Topic : Giving and Receiving Support

I've posted on several other boreds here, trying to find help, so I thought of trying here. Some of this I have already posted, but I'm just gonna write it again, so everyone can understand my situation, ok?

 

Where to begin, well I have 3 kids, they are 11, 9 and a 5 year's old and my life has been a roller coaster of a ride. My two older children, my daughter and my son, were by my ex-boyfriend who I haven't seen in nearly 10 years. He had a wife and two children with her, both girls. When we dated, from 1994-1998, he and his wife were separated, well that is what he told me. I was only 17 when we met, he was 34. I met his daughters, they were around 6 and 4 at the time when we first met. They new about me and my daughter, they came to her 1st birthday party, my daughter went to his house with them when he had them at his house, I met them when I was at his house, but they never knew about my son. Then when he left me, right before I had my son in 1998, I loss all contact with all of them, I looked and looked everywhere for them and I never found them. So to make a long story short, my 11 yr-old was on myspace and came across two girls who looked like the girls in the only picture I have of her sisters, from her birthday party, 10 years ago. They were the age they would be now and the same sign as their birthday, so she e-mailed them and one responded and said that she has a sister, who's name is the same as my exes daughters!! She told my daughter that she always knew she had a younger sister, they exchanged a few words but she's didn't reply back right away. Well she finally did, she said that she hadn't seen her dad in over a year, she is 16 now, she's the younger one, the other one is older, she is like around 18 now. She said that he moved back to Trinidad and has a new wife there. Her sister said that she wants to meet my daughter and that she did not know that she had a younger brother too, she was in shock, but seemed really sweet and kind and she even sent my daughters pic's of her and her sister, her mom and even 2 of my kid's cousin's from their father's side. She want's to meet us all, but don't know how to talk to her mom about it. she hasn't even told her sister that she has contact with my daughter, but said she is going to. My daughter is so excited, she say's that she feels so good now that she has found her long lost sister's and that she could. maybe one day she and her brother could meet their dad. My son is excited too, but he has ADD and is more worried or concerned about other things, plus since moving back home to Chicago from Georgia after 6 years and with my son not having a lot of friends that were boys around back in Georgia, all he had was his 2 sisters and his step-dad and 2 "uncle's" (my husband's brothers) so, he is having a blast being with all his "boy" cousins. All I ever wanted out of life was to be loved, to be happy, and when I had kids, to be a good mom and to raise them right and in a 2 parent, loving home and I thought I found that with my husband. We met in 2001, after I moved to Georgia to start my life over. He was my soul-mate, my lover, my best friend, my everything. He helped make me the person I am today, but not without a price. When we met I was a single mom of 2, that just moved 800 miles away from my whole family, with a history, with baggage. I opened up to him, he just gave me that vibe, he showed interest in me and more importantly, he showed interest in my kids and that just swept me off my feet. For 3 year's I was single, only dated less then a handful of guys, only dated, nothing more. Perry was the first guy I got that sucken, funny feeling in the pit in my stomach when he walked in the room or called, my heart skipped a beat, he gave me my life back. I never felt the love I had for him with no other man, I would of walk to hell and back for him. However, don't get me wrong, I loved my childrens' father too, I fell madly in love with him over time. We worked together and began a secert affair. Like i said he told me he and his wife were sperated, but we had to keep it a secert cause he was my boss. So, of course, good ole naive Patti ate it up. He was good to me, when he was around, and not going to see his wife behind my back. He lied to me about so much, that I began to lie to him too and things just got blown out of propotion, before I knew it, I was living a lie, a make believe life and he believed me to be this crazy young woman, who feel in love with him and got pregnant. It eventually just become to much and he left me when I was 8 months pregnant with our second child, my son. I feel like I pushed him away, but he had his own demons too. He was still married, but supposely seperated, he was a Muslim, I was Catholic, he was from Trinidad, just a bunch of different stuff, but I felt he loved me and I loved him. I let my insercuruties control me, plus with him lying to me and trying to cover it up, just fueled my fire and I evenutally become a very resentful, revengful person. So after he left me I moved back in with my parents, then 4 months later my dad died from a massive heart attack. Farouk was his name, he came and took my daughter for my dad's funeral, but refused to take my son, his son. He never gave me a reason why he left me. He called me on my birthday in April of 1998, said he needed some time to think, he came to the hospital when I had my son that next month, the next time I seen him was when my dad died that September, haven't seen him since. There is more to my story, can't write it all here. So now back to when I moved to Georgia and met Perry, I fell in love and he treated me good, he treated my kids good, they loved him so much, they began to call him daddy. We had a daughter in Aug, of 2002, were married in Feb, 2003. I went back to school, got my GED, things were good for awhile, well to make a long story short, I married a monster, he was a child molester and he molested my 11 year old daughter for 5 years. he was nothing I thought he was, he used me as a pond to get to my daughter. It has been the worse experience I ever been through, I can't imagine what my daughter must be going through, all she and her brother ever wanted was a dad and I thought I found them one, how wrong I was. He also molested my niece and his niece's and others. This all happened with my husband just this past August. It's been rough, for all of us, my 5-yr-old was never touched, but she misses her daddy very, very much, they had a very close bond, it was his first biological child. Like I said there is so much more to this whole story, I call my life. See ever since this experienced happened with my daughter and her step-dad, both my daughter and my son has been asking me about their "real" dad and older sisters and wants to find them and met them, but I don't know what to do. Child support has looked for my ex and never could find him and closed my case and I think he knows and is in hiding and he probably won't want to contact us, because of that, so now I don't know what to do. I can use child support, but I rather have them met him and/or their sisters, I can care less about money, I want my children to have closure, to know who their biological father is, to know their sisters, to know who and where they came from, who their family is, what can I do? I need help, any advice? I don't know how to make this happen, I know they live in Chicago somewhere and their dad in supposely in Trinidad and Tabago in the West Indies, well that is what his other daughter said, don't know for sure. I need help with so much I'm dealing with, I just can't deal with it alone, I don't know what is right and what is the wrong things to do. My lilttle girl is asking me so many questions about her daddy, that I just don't know how to answer without making her cry for him, instead I change the subject or tell her to quite asking me and then THAT makes her upset!! My life seems so messed up and confusing, I have three children with 2 different fathers, asking me about thier dad...HELP!! What do i do, how do I do thid, anyone please help!

You're not making Christmas hard for your Fiance...he is, but not deliberately.  Complicated grief is difficult to live with. Ten years is a long time, but to him, his loss could seem like yesterday.

He wants to move on with his life or he would not be with you. Guilt for wanting to love and laugh again might be keeping him down. He might feel like he's betraying his deceased wife and won't give himself permission to completely move on with his life.

There are many things that can be catalysts to his grief. Sometimes they can't be separated. Complicated grief can cause depression, sadness, anger/rage, hostility, resentment, severe remorse, helplessness, and turning off memories is impossible.

Perhaps he doesn't know how to manage being a survivor, and he might need grief counselling.

Just be happy around him and maybe it will rub off.    

Hi,

    I too suffer depression and I have epilepsy and a bone disease and spinal injury and just find it so hard to get out to make friends.  I really really hope I get a reply in here, I don't really know what i'm doing though,

 

This is the first time I have really tried to reply to anyone, I have put in posts but must put them in wrong because no one has answered them.

 

I would dearly love to join in here and get to know some people.

 

Depression is a really bad set back for me, as it makes you feel so alone and seperate from everyone else and it's so hard to explain to people.  If you tell someone you have depression the conversation stops and they either ignore it or find an excuse to go, it's sad really because i'm no different to anyone else, I want to be accepted like the next person.

 

I hope I hear from someone.

 

Take care all and have a wonderful christmas and a happy new year

 

Shelley, from Australia

Dear Shelly ,

 

  You actually owe no one an explanation. It is your business. Unfortunately people with depression have always and  are still discriminated against. It is ignorance that drives their comments. Only approximately 49 % of people suffering depression have any biochemical imbalance which is why the medication actually does help them. The remainder will try various antidepressants/antipsychotics (shrinks call mood stabilizers) and anticonvulsants to find they only get worse. That is because they don't need medication rather they need to consult a psychologist and get to the root of their problem/s and learn life strategies/tools to cope with or overcome certain lifestyle or psychological situations. The problem is that GPs and psychiatrists tell them that all depression is a biochemical imbalance and it is simply not true.

 

  Because you suffer from epilepsy your depression would very likely be biochemical due to the interruption to normal neurotransmission by the seizure activity. This happens even when you are not displaying any seizure-like symptoms as there are often small electrical seizures occuring intermittently. It has been proven that people who suffer from temporal lobe epilepsy have a higher than average incidence of moderate to severe depression. 

 

 

  If you would like more information on anything I've mentioned just post questions. I will provide references for the same. I am writing a book for laypeople and professionals on depression. I have done a great deal of research and I am still finding more new information. I have more access to information than the general public as I work for the health department .

 

  I was lucky to escape with my life and my mind after ten years of psychiatric treatment .I was unfortunately given Zoloft by my GP in 1996 for 'mild' depression and became suicidal within 7 days. The medication was not stopped but doubled , others added and then I was hospitalised and given ECT. This beautiful scenario continued for another nine years and after countless cocktails of medications , a hundred rounds of ECT

and I ended up obese, with hypothyroidism (from the meds) and unable to string a sentence together.     

 

   Finally in the middle of a holiday in 2004  I decided to tip the Clozapine down the toilet and begin weaning all of the other meds slowly. I lost 40kg in 8 mths, regained insight and clarity of thought and set about writing a page long list of goals. The doctors scoffed at me telling me I was being 'too ambitious'. I made them eat those words. By July 2006 I was off all medication. The psychiatrist tried to tell me that there was a 70% chance of 'relapse'. I laughed and said ,"relapse of what ?". I had been given the diagnoses of depression , psychotic depression ; bipolar disorder , schizophrenia;major depression and schizoaffective disorder with borderline personality and obsessional traits ! I'm sure that if I had continued to go along with what they were telling me they could have completely exhausted the DSMIV of  all possible diagnoses. All they were seeing as symptoms were the effects of the drugs they were feeding me. No one out of six psychiatrists who treated me had the brains to consider stopping all medications to see what was really going on underneath the confusing mask of medication.

 

 

   All of that aside I do understand what it feels like to be depressed and lose your independence ( on more than one level). Try to consult a psychologist also rather than just treating the symptoms with medication. Your depression is multi faceted. You are likely to be greiving for the loss of your health , mobility and independance on top of the biochemical disturbance. A good psychologist will help to learn to deal with how all of this is affecting you and develop some strategies to deal with ongoing problems and any new ones that appear. I'm sorry to say psychiatrists are rarely prepared to talk to you about anything more than how to adjust the medications. They don't offer you practical strategies like a psychologist. The role of psychiatrists has deteriorated to psychopharmacology. Freud and Jung would turning in their graves.

 

 

  I live in Sydney and I am a paediatric critical care nurse. If would like to email me personally just let me know or if not that's ok too.Take care and remember that being comfortable with who you are is far more important than what other people think.

 

Cheers,  Donna.

Thank you so much for your encouraging words.  Grief counseling definately sounds like something he needs, although a family member suggested that to him soon after his wife passed away and he thought they were wrong, so I don't want to be the one to "rock the boat" sort of speak. 

 

He did manage to go out shopping for specific items over the past 3 days, once by himself, so I know he is trying very hard and that's something he hasn't done for years.

 

Thanks

  I feel so lost and angry at the lack of acknowledgement and any support for people who have been grossly mistreated by the mental health system. After being medicated for 'mild' depression with Zoloft in 1996 I inexplicably became suicidal. However, instead of this being recognised for the adverse reaction it was, my doctor doubled the dose and added an antipsychotic followed by a six week admission to a psych ward with weeks of ECT.

  You would think that according to the stories pedalled by pharmaceutical companies ,mental health leaflets and psychiatrists that this 'wonderful and necessary'' intervention would have had me thinking clearly and suddenly happy and functioning again. That was far from the case and would be for another 9 yrs until I weaned myself off all medications and commenced cognitive behavioural therapy I was suddenly cured. The shrinks (five of them) were treating the symptoms produced by the medications. No amount of different medications or ECT was ever going to change it. I was labelled' treatment resistant'. Probably because the treatment was and had always been inappropriate.

  In short I lost a great amount of my long -term memory ( due to ECT) , lost ten years of my life ; lost my child bearing years; lost the opportunity to ever own a home (too old to start paying a mortagage now) lost the opportunity to advance my career and lost all but 3 friends ( two live in another state). I can't even get income protection insurance because I was treated for depression. They will only agree to insure me if I see their shrink and agree to be medicated for an illness I don't have with the drugs that nearly took my life.

  I am sick of seeing sanitised stories about psychiatric treatment. Meds only work for  about 49% of people taking them. That leaves 51% who don't improve or get even worse or suicide. In Australia if you were to try and post this message on any message board for mental health support it will not be posted. It will be censored by moderators who won't print anything that doesn't project a squeaky clean  and flawless image  of  psychiatric treatment. There is so little scientific evidence to support anything psychiatry says or does. If you sign a consent for surgery you do so with full knowledge of the risks involved. You don't  get that with psychiatric treatment. It is not truly informed consent that you give. There is absolutely no balanced information distributed to patients.

  However, despite what happened to me I am constantly told by others that  'I have no right to feel angry. I should be grateful just to have recovered. I should just try to forget it and move on.'  That would be easier if people didn't ask why I'm not married , why I don't have children ; why I didn't buy a home and what did I do over the last 11 years. People approach me and start talking to me claiming they know me from a decade ago. Due to the ECT I cannot remember who they are , how they know me and what they know about me. It's rather embarassing to say you can't remember who they are even after they tell you their name. Also when it comes to explaining why you gave up work for 2 1/2 yrs and they say ," Oh, did you have a job in a different industry, have children or travel?"  When the real answer is ,"No I was locked up in a psych ward drugged to the eyeballs , having my memories erased with ECT and dangerously obese with parkinsonian symptoms ( from meds)."

  People like myself are made to feel that it's not the fault of the psychiatric fraternity that  our lives were ruined. Not to mention you cannot  even sue them for compensation as the statute of limitations is only  3 yrs here. Nobody successfully sues a doctor here without becoming bankrupt themselves. So how can I get justice ? Even acknowledgement or an apology for mistreating me would be suffice. But instead they want me to forgive them and thank them for their efforts ! Would you ?

We are being evicted and we even pay our rent on time every month. This isn't the issure. It's that my husband always has to get involved with lawsuits about something or cause some kind of problem. We are being harassed by the management of the apts we live in because we filed a lawsuit of discrimination against the apts because the trash compactor isn't handicapped accessible. Can you believe this one. We are fighting it but my husband is disabled and a few years ago was arrested for things we thought were dismissed but were ajudicated withheld, now they feel we should be evicted because even though we were approved for rental ten months ago they are saying he wasn't honest on his application. The office staff said go back two years and we are approved. Now because the city is after them they want to throw us out. The stuff won't even show up on the website after july 29th cause they were mistomeaners. This place is in such bad condition and we still pay our rent, now to the courts this month. They filed the eviction so we can't even find another place to live because of that now. They are harassing us and no one can do anything for us. I sure hope the judge sees it our way or I have no way out except one. I don't like what I will have to do but I just can't take it anymore, I have a peptic ulcer now and I am so depressed I want to die. I am in pain all the time and hate my life. What next?

I'm not too sure if any of my words would do you any good, but still.....I'm very sorry. And I really hope you can find it within yourself to start looking at the future, no matter how troubling it may be. You've 'survived' 11 years of mistreatement, that makes you a very strong person to me! And I know people around you make that worse, people can be so insensitive....as long as it does not happen to them.

Holding ''them' responsible is very difficult; as soon as you point the finger at one of them, they will point at someone else. It's the same here (Holland)....we know now they already knew what Zoloft did to people when they started giving it here....me, and many others, suffered from the same symptoms as you did. Since I wasn't depressed but Bipolair I even had a more severe reaction, but I was lucky....I'm okay. But no one ever came forward either, no one ever apologized.....I even think you can still get Zoloft here....they say the risks are minimized.....

 

To answer your question......would you? I'm sorry, but I don't think I can answer that question, I honostly would not know. I'm tempted to answer 'no', but experience has taught me that keeping anger inside of me makes the situation worse for me.....I try to get rid of anger as soon as I can :) But in this case....boy, I think that would be a very hard job.  

 

I hope the new year will bring you some better things, I hope it will bring you the strength to let the grip they've got on your life go. They don't deserve to be in your attention span.

 

All my best,

My brother-in-law began taking Chantix 11-07,started losing weight,tingling in fingers and toes,drepressed,with anxious feelings about his health.  He went back to physician and was taken off his celibrex. Was told he was just having panic attacks,was not taken off his Chantix.  This man was a very happily married my of 40 years with Grandchildren. He had not ,had anything happen to him to which he would have had a reason for what occurred.  On 1-3-08 he got ready for work,kissed his wife goodbye,finished loading his vending van with frozen food and walked into his garage and shot himself with a 20 gauge shotgun.  You have to understand, this is the most traumatic,horrific thing that has ever happen in all of our lives !!!  I need help trying to help my sister get through this,as she found her husband when she came home for lunch. I"m not sure how or what to do.  I am so afraid for her.  PLEASE HELP US ! ! !

I have been dealing with anxiety mixing with attention defesit disorder and it makes my brain puzzled and makes me frustraighted. So maybee your brother in law was very puzzled and frustraighted inside. I think alot of times suicides feal trapped and that there is no escape. I believe sister should understand that it was not her fault and that God knows what was wrong with him and that he made a mistake i believe God will forgive him and i think she should find the strength to forgive him. Your brief storey helped me out because i have been thinking about commiting suicide but i always have to keep in mind when you end your own life it affects everyone around you and that keeps me from ever following through. If she wants to know why she should talk to other people who have had a suicide in there family. I know several and if she wants some advice from them i'll have the write something in the message board.