What makes you feel deranged...?

Yes, all of that.

The people I've been with have all gone through much in their childhoods and adulthoods. Benjamin as well. I don't know the extent of it for him but I know he was neglected, seriously, and is still being neglected. He started developing an serious mental illness about eleven years ago when he was 13 and his family did not think it was important enough to get him professional help or any help. He quit school then and they let him. And he has been deteriorating ever since, except for the fact that no higher education hasn't hurt him one bit. And he's done this himself. He is smarter and more well educated than anyone i've ever met. He should have been placed in a school for people like him who need to develop at their own rapid pace and be minimally guided. He could be doing anything he wanted right now if his parents did this for him. One of many things they should have given him, but didn't. He was neglected in other ways as well which has helped make him who he is today, very afraid of people, terrified to enter the world, very depressed, self destructive which spills out onto others in the form of abuse.
FUCK his damn parents !!!!

I've been on and off medication for manic depression for years now. Right now I'm off. Medication is most definitely a double edged sword, I've gone through enough years of it to know. But I'm not severe like many bipolar people, I'm very lucky. I can function like this off meds fairly well, just very depressed. I've never had a real outright manic episode, it's just low level cycling, basically.
I know I'm not to blame for my families behavior and abuse. It took me many years to just be able to place the blame where it belongs, directly on them. That's when I actually started to become more able to cope with life, when I decided that and never looked back from it. I just dumped it off my back. They fucked me up, period. It IS their fault, it has made my adult life extremely difficult to live in practical and social ways. Most of what I learned about living came from one boyfriend who I was with for quite a while; he taught me everything I know now about surviving and dealing with people.
I wish Ben could place the blame where it belongs, he tortures himself with self-loathing and he can't move beyond it. I really hurts to know he does this.


Frodnat, unburying memories is good, yes, but it still doesn't change anything much. One of the reasons I don't believe in psychotherapy as a treatment, for myself, that is. But I'm a resistant mo-fo too. I don't like feeling like I'm being manipulated. I take the drugs as well when I want to, not when anyone else thinks I should. It's a control issue for me and a damn important one. I HAVE to have it because of my past. I accept that in myself, as unfounded as it may be in dealing with the outside world, nevertheless, it's the way it's gonna be....... But then again your system of mental health treatment in Europe is most likely much better than ours. I might feel differently if it wasn't for being put through hell and abuse of their own in our system here. It was nothing but damaging to me and shut me off to ever seeking help from anyone but my primary physician for meds, again. That's it.

Actually when it comes to men though that I'm with, I'm submissive, because when i'm this close with someone, I just let go of control completely, and such relief it is to just let someone else control for me. Or neither of us trying to control. : ) I feel safe and at peace then. And it makes everything else great as well.


Alwin, what are you dealing with right now? If you feel like saying, if not cool. I know there are probably more than a couple of us here with similar issues.
 
Didn´t use any psychotropics for a long period. In the few weeks I treated with them, I got heavy side effects from an antidepressants and when they gave me a real heavy one for 1 week I felt like they locked my brain away in a deep hole :ill:.

So these things don´t work out for me. I prefer to control me by myself... Medicaments that act on neurons always have effects on real large areas in your brain. It is like you want to cut one tree in a real big forest but instead you are going to cut nearly all of them. Drugs change the number and conformation of receptors on your synapses. This is what it is, another addiction.

I prefer to remain calm, do sports and try live something like "heedful". Get rid of extreme emotions and most important of the strong appetite (You know what I mean, this is just another addiction based on these twisted and sick conditionings.)

It is more important to get a strong basis than searching for the highest intensity. As long you try to do this you are nothing more than the slave of your own emotions !!!:err:
 
Frodnat, I dunno how to say it, but you see the world through a glass, through the glass of your BPD or whatever. These problems, effects, things are not present in many ppl. Lots of ppl can be emotional and "open" or that without any problems. Dont generalize.
And antidepressants without mood stabilizers are not any good for boderlines, analizing tha past is also in vain for them, some special therapies are good but lots of them are crap or dangerous.. its a special case and 90% of the practicing doctors have no fucking clue about it, so dont believe everything.. The past can give you a lot of answers but wont change anything ever - in this case. ;)
 
Dora said:
Frodnat, I dunno how to say it, but you see the world through a glass, through the glass of your BPD or whatever. These problems, effects, things are not present in many ppl. Lots of ppl can be emotional and "open" or that without any problems. Dont generalize.
And antidepressants without mood stabilizers are not any good for boderlines, analizing tha past is also in vain for them, some special therapies are good but lots of them are crap or dangerous.. its a special case and 90% of the practicing doctors have no fucking clue about it, so dont believe everything.. The past can give you a lot of answers but wont change anything ever - in this case. ;)
Easy, easy Dora. I see the world through my eyes. No one ever told me what to think or in what way I have to see the world. Well my mother did it in my childhood, but it was more or less a closure of my eyes what she did and I am always getting a bit angry when someone isn´t able to see or open eyes.

There are studies that say that 30% of the german population needs psychological treatment. And there are also good scientific analysis with the conclusion that 35-50% of the female and 12-25% of the male population are victims. These results are not in contradiction to what I see around me. There are millions, billions like us!!! That´s the problem. Everybody deals with these problems in another way, even if they don´t recall their memories in their life. None of the therapist I ever tried to push me in any direction or manipulated me. Well one of them tried it in a few moments. I got rid of her, but this was the purpose of the manipulation. Most of the people in the jobs that deal with helping people are victims themselves. It can be that they even try to make others not to touch it.

There can also be a very healthy life after traumatizing events, if you get rid of the extreme emotions. Don´t try to feel like in your childhood, it is OVER!!!

Sorry, to say that! Extreme emotions SUCK!!! Sorry :)...
 
nah, what i wanted to say that many times i see you writing thoughts like "dont be this and dont do that because then this and that happenes" but its only true for your own life. other ppl - other kind of illnesses, other kind of reactions.. and dont generalize mental illnesses especially cos they are really different.. other ppl dont think the same when you say "extreme emotions", most of them dont even get what u think of cos its not a problem they know.. You do experience much from the world through your high sensibility and things like that (i didnt say you are manipulated by any1), so you see things in a different way - like many other ppl do. Thats all. (Ah, and check this out http://www.mhsanctuary.com/borderline/artindex.htm)


ps.
you can recall and analyze your childhood a thousand times, find ppl to blame, etc. - but from NOW on, today, at this moment only you are responsible for your current and following life. If you wanna open your eyes to something important, then see this.
 
Dora said:
ps.
you can recall and analyze your childhood a thousand times, find ppl to blame, etc. - but from NOW on, today, at this moment only you are responsible for your current and following life. If you wanna open your eyes to something important, then see this.

:)
 
Allan: Thanx for the support man! You do what you can... :cool:

Frodnat: Your focus on depression seems narrowed down to the cellular level. For mental illnesses with a purely chemical cause (like BPD?), this may be appropriate. My story on depression is based on childhood-deformations. Here, depression is ultimately caused by behavioral patterns (of course, via chemical processes).

Dora: With life comes freedom, with freedom comes choice, and with choice comes responsability. However, also motivations are important: why do I make this choice? To understand motivations leading someone to make "bad" choices, it may be (and often is) important to analyze his/her childhood. When these motivations are understood and felt to be irrelevant in the current adult environment, they can be changed. As a result, a "better" choice can be made. But the responsability for undertaking this self-analysis is ultimately with the "patient", in this sense you are right.

Trona: It seems to me you are using Ben and his problems as an excuse for not addressing some of the issues YOU are dealing with. This may be convenient in the short term, but in the long run you are depriving yourself of a better life! Unburying memories doesn't do much for you? Not if you don't relate your childhood experiences to the choices you make in adult life (see my comment to Dora above). And that takes a lot of courage. All the beliefs you have about yourself may prove to be wrong. In a way it is similar to brainwashing: first break down your identity and then construct a new one. Not easy, fall & rise, heaven & hell, but very rewarding after some years! Sorry to hear that you have bad experiences with therapists. I think it is very important to find someone you trust and can "connect to" in some way. Maybe you find it difficult trusting people in general (and maybe not, considering your openness about your problems on this forum), but I think you should consider giving therapy a second chance. Finally: I prefer to keep my issues to myself.
 
Alwin said:
Allan: Thanx for the support man! You do what you can... :cool:

Frodnat: Your focus on depression seems narrowed down to the cellular level. For mental illnesses with a purely chemical cause (like BPD?), this may be appropriate. My story on depression is based on childhood-deformations. Here, depression is ultimately caused by behavioral patterns (of course, via chemical processes).

Dora: With life comes freedom, with freedom comes choice, and with choice comes responsability. However, also motivations are important: why do I make this choice? To understand motivations leading someone to make "bad" choices, it may be (and often is) important to analyze his/her childhood. When these motivations are understood and felt to be irrelevant in the current adult environment, they can be changed. As a result, a "better" choice can be made. But the responsability for undertaking this self-analysis is ultimately with the "patient", in this sense you are right.

Trona: It seems to me you are using Ben and his problems as an excuse for not addressing some of the issues YOU are dealing with. This may be convenient in the short term, but in the long run you are depriving yourself of a better life! Unburying memories doesn't do much for you? Not if you don't relate your childhood experiences to the choices you make in adult life (see my comment to Dora above). And that takes a lot of courage. All the beliefs you have about yourself may prove to be wrong. In a way it is similar to brainwashing: first break down your identity and then construct a new one. Not easy, fall & rise, heaven & hell, but very rewarding after some years! Sorry to hear that you have bad experiences with therapists. I think it is very important to find someone you trust and can "connect to" in some way. Maybe you find it difficult trusting people in general (and maybe not, considering your openness about your problems on this forum), but I think you should consider giving therapy a second chance. Finally: I prefer to keep my issues to myself.
Alwin, sorry to see the depression on the cellular level. I am neurobiologist and it is my way of getting knowledge of what is going on. You mentioned that it is the deformation of psyche in the childhood. These and all the problems that has its integrated output as a certain behaviour has changes on the cellular level. The problem is that BPD can be seen just as a chemical problem, what it is isn´t. During the development and stabilization of the neuronal network the feedback from outside triggers changes in the network. This is most probably the reason for the BPD. It is only just another level of observing a problem. Depression is a inhibition of the neuronal network, nothing else. It is a feedback-process, the behaviour and the things that are going on in the network can´t be seperated.

Every level is important, but there are still the same patterns on every level. :) The ultimate factor is the factor that I mentioned above. There might be psychological illness that has its basis on the genetic level, but also the changes on this level are the result of deformation during many generations... Predisposition meets the problems from outside.

Well, everything is relative, good to be sure about this fact, well even this is relative :).
 
ehm.. To make it clear.. BPD is Borderline Personality Disorder.. its a behaviour thing. Depression and Panic and Anxiety are most of the times only symptomes with it. (They can be major illnesses too, based rarely on chemical or genetical errors..).. Hence "traditional" therapies usually worth nothing to BPDs and they can even be bad cos opening wounds to a highly sensitive and highly suicidal person is a bit risky. So practical ones (watching ones reactions, mistaken thoughts and changing routines) are more effective for this. If your depressed or have a phobia, you can find a clue why these are present and re-think it and then hooray, realize that everything is fine. But as I mentioned, in this case these are just concominant symptoms. As far as I know Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Cognitive Therapies and some kind of Transaction Analysis can be used for BPD, lots of other type of mind-minings are useless or bad.
____
the other thing about the here and now and responsibility .. it may sound merciless but its true for anyone being ill or healthy. TIME AND TIDE WAITS FOR NO MAN.
 
Strange somehow it seems to me that we are talking about the same thing. Everyone in its own way...

Everyone got his own time. That´s for sure.

Strong words don´t change anything.
 
Thing is for me, I had very few buried memories. That's why i say knowing doesn't change much.
I do relate my childhood experiences to my adult life. I'm well aware of these things. Many of them work to my advantage in life over others. I can survive things that would simply completely crush other people for good. Not just things in my personal life but societal things. Hard to make steps, yes, but it doesn't inhibit me in making them.

Yeah, these changes do occur in your brain chemistry permanently, as a child when you experience trauma. It just sends your brain down a different chemical pathway, as it is a developing brain, hence, illness.
 
Well traumatizing events doesn´t mean that the changes made in your brain are permanent for all the time. Most of the changes are just changes on a various amount of synapses inhibit some up- and downward pathways. There is much more plasticity in an adult brain than you can imagine.

Most of the strong emotional fluctuations is caused in areas of your brain that is responsible for associations. You experience things that in a normal way would remind you of things, but these memories are inhibited and even sometimes when you are going to touch these memories there are moments when you just even forget things that are associated here in the present with these things from the past. So you forget them.

There are very often also changes in your perception. Many of the victims can´t see faces, have problems with resolving some visual patterns. Your eye see everything but the information is blocked before it can get into your consciousness. Hmmm... So imagine there are many things outside, not inside that trigger some strange and abnormal behaviour of yourself. If you are not aware of what the triggers are you can´t get rid of the seemingly randomly changes of your emotions.

This is what the process of dealing with your past includes. If you know the triggers you get stability because you can block these triggers. That´s the clue and the things I wanted to express with all the stuff I said in the last post. If you avoid these things, you are just far away from yourself, sorry to say that. Drugs don´t change anything, your brain is able to do change its neuronal activity by itsself. It is a slow process but it works.

@Dora: It seems you know very much about the therapies. But can you really estimate their effect on you? You never went through one to say hey, it changes something for you, opened your eyes or anything. The therapists I met were very reasonable and they knew their work very well. For example the research on aversive memory, learning processes is progressing faster than you think. Many things are changing and I don´t know if your data you refer to is really up-to-date. If you are searching for negative experiences you will find them. This won´t change anything. You are talking of responsability for yourself. Well then change something for yourself. And think about the asymmetry another time, take a look.

The dominant characteristic of a borderline personality is that there are borders he is running along, afraid to cross. If you cross them many, many things will change, even if it hurts badly. Get it back !!!:)

It is inside and outside !!! That´s the problem...
 
your right, Frod.. what I say is that its not the only way of approaching the problem..
in some of the mental illnesses (e.g. phobias) the main problem is a false preconception, and in some personality disorders its rather a false reaction. If your depressed, you think things which are basically not true (like the future is bad, im bad, noone likes me, etc), but in BPD you may see things being true (like mother didnt care me, the pope fucked me, whatever) and you react to these in a bad way. Thats the difference I think. So if you see the Truth, thats not enough. You need to learn to deal with it in a new way. Eh, but I dont want to bore others to death.. :D
 
@ Trona: I can understand what you said about crisis situations. On one hand it is good to remain calm during an event that make many people being strucked by fear and causing something like a blockade in them. I experienced these events too. I went through some intense shit in my childhood. I saved the life of a friend of mine when I was 7 years old, the others just stood there with an open mouth and did nothing until the point when I began to act. You can train crisis situation by going through many of them. The mechanism is that you won´t let the extreme emotions that are occurring in these moments not taking control of you. It is a common fail-safe protection for people that experienced such things. But after these events the barriers will go down and many of the people that were somehow heroic in these moments suffer from PTSD. If you not talk about the things afterwards then you can get a very serious problem. Firemen and policemen very often need the same psychological treatment like the people they tried to help :err:.

In some cases people that went through a traumatic event become something like heroes. Doing this and that, without there own emotions. Strong, like a Panzer... in fact this "plating" is made by nothing than chocolate. It will melt away :) under the warm sun !!!