The Mental Health thread

[Alan]

Also l, as daft as it sounds, chatgpt / Gemini etc are great for using as sounding boards

They can be, but they can also be an active detriment:

Their teen sons died by suicide. Now, they want safeguards on AI : Shots - Health News

Those conversations revealed that their son had confided in the AI chatbot about his suicidal thoughts and plans. Not only did the chatbot discourage him to seek help from his parents, it even offered to write his suicide note, according to Matthew Raine, who testified at a Senate hearing about the harms of AI chatbots held Tuesday.

Just something to be careful with.

 

[Tyrannosaurus Dan]

I think my potential meltdown may have been noticed by some of the senior staff members. Our regional general manager was in for most of last week and she sat me down for a chat and basically said ‘what can we do to stop you having a panic attack’.

A few things have been put in place to ease the pressure on me so I am feeling a bit better about my situation at work. Let’s see how the next few weeks go.

 

[lemonjelly]

good to hear T-Dan. Also good to know your employer clearly values you, and also that you don't feel the need to hide your feelings.

 

[pagey]

Had an ambulance out for grandson last night, due to breathing difficulties, think it may be sepsis, so started him on antibiotics.

Apologies for going on, just seems like one thing after the other. It's really getting me down.

 

[Tredman]

Had an ambulance out for grandson last night, due to breathing difficulties, think it may be sepsis, so started him on antibiotics.

Apologies for going on, just seems like one thing after the other. It's really getting me down.

Hope the little one is ok and you’re not going on at all.

 

[Derby Wolf]

Had an ambulance out for grandson last night, due to breathing difficulties, think it may be sepsis, so started him on antibiotics.

Apologies for going on, just seems like one thing after the other. It's really getting me down.

Mate, you are never going on.

You need to have somewhere to vent/process and if that's here great. you can't support your family if you aren't looking after yourself.

I know we've previously spoken about your other grandson, DM is always open if you need anything.

 

[AndyWolves]

Had an ambulance out for grandson last night, due to breathing difficulties, think it may be sepsis, so started him on antibiotics.

Apologies for going on, just seems like one thing after the other. It's really getting me down.

Every day that little man is getting bigger and stronger

 

[Del Woppio]

Hopefully turning the corner after a day of antibiotics pagey

 

[lemonjelly]

Brilliant that you & the family are monitoring & keeping a close eye on things.
Fantastic to know your accessing professional support at the right times.
Keep doing the good stuff @pagey including talking.

 

[Alan]

I don't know if this will help you the way it has helped me (not that it's a silver bullet or anything), @pagey, but something my therapist reminds me when I stress over being someone else's burden is that expressing my struggles to a trusted person can never burden them even half as much as we ourselves our burdened by the source of our stress.

Worth saying that "stress" is perhaps too mundane a word to really capture the emotion, but I think it works for illustration.

 

[sycophantia]

Mate, dont ever worry about 'going on about it,' everyone is with you, talk about it as much as you want, as long as it helps even a tiny bit.

 

[pagey]

Thanks all, grandsons responding to antibiotics, still waiting on blood results but I'm good, just felt I couldn't catch a break, and felt I had to be strong for daughter/sister/family.

Needed to use something to let it out.

 

[Alan]

Thanks all, grandsons responding to antibiotics, still waiting on blood results but I'm good, just felt I couldn't catch a break, and felt I had to be strong for daughter/sister/family.

Needed to use something to let it out.

No need to justify it, mate. We're all with you.

 

[Alan]

My OCD is having a day. It’s been almost nonstop eviscerations of myself since rolling out of bed. It’s hard to find a reason to go on putting up with my inner monologue when days like today break me all the way down into nothing.

People say things to me now that just feel so… ignorant of my reality.

“You can’t let things get to you like this.”

“Dwelling on the past isn’t healthy.”

“Just because you screwed up once doesn’t mean you will again.”

How do I explain that I know, unequivocally, that these things are all true, and yet that it just isn’t possible for me to believe them?

 

[AndyWolves]

I hear you mate, and I can understand what you're going through. The repetitive, over and over critical voice that you know is true and everyone else is wrong.

But is it? These are just thoughts, and you have the power to decide what to do with these thoughts. You can observe them, and reflect but ultimately discard them if you want to.

Id really recommend guided meditation, and treating like an exercise you do every day.

Marcus Aurelius - "Today I escaped from anxiety. Or no, I discarded it, because it was within me, in my own perceptions—not outside"

 

[Alan]

100%, stoicism and meditation have been excellent tools to keep me pushing through days like yesterday. Stoicism as a philosophy, in particular, represents a sort of end state for grappling with OCD; the compulsions are never going away completely so a lot of the goals of treatment are in finding that “eye of the hurricane”, some peace in the always swirling mental chaos.

I think, for me, not knowing it was OCD for so long means I’ve normalized a lot of my mental compulsions, so it can be hard to tell that I’m crashing until it’s already happened.

 

[AndyWolves]

100%, stoicism and meditation have been excellent tools to keep me pushing through days like yesterday. Stoicism as a philosophy, in particular, represents a sort of end state for grappling with OCD; the compulsions are never going away completely so a lot of the goals of treatment are in finding that “eye of the hurricane”, some peace in the always swirling mental chaos.

I think, for me, not knowing it was OCD for so long means I’ve normalized a lot of my mental compulsions, so it can be hard to tell that I’m crashing until it’s already happened.

This is my go-to when things get a bit too much

 

[Alan]

Cheers, Andy.