[Valshia]

I have a mild learning disability witch I absolutely truly wish I wasn't born with and despise myself for it and always have done for years but it has improved in general over years through help with my confidence witch has helped me with my learning, communication, memory recall and other areas but the only thing is that I keep constantly getting intrusive thoughts witch are driving me truly insane to the point where I felt suicidal and they aren't even related to cbd (compulsive obsessive disorder) and I have it for at least 9 years and had slowly gotten worse and worse and I'm om medication for it witch doesn't seem to be helping at all even though I take it everyday. The intrusive thoughts usually consist of bad memories of when I was at school or sometimes can be paranoid thoughts and can very distressful and sometimes I try and reason with myself or to get rid of the thought and sometimes I can spend up to a few hours or even longer just trying to combat them and it's that serious sometimes I think whether i should be in mental institution or sometimes i think i'm mentally retarded because of it but my point is that I don't know why I keep getting them, is my intrusive thoughts related to ocd or anything else that I haven't thought of and if there is anyone out there that can give me answer to this or just any kind of help would much appreciated?
Thank you

[kaliope]

maybe you should talk to your doctor about changing your meds. they have meds that work on intrusive thoughts I believe. take care

[DePressMe]

Valshia, I feel compelled to share some of my experiences because I can identify with a lot of your basic struggles and I don't want you to feel alone. Since I don't know a lot about your personal history then you might not relate to all of my specific details so just disregard those aspects. But hopefully you can pick-up on the similarities within the big picture of it all. And, maybe it'll give you some ideas about how to interpret things in ways you may not have thought about yet.

I have a LD and horrible memories from the ways some people treated me--especially at school. It was truly emotional/mental abuse inflected upon me because I had no way to defend myself or escape it because it was by people of authority. I just helplessly endured the pain. The resulting damage to my self-image, self worth, self confidence and such had an almost life long impact....basically, the public humiliation made me believe their ignorance and it was traumatic enough that developed PTSD from it. I realize I was in school a long time ago so the teachers did not really understand why I seemed to be the "problem" so I have more or less let go of the anger I felt towards them.

It was really difficult because although I had the LD I also had a very high IQ and was academically driven so it was embarrassing that I just could not "get" some things like everybody else. I believed I was stupid even though I excelled in other areas that other students never had the "talent" for because I did not give myself credit for it. Really, it was a whole heck of a lot of work and figuring out different ways to learn and think about things in my own way so they'd make sense. Which, I see now, has actually been a gift to be able to do that--something the average person may not tend to do because they don't have the need to think in a novel manner.

But, anyway, yeah, I too have the intrusive thoughts and I have a mental illness. But just having those thoughts does not make you crazy or necessarily mean you should be locked-up in a hospital. I can't say why you are having them or if they are related to your LD or, really even predict very much about how they will play out in your life. Because you might have a different LD and have different influences on your mental health than I have in my life. To some extent I think every person is somewhat unique in how they think and how their thoughts affect their life.

But, please don't feel like you're all alone with your struggles and questions. I have much in common with you. My intrusive thoughts have changed over time but for most of my life they were about suicide and they were extremely graphic and very disturbing to have to live with all the time. Yeah, all the time--they never quit for even a minute. However, over time they have switched gears a little bit but I still deal with them on a daily basis. They are just a little "different" now in the sense that I don't find them quite as disrupting to me because I've learned how to better manage them. Meds and a lot of writing and thinking about them has helped me accept them so they don't feel like such a big threat anymore. It's a big relief to be able to go even just an hour without feeling like I am threatened by my impending death or doomed to insanity.

For so much of my life I was tortured by my thoughts and it was a constant battle to try to control them--at times I was convinced that I'd never make it--they would eventually drive me mad or kill me. No matter how hard I tried I could not stop them and my brain just kept on producing one right after another...I just wanted to hear what silence sounded like because I literally did not remember it.

I know it sounds like it doesn't make sense that even though I had spent so much time doing nothing but thinking about the thoughts...I really did not make much progress understanding them until I thought about them even more--but, it was different thinking--I learned about others experiences with thoughts, tried to get people's feedback and talked to therapists and finally I came up with some new insights.

If you would like to PM me to discuss this, I'd be happy to chat with you. I think its really good you're seeking help because I ended up waiting a little too long and suffered consequences from having them so long. Whatever you do, don't give up because your life will get better....

[Valshia]

Well thank you for sharing all that with me and yes i would love to discuss this with you as it could help me

[Feluram]

@DePressMe, Can feel the pulse here. These things put in an endless vicious cycle, often without any sight of the light at the end. I am also constantly battling to get my thinking sorted..

@Valshia, Don't let the helplessness and utter confusion slide you into the depression..Never give up, remember hope is a good thing.