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Posted 11/4/2011 9:00 PM (GMT 0)
It's been a bit since I posted here, as I feel like I've been suffering from anxiety a lot more then depression.  But as I've come to realize along this annoying trip over the last 2 years, the two go hand in hand.  I've been feeling extremely down lately and just want to quit.

I don't know where does the story begin.  I'll just briefly go over everything yet again like an old record.  I had my first panic attack and problems with derealization back in 09 when I was working in my fathers business and trying to go back to school to get myself a better job.  I dropped out of the semester because I became aragophobic t was so bad. I couldn't even leave my room.  Eventually either with the help of therapy, or just getting tired of being such a loser....I mustered up the courage to get out and get a job.  I started cymbalta at the time and eventually came off the cymbalta, and 2 months later I quit that job to apply and work in my current job at the bank.

It's been a year now at this current job, I was taking zoloft back when I first got hired and stopped about 4 months in as I didn't feel like it was helping.  I was off all medicines completely until about July.  I was getting so frustrated at work because I felt like I need to be doing more, I felt like I needed to get promotion, like I need to move up, I shoudl be accomplishing more.....so yet again I signed up for college classes because my job offers tuition reimbursement.  I did well in my summer class pulling a B+ but it was an online class.  Now this semester I signed up for 12 credits and tried taking 4 classes while working full time, and OMG I had no idea what I was doing to myself....my mood has gone to hell.  I'm stressed out beyond belief, I can barely focus, and I'm always forgetting things.  These were kind of here and there complaints before I started the college classes though so I'm not sure if I can really blame it TOTALLy on school or not.

And now lately I am absolutely incapable about making a decision.  For example last week I called out of work sick because I was having such bad anxiety/depression that I couldn't go to work.  I've already dropped 2 out of the 4 of my college classes and I'm having TERRIBLe anxiety about my 2 remaining classes.  I feel asi if I can no longer focus during the class, I just focus on the fact that I can't focus and I drive myself nuts, counting down the time until the class is over.

My initial thinking of going back to school was to stay at my current job in the financial industry and try and get an accounting degree to eventually land myself a good job. I thought that seemed like a pretty sane idea.  Now I'm thinking holy crap my anxiety/panic attacks are through the roof and i'm NEVER going to be able to do this.  I even had to meet with the dean of my college because they had to sign off on a federal waiver to make me eligible for federal aid for college because of my prior mistakes in college.  I have withdrawn from 2 whole semester in the past and have been going on and off to school since 2004.

Now I'm constantly changing my mind.  I'm thinking of leaving my job and finding something more physical and active, something where I'd be better suited and keep myself busy.  Thinking of quitting school as well and officially putting the ending stamp on my education.  If this was just a one time occurence I'd say ok maybe switch majors and give it another try.  It's been going on for 6-7 years now with college and I keep having the same result....

I'm just getting myself really down.  I change my mind about what I'm giong to do 10000x in a given day.  For example yesterday I was totally focused on finding another job and continuiing to go to school, after meeting with my advisor I felt that was totally going to be my gameplan, thena fter sitting through class, about halfway through, I was telling myself screw tihs you can't dot his you can't even sit here and focus on the teacher giving a lecture.  Just do what your good at and try and get into some sort of union or blue collar job.

Meanwhile all throughout this I have been secluding myself from my friends.  I guess in a responsible way though because it's mostly during the week.  But I rarely see them anymore, maybe once a week on the weekends when I have a day off on sunday.  I just don't know where I'm going or how much longer I can last in my current position at my job.  I'm so worried that if this anxiety/depression gets any worse that I'm going to lose it there and get fired or just quit and not have anything else to fall back on.

I keep trying to remind myself that hard work and patience will pay off.  And I have been trying to think of other types of jobs that would be acheivable with my current associates degree in business.  I could start my own business, I could do union work, I could work for a good company like UPS or something like that?  But then I feel like I'm selling myeslf short.  It's annoying because I know that when I'm healthy, and when I'm feelign ok, and when I can focus......that I'm a smart guy.  But the problem has been that I almost forgot that part of me is still even here, I'm always anxious/worked up/irritable/etc.

Anyone else deal with this?  Especially the rapidly changing ideas?  That one aspect scares me, the fact that I can't commit to one decision.  I go from one to another, to another, and never see anything out to the finish.

Posted 11/4/2011 9:44 PM (GMT 0)
Hi Mike,

It is good to see you posting. Have you ever just thought about trying to enjoy what you are doing now? And not be striving for something better all the time? What makes you so unhappy with your current job? It sounds like a good job and that you are doing well. It is as if you aren't ever happy with what you have. But that is true for a lot of us at times. But being you can't live in the moment, maybe that plays a part in to the way you feel. Try to relax with what you have.

Have you thought about taking courses on line? Would it be easier for you? Just don't feel like you have failed. You tried something and it just didn't work out. That is all. Try with the two classes and if that doesn't work, so be it. You did try and that is what matters.

I hope that you find happiness within yourself. It is there, I think you are just over looking it.

Take care,

Hugs, Karen
Posted 11/4/2011 11:50 PM (GMT 0)
I guess the best answer to that question Karen is I don't know? It's a bunch of things that makes me unhappy about what I'm doing now. First off....I've never really enjoyed customer service type positions. I took this job with the idea in mind that I'd be able to move to financial services (thats what I was told by the person I interviewed with), it's looking like that possibility is soooooo far down the road and impossible though. Secondly I don't like a lot of the corporate stuff. I'm not very big on how everyone is drinking the "happy juice" and how you can't really be yourself. Thirdly, there's so much pressure on me. I'm a teller and the demand by the company to be perfect is huge. The demand by customers to do what they want to do is even bigger. The demand by the company for me to get referrals and to sell products to the customers is even more. These are all things that I dislike about my current position.

Courses online would more then likely be much easier for me. I'm not even sure if I really even want to finish school anymore though. I really get anxiety bad during class and am not really sure if I can handle it and see this through. It's something I always wanted to do, to prove to myself that I can do it, but everytime I seem to run into the same problems.

I get scared a lot too about my constantly changing ideas. How I want to do something one week, then something else the next. I've been posting up on the anxiety forums a lot the past few weeks and stkitt is the forum moderator over there. It hit home and scared me to hear her say that lately it seems like I'm ready to burst at the seems at any moment from my posts. That's the amount of distress I am feeling lately.

My latest idea is just to start looking for a less stressful job. A job that isn't under as much pressure and still somehow has career advancement. And definitely going to try and do what you said and try and calm myself down instead of trying to push and push and achieve things that I'm not ready for. That's a major problem of mine as well. I enrolled into internal traiing at my current job that will help you get qualified for a promotion and my current manager was even saying that she never saw anyone be so adament and so fast in taking the courses and wanting to move up, she even told me to slow down.

Maybe this is some severe OCD or bipolar crap? I don't know where my need or desier to drive and always do better comes from. Most of the time that's something positive....but it just seems to be hurting me emotionally and mentally though. It has helped me to be the top rated person at my position in the company, but it's also causing me an insane amount of distress.
Posted 11/5/2011 1:09 AM (GMT 0)
It sounds like you are constantly pushing yourself to better yourself. But a less stressful job might be the answer. It sounds like a whole lot of stress to me. But younger people such as yourself can handle those things better than I could. I can see your reasons for not liking your job. I wouldn't like it either if I were you. Do you by any chance have a way that you could finish your college degree and cut back on work? Could you afford to do that? Since it is something that you want to do so badly? Then you could focus more on school. But you did say I think that you are having trouble focussing in the classroom. Do you think your depression is causing this? You said something about ocd and bipolar. Or were you just saying??? A for instance...

It is sad that there isn't a promotion in sight, it sounds like you would be the one for it. Do you foresee anything opening up? Any time soon?

You do sound anxious and stressed. Do you talk to your psychiatrist anymore? Have you explained all of this to them? There are answers. As I remembered, you didn't want to take medications before. Have you changed your mind? Or do you still not want to take them? Even xanax, I remember you were thinking about it. It would be worth a try to get rid of some of the anxiety.

Depression is hard, but piling such a responsibility as working full time and going to school full time is such a heavy load. Just make sure you don't feel like you failed at your attempt. It is more than most people can handle. I know I couldn't. But I couldn't even work the job that you do. It would be too much for me. You have achieved much in your life. I think it would be nice if you did things to enjoy yourself. You don't have to have people around all the time to be happy either. You can achieve happiness with yourself. Find things that you enjoy doing in your spare time. Focus on that for awhile. Relax some. Go with the flow of things and see where it takes you.

I hope that you feel better soon. Take care Mike

Hugs, Karen
Posted 11/5/2011 3:04 AM (GMT 0)
I know what it's like to constantly change your mind. Especially with the mood swings I have. I keep applying to different jobs when I have bad days, then I change my mind and think that I'll just hate the new job more, I need to get back into school, etc.

Do you even want to be an accountant? I know it sounds like a smart idea that has good job prospects and salary, but it doesn't sound to me like you would even enjoy it. What do you love to do? What do you love to learn about? I love the quote: "The way to overcome shyness is to become so wrapped up in something, you forget to be afraid." Replace shyness with anxiety and/or depression, and I've found this to be true for myself. Maybe you're just not taking the right type of courses.

I know what you mean about the pressure as well. I work in retail as a "lead" (lower management), and you might as well shoot yourself in both feet when there are corporate visits, because no matter what you do, nothing will be good enough. But I've learned to make it by building relationships with some of the other associates (I get along better with them than the other managers). This takes some pressure off, and allows me to do some small chit-chat.

I don't think you should give up on yourself. But finding an easier job with less pressure may be best right now, in order to give you the time to focus on helping yourself.
Posted 11/5/2011 12:42 PM (GMT 0)
Thanks guys, you both raise some really good questions too that get me thinking at things in a more focused way which is good. I'll start with Karen's questions only because she posted first, not to be biased lol

Could I afford to cut back on work? Not at this current job, the part time benefits are terrible and would make therapy impossible. I need to stay full time in order to keep going to therapy which I think....i clearly need lol. Can I take online classes? Yes, the school that I'm going to has a lot of online classes and I believe that those are probably my best option towards one day probably getting my degree. Going to classes on campus after work all day, atleast for now, is extremely stressful for me and kind of overwhelming. Do I talk to my psychiatrist anymore? I talk to a therapist now, I stopped seeing my psychiatrist. He started me on xanax about 3-4 months ago and I was doing good at work with that for a month or so but the last 2 months have been getting extremely harder at work. I don't know if it's because of school, because I'm getting used to the xanax, or because a good friend I made at the job got transferred to a different branch. So it's just a lot of adjustments going on. My current therapist though (who I used to see a year ago) made me agree to seeing a psychiatrist that he works with if I wanted to go back under his care and I agreed. Only problem here is I had a severe panic attack the last time I tried an SSRI. Literally the day after, and I know it's all self inflicted because every doctor tells me that there's no way that the drug could have caused that reaction that quickly. I left work and blamed it on a stomach sickness and called out the next day, so worried and scared that everyone knew my "secret" that I have this terrible anxiety problem.

Now to Alaskah's questions. Do I even want to be an accountant? I don't even know what I want to do. I just know that they make a good salary, I don't envision (although I might be wrong) that there's a lot of pressure for sales and deceiving people in this business (I work in a bank and although everything they do is completely legal, at times I feel like they pressure us into MAKING somebody apply for a loan or talking somebody into doing something thats not in their best interest). Those kinds of things really rub me the wrong way, it really sucks to have a conscience. What do I love to do? What do I love to learn about? I don't even know anymore honestly. Before my anxiety problems, I was pretty satisfied in my fathers family business for the most part. I enjoyed working with my family and the other guy who worked there too I got close with and we were a tight knit group. I really enjoyed the ability to have a good time and work at the same time, talking about sports and other stuff. But the last year working there was when my anxiety/anger/irritibality problems starting kicking in. Very similar to what's going on now. The thoughts of I should be doing more, I shoudl have finished school, i should have a higher paying job, I'm ready to take on more responsibility, why am I stuck? That caused me to sign up for 18 credits that next semester after taking a 2 year break from school, and the combination of my already hightened stress level, the 18 credit workload, and the 40-50 hour a week job just threw me into an absolute panic mode.

Here I am 2 years later in a job totally unrelated to what I used to do, somehow still succeeding though in my current job, but still having a LOT of the same feelings and problems. My mood wavers and changes so many times in a given day. I can have everything all figured out in my head and am semi relaxed for like 5 min-30 min or an hour, and then some outside source or even a thought in my head can bring it on. And once that switch is on, it's go time and there's no way out it feels like. I start spiraling the thoughts over and over in my head, can't focus on a darn thing, get frustrated taht I can't focus, which makes the focusing even harder, which makes the frustration and anger even worse. Pretty annoying to realize I do this to myself.

I am still not very accepting to the idea that I might need medication, but once again I'm just letting myself think that maybe I need it. My old psychiatrist said I do, my primary doctor said it would help, and my current therapist said it would help as well. The only problem with the last SSRI that I took was that I had no idea what it was. It was called Anafranil and everyone I asked about it never heard of it/or knew very little about it. It also scared the hell out of me because for the first time I noticed that the package that it came in from the pharmarcy said NEW MEDICINE. And the pharmacist NEEDED to come over to me and tell me how to use the medication. I've never had to deal with either situation, I never noticed the NEW MEDICINE stamp on the bag and I never HAD TO talk to the pharmacist about the drug. That was the night before my severe panic attack and the first night that I took the medication. I'm so weird though, everyone's got their quirks. I feel like I would only do well with a drug that I've heard of and am familiar with and that somebody I know personally has taken. Three examples of these would be prozac, zoloft, or cymbalta. We'll see though I still have to get the courage up to call one of the psychiatrists my current psychologist recommended. I'm so hesitant to do this and I'm trying ot hold off from starting a new med until I have my week vacation from work in december. That way I won't really panic about the side effects, or if I do atleast I'll be home and able to deal with them.
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