[LittleEarthquakes]

I don't think I will get better. Saying that is a "self-fulfilling prophecy" but I can't do it. I meditate, take medication, go to therapy twice a week doing ACT and DBT, try to exercise, distract myself with activities, read self help books. These things will maybe help for 10-20 minutes, but that is all.

I've been afraid of people since my earliest social interactions and I've been depressed since I was 11 years old. I was mute in school. It started out just being mute around the teachers and the class as a whole, but until third grade I had a few friends who I did talk to, but I did not seem to be the same as other kids, because my friendships were quite strange, and usually ended in them leaving me. I was in a car accident that year, grade 3. I broke my leg and had a traumatic brain injury. I do not remember the accident. I remember a student telling me when I was back at school, in a wheelchair, that everyone only wanted to be my friend because I was sick.

When I was in first grade, 99% of my entire class made fun of me publicly, chanting something about me that embarrassed me and made me feel helpless. I went to tell the teacher. She was talking to another teacher so I waited for her to look at me. When she did I told her what was happening. She was not interested.

I didn't fit in at school, and college is better but still much of the same. When I meet the one or two people who are interested in hanging out with me and getting to know me I flake out because I can't interact with them very well and it makes me feel even more depressed in their company until I can barely say anything, and they all know this because they tell me I seem ditzy, not all there, or like something is wrong. I take benzos about once or twice a week and those help, but then a couple hours later I'm tired and all I wanna do is sleep. I have bad dreams every night featuring seemingly sudden abandonment, rejection, and a lot of fear, anger, and desperation on my part.

I went through years of school avoiding the cafeteria, gym, and other events because I was afraid of having a panic attack. This was after a couple of years of having multiple panic attacks in one school day that made me feel like I was losing my mind, going crazy, that I wasn't real, that the world wasn't real, that everything was stupid, these people were stupid because I was having these panic attack feelings and how could they not see things the way I did in that moment? That is what went through my head at the time.

This is what school became for me. Just surviving, avoiding everyone, just focusing on the panic all day and avoiding it.

I kept silent. My face felt like it wasn't there during a panic attack. I touched it and it felt like it wasn't mine. My heart raced. I was lightheaded. The clock ticked by so slowly. People would hear me taking deep breaths and they would look at me.

The room had a glistening effect and I feared all the air would vanish from the world. I felt like I had maybe just an inch of air to breathe so I would strain my lungs to breathe in fresh air.

My hands and feet tingled and went numb. The teacher who was lecturing up there oblivious looked like she was farther away, then at other times during the panic attack looked like she was a foot in front of me.

I watched the room distort as my hands sweated and I anxiously counted the seconds down. 30 more minutes left? Come on, just survive ten more.

When the bell rang my panic attack would end because I wasn't trapped in a room anymore, but I would feel the aftereffects of the anxiety. I would be very shaky.

I wake up in the morning and I don't want to get out of bed. I don't want to stay in bed either. I feel restless, anxious to do something, but nothing relieves that empty feeling for long.

Eventually I get up, pace around the apartment trying to find something to do, if my mind is racing I'll think to myself as I pace, maybe do something, feel the same overwhelming depression, and return to bed.

When I get out of bed for the day, maybe around 11 or 12, I eventually have breakfast, or I substitute it w a protein shake because I don't wanna eat.

I am very paranoid and I make accusations, assumptions, based on every word said to me, the tone, and facial expression, which I am always analyzing. I cannot seem to stop doing this.

I heard somewhere that it takes around 30 days of consistently doing the ACT exercises to improve, but honestly, I HAVE been doing the exercises, and what for? So that I can feel a tiny bit better? Still the overwhelming feelings are there. It is hard for me to think of improving in the long term when the short term is so painful. I am desperate to relieve the pain that I do destructive things, and that is not helping me in the long-term, but I don't have much faith that anything will.

I don't know if I haven't consistently been doing the exercises correctly and fully and that's why I haven't gotten better, or if I just can't get better, but either way, getting better will only be a little better anyway it seems.

This isn't to say I am giving up. It just feels as if my only option is to die.

What is ACT? Some sort of Cognitive Therapy? I just completed a 3mos CBT program. It took a while and I know all about the hard work you refer to, but I had a breakthrough about 2/3s of the way into it.

I read your post with interest as I share much of what you say - especially the feeling of fear of people from such an early age. I had a safe place though (the forest) and I try to visualize that when things seem at their scariest.

Unfortunately one of the worst things about depression is the idea that it will never get better. That's just something that is inherent in depression. with depression you see everything through the lens of depression. It pretty much all looks bad. The way you see the present, the past, and the future is all filtered through this lens of depression. I can't tell you when or if it will get better or even if it will stay better. But I can tell you that it can and very likely will get better.
I don't know anything about ACT or DBT so I won't go into that.

I am very paranoid and I make accusations, assumptions, based on every word said to me, the tone, and facial expression, which I am always analyzing. I cannot seem to stop doing this.

That I would guess is just related to having dealt with depression and anxiety for so long. Maybe even a touch of OCD. There seems to be a touch of OCD in everything
It's good that you aren't giving up. Persistence, an absolute refusal to give up, is a key to getting though depression and anxiety. Because it can get better. I felt many times that death was the best option but it wasn't.

[Bill3]

(((((LittleEarthquakes)))))

[LittleEarthquakes]

No matter what anyone says I don't think I can get better. Maybe other people can and have but they aren't me.

[Bill3]

You feel completely hopeless right now.

[ManOfConstantSorrow]

You suffer a very great deal. It may well take a very great deal of time to improve. You have great self-awareness. You have made a good start. You might well have setbacks. It is the nature of the thing. Be patient and persistent.

[Fuzzybear]