places you can get assistance for covering the cost of a psychologist.  Clinical depression isn't the only thing these trained professionals take patients for, and they can certainly be good for a professional, unbiased ear to listen and ask questions that may be able to give you a different perspective on how you're feeling, and how to approach the troubles you're encountering.

Regardless of what you choose to do, I wish you all the best while you work out these issues.