Month: April 2018

The Difficulty In Finding Communities for People With Mental Health

Odds are by the time you read this post, one of the web resources that I used during my most difficult bouts of depression will have shutdown.  MyCounterpane.com founded by Kate Milliken after her MS diagnosis was in many ways one of the few safe havens I found at the time which allowed me a degree of privacy and options to help me track my mood changes, talk to other people who were dealing with similar issues and by and large conversations were moderated to insure that things never got too far out of hand. While MCP is formally shutting down May 1st, I thought it important to comment on why there’s so much of a need for sites like MCP and I do hope that Kate finds a way to continue to achieve her goals in community building and perhaps finding a business model that works to help connect folks in a collaborative and supportive community.

Working in IT I’ve always had a weird love/hate thing with technology. While on the one hand it can bring people closer together, I’ve also felt that at times it serves to lessen the quality of interaction we have. That’s not to say that every interaction needs to be some grand event but between social media and online toxic communities it can be terrifying to put yourself out there if you don’t fit that perfect mold of the “OMG I’m so happy and blessed and popular” Facebook star, YouTuber or Instagram icon.

The two resources I used during the middle of my divorce were MyCounterpane and Pacifica, both were online tools (with Pacifica offering a subscription option) which allowed me to objectively look at mood trending and each had their variation of ‘posts’ and community chats which were intended to allow open and frank conversations. As time went on I needed to use those resources less though I still tried wherever possible to keep tracking my attitude and emotional states (and in the case of Pacifica, health habits too). While for some this might seem silly when you have all these broader communities such as FB, Twitter or Instagram, my general impression of most of them is that the vast majority use the same typical language. “It gets better”, “Just get over it” or “That’s sad, I wish I could help” We all fall into these patterns, that’s the catch-22 with a connected world when difficult emotions arise, when mental health issues are present most folks can’t do anything but send well wishes.

Sometimes its easier to talk to a strangers than the people close to you.  This adage was especially true for me. In the midst of my divorce one of the biggest issues was that I found it almost impossible to really engage with any of my friends before conversations became too uncomfortable. Being able to vent to a community of other people going through a divorce or people who had dealt with depression following divorce was freeing. Advice wasn’t tinted by a past, opinions were just that and somehow easier to read and move on.  Agree with me, disagree with me it didn’t seem to matter as much as being able to get my thoughts out there and getting perspective. In some cases I had to reflect more upon my actions, others I’d look at the actions my ex had taken and tried to shift my view. It wasn’t particularly fun at first but got easier over time. I came to also realize that not all online communities were necessarily a ‘safe haven’. Reddit’s /r/depression sub is certainly a mix of good/bad.  For the most part the community sincerely tried to help one another, but at times the amount of reaching out could become overwhelming.  I often found myself taking a step away from the sub-reddit when I realized I was brought down in mood more by seeing how much others were struggling. I still find myself going back now and then to see if I can offer my thoughts and opinions in a constructive way to someone else who is just starting on their journey but self-monitoring my own state is still top priority.

While MCP may be gone, I do hope that other groups, free online communities or even subscription business models find ways to become as accessible as possible to people looking for help. The first few steps are hard, I won’t try to sugar coat that. Taking those steps though can mean the difference between feeling completely overwhelmed to finding a way to ride through the storm.

Online Communities and Resources:
As a general aside, online communities can be a helpful resource but if you find yourself needing help, seek professional help be it a general physician, a psychologist or even a therapist.
Pacifica/http://www.thinkpacifica.com/

Reddit – /r/depression

7-Cups/https://www.7cups.com/

WordPress
While not expressly focused on depression, I’ve found a number of great bloggers all sharing their experiences and stories

Stress Awareness Month — And Mental Health

Stress Awareness Month 2018

I suppose there’s logic, at least for we US folks, that April would be stress awareness month. With tax season smack in the middle of April it isn’t exactly the best of times. For me I have double-reasons to be aware. April is also when I got divorced.

One of the biggest challenges in addressing depression for me has been knowing how my body is reacting to stress and how I chose to respond to it actively. For me the first indicator my body gives me is an increase insomnia. I’ll find sleep harder and harder to come by. As a result I’ll usually feel much more fatigued and prone to feeling pain throughout the waking hours. My usual approach to this has been to try and get in a bit of exercise to force myself asleep or to use the occasional dose of melatonin  to help ease me into sleep.

Irritability is the other common symptom that I manifest. This one is often harder to attribute to depression or stressors as I work in a fairly high stress industry to begin with. I’ll usually journal about moments where I’ve found myself ranting more or becoming shorter with people in conversation. As a target shooter one of my common de-stressing activities is hitting the range and getting behind a firearm.  This isn’t something I recommend for everybody.  Be it a pistol or a small 22LR rifle, practicing my accuracy and fundamentals and the safety surrounding it is calming for me.

The last major symptom is probably the most common for folks but also the most challenging. Stress eating is a hit/miss thing with. While I don’t binge eat as I did early on in my depression, I do still find myself making bad eating choices when stress mounts. I’ve tried to divert those urges by always having simple protein snacks on hand like jerky or healthier alternatives to sweets like fruits, nuts or yogurt.

Life throws a lot of stress our way, April or otherwise. Make it a point to see what things are stressing you out and what you can do to process through it. Find your coping tools, make use them in moderation and listen to your body. It’s easy to get into the spiral and to let the stress build until you let it off in negative ways. Here’s hoping your April ends relatively stress free.

 

World Health Day — Tasks I’m Using To Address My Mental Health

One of the bloggers I follow (Sonyo Estavillo, https://lilpickmeup.com/)happened to note that today is World Health Day. While most of the news about it centers around physical health and access to health services, I thought I’d throw out some aspects of mental health and in particular the activities I use to help manage my dysthymia.

A throwback to some of the earliest posts from my own blog, I continue to use both digital and traditional adult coloring books as a mental reset. In particular Pigment by Pixite (http://pixiteapps.com/pigment/).[All Pigment images copyright to their respective artists]

Be it a watercolor styled sketch or something cartooney like a grumpy bear.

Pigment provides me an outlet that goes way outside of my normal activities. I’m an IT person by trade so I’m around blunt, fairly bland data all day. A bit of artistic expression is very much the opposite of my day and it certainly helps to slow myself down when things get hectic.

Despite having terrible handwriting, I still find that I enjoy the practice of writing in a journal. Sometimes it’s just ranting about the things that frustrate me, or reminding myself of my goals and the things I need to focus on, there’s something to be said for putting pen to paper and just getting the thoughts out of your head and onto print.

The last of my activities is not something I recommend for everybody, particularly if your depression or anxiety is severe.  I am a target shooter and hunter. For me getting to a gun range and being able to focus on nothing but myself and the target is one of the few things I can do today where I can sink my teeth into. For a few brief hours everything else that bothers me is put aside and I am not floating about in my own thoughts but I am there in the moment. The focus on safety, awareness and precision for me is a calming thing. Obviously this particularly coping tool suites me but it would not apply to everyone.

The important thing I want folks to take away or think about today is what are the things you can do to help your current state, even if it’s just releasing a bit of the stress. If you haven’t tried something artistic, or journaling, seek out something that can hold your interest in a productive way and find a way to balance it in your total health picture.

Time and Friendship – Article and Thoughts

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/brain-waves/201803/how-do-you-make-or-maintain-friends-put-in-the-time

I happened upon the above article by chance but it’s something that’s weighed on me for a while. What are the factors to how we gauge friendships. While the study suggested that there’s certainly some milestones in terms of interaction hours I tend to question how effective that is at framing a friendship.

The crux of the article focused some baseline such as 50 hours of interaction in moving from acquaintance to friend. While close friends were those whom people interacted with for 200 hours or more. While I would find those numbers plausible it sort of misses out on another factor which is the affect of time and lack of interaction. That idea has wrestled in my mind for some time.

Following my divorce I knew I had to change how I interacted with people. In my view there were friends who were established through the marriage and my ex, there were friends that I considered neutral, best friends, close friends, casual friends and acquaintances. The vast majority of my friendships were really now more acquaintances or casual than meaningful friends. I used to use a basic metric, if I have had several meals with you, or better yet if I’ve cooked for you, you can at least be thought of as a friend. The changes in dynamics with most of the friends who overlapped with my ex made me realize that there’s definitely a negative counter on friendships as well. Like any living thing, failing to nurture friendships will over time take its toll. I had to play a dangerous and painful game of understanding where my mental and emotional efforts would have to be put to survive. Some past friends has to be culled. Not because of who they were, but because of the circumstances of the divorce. Interacting with them on any level was draining and would often cause me to go into a spiral that I found no good way out of.  This pruning has gone on for the last two years and admittedly while those people whom I still communicate with are certainly locked into a ‘friend’ status with me, I realize the majority have fallen by the way-side due to neglect, either intentional or through happenstance.

Quantitative analysis is all fine and good but I also realize that there’s a far less tangible qualitative aspect that cannot be readily pinned down which affects how our friendships are nurtured, grow or wither. For me I’d like to think that the closest rung of my friends have now seen me through good and bad and are able to weather both my moods and life circumstances. There is a trust there that I won’t try to be something I’m not. To those friends who are now casual or even bumped back down to simply acquaintances, these are people while I may want to keep in contact with, I realize probably won’t see much of me beyond a cultivated image. Good or bad it’s how I have to compartmentalize relationships in my life. Take the article with a grain of salt and just remember that friendships take effort. Sometimes it can be trying, you may not get to keep all the friends you want to, but make that effort.