Depression

[smartbunny]

ALEX!! I LOVE YOU!!

My ex-bf (whom I was with for 7 years) is transgendered (and had SRS a few years ago). She has a whole community of TG friends. She would totally talk to you if you wanted.

I'll come up to Providence if you wanna hang out. You can call me anytime.

[davidd]

Does anyone know how to get a hold of Alex outside of AST?

[Alex Mac]

I'm fine. I'm here for now. Talked with my sister last night. I'm just still wrecked. All of what you're saying means a lot. It's just really hard to get out of this. Had more people level accusations my way last night. One person without really all the facts. Just trying to figure out a way through the day and I just don't have the first fuckin' clue. I just want sleep through it but my bodies like "Wake up, fucknut!" so I guess I'm awake. It just feels long. Minute are hours and hours and like days and all that. I'll figure something out.

I want to be creative again and all that shit. I've been unable to do that for so long. It just pisses me off. I feel like someone is gonna tell me to use this energy and turn it into something but I can't figure out what.

[smartbunny]

Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/alex.mac.142035

[davidd]

Hey! Glad to hear from you Alex!

You don't have to put pressure on yourself to do anything creative. I mean, if it makes you feel good, do it. But you don't have to put pressure on yourself about it. Just do something fun. Do exactly what you want to do today. Eat ten pounds of ice cream. Or maybe that's just what makes me happy. Anyway, just treat yourself well. You gotta take care of yourself the same way you'd take care of someone who came to you for help.

I've certainly had people who I thought were close to me turn away, and the pain of it is pretty hard to get through. When I was 21, my girlfriend (who I was friends with before we dated) broke up with me and started dating one of my oldest friends. I pretty much lost my whole close circle of friends and I was devastated and I felt really abandoned. Added to my usual depressed state, it made me suicidal.

But over time I got through it. It was not one specific thing that helped. It was just letting myself be sad for awhile, eventually picking myself up off the floor and going out and making new friends, having new experiences. That's the one thing us sad people have to remember, is that there's always more time to make things right (as long as we let ourselves have it.)

[Kentock]

Alex,

I have never been suicidally depressed, but I have been depressed enough to seek out professional help and medication. I highly, highly recommend seeking a psychologist or LCSW to talk to. You seem to like the idea of someone wanting to help you not out of a sense of social obligation but because you are a person and they are a person and their instinct is to help. That is exactly the description of the type of person who becomes a psychologist.

I have had therapists that I love and therapists that really bothered me (I've probably had about 5, mostly because I keep moving from city to city), but I keep seeking therapy because I know the good that it can do. Even now, when I am far from clinically depressed, I still have someone in Chicago that I go to see if I am in a particularly tough time, dealing with a lot of stress or trauma. I find it to be so incredibly cathartic.

I haven't been on medication since 2007, and I have grown a lot since then. But therapy is still a presence in my life, because it has been fundamentally important to my development as a person.

You are not alone. I am concerned about you, and so are a lot of people on this board, and it sounds like a lot of people in your personal life as well. It sounds like you are in the midst of an enormous amount of turmoil because of your self-discovery regarding gender and your decision to share this with your family and friends. In many ways, this is encouraging to hear, because to me it means that this turmoil will almost certainly decrease over time. You are in the shitstorm right now, but it's not going to last forever. Just keep walking, keep talking, and stay connected to the people in your life, either in your personal life or on this board or both.

From one person to another, I'm asking that you stay here with the rest of us. Life is a lot less lonely if you share it with other people.

[Alex Mac]

Well, I do see people. It's made some difference. And we're working on meds. I don't have a good history with them though so it's not easy. Paxil as a kid ruined me for a bit. Venlafaxine in college made my worse. I'm trying new things. It makes me feel weak and I know that's not true. That sometimes we need the help. But I'll never not be suspicious of it. I don't like the notion of being drugged throughout the day. It's just lacking in appeal, even if that's what I'm doing. So, I hear people tell me to get professional help. Already am. Don't worry about that.

Just trying to get through the day. Dad wants to go see the Expendables 2 and I'm trying, in vain, to explain that they didn't screen the thing for critics around here so it's probably schlok. Might see if a friend wants to go fishing. I'm just...heading out today is going to be hard. And I don't want to cry infront of friends. Even though that's probably the best place to cry.

You people have been heroes in these few hours with me. So, um...thanks. I'm taking steps. Just feels like steps in quicksand. People cheering me on helps, for sure. But it's still quicksand. Doing my best. Gonna try hard today. This weekend is gonna be the hard on. Birthday tomorrow. Don't even know where to begin with that. told the family that I'd rather not go out for dinner at "Uncle Fuck's Tickle Hut" or "Papa's Linguini Farm" whatever. We'll see how it goes.

[davidd]

Well I'm glad to hear you've got help and that you've got stuff to do. Just go easy on your self.

But honestly, I don't know why you don't want to go to Uncle Fuck's Tickle Hut. Nobody gives a tickle like Uncle Fuck.

[smartbunny]

This weekend is gonna be the hard on.

Enjoy for just a moment, the above typo.

xoxo - rg

[P-Dub]

Ok, this has brought up a lot of emotions in me as an out, gay 32 year old man with mental health issues. There may be some meandering but here goes.

When I was 23, I had just moved to a small NW town as a way of escaping my parents and my life. I did not know anybody, and for the first 6 months or so I was extremely lonely, to where my only regular human contact was with my psychologist. During this time I managed to survive both a drug-induced psychotic breakdown and a legitimate attempt to end my my life via intentional overdose, to which I owe a lifelong debt not only to the local police/ER staff, but to what happened next.

What happened next was, one day i ran out of pot and asked this guy who has just moved in downstairs if he had any. We smoked, and for whatever reason I found myself completely opening up to a stoner guy I had just met. He seemed concerned, and offered up a suggestion. It sounded crazy in such an appealing way that I decided right then and there to do it, and what I did was go on a Vision Quest in Death Valley, which entailed four days and nights of solo camping, fasting, meditation, etc. I was skeptical, i didn't expect it to change my life, but it did. It can be very healthy to have your foundation taken away, your assumptions challenged, the veil violently torn back.

I'm still not sure how the shift occurred, but it was seismic. I went to the desert wanting to die; I came back wanting to live.

And the stoner guy who made the suggestion? My best friend of nearly a decade now.

So I'm going to go ahead and say that you should do it. It's a mildly kooky thing and it changed my life forever. And if you're wondering if there's any oppressively newage-y, cult-like nature to the idea of going on a Vision Quest, I don't think I need to prove after 800 posts that I am generally a skeptical smartass.

So do it.

Or don't. Split five grams with a friend in dark room. Have some filthy, awesome sex. See a movie you want to see and go to a restaurant you want to go to.

It's your life. Through your choices, you can make it good.

Then, it will truly get better.

[Alex Mac]

Well, if it means anything, I was the only person to catch a fish today on the lake. But then again, so was Fredo...

[P-Dub]

.

[ozbug]

Glad you got out and were able to catch a fish today! One day down, a lifetime to go.

I hope that you will be able to find that you have friends that you can trust enough to cry on their shoulders. Though don't let it get you down if someone you thought you could trust enough to do that is not prepared to deal with such an emotional situation. Some people just can't. But I hope that you are blessed to have a good friend to help you.

And let me be the first on this Board to wish you a HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! Do this day as you wish. Go out to dinner with family or don't. Order take-out if you don't want to be at a restaurant. This is your day! I hope it is a happy one for you.

[Battleship Pretension]

Alex, I don't know you at all but I actively want you to be alive and a part of this world.

And happy birthday!

[slothborn]

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[Fentmore]

Happy Birthday, man... I'm glad you're here to enjoy it. And you should.... just enjoy it, without pressure of what you should do today, do what you wanna do. Have fun. Last day of the weekend!

Thank you for reaching out. You never know what you'll find. Have a good'n.

[ImAScooby]

I can't really think of anything to add that hasn't already been said besides noting that I am another person who is really pulling for you to get through this, Alex.

I do want to say that it makes me very happy to see how many people are coming out and sharing their stories and doing what they can on a message board to help someone out who is going through a very tough time (don't worry, I'm not gonna bore anyone with my story). There are genuinely good people on this site and I wish I had a message board like this back when I was going through my severe bout of depression a few years ago. This really is a great community of comedy nerds sometimes.

[crlygrl]

Happy Birthday, Alex. I hope you have many many more... I'm sorry things have been so rough for you, but there are good things in this world that are worth living for. I know it can be hard to see that (and that hearing it can sometimes make you feel worse) but there's always the simple things... a beautiful sunrise, a delicious meal, or a kitten/puppy/baby gorilla, or a nicely timed fart joke. I hope life is good to you this year. xo

[Alex Mac]

I won't turn this into my personal progress update thread so this'll probably be my last post in it unless things turn really south again. Birthday's pretty much over and there's a big road ahead. I got tickets to see Book of Mormon. I'm hoping to last long enough to see it. Morbid, I know, whatever. But true. Want to make it. Want to see. I'll leave this thread for other people who need it but if there are still people who want to listen, let me know. I don't want to exhaust you or abuse your kindness and I won't. But I'll do the fair warning of saying that listening even can be an exhausting thing so I don't want to end up burning you out with my own burn out. PM me. Facebook, whatever. I have AIM (in 2012, whaaaat?!). I have other support circles but if you really want to leap into the pool with me, I wouldn't begrudge more swimming partners, y'know? Just...let me know. I won't presume over-familiarity but I also won't censor or anything either.

Thank you all again. I find myself without the words to properly even explain what you have done for me.

[SeanX3]

Alex, I don't know you but just wanted to say how ballsy your posts and actions have been with all of this: coming out, asking for and getting help, doing the honest work of being human — each of those is an invitation for someone to give up, to shrink, and many do, but you chose to push on. Which is character. The world needs more people like you, not less. Keep going.