Grieving the time you loose because of mental illness is one of the hardest things. Sometimes it’s weeks and a few friends, then sometime it’s months and the special occasions missed and more friends drift away.
When it gets into multiple years its no longer about the friends you once had, or the family you were once apart off, it’s just the time. The person you could have been, the people you could have meet, the fun you never had the photos that where never taken. Years stripped from your youth, with no great brave story to say for.
People don’t want to hear about the years you “bravely” fought mental illness. Mental illness is so personal that people don’t know how to talk about or what to think of it. It’s too deep, too heavy. It’s not surface stuff.
I keep seeing people, especially older adults, claim that if you have “ADD”, you don’t have hyperactive symptoms or that you grow out of it, which is just not true.
“ADD” or ADHD-PI as its now called, just means you have much more inattentive symptoms than hyperactive (hence, PI: Predominantly Inattentive).
I like imagining ADHD as a spectrum, with PH on one side, PI on the other and C in the middle. For example, I’m diagnosed as PI but I still show hyperactive symptoms from time to time; I once threw a towel, down the stairs, at my sister’s friend because I was feeling quite hyper.
Hyperactive symptoms don’t have to be physical, they can be mental too, like racing thoughts.
I’ve been diagnosed with ADHD-PI recently and I don’t experience physical hyperactivity at all. But in my head it is quite busy indeed. I talked to my roommate the other day and she said she sometimes doesn’t have any thought at all. Like I didn’t know that was possible. Mean well there isn’t a moment I’m not thinking about at least five things at the same time.
The constant buzzing of thoughts is the reason we need background music/noise to concentrate.. to drown out the buzz. I can’t study in a library because its too quiet.. and my in contrast my thoughts are too loud.
Talking a lot is a hyperactive symptom, the leg bounce is hyperactivity, feeling restless is a hyperactive symptom. How often do PI types exhibit symptoms like this? Every day for hours on end.
The idea that someone isn’t hyperactive because their hyperactivity isn’t loud and in your face to strangers is a problem.
And ADHD is lifelong. During each life stage, or even day to day, different things effect us and we learn new coping mechanisms as we go along (good or bad) so the disorder can display really differently in one single ADHDer. It’s all still ADHD and it’s all a challenge.
Also, physical hyperactivity symptoms in kids often get internalized as they get older. So they might seem to “grow out of it,” but really their brain has just matured just enough that they can be okay bouncing their leg instead of climbing on the furniture, or that they can usually control the constant impulse to interrupt people but it’s still there and something they’re very aware of and have to consciously hold back.
I do not appear to be anywhere even close to hyperactive. I was inactive as a kid, I’m inactive as an adult. Yet I have four of the required six hyperactive/impulsive symptoms.
I’m much more on the inattentive side because my brain never shuts up…weed actually helps a lot to slow it down when concentration is required. Never knew racing/disjointed thoughts & rambling/interrupting were hyperactivity symptoms, since I can (barely) contain my restlessness and urge to pace.
A lot of the time when people give advice intended to relieve anxiety, they suggest doing “relaxing” things like drawing, painting, knitting, taking a bubble bath, coloring in one of those zen coloring books, or watching glitter settle to the bottom of a jar.
This advice is always well-intentioned, and I’m not here to diss people who either give it or who benefit from it. But it has never, ever done shit for me, and this is because it goes about resolving anxiety in the completely wrong way.
THE WORST THING YOU CAN DO when suffering from anxiety is to do a “relaxing” thing that just enables your mind to dwell and obsess more on the thing that’s bothering you. You need to ESCAPE from the dwelling and the obsession in order to experience relief.
You can drive to a quiet farm, drive to the beach, drive to a park, or anywhere else, but as someone who has tried it all many, many times, trust me–it’s a waste of gas. You will just end up still sad and stressed, only with sand on your butt. You can’t physically escape your sadness. Your sadness is inside of you. To escape, you need to give your brain something to play with for a while until you can approach the issue with a healthier frame of mind.
People who have anxiety do not need more time to contemplate, because we will use it to contemplate how much we suck.
In fact, you could say that’s what anxiety is–hyper-contemplating. When we let our minds run free, they run straight into the thorn bushes. Our minds are already running, and they need to be controlled. They need to be given something to do, or they’ll destroy everything, just like an overactive husky dog ripping up all the furniture.
Therefore, I present to you:
THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT DO WHEN ANXIOUS
–Go on a walk
–Watch a sunset, watch fish in an aquarium, watch glitter, etc.
–Go anywhere where the main activity is sitting and watching
–Draw, color, do anything that occupies the hands and not the mind
–Do yoga, jog, go fishing, or anything that lets you mentally drift
–Do literally ANYTHING that gives you great amounts of mental space to obsess and dwell on things.
THINGS YOU SHOULD DO WHEN ANXIOUS:
–Do a crossword puzzle, Sudoku, or any other mind teaser game. Crosswords are the best.
–Write something. It doesn’t have to be a masterpiece. Write the Top 10 Best Restaurants in My City. Rank celebrities according to Best Smile. Write some dumb Legolas fanfiction and rip it up when you’re done. It’s not for publication, it’s a relief exercise that only you will see.
–Read something, watch TV, or watch a movie–as long as it’s engrossing. Don’t watch anything which you can run as background noise (like, off the top of my head, Say Yes to The Dress.) As weird as it seems, American Horror Story actually helps me a lot, because it sucks me in.
–Masturbate. Yes, I’m serious. Your mind has to concentrate on the mini-movie it’s running. It can’t run Sexy Titillating Things and All The Things That are Bothering Me at the same time. (…I hope. If it can, then…ignore this one.)
–Do math problems—literally, google “algebra problems worksheet” and solve them. If you haven’t done math since 7th grade this will really help you. I don’t mean with math, I mean with the anxiety.
–Play a game or a sport with someone that requires great mental concentration. Working with 5 people to get a ball over a net is a challenge which will require your brain to turn off the Sadness Channel.
–Play a video game, as long as it’s not something like candy crush or Tetris that’s mindless.
THINGS YOU SHOULD DO DURING PANIC ATTACKS ESPECIALLY:
–List the capitals of all the U.S. states
–List the capitals of all the European countries
–List all the shapes you can see. Or all the colors.
–List all the blonde celebrities you can think of.
–Pull up a random block of text and count all the As in it, or Es or whatever.
Now obviously, I am not a doctor. I am just an anxious person who has tried almost everything to help myself. I’ve finally realized that the stuff people recommend never works because this is a disorder that thrives on free time and free mental space. When I do the stuff I listed above, I can breathe again. And I hope it helps someone here too.
(Now this shouldn’t have to be said but if the “do nots” work for you then by all means do them. They’ve just never worked for me.)
as someone that’s been in treatment for four and a half fucking years, this shit pisses me off. the list of stuff you said not to do doesn’t help you, specifically, but are incredibly legitimate ways to cope for other people. you shouldn’t make a list of things that don’t help you and say no one should do them. and don’t try and say your footnote means anything when you have a big, bolded, headline that says THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT DO WHEN ANXIOUS. there’s ENOUGH misinformation about mental health going around and this contributes to it. the things you mentioned not working don’t work for everyone because you have to have a solid foundation of mindfulness when you do them. someone can do any of the things any of the lists you provided and not benefit from them if they aren’t doing them mindfully. and even then, i’ll admit they just don’t help everyone— which is okay!!
lemme explain some of it scientifically (to the best of my ability). your senses are directly connected to your brain. when you do certain relaxation techniques, they’re most often related to your senses. because of this, a lot of techniques end up being things that are visually, physically, or auditorially stimulating. the most effective techniques focus on your senses. those don’t help everyone but you can’t ignore the science behind it and flat out tell others not to even try them.
for example, drawing is visually stimulating. learning to notice every stroke, texture, inconsistency, and color can really help someone that gets overstimulated. the texture the crayon leaves on the paper, the way the liquid flows out of a pen, the way each individual pixel on a screen changes color, the consistency difference a pencil makes when you change pressure applied— these are all ways you can be mindful when drawing.
even more than that, it can be stimulating to your sense of hearing as well. the click a pen makes, the sound pencils make when you touch them to the paper. it’s all things to notice so your mind is distracted and being put to use.
i really love that you gave an alternative list of what helps you and might help other people. i just wish it wasn’t presented in a way that puts down other legitimate recommendations. there are a lot of impressionable minors on this site that will see your list of things not to do and will dismiss them as bad suggestions before even trying them.
TLDR; the list of things to do and the list of things NOT to do are both GOODways to cope!! don’t force your experience of ineffectiveness on other people
sidenote: masturbating when anxious/stressed may calm you down but it isn’t a solid way to cope. it associates sex with stress/anxiety and can lead to sexual problems when there isn’t stress/anxiety involved!!
are you ready for the latest in research-based [ingroup] demographic stereotypy? this one’s a doozy.
In our clinical practice, adults with IQ scores in and above the superior range have sought evaluation and treatment for chronic difficulties with organizing their work, excessive procrastination, inconsistent effort, excessive forgetfulness, and lack of adequate focus for school and/or employment. They question whether they might have an attention deficit disorder, but often they have been told by educators and clinicians that their superior intelligence precludes their having ADHD.
Typically, these very bright individuals report that they are able to work very effectively on certain tasks in which they have strong personal interest or intense fear of immediate negative consequences if they do not complete the task at once. Yet they are chronically unable to make themselves do many tasks of daily life they recognize as important but do not see as personally interesting at that moment. When provided treatment appropriate for ADHD, these very bright individuals often report significant improvement in their ability to work effectively while their medication is active.
yes. so. how would you like a summary of my educational career?
Clinical interviews with patients in this study indicated that individuals with high IQ who have ADHD may be at increased risk of having recognition and treatment of their ADHD symptoms delayed until relatively late in their educational careers because teachers and parents tend to blame the student’s disappointing academic performance on boredom or laziness, especially as they notice the situational variability of their ADHD symptoms.
Like most others with ADHD, these individuals have a few specific domains in which they have always been able to focus very well, for example, sports, computer games, artistic or musical pursuits, reading self-elected materials. Parents and teachers tend to assume that these very bright persons could focus on any other tasks equally well, if only they chose to do so. These observers do not understand that although ADHD appears to be a problem of insufficient willpower, it is not (Brown, 2005).
Many also reported that they often demonstrated considerable prowess in performing specific tasks in which they had little positive personal interest but did experience considerable fear of immediate negative consequences if they did not complete that particular task by some external deadline. Often subjects described this as a character trait, “I’m just a severe procrastinator” or “I always work best under pressure.”
that’s not all.
In an unpublished study of 103 treatment-seeking adults with IQ 120 or more diagnosed with ADHD, Brown and Quinlan (1999) found that 42% had dropped out of postsecondary schooling at least once, although some did eventually return to complete a degree. Those data together with this present study suggest that individuals with high IQ and ADHD, despite their strong cognitive abilities, may be at significant risk of educational disruption or failure due to ADHD-related impairments of EF.
and now?
Biederman et al. (2006) […] found that adults with ADHD who self-reported elevated levels of EF impairments on the CBS tended to be significantly more impaired on measures of global functioning, had more comorbidities, and held lower current socioeconomic status than did those with or without ADHD who scored below the median on that scale. […]
Everything gets harder under extreme stress. The situation of constant political crisis we’re living through is extremely stressful situation, and a lot of people are struggling.
This is not a normal situation. Donald Trump has been doing horrific things since the moment he assumed office, some of which we saw coming, and some of which have been awful surprises. Both the work that has to be done and the terror we’re facing on a day-to-day basis are draining. We have faced one crisis after another, and it has been completely exhausting.
The baseline level of stress and work we’re facing right now makes everything harder in and of itself — and new emergencies can intensify that. (And sometimes you might think that you’ve gotten used to it and then find that a particular crisis hits you particularly hard.)
If you have a disability, this may be affecting you differently than it’s affecting nondisabled people. Most people are having trouble right now; most disabled people are having additional disability-related trouble. That’s true in both the background sense and in the sense that the impact emergencies have on you may be different for disability-related reasons.
If you have a mobility disability, moving might be harder right now. If you have a speech disability, speaking might be harder or impossible right now. If you have sensory issues, some sensory input you are normally able to deal with might be intolerably painful at the moment. If you have an eating disorder, it might be harder to control it right now. If you have seizures or migraines or other neurological problems, your threshold might be lowered. If you have trauma-related triggers, they might be harder to tolerate, or you might be more hypervigilant than usual. If you are hard of hearing, it might be much harder to understand spoken conversations right now. And so on.
Things you’re used to being able to do might be harder or impossible right now. Coping mechanisms you’re used to relying on might not be working. This is true for everyone, disabled or not. But with disability, we’re also having functioning problems that most people around us aren’t having. That can in itself be difficult to cope with.
For many of us, self acceptance as disabled people is a struggle. Under extreme stress, acceptance can be even harder. Acceptance is a skill just like everything else — and under extreme stress, many of us are dramatically more impaired. Acceptance gets harder, at the same time that there is suddenly more to accept. But you’re still worthy of acceptance. You’re not broken. It’s just hard.
Being disabled isn’t a failure. Being more impaired in a time of extreme stress isn’t a character flaw. You’re not alone in struggling. Nondisabled people are also more impaired right now; and they also can’t make it go away through sheer force of will. The particular things you can and can’t do may be different — because you have a disability, and disability matters.
Tl;dr The times we’re living in involve a lot of fear and extremely stressful political crises. This kind of stress makes everything harder. If you have a disability, some of your coping skills might not be working very well right now. Acceptance may also feel a lot harder. It’s worth remembering that it’s normal to struggle in situations like this — and it’s not your fault that disability matters now. Your body is not a character flaw.
Accepting ourselves the way we are means we allow ourselves the things we need to make life a little easier. You don’t have to fight it, it’s ok have different needs to others. You are worthy of kindness, so be kind to you ❤
lovingdread 