Does Anyone Else Have to Plan Their Life Around Their Mental Illness?

[Poptart]

I'm pretty frustrated.

My family heavily wants me to be a teacher but Im terrified. After my failed physical because of bipolar, I have to face the reality that if I relapse there will be repercussions at work 100% of the time.

And I have to live with this fact for the rest of my life.

I just dont want to bring a classroom of kids into the mix when Im manic or depressed.

I think my illness has really cut off so many options for me. Im afraid to live alone in case I relapse and hang myself. Im afraid to travel in case I relapse and hang myself. Im afraid to do things that most in their 20s take for granted.

And now Im too afraid to work in case I have a relapse and get sectioned or act weird.

Does anyone else have to plan everything around relapsing?

 

[Mr2005]

Yes. My girlfriend

 

[Deleted member 17949]

I'm worried about having to do that tbh. I feel like I would need to to not ctb since it's damaging my life so much.

 

[glittergore]

Yes. In order for me to keep my mental illness under control, I have to follow a strict regime of self-care, therapy, and medication. It takes over a good portion of my life, but it's even worse when it's out of control. I also have some plans in place for if I relapse, either a depressive or manic one. I'm actually about to start my student teaching semester and have the same concerns you do, but I'm still going to try because teaching is a passion of mine and I have to make a living. You have to be careful and vigilant, but there's plenty of bipolar people out there that can have successful careers. I hope to one day teach abroad, but I'll have to have a longer history of stability before that happens.

Relapse is always a possibility so you should do everything you can to prevent it or, if it does happen, cope with it, but your mental health will get worse if you let the fear of it stop you from living.

 

[nerve]

Yeah. It's a big part of why I want to die. I'm so tired of missing out on life because I'm too busy being mentally ill. There's this sense of shrunken expectations always following me around.

It's so easy to torture myself with thoughts of who I could have been if things went differently for me. The quiet disappointment is suffocating.

 

[Sensei]

I also suffer from bipolar disorder (II) and I'm actually a teacher. Ironically, the constant stress at work was what triggered it in the first place. It's still possible for me to work as a teacher, but I have had to make some changes. I only work 90 % and avoid all projects which aren't absolutely necessary. My principals are very understanding, much thanks to the fact that I work with problem youths and do it well, and they "protect" me and let me focus on my teaching. If you decide to work as a teacher you need to be really careful, try to minimize stress, and focus on your teaching. Also, I think you must inform your principals or it won't work.

 

[Intheo]

It's taken years out of my life, if not decades. I spent many years being frustrated, unmotivated, nihilistic, and watching my life pass me by. I wasted my youth. Even now as I realize on an intellectual level, when depression takes hold of you, you can't do anything. I keep going back in time wishing I lived my life differently.

Now I feel my life is coming to an end, I can't just end my own suffering because I don't want to hurt the people I dragged into my life.

 

[ghostgirl1995]

Yesss! I'm so tired of my mental getting in the way and no one understanding me.

 

[JustLosingMyself]

Yup...
Career is frustrated as everyone is sort of expecting I'll have a relapse and keep the interesting projects away from me

 

[GravityUtilizer]

It's taken years out of my life, if not decades. I spent many years being frustrated, unmotivated, nihilistic, and watching my life pass me by. I wasted my youth. Even now as I realize on an intellectual level, when depression takes hold of you, you can't do anything. I keep going back in time wishing I lived my life differently.

Now I feel my life is coming to an end, I can't just end my own suffering because I don't want to hurt the people I dragged into my life.

Hey you should go easy on yourself because this:

when depression takes hold of you, you can't do anything.

Precludes this:

I keep going back in time wishing I lived my life differently.

Basically I don't think you could have done any differently. You have a mental illness and probably did all you could at the time.

And to the OP: yeah I'm treading ridiculously carefully thinking about going back out into the workplace.

 

[so tired or manic]

taking testosterone evened my mood swings quite a lot, but now I'm more depressed, which I think is more because of the weather. I was more manic in the southwest and more depressed in the northeast. hoping to get back to the desert so I can be happy again. I'd love to see how that goes with my more even mood now.

money keeps getting in the way and my pets refuse to stop getting sick, but at least I know what needs to happen.

 

[Sensei]

taking testosterone evened my mood swings quite a lot, but now I'm more depressed, which I think is more because of the weather. I was more manic in the southwest and more depressed in the northeast. hoping to get back to the desert so I can be happy again. I'd love to see how that goes with my more even mood now.

That's very interesting. Bipolar disorder is so extremely multifaceted so I wouldn't be the least surprised if it turned out that weather can be a factor. Make sure to post here about it if you see a clear pattern.

 

[bpdteacher]

As a teacher with a mental health diagnosis, my most pressing concern with your post is that it starts: 'my family wants...'

What do YOU want?

 

[Sinai Silence]

I have physical problems which have closed the doors for me which I wanted to walk through; whilst my mental health has slammed a lot more of those doors in my face. The questions I always ask myself is; "Will my mental health get in the way of doing X?" The answer usually being yes.

 

[ohhgeeitsme]

Anxiety has ruined my life in sooo many ways and it's only one of my mental problems. I'll never live the life I want, or live up to my true potential. I can't be the kind of friend people deserve. I'm not reliable.

I've tried. For years, I did everything I was supposed to. I stayed sober, exercised daily, ate healthy, CBT exercises, meditation, the list goes on. I really worked hard to fix it. I finally accepted that my anxiety cannot be cured by lifestyle changes alone. I then turned to SSRIs, which destroyed me even further. I hate being mentally ill. I can't believe I ever thought it was cool when I was a, ya know, teenager goth. It's not. It's torture and I'd give anything just to be happy and at ease.

 

[LittleJem]

hi, in Psych Ward I met one classroom/special needs teacher with Bipolar. She is happy at wirk and when she's ill they release her to hospital. It might be tricjy but coukd also be rewarding. Excuse typos cold hands

 

[ZRA]

Yes. In order for me to keep my mental illness under control, I have to follow a strict regime of self-care, therapy, and medication. It takes over a good portion of my life, but it's even worse when it's out of control. I also have some plans in place for if I relapse, either a depressive or manic one. I'm actually about to start my student teaching semester and have the same concerns you do, but I'm still going to try because teaching is a passion of mine and I have to make a living. You have to be careful and vigilant, but there's plenty of bipolar people out there that can have successful careers. I hope to one day teach abroad, but I'll have to have a longer history of stability before that happens.

Relapse is always a possibility so you should do everything you can to prevent it or, if it does happen, cope with it, but your mental health will get worse if you let the fear of it stop you from living.

pfp check outs: "I believe in taking care of myself, and a balanced diet and a rigorous exercise routine. In the morning, if my face is a little puffy, I'll put on an ice pack while doing my stomach crunches. I can do a thousand now. After I remove the ice pack I use a deep pore cleanser lotion. In the shower I use a water activated gel cleanser, then a honey almond body scrub, and on the face an exfoliating gel scrub. Then I apply an herb-mint facial masque which I leave on for 10 minutes while I prepare the rest of my routine. I always use an after shave lotion with little or no alcohol, because alcohol dries your face out and makes you look older. Then moisturizer, then an anti-aging eye balm followed by a final moisturizing protective lotion."

For me it feels like this comes down to trying to minimize my responsibilities to get to a stripped-down version of my goals. Idk, I guess some people can handle the self-management here, but this seems somewhat exceptional.

 

[nozomu]

Your family wants you to be a teacher, but what would you like to do? Say if you could hypothetically have any job that would be accommodating of your illness

 

[leloyon]

I have selective mutism. Kinda hard to function in society when you can't speak.

 

[ferret-in-a-sock]

taking testosterone evened my mood swings quite a lot, but now I'm more depressed, which I think is more because of the weather. I was more manic in the southwest and more depressed in the northeast. hoping to get back to the desert so I can be happy again. I'd love to see how that goes with my more even mood now.

money keeps getting in the way and my pets refuse to stop getting sick, but at least I know what needs to happen.

Same with testosterone. I stopped taking it to try and save money and now I'm dealing with the worst PMS mood swings. I got a new doctor and started taking it again, but I'm still rocketing from either manic to neutral to browsing the forum.

 

[lionetta12]

I'm pretty frustrated.

My family heavily wants me to be a teacher but Im terrified. After my failed physical because of bipolar, I have to face the reality that if I relapse there will be repercussions at work 100% of the time.

And I have to live with this fact for the rest of my life.

I just dont want to bring a classroom of kids into the mix when Im manic or depressed.

I think my illness has really cut off so many options for me. Im afraid to live alone in case I relapse and hang myself. Im afraid to travel in case I relapse and hang myself. Im afraid to do things that most in their 20s take for granted.

And now Im too afraid to work in case I have a relapse and get sectioned or act weird.

Does anyone else have to plan everything around relapsing?

Often, it's hard to do a lot of things when you have PTSD. It limits life quite a bit, but I'm making adjustments to my life to try and make it as comfortable and liveable as possible. If I didn't have so many triggers life would be so simple and carefree. But sadly it's not possible and I just have to deal with it and find places in society where I find a minimum amount of triggers. It's boring and it's sad at times, but it is what it is. There's so little diversty here that a lot of the non triggering activities I wish to participate in are not available where I live so my next big plan and goal is to move as soon as possible so I can maybe live a happy doable life for me.

 

[Gaga786]

Often, it's hard to do a lot of things when you have PTSD. It limits life quite a bit, but I'm making adjustments to my life to try and make it as comfortable and liveable as possible. If I didn't have so many triggers life would be so simple and carefree. But sadly it's not possible and I just have to deal with it and find places in society where I find a minimum amount of triggers. It's boring and it's sad at times, but it is what it is. There's so little diversty here that a lot of the non triggering activities I wish to participate in are not available where I live so my next big plan and goal is to move as soon as possible so I can maybe live a happy doable life for me.

Exactly. There are just an abundance amount of triggers which hamper our daily life. What hurts me the most is I find up envying others who don't have to deal with C-PTSD or any other sort of mental illness which impede or hinder their daily life. I can see most of them just killing it in life. However, they might also have some sort of issues or anything, but alteast they don't have to be thinking of CTB at every given moment like me. I must concede some may have it worse as well. Unfortunately, It is what it is
Im also trying to move out in hopes of ameliorating my life

 

[Celerity]

I made peace with a different career path that I am hoping will be less stressful. I no longer aim to enjoy my work or "be successful ". I just want something that provides my target income, has stable demand, and offers a low stress work environment. Giving up on my dreams was devastating, but it ended up being a relief to let go of all the pressure I was placing on myself to succeed. Even after wasting my 20s on a dead-end career and all the misery involved, I actually anticipate that I will be happier with the apparent downgrade than the career I originally wanted.

I hope you can find a way to make teaching work for you, but I just wanted to add my 2c to say that you shouldn't give up if it doesn't. There is so much more to a good job than the work itself. Keep that in mind if teaching seems like too much.

 

[thx1138]

I think you should listen to yourself first, your family second. And that is only if your family is good and supportive. If they are abusive, don't listen to them at all.

It's very hard for me to make plans about anything. I'm just living day by day now. It's disappointing. I don't even remember what my dreams were when I was a kid. I'm very afraid of people, so I do have to make crazy adjustments to my life to avoid them as much as possible. Currently, I'm trying to fix myself again, therapy, drugs, etc. If it works, maybe I can finally have a long-term plan.

 

[situationalsui]

I'm pretty frustrated.

My family heavily wants me to be a teacher but Im terrified. After my failed physical because of bipolar, I have to face the reality that if I relapse there will be repercussions at work 100% of the time.

And I have to live with this fact for the rest of my life.

I just dont want to bring a classroom of kids into the mix when Im manic or depressed.

I think my illness has really cut off so many options for me. Im afraid to live alone in case I relapse and hang myself. Im afraid to travel in case I relapse and hang myself. Im afraid to do things that most in their 20s take for granted.

And now Im too afraid to work in case I have a relapse and get sectioned or act weird.

Does anyone else have to plan everything around relapsing?

Mental health is a full time job in my experience. My heart goes out to you.

 

[MlKE]

Yeah, I isolate myself since as long as I can remember because I get very tired and agitated by just about everything. Some kind of burnout with a very short fuse that makes me pretty insufferable unless I can get lots of time alone to recover. Then I feel bad for wasting days away doing nothing, and get agitated at myself again even when I'm trying to recover. I gather just enough will to go to work, then I go home and I'm completely devastated. Physical and mental exhaustion, and spiritually dead because it's all for nothing. I just do it so I can repeat it again another day.

 

[estrangered]

Yeah, I isolate myself since as long as I can remember because I get very tired and agitated by just about everything. Some kind of burnout with a very short fuse that makes me pretty insufferable unless I can get lots of time alone to recover. Then I feel bad for wasting days away doing nothing, and get agitated at myself again even when I'm trying to recover. I gather just enough will to go to work, then I go home and I'm completely devastated. Physical and mental exhaustion, and spiritually dead because it's all for nothing. I just do it so I can repeat it again another day.

just wanted to say that youre not alone as i completely relate, every day i get home after class i have to lie down for hours to collect myself again from how socially, mentally, and physically exhausted i feel. i cant make myself do much outside of this routine. i went out with friends for the first time in over a year 2 days ago and im still utterly burnt out from it.
this shit sucks so much, truly wish you all the best.

 

[MlKE]

just wanted to say that youre not alone as i completely relate, every day i get home after class i have to lie down for hours to collect myself again from how socially, mentally, and physically exhausted i feel. i cant make myself do much outside of this routine. i went out with friends for the first time in over a year 2 days ago and im still utterly burnt out from it.
this shit sucks so much, truly wish you all the best.

Thanks, I hope your studies go well so you can get a decent job that doesn't sap all your life away. I think, that as long as you get the means to become self sufficient without spending 100% of your time and energy just to make ends meet, you can develop a life outside of working. Failing my studies is my biggest single regret (so far, lol).