[yatzii]

Apologies for the wall of text, tried to keep it as short as I could. I really appreciate your time. Just to clarify I have not been diagnosed with any mental disorder, I have never gone to the doctors about it and I am in a sort of denial that anything is actually wrong.

I have never been mentally sound growing up, I went through periods of serious isolation not wanting to talk to people having heightened anxiety. To wanting to always be at a friends house after school. During my later teens there was a lot of hard drugs and some bad episodes of depression, trouble with the police in relation to drugs. This is when my mental state became very erratic. Periods of feeling like the coolest guy and also periods of feeling like a worthless ****. However, I swear this is every teenager.

Fast forward to going to Uni, left home, family and moved to the other side of the world. Everything was fine I was enjoying myself until I slowly just couldn't take it, I become a shell of my former self locked in severe depression to the point where I couldn't handle social interaction and started to abuse alcohol (drinking a lot on my own), only made things worse so stopped.

After awhile I recouped and ended up going to the gym and got heavily invested in it, almost obsessed and felt amazing, i would dancing in my room looking at myself in the mirror thinking I was huge, ripped and awesome (I wasn't). Got a GF, things were good (At this point I just assumed I had got over my problems and was on the way to success).

Fast forward some more, I was diagnosed with Celiac disease, became very ill, lost a lot of weight, took up some weird ideas as to why it all happened, why I also got seb derm (skin condition, effects my face) at the same time. Changed my diet in a crazy way to try and improve on everything (skin/digestion). Became heavily depressed, ruined my relationship with GF to where she cheated on me. Dropped everything and came back to where I was raised to live with my parents. Very depressed for a long time but picked myself up and got into the work place.

Things were feeling good, very good. I felt amazing I worked insanely hard, thought I was the **** again got back in the gym. Became very depressed again, my skin seemed to bother me as I said I have seb derm and it's a condition I have to maintain. Effected my work and people were constantly asking me what was wrong, I knew I was off but thought they were just being over dramatic. At this point the downs were getting bothersome, my social skills would drop insanely and I hated looking people in the face, anxiety was really elevated. Wanted to be left alone completely. However, at this point I wasn't questioning anything I was used to ups and downs. I would just keep trucking on.

This is when things got a little weird. A girl at work took interest in me and I was feeling generally al right. I enjoyed the attention but I was getting very stressed about it all. This is when when depression hit a new turn for me, I know at the time I was worried about how she would take my skin problem, even though she clearly didn't care or notice (I am very over critical of it even when I can get my skin looking healthy). This over critical view definitely added to the stress. Any who, this time the suicidal thoughts came in hard, constantly thinking about turning my motorbike into the other side of the road whilst driving at 40mph, walking in front of a car, being extremely reckless on the road, a lot of near misses. I felt numb, did not care. I remember walking constantly at night thinking about how I want to kill myself or kill anyone who came near me. Just to note I was smoking some weed around the time of the night walks.

I carried smoking weed, sitting by myself in an abandoned house and venturing out at night, it all seemed to help. I suddenly had a switch go off and instead of being depressed I was very happy, feeling very confident, devious and I went around climbing into peoples gardens, stealing push bikes for joy rides and just enjoying myself. I was getting a rush from it all. This didn't last long, one day I just stopped doing it, suddenly realising the stupidity of it. I work in a big global Law Firm in a very professional setting, adds to the ridiculousness of that period. I stopped smoking weed round about now.

Since then I have had another episode of depression, same attributes, social skills gone, can't bear to go out in public which switched to an insanely good feeling again of being able to take on anything.

I am starting to get concerned now, is this all normal? There is part of me that thinks I am being paranoid and this is normal, but there is another side that is starting to get concerned. I am al right at the moment which is nice.

[Victoria'smom]

The best thing to do ii s call a clinic to be evaluated, start therapy and then maybe meds. Is it normal? No is it bp? Maybe? Is it difficult to tease out what's mentally wrong vs. Symom's of physical issues? Yes. For any quality of life, long term you need to get evaluated.

[Ripose]

I went through life in much the same way but I always attributed the ups and downs to how much I was drinking during each phase. Fast forward to 2002 when I quit drinking and realized that my problems only became worse. I started seeing various doctors who found many physical and mental ailments. So it tuned out I had COPD, osteoporosis, malnutrition, severe lack of vitamin D, and bipolar I.

So like Miguel's Mom said you need to be checked for both physical and mental components. Go to your PCP first as a starting point.

I hope you get things straightened out soon!

[Azvixxen]

First off, I am learning more and more that "normal" doesn't exist in the way we think it does. For each person it is different. It seems in reading your post that you have several periods where you are feeling anything but "normal".

I agree that seeking medical help in determining what might be the culprit is a step you should consider. I also know that until you are ready to do so, we can ask you to seek help until the end of days but ultimately you need to make that choice.

I can offer only to listen, to offer my advice, and to hope that you will have brighter days. I have felt the way you have, known the despair of trying to figure if it would be worth missing that upcoming turn as you speed down a road, known the euphoria of being on top of the world just because I am amazing. These all passed and now I seem to just hope I can stay even keel for more than a few days at a time. We all have our struggles and you are taking a good step in joining the forums to search out how others deal with said struggles.

Good luck