#like i CAN function. i do all my daily tasks. i'm sleeping and eating well. i have an okay amount of energy

[fingertipsmp3]

I love knowingly making bad decisions

[descaladumidera]

On High-Functioning Depression and Why It Sucks

People with High-Functioning Depression (aka Persistent Depressive Disorder (PDD)) experience depressive symptoms, but much less severe. They can still do their daily tasks, like going to work, cleaning their homes, taking care of themselves, but it comes at the cost of feeling completely and utterly drained afterwards and all these tasks being incredibly hard.

The defining factor is that the people experience a depressive mood for most days for at least two years.

Symptoms for said depressive mood include but are not limited to:

• insomnia or sleeping too much • feeling sad and/or hopeless • fatigue or no energy • lack of self-esteem • changes in appetite (decreased appetite or overeating) • suicidal thoughts

Now. This is my dunno-how-many-th attempt at writing something about this. Haha. Depression, amiright? Anyway. Just. Scroll past this if you're not interested in reading about my own experiences. I just need. To scream this into the void. And maybe it'll help someone else to recognize that they are not Just Sad™ and get the help they need.

I'll put everything else under a cut. Because. This got long.

To preface this: I'm officially diagnosed with depression and anxiety and I'm trying to get some other stuff checked out, but that's not important right now. (It's a lie. It is important, but if I start, I'll go down a rabbit hole, rant for a few paragraphs, and then break down crying. So. We leave that out. It's not important regarding this post.)

When I first got diagnosed, I didn't know that PDD was A Thing™. And I don't know if my therapist did, either, 'cause I think they were kinda doubting that I was depressed at all. Which. Fair. If you go by the classic depression symptoms and severity (even though depression is not a one-size-fits-all kind of thing).

I was not depressed enough to not get out of bed or take care of myself. I was not depressed enough to not go to work. I was holding down a steady (albeit shitty) job at that time, I showered regularly, I cleaned the house, I walked and took care of my (now deceased) dog, I did everyday tasks. But, and that's the crux of the matter, I was completely drained afterwards. Taking a shower and going to work on the same day? Killed me completely. Going to therapy and to work on the same day? Yeah, no dice. On those days it was too much to eat a dry slice of bread, but I forced myself to anyway.

And then. Well. You have to know that my job required me to work from 5:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. So I got home around midnight. I was always bone tired, but. I. Couldn't. Sleep. Just couldn't. Still can't. Body tired, mind exhausted, but when I could finally fall asleep at 3 or 4 a.m., I would wake up every half hour or so. And then it would take me up to an hour to fall asleep again. Rinse and repeat. (I got a weighted blanket now and it got a bit better, with my sleep being uninterrupted on most nights for about three to four hours. Not ideal, but so much better than what I had before. Believe me. I lived with that horrid sleep pattern for years and it had me on the brink of crying each time.)

And then I stumbled upon the term Functioning Depression on a Clint Barton/Hawkeye post on Tumblr of all things. Turns out it's not functioning but high-functioning, but that's neither here nor there. Fact is, it helped me to understand my particular flavor of depression.

I did a Google and. Well. This high-functioning depression stuff fits me to a T. The sad part is that I had already stopped therapy by then (which is another whole other story in and of itself, which will also make me break down and cry if I start to think about it). But at least now I knew that I was not not depressed enough. I simply have a different type of depression (well, this part is a self-diagnosis, but whatever).

It's nice to know that for myself, because no one else cares. They just see me functioning like a normal person in everyday life and assume I'm fine. Because for most people depression comes in the form of being "too sad to take care of yourself".

"You don't look sad." Yeah, no shit, Sherlock. I don't go around and proclaim my permanent suffering, because my brain chemicals are whack, to the world. It's none of your business. My parents know I have depression (they accept it, so why would I confuse them with the sub-type?), and my friends do, too. Some of those friends also know about the high-functioning part.

But yeah. It's hard to get acceptance, because I look fine. But I'm not. I stopped therapy (for unrelated reasons), I'm not on meds, I don't have any officially taught coping mechanisms. I'm just trying to do my best. Sadly, that "best" is. Slugging through. Existing. Just. Existing. And crawling from day to day and not thinking about how to best kill myself. Because. Yeah. That has been an intrusive thought lodged in my head for months now. I would have bouts of suicidal thoughts in the past, but this one has lasted the longest and it's so damn hard to fight it each and every day. I'm just. So exhausted.

I'm not fine. I'm not. But I appear to be and it's so hard to get help for a mental illness that's even more invisible than usual. I just want to give up. I'm so tired. And the most infuriating part is that I could do something about it, but I just. Don't.

I'm not a child anymore. My parents should've gotten me help for my anxiety when I was a kid, but everyone always said that I'm just shy (well, I thought so, too, until I learned about anxiety when I was an adult—fun times). I don't blame my parents. It's not their fault. I grew up in the 90s and 2000s in a small town in Germany. Mental health? What's that? I don't blame them. But I mourn the opportunity, 'cause everything is so much harder if you're an adult (for example getting an autism or ADHD diagnosis, which I'm looking into, but … yeah). Kids get help easier. Because they're kids. As an adult you're fucked. And not in the fun way.

It's not like in fiction. Nobody will come and save you. Nobody will be your hero and drag you out of your pit. You can only save yourself. It just sucks when you're too tired to do so.

[ouroboobos]

being depressing and longwinded again irls scroll away please tyyyyyy

another shitty evil thing abt mental illness is unless youre unusually privileged you cant really do anything to keep it from fucking up every single aspect of your life and making it practically impossible to live comfortably. and if youre like me and youre from a low income background you probably want some relief from all the stress and exhaustion that comes with not having enough money. i want a financially secure lifestyle, i want to splurge and go on vacations and eat whatever i want and own a home and not be below the poverty line for the rest of my life because its fucking miserable. but i cant do anything to escape it lmfao!!

im terrible at school and cant afford it anyway so idk if ill ever be able to go to college. i cant handle stress or uncomfortable lighting or noise or crowds or excessive human contact or total isolation or fast paced work or strict routines or nonspecific routines or average work hours or understanding and following instructions or interviews or emails or phone calls or video calls. i cant even drive yet because it's such a severe stressor and it requires me to pay attention to too many things at once.

so like what the fuck am i supposed to do lmfao. even if i landed a job, with my limitations it would definitely not pay well. and getting a job is hard enough, but keeping one is a whole other thing. at my best i can accomplish a few small daily tasks around the house. i can go see a friend once or twice a week. i can do some moderate exercise and i keep up with my hygeine pretty well. i'm still tired and agitated and living feels hard but all around things are pretty good.

but i also have periods where my symptoms prevent me from functioning at all. i dont sleep for says at a time because im so hypervigilant, my nightmares are worse, or i do nothing but lay in bed all day, i dont eat, i cant think, i cant remember anything, i struggle to speak, i cant change my clothes, i can't shower, i feel phantom hands, i forget my age and where i am, i make plans to kill myself, i have violent urges, i can't be touched or spoken to or even handle people being in the same area as me. it's not a matter of "if", its a matter of "when" because thats just the reality of my symptoms. it'll happen again inevitably, and then i wont have a fucking job at all.

i've been told in the past that i may qualify for disability but even if that's true i would need to stay below a certain income level to keep my benefits. so basically im going to struggle financially for the rest of my life on top of trying to survive with my symptoms and it will literally never end. lol

[horce-divorce]

man. so. i've been doing REALLY well mental-health wise since i moved back to michigan. in the past 2 years i even started sleeping regularly and established a bit of daily routine

but my routine is messed up rn because i had to stop smoking weed. i chose to for my EEG in a month but also bc i'm out of money lmfao. and i would maybe even be able to function w/o weed if it wasn't for the ARFID. but my life and my nice new routine is falling apart now bc i went off my meds and, predictably, i cannot eat! and I am. frustrated. I just need to vent :^)

cw for talk of food/ED & neuro issues

without weed, it takes me so long to eat even 1 apple, sliced as if for a child (usually 1.5 hours), that i have to devote my ENTIRE day to making sure that i'm getting enough calories to even sort-of function. because if I only eat "what I can" I will only be eating about 500cals a day, i will start barfing, and I will end up in the ER. it's happened multiple times before.

so my routine is all wack rn. i wake up at like 8:30, I work on a carnation shake from about 9:30-10:30. around 11 I slice up some fruit and work on that until about 1pm. i have to watch tv while I do this bc otherwise I'm too focused on how the food feels and I will have a panic attack. this esp is fucking me up bc for the last 2 years I mainly watched TV at night (easier to get immersed and then go to bed then walk around all day still being immersed. is that an adhd thing?? idk)

anyway by the time i'm done w my apple it's time to think about lunch, and that also takes me several hours to complete, and by then, it's time to think about dinner, and at that point I still probably have not eaten even 500cals. and i havent gotten anything else done in the meantime (like art, or transcripts, or whatever) either because it hurts too much to sit at the desk, or because I can't eat and focus on a task at the same time (I hyperfocus, the food will go uneaten). or both.

normally I eat smaller meals/snack thru the day, then eat 1 large meal at dinnertime, but I literally physically cannot make myself do that without weed anymore.

and like, neuro didn't tell me I need to stop smoking weed for my procedure, I took it upon myself to do that bc I want them to have the data. and my counselor said now's a good a time as any to quit if I'm out of money, because when they DO ask you to stop smoking for a procedure, it's usually like, 6-8 weeks out or something.

like, technically can I survive on less than 500cals a day for a month? probably, but I really don't wanna find out?? I don't wanna live like that??? i've been losing weight like crazy and NOT in the Cool Good For You kind of way, in the "shit I already needed to replace my clothes bc transition and now this and I HAVE NO MONEY" kind of way.

i did request an appointment w my pcp about my stomach after calling the nurseline (hopefully they get back to me tomorrow). but I feel like they're just gonna refer me to a gastro. and that's gonna be another indeterminate wait for someone to look at. and idk if i can continue to not use weed that whole time. like idk if I can stand it. i cant fucking live like this I'm literally suffering and can't do my work or anything.

idk maybe like, i can stop smoking just a week or two before my EEG and that might be ok? so that I wont fucking starve in the meantime??? :( REALLY hope the next gastro isnt such a dissmisive ass hole like my last one....

[actualmythicalcreature]

Home from wedding. Burnt the Ｆｕｃｋ out.

Aight so Imma take this opportunity to talk about autistic brains because let me tell you, I'm having a damn bad time. If you only thirstfollowed my main because you dig my face, you can tune out now.

I, like many autistics - don't react to things until after they have happened. Its how my brain works - and it took me many years to realize that not everyone else's brain works this way. In order to get through events that are incredibly stressful for autistic brains (lots of socializing, multiple conversations happening simultaneously in a small space while neurotypicals 'mingle', lots of sensory input, increased expectation of following an unknowable social protocol, etc) - our brains sometimes sort of just, don't process it. We're busy trying to complete the task and get through it- so our brains store up all the bad feels about it until it's over. It's a survival technique. It makes me really good in a crisis because I'm calm and focused on resolving the problem.

Unfortunately, this means that the moment I have completed the task - I feel all that stored up bad all at once, and lemme tell you it packs a damn punch. Every moment of anxiety, stress, confusion, exhaustion, and overestimulation that accumulated while in the process of completing that task - hits you at once. Most people feel the stress while the stressful thing is happening and then it's manageable because they deal with it in short bursts. I have no such luck.

I went to my sister's wedding, and I was in the wedding party. I did the flowers for the event as well. It was a multi-day excursion where I was entirely unable to use the daily coping mechanisms that make my life manageable such as a dedicated and strict routine and support from my caregiver. I had fun. It was lovely and beautiful. I managed to get all my packing done, travel the hour to her town, do all the flowers, a rehearsal ceremony, plan the decorations and setup, throw a fun evening of debauchery and laughs for the brides side, sleep on a couch for 3 hours, get myself ready, assist the bride, care for my son throughout, get through the ceremony, set up the reception, get through the reception, wair for my caregiver to come get me, and then pick up my dog from the sitter and drive the hour home... without feeling a damn ounce of the ever building fatigue.

The moment I got home last night- I was done. My thoughts were incoherent, my body suddenly weighed thousands of pounds, I couldn't muster enough strength in my arms to even lift my waterbottle to my mouth. My partner had to help dress and bathe me. I have wounds and bruises that I don't remember getting. Everything makes me cry. I can't accomplish the most basic of tasks for myself.

Not one guest at that wedding would have looked at me and thought I was stressed, overwhelmed, or uncomfortable. Most of them would not even have noticed that I am autistic. This is one of the reasons that autistic people get branded as "high functioning" - because from the perspective of the people at that wedding, I 'functioned' perfectly. Though a little strange and awkward, I blended in well enough with them, and that's what my autism is judged upon. How well I accomplished that task.

Today, I am disabled. I require another person to care for me. Someone else has to make my food or I won't eat. I will be stuck in my bed. It may last for days. I am not functioning. This is normal for me. It has been like this my whole life. It was like this when the task I got through without feeling was "school" and I would get home every day and feel like I was dying. It was like this when I went to work every day, and then came home and couldn't manage to make dinner or clean anything because I couldn't move. Its like this every time I leave the house to run errands, and I get home and have to sit still and do nothing for a few hours.

So. I dont know what the point I'm really trying to make is here- and I just used up the last of my energy writing that and now I'm confused and disoriented again so I'm going to lay down in the dark for awhile. But yeah, The wedding was lovely. I had a great time.