I have been feeling like this more and more lately. Everything is going wrong. i took on a really big home improvement project and I knew better but you know how we do...i can do it. Well I did do it. i accomplished the project. Now i feel like I am going to die.

background...over 2 years out. auto accident..pcs..headaches, confusion anger, emotional instability.etc etc

Anyway...the project took me about 6 months and I had very little help. now my relationship with my boyfriend is falling apart. we have been together a year and 3 months or so...AND we are long distance which makes it even harder. But I have plans to move, always was moving there, am not moving there just for him. i did however pick up the pace big time getting myself into too much too fast and with no help. my bad.

i am totally flying off the handle all the time. I feel totally hopeless. i am seeing a social worker which has helped in the past but nothing is helping. i was put on zoloft about 5 months ago and it was helping a lot especially with anxiety but it doesn't seem to be helping much now even though i increased my dose.

every little thing is just so overwhelming. I only leave the house now to work and grocery shop and necessary things. i hate house arrest but i don't know what else to do.

I'm so sick of this controlling me. I feel like i am going to be alone forever because there is no way anyone is going to let "that" into their life/house..whatever.

What do you do when your this low and nothing is helping.

Hello, andi -

I so completely resonate on the same wavelength as you wrote above. So much so that I've highlighted in blue your quote wherein I have had persistently the very same thoughts and same words playing nonstop 24/7 for 9 months now in my mind.

It has put me into nonstop-panic-mode 24/7 for these past 9 months of 2012 year#4 post-life changing closed-head/brain traumatic event. That's no real life. I've repeatedly requested Rxklonazepan; instead "Let's change antidepressant" or "add another", yada yada yada.

SO in reply to your question,

All I can offer is my own "only best answer" to that for myself. I am going January to go do a *free* 10-day-residential intensive vipassana meditation training in a regional residential meditation center. *Free* room and board x 11 days also.
10-days of voluntary silence (NO talking, NO cell phones, NO smartfones, NO smartPads or computers, NO internet, NO tv, NO music

It's my only best hope of learning *a way* simply to work with my mind, simply as it is, simply as I am, to cope, to simply live, and be fully alive, present. And thrive again, yes. I'm likely much older than you; widowed; yet I like you want to love and relationship in my life.

I withdrew this year into virtual isolation & silence, a 'self-imprisonment' in my own mind, in my home, not going out socially all year, 9 months straight. I've been quiet, I've been still --- but my mind is never quiet, never still, never a moment's rest. I've been in hell in my mind 24/7
I've been "toughing it out" all 2012 and it's not workin' for me.

If you're interested, ask and I'll send to you the link to the center nearest to you.
The Southeast region meditation center would be driveable for you, if you still live in East Tenn.
It costs no money, non-profit; it's not a religion; I'm unaffiliated, not selling or advising anything.

Meanwhile, perhaps you may find some a ray of hope, reading an earlier thread I started a few days ago hoping to hear of NeuroTalk members experience with actively using meditation post-TBI-PCS and the stress of trying to cope, living with newly-acquired cognitive dysfunction..
That thread link, titled "Insight meditation training?" is hopefully neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread177285.html

Vipassana meditation is the training I am going to do. It's a 2500 yr old method. It's free.
Here's the link: http://www.dhamma.org/

Insight meditation is a 'generic' name for vipassana meditation. May or may not be free.
Here's the link: http://www.dharma.org/

MBSR/Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction is U Mass. Medical School program of health. Costs $.
Quick wiki-info link on MBSR is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindful...ress_reduction

And MBSR weblinks: http://www.umassmed.edu/Content.aspx?id=41254
Official MBSR website at U. Mass. http://www.umassmed.edu/Content.aspx...kIdentifier=id





http://www.dhamma.org/

http://www.dhamma.org/

http://www.dhammabrothers.com/
Moving, inspiring documentary film, short ~:50min.; avail online and via netflicks, or public libraries.

http://www.dharma.org/ Insight meditation





Best regards,
Theta

as bad as this sounds i am so glad someone else feels this. im finally home from a very long week at work i'm going to cry for a while and try to sleep away the pain. lucky me got to try to run sept reports today - result - major headache...3rd one this week.

thank you theta and i might want the info for that meditation. i need to find some peace.

Ah, yes, get some rest.
Quiet your mind, if you can, let go of your hard workday at work, if you can, nourish and rest your body.
And quiet and rest some more ... on ad infinitum.

It's SO very hard I know. You're working a job in the world, giving it your best, and trying best to do everything needed to do, to take care of yourself, your home, your relationship and to rest, restore, heal and renew --- I do know, tho' I can no longer work professionally as I did pre-rearended mvc 4 yrs ago.

Rest and we'll talk more later when we've both rested overnight, if you want. I am here for ya, andi. Whatever I can offer to help, we each and all need it. And it's not easy doing it largely all solo, I know that also.

Rest and take care,
Theta

Theta,

You said < I've been quiet, I've been still --- but my mind is never quiet, never still, never a moment's rest. I've been in hell in my mind 24/7>

Have you tried to find some simple stimulations that will fill your thoughts with acceptable stimulation to block out the negative thoughts and such?

I am rarely without some sort of mild stimulation, be it music with or without lyrics (YouTube is a great place to find those oldies I liked), casual online browsing, a manual task or two, yard work, reading simple books, etc. Without these simple stimulations, I would go batty.

My best to you.

There are times in our lives when the dark is so heavy and thick that hope seems out of reach. I have felt this way more than once and may again. Even though I am lucky enough to have family close by. They do not know my struggles the way I do.

They notice my struggles but... When I am very low and feel alone I count my blessings, such as they are. Sometimes I feel it would be better to have been left a drooling, babbling idiot.

There are no broken bones, gushing blood or any easily medical identified malaise. So easy for a Dr to write you off. It's tension or anxiety, or worse your a maligner or other somtoma forma patient.

I am not myself and may never be myself as I was and yet the message I hear frequently is adjust, accept. Difficult words when I can not understand or even truley communicate whats happening to me. I feel like the character in Flowers for Algernon. At that crucial point when you know things are changing and not for the better.

What was so a part of me slips away like sunlight at sunset, and into the dark I go.

Thanks to rmschaver for this welcomed reminder from my long forgotten past. How excellent. Perhaps I could try to read it again, as I am now at this stage of my life and experience. (LARGE PRINT maybe?? )

Flowers for Algernon. Yes. This. Exactly.
So mindfully, painfully, excruciatingly aware.

Your analogy to Algernon sparked my recall of another likely metaphor for it , thank you kindly. And that's of "Hal" as the onboard computer in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Thanks for Algernon, rmschaver.

Theta

Thank you, Mark, for this. I hear ya, my friend.
Yes. I have indeed tried to just 'simply occupy my mind'.
Nothing works for me.
Not in this year nearly all year my year#4. You know I'm neither 'young' nor a 'newbie', being in year#4.

Year#3 I thought I was doing well, managing well, active again, happy, taking good care. Enter: I got a creative project last year which I thought I could do well, and manage to take care of my brain, resting to balance out the activity.
I similarly to andi perhaps, thought I was taking good care while enjoying being moderately more active and engaged in the world. After a year of "being better, doing better" I simply couldn't sustain it and all went away, including my self. Ugh.

To answer your question, for example I cannot abide any music whatsoever. No 'relaxation' music, no classical music, not our fave rock&roll from our 'SaladDays'. Not even REM or CountingCrows. REM used to be 'good for my brain', and Mozart. Can't go to the symphony or ballet, or any live music.

DownHere is home to such richness & diversity of American music genres and songwriters. There is really fine live music, jazz, or whatever to enjoy every night of the week all year outdoors, free, in small lovely venues with beautiful sunset to enjoy. One of the things I loved about Gulf Coast living. Sigh.
Can't do youtube either.

Crossword puzzles now serve only to remind me painfully of the cognitive, vocabulary and language skills that I've lost. No sudoku. No drawing, no calligraphy. No reading books or magazines. Can't sing or even hum!
Solitare using playing cards makes me feel hopelessly doomed and like 'just passing time'.

Playing cardgames on the computer and anything like luminosityjust tax my eyes/vision or just plain annoying. (I'm just not a gamer. And that's okay. I like playing canasta with real cards, real people, yes. I presently can't abide 'chattiness' of people; conversations are annoying, taxing, difficult for me. Hey, Mark, I'm tellin' ya, this 'me' is no fun!

I 'hate' tv'; for me it's all largely stupid, irrelevant, or annoying.
Movies can be okay, sometimes. I really didn't watch tv pre-crash. Now my tv is too small, i.e. my vision is such that it's really taxing for me. No radio, no talk shows. No books on tape. Did I say no magazines or short stories, even?

Lil dogs that don't yap & barkbarkbark, cats, and birds, yes! Yes, I walk my friends' lil canine guys and gals down by the bay now that it's Autumn DownHere.


I can do knitting, or ironing, or wash the car or the dishes, or volunteer somewhere, but my mind doesn't 'rest' in so doing. I can no longer it seems just 'simply' do anything.
My 'mindfulness' has turned seemingly malevolent and all consumingly 'doomed', against me. Positive-thinking and affirmations? Don't work for me anymore; I've grown cynical about all that. (Perhaps I need to change my signature! ha ha.)

So, thank you. I've tried. I cannot 'divert' my mind. Sigh.
So for me, my one small hope is this ray of light-in, to truly go back to beginners mind, i.e. retrain in a more rigorous meditative 'discipline of mind'. I am already painfully aware of my thinking mind. I'm just outta tools to work with that as I am now in all this life-changingness.

With respect and appreciation,

Theta

P.S. I promise to later severely edit this at-length post!

theta,

This may not help at all but I'll mention it anyway. Back in high school, when I was struggling with my first serious episode of PCS, I was put on an anti-seizure med. First it was Dilantin (phenytoin) then later changed to phenobarbital. I had two years of settled mind and brain while I was taking the phenobarb. I had no noticeable side effects. I was not taking a large dose. In fact, I ended up taking half of what my neuro originally prescribed.

I ended up needing it again in college to help me with the stress of studies. It help me have a stable mood, too.

Just a thought. It would be cheap to try and at low doses is relatively harmless.

My best to you.

Thank you, Mark.
I'm glad that you were helped back in high school by the dilantin. Phenobarb does not sound like anything any of us would ever care to risk to take. Why ever were you as a young child rx'd such meds, as a child? Were you experiencing seizures? For pain? To help you to "focus&concentrate" in school, like for ADD-ADHD? Was it for behavior, e.g. out of control?

I'm unsure what you mean by "I had two years of settled mind and brain while taking the phenobarbitol" and "It helped me have a stable mood, too." My experience has nothing to do with "mood", it's not "a mood". My mind is 'settled', it's not all-over-the-place.

And if it were for me a matter of 'mood-regulation' I would not go to an anti-seizure med or barbituate use. OMG.
How toxic for a traumatized young guy's brain following concussion. Wow.

I can only imagine that on phenobarbitol a kid would be so deeply-sedated, and thus rendered "manageable" and uncomplaining, no trouble for anyone.
I can't picture any one doing well in school on it.

I'm just not keen on drugs, I don't think or believe that throwing 'severe' brain&mind-altering drugs at me is any way going to do it. I'm not impressed by antidepressants, in my own experience.

In my case i was not first-depressed' and then got rearended. I got rearended, tbi-pcs'd, my life as i knew it and my self as i knew my self, went down the toilet. Whoosh.

I don't wish to be 'medicated' to change how I 'feel' in response to all of this. I want to genuinely be better, do better, live and love and feel life more fully. As another poster said it, I want my self back.

Thus that's why my best choice is to turn to serious meditation rather than serious medication.
To train mind to heal mind? It's my best choice.
Okay. Thank you. I do appreciate your suggestion.
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Mark:: May I suggest we continue to discuss in a new thread? This is potentially a very interesting discussion! I wouldn't want whichever/whomever's thread this is we're on (I forget which) to get 'highjacked' to being all about meds.

With appreciation,
Theta