Thank you once again. I have received your book today and will start reading tonight.
I just wanted to ask you for some thoughts on something that I have been feverishly researching for the past couple of days. And that is - the difference between an "anxiety disorder" and depression.
Since my last panic attack on Sunday (which I believe was the result of the combination of the stress of seeing the counsellor plus the fact that I drank alcohol on saturday night), the only symptoms I have been having are anxiety-based.
These manifest themselves primarily in this physical sensation of pressure in my head, and the usual "generalised anxiety" or constant sense of worry/apprehension/etc that is not about anything at all (I am not worried about anything, just have this terrible sensation all the time).
Everything that is happening to me in the past 4 days is manageable - apart from this feeling of pressure in my head. It is the one thing that is making my life miserable, and that I cannot shake. No matter how much I relax, take my mind off it, do something else, exercise... etc etc. I feel as if if it went away, I would have no problematic symptoms at all.
And I have had no depression at all for days. The last depression I had was on Saturday. It is like this sensation has completely replaced the depression. Could the depression I experienced simply be a red herring - in that, the anxiety came on with such force and so out of the blue, that the depression was simply a reaction to that, and that I am not actually depressed. But that I do have an anxiety disorder... It was certainly anxiety that started all this, with disturbing physical symptoms, back when it all began nearly 6 weeks ago. I have read that if it is anxiety that started, and then depression that kicked in later, it is likely that the problem is an anxiety disorder rather than depression.
Having read a lot about anxiety disorders, it seems many people are of the belief that "talk therapy" will do nothing to help, and that going over past events and dwelling on them will only serve to make things worse. And that the only real way to get past an anxiety disorder is to "re-program" the brain into thinking more positively and to make it fully aware that there is actually no present danger. And this is what CBT does. Do you have any insights into CBT - is it something you have tried or believe in?
I also have had what I am trying not to consider a setback, but what feels like one, in that WPF (who I went to to try to get psychotherapy) have written back to me to say that they think weekly counselling sessions are what I need and they will try to arrange this for me.
I just do not think this is enough. I believe I need some form of either psychotherapy or cognitive behavioural therapy, and that I need it to be fairly intense, say 3 times a week, especially in the initial months. WPF were my only hope to get this really as they are a charity and offer cut-price therapy - I could not afford to pay a private practitioner. So even though this is progress in one way, it feels like a massive disappointment because it feels like they have misunderstood the severity of my symptoms and that they will not help me.
I don't know what happened in my 90 minute assessment, or if I have just got worse since then but this does not feel right. What do you think? Do you think it really matters whether I have counselling, psychotherapy or CBT? Will it make a great deal of difference? What is your take on the whole anxiety/depression thing - do you think they are essentially the same thing and that whatever symptoms you have, it is ALWAYS about looking to the past for the causes? Or do you think that anxiety disorders such as GAD (which seems to be the closest self-diagnosis I can make), have causes in "negative thinking styles" and need to be treated differently?
Again, many thanks for your helpful insights,
Gareth
Self help - can it really work?
#17
Gareth 
- Advanced Member
-
- Group: Members
- Posts: 64
- Joined: 13-April 05
Posted 20 April 2005 - 05:06 PM
Just to say quickly something I forgot - I hope you understand that all this prodding and fretting is simply about me trying to get the appropriate treatment. I do not want to waste any more time, and because there is no much disagreement out there about the best treatments, I am lost in a bit of a no-man's land.
I don't want to do months of counselling with no effect.
It does not help that I was really hoping for something from WPF, but they seem to have misunderstood me.
Thanks again.
I don't want to do months of counselling with no effect.
It does not help that I was really hoping for something from WPF, but they seem to have misunderstood me.
Thanks again.
#18
Benjamin Fry
- Administrator
-
- Group: Admin
- Posts: 497
- Joined: 04-May 04
- Gender:Male
Posted 22 April 2005 - 12:39 PM
Your concerns about all these details are probably just your way of coping right now. There is no way that you can make this better just by harvesting information. It may be some comfort to you and it may be a good distraction but in the end (as you have seen) if you look hard enough for long enough you can find someone to tell you anything that you want to hear.
I honestly think that you donít need to know anything much more about what has happened to you other than what is in my book. Thatís the bottom line and it wonít be hard for someone with a mind like you to understand. We have already been through the basics and it seemed to hit home for you. From there it is a matter of doing something to help you to release your pent up trauma, which are emotions, memories and thoughts.
WPF is a good organisation and I think that it is great that they have offered you counselling. It is probably exactly what you need. It is better to take it easy at first. You have seen already how you had one session, then you were drinking at the weekend and then had another attack. They are all likely to be related. During the course of your treatment you can discuss with the therapist the possibility of increasing the frequency and what that means for you. I donít think that the technique matters a lot at the moment. The important thing is for you to find someone you feel comfortable talking to. And to talk.
Anxiety and depression are both responses to being overwhelmed by emotions that are trying to be set free from your system. Anxiety may actually be a feeling being released. It is also a reaction to your feelings, often a reaction to anger which is the most threatening of emotions. Depression is the result of clamping down on all of these processes so hard that you feel nothing. You can see therefore how they can ebb and flow to one another.
Yes the causes are in the past. Where else could they be? One thing follows another. You know what went wrong in the past. It is the residual effects of this that are still with you in the present. If you want a better future then you need to engage with them.
Thoughts are overrated. The conscious mind is a blunt malfunctioning tool. Donít give it too much credence. Yes negative thinking is better to avoid, but it is also a function of a deeper malaise. Unconsciously you are now attempting to heal that.
Iíd encourage you to give up the search for a perfect phenomenological description of yourself and start to do something to get better. Abandon the self-diagnosis and put some faith in your WPF appraisal. After all your assessor is an expert and has spend time with you observing with an objective eye.
If you wrote as many words about your past (the events and how you feel about them) in this forum as you have done about your present, then you would already be feeling a little bit better. Perhaps you could consider bringing your story from your childhood to the Open Forum?
I honestly think that you donít need to know anything much more about what has happened to you other than what is in my book. Thatís the bottom line and it wonít be hard for someone with a mind like you to understand. We have already been through the basics and it seemed to hit home for you. From there it is a matter of doing something to help you to release your pent up trauma, which are emotions, memories and thoughts.
WPF is a good organisation and I think that it is great that they have offered you counselling. It is probably exactly what you need. It is better to take it easy at first. You have seen already how you had one session, then you were drinking at the weekend and then had another attack. They are all likely to be related. During the course of your treatment you can discuss with the therapist the possibility of increasing the frequency and what that means for you. I donít think that the technique matters a lot at the moment. The important thing is for you to find someone you feel comfortable talking to. And to talk.
Anxiety and depression are both responses to being overwhelmed by emotions that are trying to be set free from your system. Anxiety may actually be a feeling being released. It is also a reaction to your feelings, often a reaction to anger which is the most threatening of emotions. Depression is the result of clamping down on all of these processes so hard that you feel nothing. You can see therefore how they can ebb and flow to one another.
Yes the causes are in the past. Where else could they be? One thing follows another. You know what went wrong in the past. It is the residual effects of this that are still with you in the present. If you want a better future then you need to engage with them.
Thoughts are overrated. The conscious mind is a blunt malfunctioning tool. Donít give it too much credence. Yes negative thinking is better to avoid, but it is also a function of a deeper malaise. Unconsciously you are now attempting to heal that.
Iíd encourage you to give up the search for a perfect phenomenological description of yourself and start to do something to get better. Abandon the self-diagnosis and put some faith in your WPF appraisal. After all your assessor is an expert and has spend time with you observing with an objective eye.
If you wrote as many words about your past (the events and how you feel about them) in this forum as you have done about your present, then you would already be feeling a little bit better. Perhaps you could consider bringing your story from your childhood to the Open Forum?
visit benjaminfry.co.uk for more information on my work
support getstable.org for better mental health treatment in the UK
support getstable.org for better mental health treatment in the UK
#19
Gareth
- Advanced Member
-
- Group: Members
- Posts: 64
- Joined: 13-April 05
Posted 22 April 2005 - 03:10 PM
I have received your book and have already found the first few chapters very helpful and illuminating.
The bottom of page 47 to the top of page 49 could be talking about me - where you describe the worst of your anxiety symptoms.
I am sure you are right when you say that I am using detail to mask the real problem, and in a way to prevent me from moving on.
I am very glad that you think that it doesn't matter whether I begin with counselling or therapy. I will take whatever WPF can offer me and see how it goes. My only concern remains that once a week is not enough. Last Saturday is a million miles away when feeling like this, as I'm sure you know, and having two sessions a week I think would be good. I will work through this when I meet the counsellor.
Since my real low point midweek I have made some headway over the past couple of days by simply forcing myself to relax. I have sat still, listened to music and almost pushed myself into a more relaxed state! I didn't think it was possible but a lot of this seems to be mind over matter - you can actually make headway using pure and simply sheer bloody determination.
I have felt a little more positive after doing this, and I have sometimes even been freed for a few minutes from the pressure in my head. That symptom has certainly not been as bad as the 24 hours after I had my panic attack on sunday.
The strange thing is, since feeling better I have been sleeping worse and waking more in the night! You can't win...!
But today I am exhausted. I have not been tired for six weeks, not for a second, and now I am. I will take this as a good sign, that my body is letting its grip go a little bit and is "doing its thing" as you say.
I have also told my brother about the problems I have been having, and we have started talking more about the past. At the moment he refuses to accept that my problems are anything to do with the past. He has a romantic notion that only intelligent people go through depressions and that I was always going to go through one, and that it just shows I am a deep person or something. He thinks this is just "who I am" and I will be free of it in time. Anyway, still it is useful to open up to more people that just my wife and to yourself.
I have also taken your advice and posted on the open forum. Writing my life story felt very self-obsessive, which is odd considering that is exactly how I have been for the past 6 weeks! I think it helped.
I will take all of these things, and up them up to progress, of which your words of encouragement have been a big part, so thank you once again.
Gareth
The bottom of page 47 to the top of page 49 could be talking about me - where you describe the worst of your anxiety symptoms.
I am sure you are right when you say that I am using detail to mask the real problem, and in a way to prevent me from moving on.
I am very glad that you think that it doesn't matter whether I begin with counselling or therapy. I will take whatever WPF can offer me and see how it goes. My only concern remains that once a week is not enough. Last Saturday is a million miles away when feeling like this, as I'm sure you know, and having two sessions a week I think would be good. I will work through this when I meet the counsellor.
Since my real low point midweek I have made some headway over the past couple of days by simply forcing myself to relax. I have sat still, listened to music and almost pushed myself into a more relaxed state! I didn't think it was possible but a lot of this seems to be mind over matter - you can actually make headway using pure and simply sheer bloody determination.
I have felt a little more positive after doing this, and I have sometimes even been freed for a few minutes from the pressure in my head. That symptom has certainly not been as bad as the 24 hours after I had my panic attack on sunday.
The strange thing is, since feeling better I have been sleeping worse and waking more in the night! You can't win...!
But today I am exhausted. I have not been tired for six weeks, not for a second, and now I am. I will take this as a good sign, that my body is letting its grip go a little bit and is "doing its thing" as you say.
I have also told my brother about the problems I have been having, and we have started talking more about the past. At the moment he refuses to accept that my problems are anything to do with the past. He has a romantic notion that only intelligent people go through depressions and that I was always going to go through one, and that it just shows I am a deep person or something. He thinks this is just "who I am" and I will be free of it in time. Anyway, still it is useful to open up to more people that just my wife and to yourself.
I have also taken your advice and posted on the open forum. Writing my life story felt very self-obsessive, which is odd considering that is exactly how I have been for the past 6 weeks! I think it helped.
I will take all of these things, and up them up to progress, of which your words of encouragement have been a big part, so thank you once again.
Gareth
