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Author Topic: Cats are nice  (Read 1985 times)

Castus

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Cats are nice
« on: June 28, 2017, 05:09:36 am »
"I meant," said Ipslore bitterly, "what is there in this world that truly makes living worthwhile?"
Death thought about it.
CATS, he said eventually. CATS ARE NICE.

-- Terry Prachett, Sourcery

I really do love cats. I just recently got a kitten for my birthday. Her name is Chava and she's the best. Hawke can vouch for this. But I don't think Chava, God bless her, can alone make living worthwhile. I am increasingly convinced that nothing can. I thought about putting this in Prayer Requests or TISI but neither one really fits. So here; I guess this SIG works.

Trigger... alert? Is that how that works? Trigger alert? I don't know these things; I'm a Republican.

Anyhow. I have no-one else to talk to, so you all drew the short straw. As my thread history in PR may indicate I've been battling chronic depression since late 2015 or so. From 2016 on I've been institutionalised on three separate occasions -- the last, notably, being the result of a hilarious story involving lots of vodka. But that's neither here nor there. Anyhow, since my release in May from the hospital (May 1st to be exact, so we're coming up on two months) things went well for like two weeks and I've been collapsing slowly ever since. I've had two major breakdowns in the last three weeks; the first of which featured a great deal of pointing a kitchen knife at my own chest and gripping the handle very tightly. The second one was earlier today (well, late yesterday now) and was less dramatic although no less traumatic in the scheme of things. I'm so tired. So tired. I am constantly assailed with visions of hurting myself in violent and implausible ways. If I can time it well I may seriously consider killing myself after I post this. I don't know. It's like being trapped within a constant explosion.

I just get so angry and so tired. I want to stab myself quite a bit. The thought of violently breaking my own fingers is also quite appealing. I'm so angry and tired. It's impossible to describe. That's part of the hell of it, really. All these feelings and emotions and being entirely unable to fully express what it's like besides images of hurting myself. Stabbing my chest, crushing in my head, ripping my chest open, stabbing myself in the head, strangling myself, blowing out my brains, carving open my throat with a knife. etc etc. I just feel a deep, deep emptiness. A void. And when not immersed in the void I'm busy questioning my own emotions and whether my thoughts are genuine; and hating myself more and more and more and more for all of the things I do that I hate, the things about myself that I hate.

I'm trapped in this horrible vicious cycle of hospitalisations and never getting better. I'm so tired and angry. I want to break free of this but the only way to do that is to die. But dying scares me. Dying scares me and living is fucking terrible because I'm just fucking losing my mind and descending into stark raving madness. I can't describe it. No-one can help me. I don't want to "get help" because that fucking means nothing. Within the last year and a half I've spent four total weeks in mental institutes; I've been in talk therapy every single week, and I've been medicated daily for well over a year as well. If that isn't "getting help" then I have no idea what getting help is supposed to look like. I know I'll feel better later, but it will just be a band-aid at best. It always comes back. People have told me that it's my fault that the help isn't working. I'm not trying hard enough to improve. I'm not getting a job. I'm not going to school or opening up or self-improving or behaving or doing any of the things I'm supposed to. I don't know how I can get a job when I can't even physically work a full-time job and can /barely/ work a part-time one. I don't know how I can go to school when I can barely hold myself together and when trying to figure out what I want to do with my life usually leads to frustration and visions of extravagant self-mutilation. Of course this is all overlaid by the fact that I am functionally incompetent, frightened, irresponsible and self-destructively lazy to the point where I --know-- I need to fix things but feel compulsively unable to improve; totally convinced that I am suffering from an irredeemable defect of character.

There are so many things wrong with me you wouldn't believe. I want to scream and rip myself open and die. Also break and/or rip off my toes. That one came to me just now. Also the eye-gouging. Do you know how many friends I have? Three. Four if I'm being generous. They can't help me, how the fuck are they supposed to help when medical professionals can't help me? When my own brain is fucking destroying me? I'm drifting away from all of them anyway so I guess it doesn't matter in the long run. There's really nothing at this point. I need to get really fucking high. Just fucking stratospheric. Weed, coke, ecstasy, acid, let's throw 'em all in; and then once I'm so fucked I'm barely a human anymore or once I am quite literally going insane because coke, acid, weed, and ecstasy should not be mixed, I can finally work up the courage to kill myself in the most violent way imaginable. I'm not going to do any of that, of course. I don't have the means or the opportunity. All I'm going to do is suffer and hate myself and feel so many emotions that I can't even think in a straight line. I'm not gonna kill myself. I can't keep living. sigh.
“Castus, meanwhile, goes straight for the bad theology like one of those creepy fish that swims up streams of pee.” — Darkhawk

“Believing in the Lord means you are connected to me no matter when you are poor, sick, or struggling in a relationship. I am always with you. I want you to believe that. The future is uncertain, and much suffering awaits. However, the mission of the believer is to live life doing their best, no matter what the circumstances.” — Ryuho Okawa

Vixen

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Re: Cats are nice
« Reply #1 on: June 28, 2017, 07:52:54 am »
I really do love cats.

I love cats. I love dogs more, but I do love my cat. I think my cat loves me too. She brings me decapitated mice daily.
The other day she brought home a stunned mouse and gave it to one of my dogs to teach it how to hunt. It was the cutest thing ever.

Anyhow. There's no way I can tell you I know how you feel. Cause I simply don't. But I want you to know that I have a lot of respect for you to be able to put this out in the open like this. There is still a big taboo on mental illnesses and speaking out like you do will probably help others come to grips with their situation.
You are one of the people who's reactions I always read on the forums. I love your insights and your quick wit.
I wish there was something I could do for you. For now I'll give you a big virtual hug (after you put that knife down, thank you) and I'll keep you in my thoughts.
You're only given a little spark of madness, you mustn't lose it.

Darkhawk

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Re: Cats are nice
« Reply #2 on: June 28, 2017, 03:14:26 pm »
"I meant," said Ipslore bitterly, "what is there in this world that truly makes living worthwhile?"
Death thought about it.
CATS, he said eventually. CATS ARE NICE.

-- Terry Prachett, Sourcery

I don't have all of that going on but I've had periods of self-harm and violent self-harm ideation in the past, and dear gods the self-harm ideation is terrifying.  (When I'm under serious stress I can't go near the knife block or look at the cleaver, because it sets me off still and I just nope right on out of there.)

Speaking from my own perspective of hopeless clinical depression: I was incapable of getting better in any useful ways (as opposed to beating myself up for being a total fucking failure and waste of protein) before I got some of the underlying issues treated.  And the underlying issues may not be - probably are not - stuff that gets treated as a "psychological disorder".  Specifically: I have an autoimmune disease that has mildly physically debilitating effects on me and also produces symptoms of being a lazy shit who should be ground under the wheels of hopeless capitalism for generalised worthlessness:  fatigue, laggy thoughts, depression, memory issues, complicated physical frailty and exertion issues, and crankiness.

I first got proper treatment for this reasonably common disease for which I had symptomology, a family medical history, and relevant personal medical history going back twenty years in my mid-thirties.  Trying to unlearn the "everyone's got minor problems, you're just a useless lump of poo" that got ground-in over time has been... hard.

What I'm trying to say is the odds are good there's something glitched out biochemically, and it's quite possibly even something that can be fixed, and some fucking idiots are blowing it off or not looking at the right things.  I know it's hard to self-advocate, especially when there's mental effects going on, but you might get something you can actually work with if someone checked your hormone balances, or your subtle vitamin issues in detail, or a whole bunch of other things.

I've been on an antidepressant that actually worked for me but nothing worked for what's actually wrong with me but thyroxine.  I hope there's something that can be found and addressed for you too, that will make all the rest of it easier.
as the water grinds the stone
we rise and fall
as our ashes turn to dust
we shine like stars    - Covenant, "Bullet"

Ashmire

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Re: Cats are nice
« Reply #3 on: June 28, 2017, 10:25:01 pm »
"I meant," said Ipslore bitterly, "what is there in this world that truly makes living worthwhile?"
Death thought about it.
CATS, he said eventually. CATS ARE NICE.

-- Terry Prachett

trying to figure out what I want to do with my life usually leads to frustration and visions of extravagant self-mutilation. Of course this is all overlaid by the fact that I am functionally incompetent, frightened, irresponsible and self-destructively lazy to the point where I --know-- I need to fix things but feel compulsively unable to improve;


Darkhawk already said most of what I wanted to say, but if strongly seconding that helps, I would definitely add my vote for trying to find a non-mental-health solution, especially since it sounds like those things aren't working.   You aren't likely to have the specific thing that most affected my brain, since that's female-only, but there are tons of other   treatable conditions that can make you feel crazy.   Most of the years between puberty and age 30 are a blur of deranged crying jags and screaming fits in my memory, and none of it had to be if people hadn't been looking for a defect in my mind and personality instead of in my endocrine and reproductive systems.

Also, at 19 I was nowhere near ready for many of the things people say you should be, but I did eventually manage to find a job and live indepedently, so remember you are really, really young and being young, contrary to popular belief, mostly sucks.

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