[janiedough]

Hey everyone,

This is a very long post. Part of it is venting, part is recording my recent memories of this event so that I have a record in case I forget the details later, and part is asking for confirmations and even advice (if that is acceptable, if it isn't then scratch the part about the advice).

I posted on here a while ago and had a warm welcome even though I haven't been diagnosed with anything except my family doctor thinking I could have anxiety (I don't know if she diagnosed it or not), and ADHD (only due to my quiz answers and there being the possibility of me having it as a kid). This past week has been difficult for me. I will use the trigger icon for the details of my experience because it is a very vivid recollection and could be potentially nerve-racking to read.

Possible trigger:

I had an episode of crying that was much worse than any in the past. The reason being that I had someone yelling at me telling me that I had to leave or stop crying, and upon trying to leave (I couldn't make it to my car and ended up just laying in the grass), this person followed me to tell me that I had to leave or stop. I couldn't move or stop crying/whimpering. About 2 to 5 minutes later, this person makes me come inside and lectures me that he/she can't take my emotional response and that I can't do "this". I start hyper-ventilating around this time while the person continues to lecture me. (I don't know if the hyper-ventilating occurred because I was trying to stay quiet or if it was an intense fear response). I continued to hyper-ventilate and lay on my back on the floor. About 2 minutes later, this person comes back and starts yelling at me again that I had to stop. As they approach me, I get scared and run past them. I remember not knowing what to do and thinking "I have to get away. I need to be alone. please let me be. please don't chase me. please stop yelling at me. I can't do anything. I can't stop. Please, just let me be alone. It will be over sooner if I have my space." I couldn't voice any of this because I was hyper-ventilating at the time as I was running away. The person continued to chase me. I decided to hide behind the couch, as I thought that it would communicate my need to be left alone. The person continued to lecture me about "this" not being acceptable, and threatened to call the police if I didn't stop. They also said something about me being retained in the hospital for at least 48 hours, which I don't understand. The only thing that I think I was doing at the time of the person's threat was hyper-ventilating while sitting in the fetal position on the floor behind the couch. I remember thinking, "please don't hurt me... I know [this person] won't hurt me, but I still have the feeling that someone is going to try to hurt me." I acknowledged the situation I was in at that time and knew that nobody was going to hurt me, but my body and emotions were having the opposite feelings. I stayed behind the couch until the person left because I was afraid of what would happen if I came out from behind the couch and the person tried to lecture me or threaten me again. When the person finally left, I waited a few minutes before leaving the couch, and was able to stop hyper-ventilating. I proceeded to find something to eat, because the episode interrupted my breakfast (I was woken up earlier than I wanted to be, so I was a bit low on sleep as well. I think it started within one hour of me waking up, and it usually takes me a full 2 hours to completely wake up in the mornings). I later talked to my ld bf with video chat, who helped me feel better.

It is funny that after the episode, I didn't feel any pain anymore. It was a bittersweet 20 minutes or so and I felt relieved and kind of happy. Then the pain that I usually feel day to day returned, and I was a bit bummed, lol. After a while, the people that triggered my episode returned. My attitude toward them wasn't mean or spiteful. I tried to be as positive as I could, and as kind as possible so that no more problems would arise. I remember that I offered to make one of them something that I knew they liked, and I remember smiling yet having tears at the same time. I was completely mellow at that time. The person refused the offer, and I regretted doing that the next day, because I realized that they didn't deserve it since they never even apologized, and instead, the next day, they mocked me about the situation. I didn't even try to intervene anymore other than just telling the person that that isn't a nice thing to say or nice way to act. I explained the situation to an elder in my family, and asked for their help if they think there is anything that they could do because I came to the conclusion that I was powerless in the situation (mainly due to one of the people that triggered my emotions being younger than 18, and I didn't want to say anything that would damage them psychologically because I really care about them and want them to be healthy, happy, and a kind person).

So, that is the story of the worst breakdown that I have ever had which occurred within the past week. I have a therapy session scheduled this week and plan on telling this story to my therapist. It is my third or fourth session. I was wanting to move slower with getting into the details of my crying episodes since they haven't happened for almost 6 months, but after what happened last week, I feel like I should bring it up this next session. I don't want it to happen again. I am no longer in that powerless situation because I am avoiding the people that triggered my breakdown, but I don't want to be affected so much by those situations. I want to be strong enough to be able to manage tough situations like that and not break down.

My first question to people here, is if the episode/breakdown that I described above is similar to anything that anyone with bipolar, or another mood disorder experienced themselves or if anyone has witnessed a similar situation with a person acting the same way that I did. I also would be interested in hearing thoughts on if how I acted is a warning sign for any other disorders, and if I should do anything proactively to help prevent future problems from occurring. Again, I am seeing my therapist this week, but I only have 45 minutes to communicate things and get advice. I want to use my time wisely to bring up the most important things, but I don't want to focus too much on something and give my therapist the wrong idea or incomplete information. I am terrible at staying on track when recollecting memories, and I want to say the important stuff first just in case I get side-tracked in our session.

My second question regards coping techniques for negative emotions. Over the past year and a half (that is how long I have been having emotional problems), the only thing that I can do to help control my emotions when I notice that they are getting high and my irritability increases (I am on the verge of tears, or already in tears), other than going for an intense run (which I can no longer do because of other problems), is to start singing out loud to myself when nobody is around. I think the reason that it works so well is that in order to sing clearly and well, you have to relax and breathe well. I'm not the best singer, but I took a voice class once in college, so I know the basics. If I notice my mood/emotions changing negatively, but not over the top, I just focus on my breathing and meditate for a little bit until my body feels relaxed. The breathing/meditation takes anywhere between just 1 minute to an hour to get my mind/body back to normal depending on the level of pain I am dealing with at the time.

Thank you to anyone that has read all of this. I know it is a lot. I hope to stay strong through this problem and face it head on. This post has helped me vent a little bit too. I have such contradicting feelings. It's confusing. The strongest is to be kind and compassionate to others, though, so I think I will be okay.

[WibblyWobbly]

1. I have never experienced anything like that due to bipolar. My crying spells are quiet when I'm depressed. When I'm manic and crying, generally someone is getting screamed at pretty violently. I did have similar experiences with PTSD because I was so skittish. I don't think that 1 (non-psychotic) breakdown can be enough to diagnose a lifelong disorder.

I'm reading between the lines that your friends/family/roommates thought the situation was abnormal, either that you needed help or were attention-seeking. If you would normally trust their judgment, that might indicate that your reaction to the "trigger" was unwarranted and you might want to focus on that with your therapist next session. If you're worried about time, just cut out a lot of the details and prepare a few key points. For me it's like a formula: x resulted in y and the whole thing made me feel z.

2. Google "coping skills" to get huge lists of ideas. You would probably benefit from mindfulness techniques like progressive muscle relaxation. Most of the rest are distraction-type skills, like walk your dog, write a poem, watch a movie, go for a run, etc. Personally, what coping skills I use depends on what type of episode I'm starting or having.

[janiedough]

Originally Posted by WibblyWobbly

1. I have never experienced anything like that due to bipolar. My crying spells are quiet when I'm depressed. When I'm manic and crying, generally someone is getting screamed at pretty violently. I did have similar experiences with PTSD because I was so skittish. I don't think that 1 (non-psychotic) breakdown can be enough to diagnose a lifelong disorder.

I'm reading between the lines that your friends/family/roommates thought the situation was abnormal, either that you needed help or were attention-seeking. If you would normally trust their judgment, that might indicate that your reaction to the "trigger" was unwarranted and you might want to focus on that with your therapist next session. If you're worried about time, just cut out a lot of the details and prepare a few key points. For me it's like a formula: x resulted in y and the whole thing made me feel z.

2. Google "coping skills" to get huge lists of ideas. You would probably benefit from mindfulness techniques like progressive muscle relaxation. Most of the rest are distraction-type skills, like walk your dog, write a poem, watch a movie, go for a run, etc. Personally, what coping skills I use depends on what type of episode I'm starting or having.

Possible trigger:

I think that there was reasonable warrant for some reaction given the circumstances. If I had been left alone to cry (it was actually a very controlled set of squeals. This was better than the alternative of crying out at the top of my lungs, because that is what my body wanted to do), I would have recovered in about 15 minutes. I guess I didn't explain the "crying" well. It was not normal in any sense. The sensation was uncontrollable. I could not get it to go away. If I tried to control it without letting out any sound, I think my body would have gone into shock or I would have to dig my nails into my arm to stun myself with pain, and even if I did that, I don't know if the sensation would go away without letting out a sound. The fastest way that I have found to get rid of the sensation when I get it is to breath deeply and then wail loudly multiple times until it goes away. I usually only do this when I know that I can without negative repercussions. Otherwise, I do the best I can to contain it. Sometimes that involves me banging my head on the wall repeatedly, or singing. This is not a normal thing.

The "trigger" was someone yelling at me to stop defending myself when the other person told me that they don't know how my significant other can stand being with me. I felt powerless, and like I had no worth in their eyes. Like I was not worth respecting, not worth being treated as a person, like I was expected to be a slave/servant to them, like they didn't care about how I felt or even view me as nothing more than a nuisance that they would rather see dead. These were family members, so... (My family has issues.)

I was hoping to find someone to relate to, or that has gone through the same thing. I don't care about a diagnosis. I just want to overcome this.

It happened a few times before, as to why I was able to give a time estimate for recovery. It did happen pretty bad once before, though, I didn't hyper-ventilate. It was with a friend/roommate. We are still friends btw. The person was kind of arguing with me about a dish that I burnt something in, and was soaking for a while because I couldn't scrub it off. At one point, my friend was lecturing me about something to do with the dish, and as he continued, I felt more and more like I was going to burst. I remember trying to hold it in for as long as I could. I was trying my hardest to remain silent and calm, but after a while, I couldn't anymore, and I remember screaming "Stop," "Stop," at the top of my lungs, while holding the dish in question (I was in the middle of scrubbing it), I had the urge to throw the dish out of my hands and remember my arms going up and down with the dish a couple times, and then, I darted into my bedroom and slammed the door shut after I threw the dish on a soft couch so that it didn't break. I continued to wail for a long time. My bf was there at the time and tried to help, but anything that he said or did made it worse. He couldn't even cuddle me. I screamed at him to just leave me alone a couple of times during the episode, too, and started banging my head on a pillar because it helped me feel better. I ended up moving out of the apartment I was sharing with the friends and in with my bf to prevent us from getting evicted (the neighbors complained about the noise, though not until a week after, probably because they overheard my bf making fun of their car when he didn't know it was theirs). The episodes stopped for a while after I moved in with my bf. Now he is gone, and they are happening again. (We are still together, just long distance). I think that I probably had fewer problems when we were together in person because he made me feel safe. I felt threatened by the neighbors and awful living conditions of the apartment in the first bad episode, and in the second, I felt threatened by my family member that was yelling at me, and it didn't help that there were no rooms with a door I could lock to hide in. I haven't even thought about that dish episode for a long time. I was probably blocking the memory due to the embarrassment.

I can't google "coping skills" if I don't know what it is that I am coping with. I really just want to know what it is that is happening to me.

[janiedough]

Originally Posted by janiedough

Possible trigger:

I think that there was reasonable warrant for some reaction given the circumstances. If I had been left alone to cry (it was actually a very controlled set of squeals. This was better than the alternative of crying out at the top of my lungs, because that is what my body wanted to do), I would have recovered in about 15 minutes. I guess I didn't explain the "crying" well. It was not normal in any sense. The sensation was uncontrollable. I could not get it to go away. If I tried to control it without letting out any sound, I think my body would have gone into shock or I would have to dig my nails into my arm to stun myself with pain, and even if I did that, I don't know if the sensation would go away without letting out a sound. The fastest way that I have found to get rid of the sensation when I get it is to breath deeply and then wail loudly multiple times until it goes away. I usually only do this when I know that I can without negative repercussions. Otherwise, I do the best I can to contain it. Sometimes that involves me banging my head on the wall repeatedly, or singing. This is not a normal thing.

The "trigger" was someone yelling at me to stop defending myself when the other person told me that they don't know how my significant other can stand being with me. I felt powerless, and like I had no worth in their eyes. Like I was not worth respecting, not worth being treated as a person, like I was expected to be a slave/servant to them, like they didn't care about how I felt or even view me as nothing more than a nuisance that they would rather see dead. These were family members, so... (My family has issues.)

I was hoping to find someone to relate to, or that has gone through the same thing. I don't care about a diagnosis. I just want to overcome this.

It happened a few times before, as to why I was able to give a time estimate for recovery. It did happen pretty bad once before, though, I didn't hyper-ventilate. It was with a friend/roommate. We are still friends btw. The person was kind of arguing with me about a dish that I burnt something in, and was soaking for a while because I couldn't scrub it off. At one point, my friend was lecturing me about something to do with the dish, and as he continued, I felt more and more like I was going to burst. I remember trying to hold it in for as long as I could. I was trying my hardest to remain silent and calm, but after a while, I couldn't anymore, and I remember screaming "Stop," "Stop," at the top of my lungs, while holding the dish in question (I was in the middle of scrubbing it), I had the urge to throw the dish out of my hands and remember my arms going up and down with the dish a couple times, and then, I darted into my bedroom and slammed the door shut after I threw the dish on a soft couch so that it didn't break. I continued to wail for a long time. My bf was there at the time and tried to help, but anything that he said or did made it worse. He couldn't even cuddle me. I screamed at him to just leave me alone a couple of times during the episode, too, and started banging my head on a pillar because it helped me feel better. I ended up moving out of the apartment I was sharing with the friends and in with my bf to prevent us from getting evicted (the neighbors complained about the noise, though not until a week after, probably because they overheard my bf making fun of their car when he didn't know it was theirs). The episodes stopped for a while after I moved in with my bf. Now he is gone, and they are happening again. (We are still together, just long distance). I think that I probably had fewer problems when we were together in person because he made me feel safe. I felt threatened by the neighbors and awful living conditions of the apartment in the first bad episode, and in the second, I felt threatened by my family member that was yelling at me, and it didn't help that there were no rooms with a door I could lock to hide in. I haven't even thought about that dish episode for a long time. I was probably blocking the memory due to the embarrassment.

I can't google "coping skills" if I don't know what it is that I am coping with. I really just want to know what it is that is happening to me.

Also, I should mention that when it does happen, it is like clockwork. It happens one or two days before my period. So, once a month. When I was living with my bf, I was able to get through the tough days without an outburst. Now, I seem to be getting them again.

[elevatedsoul]

well it sounds like panic attack to me, with the hyperventilating... but im no doctor so i would definitely talk to your therapist about these things

[thecrankyone]

I find it helps to write it out and list key points I need to bring up when I go to my pdoc.

Keeping a diary or journal also can help make things clearer, even if it is kept private.

[Edgar's Mom]

You are obviously having a very strong reaction to some specific triggers and it might be good to bring that up with your therapist when you see her/him. It looks as though you have a very difficult time with being lectured or berated, and that the feelings those situations bring up are a huge trigger for you.

It also sounds like you don't feel safe during these episodes. It might be worthwhile to work out a coping strategy with your therapist for when they happen. You need to figure out how to get yourself to feel safe --whether that's going into a room alone, leaving when you are able etc. You may need to set some boundaries with some of these people so you can protect yourself. These things will all take time in therapy and will also take some hard work.

I would print off what you wrote and give that to your therapist. S/he can read it in a few minutes and that can help save time in your session.

Good luck!

Lisa