Author: iainsidemyhead

Last night I posted on facebook ( https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10216579259342795&id=1498428165 ) About how going to a barbecue for just a little bit was such a huge achievement for me. I was in tears after it took so much out of me. Pretty much a day on and the tears are coming again. Slower at barely a trickle but there. Tonight I feel so lonely and alone and miserable and fed up and useless and a let down and so many other negative words. I wish there was some way I could feel a little more positive and valued and worthy and there was someone who could show me I am. In theory I know there is but it is a struggle to actually believe that. And even more of a struggle to believe that anyone who is a friend and who cares will be around in the future. I’m not at keeping in touch with people. I don’t have old friends from school or even many from uni I see or talk to on even a semi regular basis. I feel like I didn’t do anything today. Oh sure I went to play cricket until the Ballymena weather stopped it. But I didn’t do much there. I was up from 3am before that (insomnia again) but all I did in the 6 or 7 hours I had between then and getting ready to leave was lie on the sofa watching tv and eat some breakfast. When the game finished I was among the earliest to leave. I went home and watched some more tv. I went to the shop to buy a few things I needed or had said I would get for cricket and tag. I had hoped to do this while doing a full shop but I couldn’t face trying to do it all. I had dinner. Take away. Ordered for delivery so I didn’t have to do anything. I lay and watched some more tv. I had hoped that today with no work and only a short game of cricket I would manage to do my dishes or some washing or cleaning. I managed to throw the bath mats in the washing machine and nearly left them in it after they were done. The dishes still lie beside the sink. The heap of clothes still lies beside the laundry basket (yep most of them aren’t even in it). I had hoped that I might enjoy myself parts of the day and feel better for having been out last night. Maybe I did. I don’t really remember it though. I feel like I did nothing with the day. But I did. I survived. I got up. I had breakfast. I took my tablets. I got dressed. I went out. I drove to Ballymena and played cricket for a bit even if I wasn’t great. I drove home. I went to the shop. I had dinner. I tried to read for a bit. And I did it all without falling apart. Yes I had panicky spells and tough spells and spells I wanted to be left alone or crawl into bed but I survived. And it took until half nine (ish) for me to cry. And I’m still here. I’m still trying. So I achieved a hell of a lot. I survived another day with the terrible twins anxiety and depression. Some days that is enough. It is mighty hard trying to remember that. When I see the mess of the house, the takeaway boxes, the dishes I get hit by the reminders of what I havn’t done or can’t do. When I go to bed to see if I can catch up on some of the missed sleep I feel horribly alone and unloved. But I have to remind myself I am still here. I am still going. And while it may not feel like it I am a decent person and I have achieved something today just by surviving. If I can remember that it will be ok. It’s hard but I will keep going and little step by little step I will get there.

Or that’s what my head thinks anyway. And not for the reasons Bilbo said either. Whenever I walk out that door my body starts seeing danger. Sometimes even before the front door. Leaving my bedroom or even bed can be scary. Talking to people even via text or email can be terrifying. I see danger lots of places.

So often when I am out I can feel the fight or flight reflex kicking in. I feel the need to look for safety and to run away from the danger. But its not real danger most of the time. While my body seems to be gearing up to run away from a sabre tooth tiger I am aware the cause of the reaction is just a person walking down the street. But my mind sees danger in that and soon the chemicals are pumping round my body. I am on edge and fidgety and nervous and battling the urge to run back to my nice safe cave (bed) where that sabre tooth tiger (life) can’t get me.

It’s hard doing this. It’s hard having to force yourself to do something that for most of your life felt natural and normal. And it gets frustrating having to do it day after day after day. And it gets frustrating when people don’t seem to know how hard it is. The thing is there isn’t a whole lot people can do to help sometimes. But I still get frustrated with them even though its not their fault.

I don’t like having to work to get through life. But I have to do it. It’s the only way I can teach my mind that life isn’t as dangerous as it thinks. Gradually things get easier. It takes a long time and sometimes it gets worse again. I just try to work through my anxiety and fear as best I can. I need friends and family to help me often. If I can manage short periods of time at events or small events it helps me build up to normal life. And if I have people to help me get through the door or help me through the bad spells it makes a difference. It can make it a little easier and safer feeling. Very few things feel safe and I sometimes feel desperate just to have something that does in the hope I can actually enjoy myself for more time instead of having to fight. But I also know I need to keep teaching my body that it can get through the stuff that feels dangerous and that it doesn’t have to run away. It’s a balance. And sometimes I do better than others. But I just have to make the most of the good days and push through the bad as best I can. And be patient with myself when its bad. It will get there with time. My body will learn eventually life isn’t full of danger and will stop trying to run away. It just needs time.

Last night I was very snappy with friends at tag rugby. I let stuff get to me again. It was a horrible rainy night and people didn’t like the weather. The usual comments and jokes were made about not wanting to play and calling it off etc. I know they were made in jest and not serious but they annoyed me and I got frustrated with people for making them.

At the moment I have very little motivation for anything. I don’t usually want to do much. I spend a lot of the time just wanting to curl up in a ball in bed because it feels safe or because it is the only thing that doesn’t feel incredibly difficult. Sometimes it takes all that I have just to fight that urge. Making myself do other things takes an enormous effort and is a massive battle for me. So when I heard other people saying they weren’t keen to be there or didn’t want to play because of the weather or we were playing a good team I was very angry. I would love to be in the situation were those were the things making me not want to play. I felt I was making a huge effort to be there as I have been doing for months and really struggling with it and other people were minimising that effort in a way. I really wanted some positive voices around me and some support to help me through the night and the complaints felt like negative voices. I felt like I was having to battle my friends as well as the voices in my head. So I was upset. And I answered back to people and was rude. And that wasn’t fair of me. I know people did not mean to minimise my struggles or to make them harder. It was just an unfortunate coincidence. I know many other times I have made the same comments myself. We rarely realise the effect our words can have on others. And I know well that there is rarely a good thing to say to me at the moment. Almost anything can set me off and make me feel worse. I am just in quite a negatove frame of mind a lot of the time and take the worst possible meaning of things. I cannot expect people to watch their words around me all the time. Maybe I can work on communicating better with them why their comments are hurtful or annoying but I also have to try to be more patient and not take my frustrations out on them when it is not their fault. It may be hard sometimes but it is a struggle worth making.

Today was a bad day. Yesterday wasn’t great and I didn’t sleep well (even by my low standards) for the second night in a row. And today my problems got to me. I wasn’t ok with what I was feeling and experiencing and it really bothered me.

I have been battling the feelings of being alone and cut off from everything and everyone. I have been struggling to manage day to day life. I have been grumpy and irritable. I am not sleeping well. I feel pressurised and judged by people most of the time. I know intellectually this is the depression and anxiety. I know these are symptoms of a disease. But I struggle to accept that. I am angry and frustrated with those around me for making me feel this way or letting me feel this. I am angry and upset with myself for feeling this way. I know these feelings are a consequence of the depression and anxiety. I know it is not me or people around me that are the root of the feelings. But I hate feeling them. And I struggle to accept that they are part of an illness. My mind seeks someone to blame whether it be me or someone else. Deep down I know this isn’t helpful. I know I need to move past the emotions. If I focus on them I will sink further into the mire of depression. But I don’t know how to do this in my confused and depressed state. So I wallow in the horrible thoughts cycling between pity, anger, guilt, frustration and so many more emotions. It is a jumble of feelings I can’t sort out or get a handle on. As one dissipates slightly another rises to the surface. I hate feeling this way. I know it is the demons in my head but I don’t seem to be able to fight them at the moment. Having them is horrible. I just want rid of this struggle. I want it to be over. I want a magic wand to wave and fix my head and wonder why no one will do it for me. Deep down I know no one can. It is a process and with time I will get there. But for now I just want this all to be gone. I want peace. The phrase I just want this to be over hammers in my head. It scares me. I know it means I want my depression to be gone. I want to be free of these problems and able to live my life. I want to be healthy again. But I am scared because I understand how for others that phrase can mean something else. That I know why someone can feel they would rather not live than feel this all the time. I am not at that point. I hope I never will be and I don’t think I will. But it scares me that I can understand why someone could think that. I never knew before. My greatest weapon against that is knowing there are people around me who would be hurt by any movement I make along that path. I cannot do that to them. So I will not go there. My family and friends are literally my life support. They are my biggest reason to keep going. And so I have to keep fighting my demons. I have to deal with the emotions and feelings and thoughts in my head. And gradually I begin to take back some control of my head. Pushing through the lack of motivation I got myself out of the house. That helped a little. I walked for a bit. That helped a bit. I managed to reach out to friends for a little support. That helped a bit. I got some tasty if unhealthy fast food. That helped a bit. I talked again to family. That helped a bit. All the little bits adding together helped a lot. Today was a hard day. I let my illness get to me. I was fed up of dealing with it. I wouldn’t accept that it limits me and takes me to places I don’t want to be. I stopped trusting myself to get through it. I let the negatives build. I let it get to me and take over me. But eventually I got there. I worked through the stuff that helps me. It tool me time and effort and not everything worked. But with some support I got there. I beat back the demons for a while. They will be back again I know but I proved again today I can get through the horribleness. I can do this. It was a bad day and a hard day but I am getting through it. I am proving I can do it. It is a struggle but I can get there. I just need to keep going and maybe one day the struggle will be over and life will be ok. I have that hope again. It was gone for a while today but its back. And hope is a great weapon. With hope I can do this.

Edit: It is now the afternoon after I wrote this post originally. I do not feel this way any more. However I want to leave the post as it shows what is going on in my mind at times. This is a snapshot of the sort of things that people battling depression and anxiety can face. This is some of what I experience in dark moments and I know no other way to explain how I feel and why I hate these problems so much at times. This is what depression can do.

I’m going to preface this post by saying I am not in a great place as I write it. Much of this may be irrational and unreasonable and unfair but I think it is important to explain to people where my head takes me at these times. Often when I have written at times like this and read it back later I have felt ashamed, embarrassed, guilty, afraid and disappointed. One of the reasons I want to post this is something I read a couple of months ago. Someone who had talked openly about their struggles with mental health and who recently lost a close friend to depression commented on how so often we talk about our experiences after the event not during. That struck a chord with me. This is the best I can manage to talk about during a depressive/anxious episode.

I have talked previously about feeling lonely. This comes with a whole range of irrational fears and thoughts. Sometimes my head takes me to a place where I feel no one likes me and I am completely alone. This is awful but is not the biggest challenge I face as I can see the poor logic behind the feeling with relative ease. The real challenge is something else that I feel and that was triggered accidently by a friend earlier today. While I reacted somewhat poorly at the time it was a number of hours later that the real problems kicked in as the thoughts festered. During this time I had also spoken to another friend about the incident and only given them half the truth which probably made the problem worse. I was already irritable and grumpy today largely due to having a virtually sleepless night previously and struggling to both get to and through work. I was able to mention being irritable and some causes of why but did not mention this deeper problem.

What I struggle with most is when I know that people are my friends and like me but only to a point. I feel there is a limit to our friendship and that I have few if any good friends. On reflection of my life I often feel I have had many friends but rarely a best friend. This is what I feel I miss. A good friend or group of good friends. This is were I feel I am being unfair on those around me. I know I probably have many good friends who are there for me but at these times I feel I have none. This is a hard feeling to fight. I struggle to logically defeat the feelings and begin to resent my friends for not being there more and myself for not being good enough to have friends that are close. My head can use many things to persuade me that those around me do not care and reinforce the horrible feelings. What I really want at times like these is someone to reach out and show me I am not alone and am cared for and loved but need it to be without prompting or my head will convince me the person doesn’t actually feel that way. As no one can know how I am feeling without me telling them it is highly unlikely any such message will arrive at the right time. It also feels a lot to expect of people to keep looking out for me for the weeks and months that I struggle through. I am sure many did such things for part of the time at least but that will not stop my head telling me they don’t care at the times they don’t and I struggle to fight those feelings. I was off work for over three weeks recently. Even now I am only back part time as part of a phased return. I know most people are or were unaware of this. I still feel hurt that in this time no one apart from my family came to see me. When I run through my friends in my head I can easily justify and understand why any of them didn’t visit especially as I know many people struggle to know what to do to help. It makes perfect rational sense to me. But my head still makes me feel hurt that no one and it doesn’t matter who made the effort. That feels unreasonable to me much of the time and it probably is but I can’t get that feeling to go away. And that frustrates, annoys and scares me. What worries me more is the large periods of time I don’t know whether that is unreasonable or not. I doubt so much at these times I struggle to know what is true and what is in my head. Reality feels a little shaky at times. That scares me. All I really want at some times is not even a visit but someone to just reach out and ask what they can do to help and when or offer something. I know some people told me they would help and I just had to ask or said their door was open and I could visit. In the good times this is very much appreciated. In the dark it simply isn’t enough to fight the thoughts in my head. That is not intended to do down any of the people who made those offers it is simply me explaining why they aren’t always enough to stop the dark thoughts. It can take a huge effort for me to ask for help. I struggle to do so. When I am in a bad place it can be more than I have to do so or to explain to someone how bad it is. To do so feels like I am guilting them, pressuring them and forcing them to help me and makes me feel awful for doing so. So I don’t in most cases. I bury the urge to get help and try to struggle on alone. In the past few months I have regularly messaged friends talking about how I feel and quite often mentioned the idea of doing something together. I often leave this slightly open as asking for specific times and being turned down hurts and makes me feel unworthy and unliked. However, the slightly open nature usually means while this immediate reaction is avoided the event rarely happens and the feeling simply builds in the background. I struggle to find the energy to organise things and the courage to ask people or to tell them why I am asking. I struggle to find a way to tell them I just want some company without sounding desperate even though I am. I feel bad if I say I need company as I can manage without it but that is all I can do. Manage to survive. I don’t know how to explain to people that I want company but on my terms and in my way as so many things feel too much. I just want someone to understand and to try to help. This is where my desire for a best friend or two comes in. I just want someone who will do whatever they can to help. During this time many friends have arranged social activities through groups and I have been part of the group invited. These invites are nice but usually it is simply an activity that the group is doing or someone wants to do and I one of several invited and my attendance will not affect whether it occurs or not. I often struggle to attend and rarely commit easily. I want someone at some stage to message me and say lets do something for you. Let’s make sure it’s something you can do and lets just spend time together doing whatever you are able to do or want to do. I want to feel valued as an individual. Again this is probably quite unreasonable to expect people to plan around me and I feel bad for wanting this but I don’t know how to make the feelings go away. I also resent friends sometimes for doing things without me. Especially when they organise events they know I am probably not comfortable attending. This is unreasonable of me. I cannot expect them to set aside their lives and organise everything round me. But my head tells me they should do so at least once. I don’t know how selfish that is but I don’t like saying it or feeling it. It feels I am being horrible to my friends. I know that my friends cannot possibly know how desperate I am at times and the enormous effort I have to make to ask what I do and to manage what I can sometimes. But I feel like I have been crying out for help at times and no one is answering. Intellectually I know this is because I cannot communicate clearly and the call isn’t being heard or understood but I struggle to deal with the hurt I feel each time. This builds inside me and eats away at me and I hate the feeling. I hate feeling like this towards good people who I know are doing their best to help me and I want to be rid of these feelings but I don’t know how to manage it sometimes. When I can clear my head and get a sense of perspective they tend to drift away but they always seem to lurk in the back of my head ready to pounce when I am low. They contribute to my already grumpy and irritable nature. They can cause me to feel annoyed with those who try to help as they aren’t doing exactly as I want them to do. This is again unreasonable of me and unfair on them. For those times that I am I unfair on you I apologise. I will try to fight these feelings when I can but I fear I will fall short at times and hurt you. I hope I don’t but I fear I will. You do not deserve that. I am grateful for what you do. All you can do is your best and you do that. It is on me that I do not appreciate that at times. Thank you for persevering. I do not deserve you.

Something that has made a big difference in my struggles with depression and anxiety recently is beginning to trust myself and my process. Dealing with and recovering from depression and anxiety is a long road. It is not a straightforward process and has many ups and downs. I have been through previous bouts of anxiety and depression and have developed strategies that help me. There are lots of techniques available that can help people with these problems. Not all will work and those that do will not work all the time. There is a lot of support available to people with these problems. Counsellors, medication, even friends and family and many more. Some of these will help at times and not at others. But the important thing is there will always be something which can help. And we can only deal with one problem at a time. When I am struggling I often find it overwhelming trying to deal with my problems. It feels like I am always going backwards and any progress I make is immediately swept aside. I can only see the negatives and the dark times and the worries and the fears. Once I begin to regain some perspective I can see the progress I am making and see improvements I am making. Seeing that progress gives me hope that I will get better. Once I start feeling that way I can get some momentum and progress gets quicker. What leads me into my problems is the development of bad habits in my thinking. Developing new habits to replace these takes a long time and lots of patience. Remembering that is key to doing so. There is not a magic wand that can be waved and I need to remember that. I have to trust the process that I go through. When I am struggling I doubt myself and my decisions and my thinking. Trusting my process is hard but doing it is what helps me get better and it is a positive cycle. Trusting the process and myself makes it easier to trust and therefore builds on the previous work. It is important for me that those around me understand this. I will doubt myself and my thinking and I need your help to believe in myself. However, I also will need you to challenge me at times as my thinking will become muddled with doubts. This isn’t about someone else knowing what is right for me but asking me how or why something is right. If I can’t explain my process and thinking that may be indicative that it is clouded. Looking at it from another perspective is a simple way of clearing my own head of doubts. I can usually manage to reassure others about myself and tell them the benefits of patience and trust better than I can myself. Having that support is key to trusting myself and my process. And when I do that I am on the road to recovery. It may not be an easy road but as long as I trust myself the setbacks do not force me off course. Every person who experiences anxiety or depression or other mental health problems will have their own process and ways of dealing with things. Finding what works for you and trusting yourself and your methods is key. That doesn’t mean using the same technique or strategy every time although that may work. New methods may be needed but trust the process that finds methods that work. If medication or counselling or therapy or meditation or any one of a hundred other things are something that works trust it and the thinking that led you to it. As long as you are taking positive steps you are using the process. Trust yourself to keep doing so and believe in your ability to do so. When you do so you can make the changes you want and life can improve. Trust yourself and believe in yourself. That is my message to myself and others. We will get there.

Through working with my counsellor I have identified one of the things that has contributed to my build up of stress is my inability to say no. I struggle to tell people that I can’t, won’t or don’t want to do what they ask. This can be in any situation whether it is work, social or personal. All these things add up to create more and more stressors in my life. I put myself under a lot of pressure in my life in a number of ways and this is a big one. I always feel I should be trying to help others and do what I can for them. And while this is a worthy goal it needs to be balanced with an understanding of what is possible in life. While it might be good to say yes and try to help someone it might not always be right. If it pushes you too far and puts you under too much pressure it is sensible to say no. Learning what I am capable of and what is right for me is an important step to managing my stress better in future. It will be a gradual process and one which will take me some time to master. As a good example of this a few days after I had a good discussion about this with my counsellor was the day I passed my viva for my PhD. I arranged to go out with a few friends that evening to celebrate although not being in a great frame of mind it was a relatively quiet night. I deliberately kept the number of people I asked small as larger groups are more difficult for my anxiety. Those I asked were people who knew the problems I was having and were or had done PhDs which gave me a small group I felt comfortable with. The somewhat arbitrary selection criteria simply gave me a way to limit the number of people attending. When I considered asking others I always ended up feeling if I invited one person I needed to invite others too and adding lots more people and having a larger group than I felt comfortable with. For this reason when one friend asked about another person attending I said no even though it was very hard to do. I felt slightly bad for doing so as I have no problem with the person in question and didn’t mind them coming except if I invited them I would have felt obligated to invite several more increasing the number beyond that I felt comfortable with. Even though I felt bad for saying no I was also slightly proud of myself for doing so and happy that I had at least managed to do so. Later that night it was suggested we play a certain game. The game is essentially a music quiz which involves identifying song lyrics. As those who know me will be aware I rarely listen to music so am basically completely useless at this game as I don’t know many if any of the songs. This means I don’t really enjoy it and in my current anxious and depressed state this feeling grows even more. I can have some fun during this game as I am still just hanging out with friends and the banter can be good. However, sometimes not really knowing what is going on makes me feel less part of the group which is a feeling I can struggle with anyway at times like this. As usual with a group of friends competing there is a lot of winding each other up during games. Comments telling the other team they are useless or are idiots for not knowing something are meant in jest but when my head is already trying to make me believe them it can be hard to take them as such. Fighting the anxieties and demons present in my head during social situations simply become harder during activities such as these so I was not keen to play the game. However, I could not summon up the courage to say so. I knew in my head I had managed to say no to something earlier that day to make the night easier for myself and people were understanding but I couldn’t do it again. At one point I was actually asked about playing it before but all I could say was I had played it before but not contributed much as I didn’t know any answers. That would have a been a great opportunity for me to say I didn’t enjoy it but I knew that several of my friends there loved the game and wanted to play so I stayed quiet while desperately hoping someone would realise it wasn’t for me and suggest something else. As we played I nearly got up to leave several times but stuck it out to prove to myself I could get through awkward and difficult situations. Even until now I have not been able to talk to my friends about this as I still feel bad for not wanting to play and feel I am letting my friends down for not wanting to do something they enjoy. What that day showed me was I was capable of saying no to something and doing what I needed to do for myself but still struggle to do so at other times. For some time after I was annoyed with myself for what I saw as my later failure rather than taking the positive that I succeeded once earlier. Working through the process and getting into the habit of acknowledging what is difficult for me and what I am capable of doing will take time but hopefully I will get there. And I know I will get support from my family and friends on that journey. Knowing people are understanding that at the minute things are tough and I am not capable of things I otherwise would be is a big help. And I know I have people around me who will help me learn and not be offended by my saying no om occasion. So I will get there even if it takes some time.

Loneliness is an awful feeling. I often feel alone and uncared for at the moment even though I know intellectually many people do care. It’s one of the things I hate most about not sleeping. I am alone all night with no one to help counter those feelings.

My feelings aren’t helped by my low self esteem which leads me to believe that no one could like me or want to be around me. My anxiety doesn’t help matters either. I find it near impossible at times to go out with friends or even go out at all sometimes. The times when I am too low to work are even worse as so much of the day is spent alone.

Dealing with my loneliness and even admitting it can be very hard. It feels very accusatory to tell my family and friends I feel lonely. As if I am telling them they aren’t there for me which I know they are. Or as of I am trying to guilt them into doing more. Asking people to spend time with me or talk to me feels like a big imposition on their lives (the low self esteem again making this worse). And asking someone to do something and getting a negative response even if it is for a valid reason feels like a real kick in the teeth. As if it confirms that no one likes me and I am destined to be alone for ever.

I really do appreciate all the support I receive from family and friends. I know I am never truly alone even if my head refuses to believe it sometimes. I have previously said on facebook the biggest help I receive is just people being there for me. Simple things like a message or an offer to do something make a huge difference. They show my head that I am not alone and there are people who are there to help me and support me. Someone reaching out unasked and unprompted gives me a massive boost. It means the world to me sometimes. Loneliness is awful but even a tiny gesture from a friend can make it go away and I have the friends to get through this. It may be a long and difficult road but I will get there.

First of I suppose I should say that’s not strictly accurate. I’m not always tired. Just most of the time. And that’s because for me I’m tired has many different meanings and usually at least one of them will be true if not a combination of them. So what are these many meanings.

First and foremost the obvious one. I need to sleep. As my problems develop my sleeping pattern goes out the window. Operating on a handful of hours sleep becomes the norm. Recently I have commented I am now getting 4 or 5 hours sleep most nights up from the 2 or 3 I was getting a short while ago. And it has been a few weeks since I had a completely sleepless night. The sleeping problems can be driven by anxiety or depression. I can lie awake unable to slow my mind and stop the fears racing around my head or I can lie awake and barely notice the night go by as my head is so completely empty.

Being tired can also mean I am exhausted from the exertions of every day life. On bad days any one of getting out of bed, making breakfast or getting dressed can leave me needing a rest. Doing all three and then leaving the house can be near impossible without a break or two and several hours. The sheer energy required to just go about our daily business is often more than I have to give. I can spend so much of the day tense and worried and stressing that by late afternoon or evening I am completely spent. Adrenaline can only get you so far and then it stops.

Being tired can mean I feel completely devoid of energy and motivation because my depression has taken hold. I feel slow and my head isn’t clear. I struggle to focus or remember things and activities that are usually done on autopilot become challenging. These symptoms match those I feel when I am tired so my brain automatically combines the two.

It can also mean I am tired of feeling this way. I don’t want to be depressed or anxious anymore. I just want this to be gone. I am tired of having to fight every day just to get through life. I just want a break. I want to be free of my problems and not have them hit me in the face every few minutes. I don’t want to have to rely on coping mechanisms and just can’t be bothered doing anything to help myself anymore.

It can mean I am tired of saying no. I don’t like turning down social invitations or requests from friends or family but at these times there is so much I am unable or feel unable to do. I want to be free of the worries about whether I can actually do something or if it is too much for me. I just want someone to say we will look after you for a bit. I want someone to say I will come and do whatever you are able to do just to be with you. I want someone to say I will do something to make your daily life a little easier.

It can mean I am tired of saying yes. I don’t feel I can look after myself at the moment but yet I can still end up looking after others. Whether it be driving them somewhere, organising something, answering questions or generally helping out sometimes I just want people to leave me alone and not rely on me. It can be enormously beneficial doing something for someone as it gives such a good feeling but sometimes I just want to do it on my terms and not on yours.

It can mean I am tired of asking for help. I don’t like being dependent on others. I feel like I am a burden at these times. It seems whenever I talk to someone invariably I am hoping they will be able to make my life a little easier or brighter. It can be very hard to ask someone for help and hear they are unable to give for whatever reason (usually very good ones) especially as it can take a long time and a lot of effort for me to summon the courage to do so. It can be equally hard to ask someone for help and get an instant reply of yes anything or always to get what I ask for. It can cause me no end of worry that I am disrupting people’s lives enormously and having a negative impact on them.

It can mean I am mentally and emotionally drained. There is nothing left. I have put all my efforts into something and have nothing left afterwards. No sense of fulfillment or accomplishment or joy or even relief. Just that dull empty ache of exhaustion and depression.

All these things and more can be covered by that little phrase ‘I’m tired’. And each drives the others. As sleep becomes elusive the energy to fight the doubts and worries disappears. As they increase the effort of life increases. As this happens sleep becomes more elusive and the cycle continues and worsens with each time. It takes a lot of time and effort to break the cycle. And even longer and more effort to climb back out of that pit. But I keep going because one day I might not feel tired. One night I will sleep and wake up feeling refreshed and ready for the day. One day the effort of daily life will not take so much out of me I can enjoy my life again. One day I will not be tired. That day may be a long way off and for now I may feel tired but it can happen and that gives me hope.

In my battles with depression and anxiety the most important aspect has always been the support of those around me. It is at these times the people who really care for you come into their own. I have always been lucky to have good support from my family and friends.

When my anxiety and depression kicks in my self confidence (which is never great to start with) plummets. I begin to doubt everything about myself and feel that who I am is not enough. I don’t like who I am and can’t see any reason why other people would either. I question whether I am worth anything or just a burden to everyone around me. It can be very hard to counter these thoughts especially as my problems worsen and I struggle to determine what are genuine thoughts and feelings and what is caused solely by my depression. It is at times like this the people around me are important to keep me grounded and focused on reality. They are what let me know I am not worthless and that I can keep going. That it is worth fighting on because I do matter to other people and can have a positive impact on their lives. They give me a reason to keep on living just by showing me that I matter to them.

Even small things like sending me a message to ask how I am can make a huge difference. I have cried for nearly half an hour on occasions after a friend has texted out of the blue because it has made me realise that someone cares just a little and until that point I didn’t know anyone did. Even better are times when someone has visited me or asked to do something together. It makes such a difference knowing someone wants to spend time with you especially when they initiate it and you don’t have to ask people as at these times it feels like you are constantly taking from people and giving nothing in return becoming a burden.

There will be times when life gets too much and I need to ask people for support. Knowing there are people around who will answer my call is a massive relief and source of comfort. Having people to listen to me and sometimes provide an alternative view is vital to working through my problems. Those who help with day to day tasks whether it be a little cleaning, providing food or driving me about are also vital. All these things take a huge effort when I am struggling and getting that extra help is massive to me.

Those who are there when I do manage to summon the energy to venture out and try things are also a massive help. Having someone around who knows what I am going through and is understanding can be the only thing that makes a trip out manageable.

There are many people who have helped me over the years and I am extremely grateful to them all. Without you I would not have been able to cope with so much of what has happened. You have helped me understand that I am a decent person and not hated by all as my head often leads me to believe. For that I will always be thankful.

I also know many people don’t know how to help friends or family members who struggle with mental health. All I can say is make sure they know you care about them and value them as a person. That can be enough to change a person’s whole day. If you can make a little effort to spend some time with them that is fantastic but even asking about them or sending a little positive message can make a difference. When you feel completely worthless and alone as I do so often every bit of comfort no matter how small is worth its weight in gold. As someone who has battled for years and received many such nuggets from family and friends I can attest to that. My family and friends have kept me sane these last few years.