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Originally Posted by Rose76
I'm in an awful rut for way too long. I don't feel depressed, emotionally. Then, again, I was just crying for a few minutes. I had read on facebook about today being the anniversary of a relative who died. I got over that. I'm not really sad. The trouble is I'm still in my nightgown and in bed. It's after 5 p.m. I got up for breakfast and lunch. Just didn't stay up.
I'm watching birds coming to the bird feeder outside my bedroom window. That's all I want to do - sit up in bed and watch the birds.
A year ago, I was busy caring for my boyfriend who was sick and near the end of his life. He's gone. I got over the initial, severe pain of losing him. I'm not paralyzed with grief. Time heals. However, I just don't have any energy to even get dressed. I would call this depression, I guess.
My bedroom window is nice to look out of. I can see sky, mountain tops, rose bushes and birds. They sound sweet, chirping on and off. I'm comfortable here. I don't want to move.
My apartment is very messy. If anyone came by and looked in, they'ld think there was something mentally wrong with me. There is.
I'ld feel a lot better, if I picked up my house and tidied things up. I don't know where to start. I know it doesn't matter where I start. I could start anywhere. I could spin a bottle and start where it points.
I've been very isolated for months . . . since just after Christmas. Now I like it that way. I hate the thought of having to talk to anyone. Too much work. I avoid answering the phone. I resist stepping outside the front door because some neighbor might walk by and try to talk with me. I talk to myself all day . . . sometime out loud. What is wrong with me?
I will appreciate anyone leaving even a brief comment on this thread. I've withdrawn into a world of my own inside my own head. I'm getting stuck in here. I want to get out of my head, clean up my apartment, put some clothes on and live more normal. But I'm stuck in here.
Getting unstuck might sound like a simple choice I just have to make. But this is going on day after day after day. Every night I tell myself I will do better tomorrow. Every day turns out the same. I go from bed to couch to recliner to bed.
Were any of you ever "stuck" like this? Anyone who's been depressed can probably recognize some of this behavior. I'm worried that I'll never pull out of this. Even if I do, I worry I'll just relapse back into it. That's been happening since after Christmas.
Any encouraging words that anyone can think of might help. I feel cut off from the human race. I know this is a dreary story.
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Yes. I've had that. I'm still having a lot of it in fact. I'm gradually getting better like... it used to be literally painful to get dressed. I just kept doing it though, allowing myself some time to dress up gradually. I can dress up fast without a real problem now. (It can still feel like discomfort but nothing too bad.) I used to have to lie in bed for 3-4 hours before I could get up. Not just in the morning, during the day too, I would lie down then it would be hard to get up. I only need 30 minutes now before I can get up. Actually I maybe reduced that to 15 minutes yesterday.
Well, 15 minutes getting to sit up at the side of the bed, and 15 minutes standing up then (reading some cr*p on the phone until then or thinking about the bad past etc).
It's just slow progress for me because I was stuck in it for very long before I started seeing the way to get out.
And I think that that is the one best advice I can give you. Do not allow yourself to stay stuck in it for long. The neural connections in your brain will start atrophying and it's painful to have to rebuild all of it. This isn't a joke. I am living it right now.
Also be prepared for how it'll be fluctuating... two steps forward, one back and the like...
Good luck!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rose76
Yes, COVID, no doubt, affects and throws off a lot of familiar patterns. I have plenty of company in that regard. Lots of people have been more badly affected than I've been. I know mine aren't the worst problems, but I've gotten overwhelmed by them nonetheless.
This viral issue is winding down. I thought that would speed up me getting back on track. I feel like I ran out of gas and can't find a way to refuel. This is awful disappointing. It's like I'm getting to the bus stop just ten seconds too late. The bus has pulled out, and I can't catch up with it. I don't expect anyone in my real life to understand this. That's a lonely feeling.
I'm going to read some "success stories" in the forum for that. Maybe that will give me some hope. People do recover from being very down.
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Yes, yes. It feels like you've run out of gas and can't find that fuel again. That is why it's a gradual process. Try and catch a moment when you don't feel so bad/low/fatigued and then try and make a little step then. Until it tires you out then rest and try again. That's what I've been doing. Both mentally and physically.
PS: Weirdly enough I relate to you also in that I do not emotionally feel depressed usually. I'm just shut down, and low energy and rut and all that. Maybe that is the consequence of the issues causing this problem eventually. I got very drained in my life and then I had a sudden emotional impact (trauma experience, having to lose a relationship being traumatic) and then I got to this point.
PS2: Oh I again found something where I relate to you strongly... That world in your head that you are stuck in. YES. SAME. (Even before cPTSD trauma it was like that.) I am gradually leaving it and I've worked on that a lot but I'm not totally out of the woods. I'm finding out what bad mental (and sometimes physical) habits I have that keep me stuck there. Even though I also found that being in my mind like that allowed me to process the past where I really needed to learn from it. It was just overdone and not regulated because I had no way to learn more easily for a while. Maybe that part is just me though. So my suggestion is, find the mental and physical habits that contribute to keeping you stuck in your head in that little world. And gradually get rid of them, train yourself out of them and find better habits.
One mental habit would be finding positive thoughts. Especially positivity about why you want to be back to your normal life. Yeah, I know, hard, very hard initially.
Physical habits of course are important otherwise too, for retraining your energy level - and through that, your mood - and getting out of the whole rut. A really typical example of such a physical habit is: don't allow yourself to go lie down in bed after you got up. I worked on that too and I got really good at that one by now.