Depression Forums
Depression Related Forums => Depression Central => Topic started by: tharidler on July 18, 2012, 12:30:50 PM
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hi all
i appologise if this post is long or rambling but i felt writing down some things might ease the stress and help me to focus i have posted some of these things before so i'm sorry to repeat myself but here goes i have been in therapy for around five years but my problems go back a lot further some to my childhood the arms race in the 80's somehow wormed it's way into a young mind and festered about the prospect of nuclear war and life ending well this screwed me up bad to the point if i could not hear noise or traffic i would go into full blown panic thinking a device had been detonated and an emp shockwave had knocked all electrics out i know this may not make sense but it will build a picture (hopefully) my father being northern and having a hair trigger temper didn't sugar coat things so when he found me in a panicked state he slapped me told me not to be so stupid and anyway when you die you die and thats the end. as you can imagine this really helped me i know a lot of you will agree with his take on life after death but i wasn't even a teenager at this stage anyway fast forward ten years i started having my first real issues with depression so i took the pills and carried on things seemed to get better so i stopped the pills and life went on i managed pubs and nightclubs at the time so life was good i met my wife and we partied a lot then one day i had an odd sensation in my stomach not painfull just strange so i went on the internet to look at what it may be and thats when the walls came down i had been drinking to much for years (liver problems cancer etc) i was also a smoker (lung cancer etc) i suffered with ibs (stomach cancer etc) by now i'm sure that you can see what was happening in my head so i went to the doctors and they ran blood tests i was honest about levels of drinking and so on the results came back and he said i was ok but to cut down on booze and give up smoking and i just needed to take some folic acid (no i was not pregnant as i am all man) but it helps with malabsorbtion of vitamins so you think thats that then no i go home hit the net and spiral out of control i find proof that the doctors wrong and i need medical help so i see another doctor and then get some private consultations but they are all wrong and then i have to see a pyschologist about medical phobias and thats when bit by bit the shroud is lifted on my issues (stick with me as i'm nearly there)without going into all of the details on my family life past and present and other issues on an open forum it turns out since a young age my fear of dying has built to epic proportions and now (with a list of other issues)it consumes me to the point that i waste so much time thinking of death that one day it will be here and i will have dedicated my life to being scared of it and not living and enjoying things as i should do at the moment i am still waiting to start a new meds regime and i hope that this may help to lift me but my point is this how can it ever be possible to deprogram myself of a fear that is an inevitable fact i have done all the work ever asked of me by my therapists but still it is the first and last thing i think of everyday so how can it ever get better my therapist once said what's the worst that can happen well i said i would be dead and she said yes but you would not know as you would no longer exist and while i can see the logic that did not help me i really have tried to work through this but i just have no idea and my therapists answers are not helping at the moment and this just never ends for me as it is such a crippling overwhelming dark dreadfull fear that i cannot escape and the irony is not lost on me when i talk about suicide anyway i'm sorry to ramble i hope this makes some sense any suggestions on any methods to help would be welcome
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I wonder if you could work out exactly why you have this fear, it may help you to address it better.
Z xx
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You are not alone. I used to have the same overwhelming fear of death. I also thought that every ache and pain I had was terminal. So I do understand. Have you tried CBT? This helped me with this fear. I look back on my notes from CBT and the first and uppermost problem I wrote was my fear of dying and leaving my family. The CBT really helped me make sense of this fear. S x x x x
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hi zaf and shaz
thankyou for your replies first of all zaf it has been suggested that the fear may come from my childhood because of the arms race and tv programs and my father saying that he doesn't believe in god and when you die you die although this doesn't seem to bad these were strong messages for a young mind this is what we think started the initial fear of death. shaz i have done cbt twice and it has helped in some ways to identify triggers for anxiety and to help me understand why i am the way i am and it has been suggested that it could be a fear of leaving my wife and children but sadly as i said to my therapist (you may think i'm not a nice person saying this)my fear is such that i don't care about anything but my own demise what i mean is i love my family very much but i don't think leaving them behind is my issue it's just the fear of not being.
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I'm convinced things that happen in our childhood can become huge phobias or fears as we get older, have you been able to identify exactly what it is about death you're so afraid of?
Z xxx
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I am sorry. These fears are awful. Take care. S x x x x
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hi zaf
i know this will sound obvious but i don't want to die its not really about disease or pain the only thing we have come up with is simply put not existing it's without doubt linked to my childhood the cbt has helped to identify some of the obvious causes but as yet i cannot build a coping mechanism to help deal with it
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I wish I could help tharidler, is there any other type of therapy that might be useful for you?
Z xx
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i have done cbt and anxiety courses and i have wondered whether hypnosis may help but my worry there is that it would be temporary and come back stronger this is when i start to worry that there is nothing that can be done as it is i already regret the lost time that is gone because i spent it in a dark hole because of this fear and when i talk at therapy the answer is always we need to work more on the roleplay aspect of therapy i don't mind doing it but i fail to see how it can resolve this issue and it has never been explained to me how it will help
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I have no experience of hypnosis, I think I would have to trust someone implicitly before I would consider it myself. If this fear is something that affects your life so badly perhaps its worth giving more time to the roleplay aspect of therapy?
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i think i agree with you about the trust issue and i will continue the roleplay untill it works or not thanks for your opinions it helps
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I have had hypnotherapy, you are always aware of what is going on. I felt just very relaxed. It worked up to a point but it was expensive. I still found counselling and meds worked best for me. But at the time I would have tried anything to feel better.
S x x x x
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i may still look into hypnosis i will talk to my psychologist and i will look at cost and decide when i'm able to make an informed choice but as you say shaz sometimes we are willing to try anything to make it better many thanks also for your comments