Swallowed In A Dark Hole
Hello, I have bipolar disorder 1 which is hypermania and depression. I live with several family members who don't believe in my mental illness. They tell me that I need to get over it and go on. I have huge issues with my bipolar lately. I am seeing a therapist, but was just taken off a medication that was heavily negative on me (I won't go into specifics). I can try a new medication, but I have no funding and my family refuses to help.
Right now, I am currently in a depressive episode. These last 5-6 months a time for me. This is the worst it's been for awhile and I'm scared of what I could do to myself. Everything is hard to manage and I am so stressed. I can't breathe and I think half of that is due to crying too much. I am tired of feeling like this. It hurts...and it's not a hurt like you scrape your knee. It's a deep immense hole in the middle of my chest that is swallowing me up.
My therapy isn't enough on it's own without medication or support. I'm hoping I can just poor everything out here for the moment. This is so hard for me. I'm tired of having to suppressing my feeling so those around me aren't uncomfortable or embarrassed. I'm so exhausted and lost. I can't sleep and my appetite is gone. I feel sick. Does any one else feel like this when they're going through a depressive episode?
Dear @ThePianist , I understand completely what you're going through. It was too hard for my family to accept that I have a problem. You can try to bring your parents to your therapist/psychiatrist so they can explain stuff to them, if you didn't try that.
And for your depression, you can read this great article:
https://www.depressiontoolkit.org/takecare/
If you can't manage it, you can try to treat it with those suggestions for depression self-care. Self-care during depressive episodes is really important and I hope this will help you.
I see that you accept any help and support and that's great, because some people won't even try what we suggest them and then everything goes worse than it was, and then they question themselves why it doesn't help them, when they actually tried only medications which is definitely not enough for depression.
You can also try our depression self-help guide, which is harder than self-care but if you try it, you'll see that it can be worth it. You need to try so hard, and if you do I promise you that you'll feel better, at least a little much better.
Here's a link to self-help guide: https://www.7cups.com/depression-help-online/
I hope you'll feel better soon. I send hugs to you! 