a day ruined from depression

[xxsilverdragonxx]

Today was baaaaad. I'm actually looking forward to getting up for work tommorow, it will be a change from today's misery. What happened was another dream, my ex in it. This is the second major one that involved her. The dream had many emotions from many angles in my life, not just my ex. That's what made it so bad. She was in it, and my grandfather died and no one seemed to give a f***, and some other things that I have emotional ties to were brought up in it.

 

OK. I wake up, wanting to cry, scream, and die at the same time. I had not felt this bad I think since a few hours after my ex broke up with me. As soon as I woke up I knew something was wrong. Everything seemed out of place. I woke up so depressed and anxious I couldn't hold a simple conversation with my mother about what was going on the rest of the day. Its hard for me to cry, or it takes a lot of pain, but today I felt I was on the brink of a complete loss of control. Its been almost 13 hours since I woke up, and I can still feel it lingering inside me.

 

So today after lunch I went straight back to my bed, didn't talk much to my sister and her husband who came to eat with us. Didn't go watch the game on tv either. I didn't even spend time with my 1 year old niece, who I love dearly. No, I got in my bed, covered myself up, and stared around my room trying to come to terms with the oddness steming from...of all things a stupid dream. I finally drifted off to sleep, and slept well into the afternoon. I felt better the second time I woke up. So much better that I wanted to work out, which is what I had planned on doing for the day, but of course didn't get to it earlier. That seemed to help too.

 

So I'm left with the stark realization that I can't control my sub-conscience, and that it can control me. It ruined my day. My point is that the bad feelings didn't come from the dream about the ex, that was just the icing. But because of the combined depression that had set in, my ex was on my mind today for longer than I would have liked. I hope this isn't the beginning of a relapse or setback. If it is, i'm assuming i'll be consumed with utter madness before it's all over.

 

I know I'm not really asking for advice, I'm just trying to get a better grasp on why these things pop up, and take the necessary measures to stop them from happening again, or at least get to a point where a dream that I don't even remember most of wouldn't completely strip a whole days worth of improving, learning, or relaxing.

 

Then again, maybe i'm in that rare group of people that require backwards coats and padded walls.

 

I hope I wake tommorow with a better start.

[johan]

Having been through what you're going through, I KNOW what you're talking about. I remember days like you had today, and, looking back, they were worse than the day I realized my relationship was over. Compared to the amount of pain I felt afterwards for no apparent reason, the breakup itself was nothing.

 

I suffered, too.

 

Do you think it's weird that you're suffering like this and she's nowhere around? I mean you have all the time in the world to do exactly what you want to do, and you chose sleep and avoidance and suffering. She wasn't right there torturing you in person. You did it to yourself.

 

I've said it a lot around here, and maybe it'll help you. The vast majority of the pain people feel after a breakup isn't due to the death of the relationship. That alone hurts, I know. I think that people understate by a huge amount how much they suffer because of how much they blame themselves for the failure. People think they should have seen it coming, or they shouldn't have gotten involved with that person in the first place, or they shouldn't have taken the person for granted, or they farted too much or they didn't stay attractive or they decide they just aren't lovable. I think that losing faith in your ability to manage your relationships, of being in control, of being able to protect yourself from that pain, for fooling yourself so totally, maybe how your ego feels about being rejected and how much it blames the human you, (who knows, I'm just wondering if any of this connects with you), is the major source or pain and depression after a relationship ends.

 

You can forgive yourself one of several ways:

1) replace her,

2) forgive yourself, be realistic about yourself and realize that you're human,

3) get cynical and angry and invent theories for how you should "treat" women in the future in order to protect your heart.

 

Women sucker us men into believing we are like gods. They kiss up to our egos. Then they take off and treat us like we're nothings. And we feel like failures. That hurts a lot.

 

Guys generally don't treat women the same way. We don't have to go after their egos as much as their hearts. They hurt when the relationship ends, but they blame us as much as or more than they blame themselves. So they hurt less.