Anxiety and Depression is something that we don’t like to talk about as men. “It’s not something that we do.”
Well, that’s an outright lie, and in some cases may be worse than our counterparts. I think we are raised differently and we start out thinking that we are the provider and have to deal with everything on our own. Sadly we do a lot of the time and sometimes our partner even has a further negative impact on our responsibilities.
It starts with ourselves though, realizing that we aren’t responsible for everyone else. It’s frustrating, don’t get me wrong, also out of our control. I ended up removing a lot of my “friends” and contacts this year, from my normal conversations and across social media. If they don’t add value to your life, then they need to go. Because the alternative is that they only bring grief and drama.
After being in an abusive relationship for years, my counselor suggested that I talk to my doctor about some medication. I confided to my counselor that I don’t sleep anymore, and when I do I shoot up in the middle of the night from horrible dreams. Reliving the past is something that I’m great at, and that surfaces during my dreams quickly turning them into nightmares.
I have always been against medication! “There’s always a solution” I have told myself and others for my entire life. I trusted my counselor and talked to my doctor, she started me on a common PTSD medication and it took the nightmares away. I was still restless and couldn’t sleep some nights but the fact that I wasn’t waking up drenched in sweat was a huge improvement.
Recently I have been getting more restless with the increase of other chaos going on in my life and we increased the dosage and so far it’s helping. I have to remind myself that I’m human and not a living soul is meant to endure the hell that some of us live each day. Anything that will help me live my best life, I’m a lot more open-minded to now.
I’m human and need to treat myself as such. I can’t handle every situation out there, and I can’t handle them all at the same time. I will surround myself with the right people the help lift me up on the bad days. I still have a bad day and have bad thoughts, angry thoughts but I take it one day at a time, and believe it or not medication helps. One day I hope that I won’t need it but in my time of need, I feel safe admitting I need help and getting it. I don’t want to live in hell anymore.
How do you handle your anxiety or depression? How do you change your mindset on a bad day?
Join our Facebook Dad’s Group and share your thoughts!
Here’s a great resource on Depression – LINK