What is the point of it all???

[Zoe 6]

Is it the emptiness, the nothingness, you hope to flee? What kind of life do you want to have? Do you have moments where the nothingness isn't quite as bad, or is it the same horrible thing all the time?

Lou, if you prefer, you can just ignore this post of mine or reply via PM.

[ReneBean 3]

I think we have all had those urges to run away - but What would you do once you got "there". Think of what you would like this New Beginning to be like. Figure out one thing that you would do or do differently if you DID run - and do it.

Feel strapped to your house? Maybe it't time for a new one - or maybe just new furniture or new wall colors. Sometimes, Change really IS good.

And, I second the advice to visit your physician for a heart-to-heart about your medication. Other than that, all I can offer is (((HUGS))).

[HunnyBun 2]

Loopylou, you say that you want to run away and start fresh, leaving your problems behind. Can you tell me (us) the problems you want to run from?

Is it a bad friend? Debt? Family that mistreats you?

I would love nothing more than to be able move hundreds of miles away from my family, especially my mom. She poops all over my ideas and hopes, critisizes me, doesn't believe I am strong enough to lose weight, pretty enought to find a good husband. She critisizes the way I raise my son, yet I grew up hearing my mom call me names and my dad hitting me just the take his anger out on someone defenceless.

Yet... I live here with my mom because I make so little money, I can't afford to be a single mom and live on my own. Sometimes I think that if I just find a husband and move out my life will be better... but when I have a husband and things don't work.. I will dream of divorcing him and moving on.. and where will I go? It's scary and it's hopeless but I force myself to ignore my mom, sometimes snap at her and become an angry bi... just to show her that I too can be hurtful. Sometimes I just stop caring.

Depression is possibly the hardest thing to deal with, and I know I am not depressed, but I feel I am on the verge... I have nights when I cry and look at my bottle of phentermine... how nice would it be to swallow the whole thing and fall asleep and never again have to wake up to have my mom hurt me, never again have to worry that I wont make my car payment... but I have a 7 year old boy who would have to live with my mom if I died.. and I wouldn't be here to protect him from the abuse. I would rather live a million years being abused than let someone abuse my son.

Maybe you don't have someone to protect like I do, but give your life to someone else. Do you love animals? Become a foster family for abandoned dogs. Are you good at something? Offer to teach it to others for a small fee. Start selling all your junk on ebay and with every penny you earn, pay off those damn debts or buy yourself a nice treat. Love kids? Offer your free babysitting services for teenage moms who go to GED school at night. If you don't have the energy to do any of it, then tell everyone to buzz off and do whatever you want all day except for any of your responsibilities.

Please do share the problems you'd like to leave behind... maybe some of us may offer a solution you never thought of before, and it might work!

[DevilMayKare 1]

I have never told anyone this--EVER. It would just be too much to expect people who know me to understand. When I was in my 20's I decided to kill myself. I made a plan and even scheduled it for a time when no one would be expecting me anywhere for a few days. After I made the decision, it was just like I've often read--I felt an incredible peace and calmness. I lived in a one bedroom apartment by myself. I knew I what I was going to do for about 3 days before and when Easter break of my senior college year came and I wasn't due at class or work for 3 days I wrote about a 3 line note, drank a couple glasses of wine, put some Bach on the stereo, took an entire bottle of Sominex and went to bed.

And about 12 hours later I woke up. Shit. Now who wouldn't suspect that you cannot kill yourself with Sominex?? I woke up long enough to think to myself that I was the stupidest person on the planet and went back to sleep for another 4 hours or so.

Obviously I didn't die. And as much as I should have felt relieved by that I just felt embarassingly DUMB. Honestly I was more mortified at the thought of being so stupid than I was at the thought of killing myself because at the time death just seemed like a relief. So I didn't tell anyone, put my big smile back on and went to my waitressing job when my shift started in a couple days. Believe me, anyone would have been SHOCKED to know what had transpired in my life the previous few days. I felt very chipper and almost like, "well, I tried--I can always die later if I need to."

Weeks later I was talking to a guy friend and we had one of those "why keep on living when all is vanity?" discussions. (I did NOT tell him what I'd done.) He said he wanted to keep living just to see what happened next. It would be like putting a captivating book down halfway thru. I remember there was some big oil spill from an American ship off the coast of France at the time and he said he really wanted to hear what the French had to say about the mess the Americans made. That just seemed so strange to me because I could care less what the French thought. But there WERE other things I was curious about. I started paying more attention and wondering about the "plots" around me. Now WHO could have come up with a "Governer Schwartzenegger" plotline? Life is so very much stranger than fiction. If for nothing else it's worth sticking around to see what's going to happen next.

I'm sure this will seem very wrong to some here, but the fact that there is an option to leave if it gets too bad is actually a comfort to me. My God would understand. But he's in no hurry to greet me and as long as there are still strange, wonderful--and bizarre things going on in the world it's worth sticking around to find out what they are. There really always is time to die. Living is what runs out.

Maybe that's the point. Life IS-- it has a beggining and an end. Everything inbetween is ours to make of it what we can. And as long as sunsets are free and there are full moons to wait for there is something to experience and enjoy.

[loopylou 0]

The problem, as I see it, with my life is that I never make anything happen, I am so passive I might as well not exist. I dont mean that I let people walk over me, or that I dont voice my opinions but its more like.... I am afraid to act. I took this job because it fell in my lap - not because I went after it, I went to Uni because it was expected and did 'whatever seemed mildly interesting'. Life is what happens around me, happens too me, but I dont (won't?) create my own life. Why?? I have tried to explain it like ... I am afraid of Fate, I am afraid that if I act, if I do something, anything, that the consequences will be bad and I will only have myself to blame. But if I just let life happen to me I cant be held accountable for whatever happens - good or bad. I think this is about my Mother (or, sMother as I like to call her). sMother cant get jealous of my success if it just 'falls in my lap' and sMother can't clean up my mistakes and take over my life, if I dont have one. Perhaps it is my ultimately revenge on sMother - if I live 'well' she gets to play the matyr, if I live 'poorly' she gets to play the rescuer, but if I refuse to live at all, she gets nothing. I have no life but at least the space that exists, where my life should be, is mine. Sometimes I confuse my hubby with my sMother and try to run away from him too, he tries to get me to live, which to me simply feels like another person trying to smother or control me. This is what I want to run from. I want to find a place where it is 'safe' for me to live, to exist.

[the best me 6]

but if I refuse to live at all, she gets nothing.

Sometimes I confuse my hubby with my sMother and try to run away from him too, he tries to get me to live, which to me simply feels like another person trying to smother or control me. This is what I want to run from. I want to find a place where it is 'safe' for me to live, to exist.

Good stuff...keep talking.

Hey, what's so unsafe about living, existing? What's so unsafe about screwing up, doing it wrong, or even doing it well? Because you have a sMother who has an opinion? I like the "rules" posted above...but, really, how come you are the only one who gets off the hook for living? We all make a mess of it sometimes. So what? The world keeps spinning...I think God has a plan for you (for all of us) so how come you get to be the one excused from it? I don't get out of it, and God's plan for my life isn't so world-shattering either. I'm not curing diseases, I'm a wife and mother and friend. Some might think that's not enough, but I know how profound my work is in the lives of my kids...even YOUR Mom did a pretty profound work on you, right? And I know how important I am to my hubby, and not because HE says so or even sees it all the time, but because God says. My job counts. It matters for eternity, because I, and you, leave behind a legacy. We all do. So how come you don't have to? Know what? You do! And it can be good or bad, or nothing, but it is something. Get a hold of yourself!

Loulou, did you ever quit that job? Whatever happened with that? Do you see the correlation between your increased stress in that job and your meds not working well? If you ever want to feel inert, quit a job and go visit a month later and you will see...life goes on. It's just a job. It isn't you, and you are infinately more important than your success or failure as an employee. A job is just a means to an end, it isn't YOU. Some folks find great meaning in their work, and feel very fortunate getting paid for something so gratifying, and that's great...it's their role to fill on the big ball of gas and Water and land. But your job has been a stress you don't need. Just wanting an update. I think if you quit, you are pretty doggone smart.

Awright, girly. I got my eye on you and I'm praying everytime I log on to LBT, which is often, so (((((hugs)))) my friend.

Kare, I just loved your post. You are something else.

[franp 8]

Lou, There are so many of us who have been in your shoes. I have learned that you are what you speak. If you speak negative all the time, then that is what you receive. Try to look upon the positive things in your life. Look for the good in people and situations. I had a boss once who was very demeaning at times. When I had a confrontation with him, it was hard for me to try to find something "good" about him... but he had the most beautiful salt and pepper hair. I just concentrated on his hair and not his disposition. I know this soundsx stupid, but it would get me past the anger that I wanted to feel towards him. I have had counseling in the past, but no one knows me but me. We all have the ability to look deep inside ourselves and really know what the problem is. The hardest thing we have to do is to admit the problem, bring it to the surface and then deal with it. I'm not a church person, but every Sunday morning I watch Joel O'Steen on TV. He is the most positive person that I have ever heard. Look for something good to happen to you today.......and it will. Hang in there and don't loose hope.

Fran

[loopylou 0]

What's funny is that I do think of myself as a positive person. I always look for the good in things, and in people - even my crappy boss. I am thinking positive.... I am looking for answers, looking for life, looking for a reason to keep fighting. You're right Kathy, I dont have the right to not live - however I am doing it (or rather not doing it) anyway. I guess that your question about 'why is it so unsafe to live?' is the really important thing. I am frightened of my power to have an impact on the world. I feel that I have too much power to cause harm. I think that by avoiding life, I am avoiding guilt, shame and fear. Intellectually I know that there is nothing special (or especially bad) about me that could make me this dangerous, but it seems to be what my emotions experience. Its not so much life that is unsafe - but me that is unsafe, dangerous and too powerful. Gawd, how narcissistic that is!!

But it is like this Marianne Williamson quote:

" 'Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.' We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing Enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we subconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we're liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." -- From A RETURN TO LOVE

I adore this quote, I just dont know how to realise it in my life.

[Marimaru 7]

LouLou,

I recently discovered about myself that I have a really huge fear of change. It's wierd though, because it only applies to MY life. Change in other people's lives is great and they should embrace it! Not me though. Even at work I handle change well, but my personal life that is all about ME must stay the same or I am afraid. I also know about myself and recently voiced outloud that I put way too much into what my mom thinks about anything and EVERYTHING. I don't have a sMother like you do, but for some reason I give her the same power over me. And I don't argue with her outside of work. She mentioned the other day that no one is as perfect as I treat her like she is. That I must have started 'experimenting' with disagreeing with her at the office, because somehow it's 'safer' than in "real life". I don't know how it is different, but somehow it is.

The other night I had a conversation with her and she told me all of the reasons that she doesn't think I should get married. She told me that she was afraid to tell me because she thought there were too choices for what I was going to do with the information. The first is that I would internalize it and it would never come up again but it would be eating me up from the inside. The second is that I would let her opinion ruin my relationship with her, when all it is is her opinion, and she just wants me to know. So after I listened to her I worked very hard to return my thoughts to her. This is something I have never been good at. This conversation was a very good place to take that first baby step for me. I told my mom my thoughts on ONE subject.

I said all of the above to show you that you don't have to turn your life around all in one day. I will agree with folks that getting your medication adjusted is a big thing to help you balance out. I've been on antidepressants too, and they work best at the right level. My mom (here she is again) said something to me that made alot of sense on this subject. She said that medication gives you the balance you need to figure out your problems, or figure out what steps you need to take to create a solution in situations that throw you off balance. In other words, they don't solve your problems, but give you an extra moment to sort them out without becoming so depressed over them (or in my case bitterly angry all the time).

Is there something that you could take a baby step on that might help you? Maybe you make a decision today and don't tell your sMother about it so that she can't have an opinion one way or the other. Or maybe next time she says something about anything you don't want to talk to her about you just say "you know, that really doesn't have anything to do with you, how about we talk about _____". Just little tiny baby steps. You know?

It seems I went on for a while... heh...

[kimalicious 5]

HI Loop, I hope you have talked to your doc. If this is a new med or something that you have been on for a while, either way, checking the progress and having the correct meds make all the difference in the world. I hope this doesn't sound stupid or childish, but I know when I can't pull out of the doldrums I sit back and think of the best times in my life, I even get out the pictures and call old friends to make them remind me of where those feelings came from. Most importantly I remind myself that these feelings will pass and I will wonder what I was ever worried about as long as the meds are right. Stay strong and stay with people and keep talkin about it and ask as many people you can what they think life is. I for one still don't know and I'm not religious but knowing I can at least get through my days is good enough sometimes. Good luck sweetie.