I’m turning into a bitter b***h and I don’t like it. The months between November and the end of February are quite stressful for me, there’s the inescapeable festive season, lots of painful anniversaries, lots of birthdays (incl mine), Valentine’s Day, and I’m glad when March arrives. This year I’ve noticed that I’ve been more angry and I’ve been pushing my friends away - luckily for me, they’re not having any of it and are sticking around, giving me pep talks about how much they love me, but they are all such lovely people and I find it very hard to believe that they want to know me.
What the hell is going on? Is it an MS thing? I’m not normally like this, but I just feel like I’m at the bottom of a deep hole and digging even further down, and I can’t seem to shake it.
This isn’t you at all, especially when I have read some of the posts you have put on here. Maybe as Rebbecca has said it is SAD. I have a friend who hasn’t got MS and she is the most miserable person you could come across this time of year. When the spring arrives and the sun’s out she’s back to her normal cheerful self. Maybe worth a trip down the ole gp’s just to check. I’m, glad to hear that your true friends are taking no notice of your change in mood.
I for one really hope you come out of this VERY soon.
Christmas etc would turn Pollyanna into a witch, in my opinion, with bells on when you add in all the extra stuff you have around this time. Having said which, I support Janet and Rebecca’s sensible words. Chat with the GP, perhaps? I hope the sun comes out soon for you.
Hi Luisa, I think you have had some good replies that I can’t really add to. However, I have never met you but on here you do not come across as a bitter b***h. From your posts on here I know you have had a very hard time and gone through things that I would not have been able to cope with, you have done fantastically well. It sounds like you have some good friends around you. One more thing, seem to remember you saying on another post that your birthday was close to Valentines day so can I wish you a happy birthday. Cheryl:)
Thanks for your replies, and for the birthday wishes Cheryl (it was on Fri 10th) - I’ve been taking vit D since October, and the halogen heater that I use a lot is supposed to be good for SAD. I’m not sure about going to the GP with this, from experience, they tend to hand out anti-depressants quite quickly and I don’t want to go down that route. I was on prozac about 12 years ago, and although I felt like there was a level below which my mood didn’t go, I still felt bad because I was on medication for depression, vicious circle sort of thing. I’m hoping I’m going to start to come back to being me in March - once the hell of Valentine’s day is out of the way (avoiding TV until 15th Feb), I just have what would have been my husband’s birthday on 27th Feb to get through, and that’s the end of the painful anniversaries for just now. Happy jolly face will be on for 6 of my friends birthdays for the rest of Feb (I’ve got to start making friends with people who were not born at the beginning of the year!). The days will start getting longer soon, and the weather should be a bit milder, so I think that should help.
Hi, I agree it might be SAD. I bought a couple of SAD light bulb (I got them on Ebay), and fitted them into normal table lamps. You don’t need to use it all the time, I use mine for an hour each morning and tea time. I also take a high dose of Vit D3. This winter I haven’t felt as gloomy and grumpy (which has bee noticed by my husband abd son!)
Something I often reckon can be helpful is to look into the stages of grief (google it and you’ll find some stuff about it). It’s about the different emotions we can go through when we’ve suffered a bereavement, and being diagnosed can be a bit like that - we need to grieve the loss of our old ‘healthy’ life. So it can be common to experience things like denial, anger, depression etc., and so I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you.
Finding ways to process how you’re feeling could probably help. That may be journalling or talking with friends, seeing a counsellor or asking your GP to be referred for Cognitive Behavoural Therapy. Or simply having a good scream and punching your pillow might help get out some of what you’re feeling.
Glad your friends are not letting you push them away.
Thanks again - Lynne, I’ve been taking 10,000iu/day of vit D since Oct, think I’ll look into getting a few SAD lightbulbs, my halogen heater is supposed to be good for SAD, but not sure how strong the thing needs to be. Dan, you would not believe the amount of times I’ve gone through the grieving thing in the last few years,
I think that maybe everything is just building up, the MS is gradually getting worse, and things are getting a bit too much. I really don’t want to be pushing people away - my mother did that a lot, which is why I wondered if it was maybe to do with the MS.
I read somewhere that smiling, even if you fake it, is good for you. I’ll just keep my smiling mask on for just now, if I let it slip I scare people. Hopefully it won’t just be a mask for too much longer.
Happy belated birthday, I hope that you had a good day and that your smile was a real one if only for a little while.
I completely agree with you that November to March is a horrible time of year, particularly as, like you, I have some painful anniversaries to contend with. I can understand your reluctance to go on anti-depressants, particularly given your previous history with them, and I was just wondering if you had tried counselling.
I have found that counselling really helped me, if only because it gave me a chance to vent whenever I needed to. I often described myself as a little ball of rage going in to the sessions (or a big ball of rage on a particularly bad day!) but always came out with a feeling of relief, I was able to say the things I really felt without worrying how that would effect the person I was talking to. What I have realised recently is that counselling is not just a one off process after which I am cured, sometimes I will need that support every week, sometimes I wont need it for months or even years, but I think it is a comfort knowing that I can access it when I need to. 2012 has already been a big learning curve for me!
I hope that you are managing to get through these last few weeks, it is nearly March and I will be hoping that things start to pick up for you and your smile is more often real than it is fake.
Thanks for your reply, I hadn’t thought about counselling before, but I have seen on here that a lot of people have benefitted from it. I’m now a bit wary about letting anger loose, I lost my temper big time a couple of weeks ago and was shattered for 3 days after (my smiling mask seriously took a bashing!), I’m normally quite a placid, easy going person, but I think that with everything else that I deal with at the beginning of the year, the thing I got angry about just tipped me over the edge, I’ll try not to do that again, the consequences are just not worth it, and I had to make sooooo many apologies!
Being angry is normal, it is part of the grieving process. It took me three years to get through being angry and learn to accept that I could not change anything. This enabled me to get on with life - limited as it is. I try to stay relaxed and yes friends who have stayed the course are valuable and to be cherrished.
Lists of good things to do are helpful and seeing those crossed off ensure that I value myself and feel I have achieved something.
Last thought at night is always - tomorrow will be a better day.
I hope that writing on the forum has helped you, I think it is a great place to talk, vent, laugh and cry. I have been a bit addicted to the site since I first became ill and now my diagnosis has been confirmed I feel like I can legitimately join in with discussions. My diagnosis was confirmed in January, that didnt make this time of year any easier to get through!
I am a big advocate of counselling, I have been to several therapists at different points of my life and most recently accessed a counselling service through my GP. I have to say that the service I have received there has been amazing and really has made a difference to my life. I also have friends who have accessed counselling through cruse and they have also said that it really helped them. I see it as a possible alternative to anti-depressants and it helps me to have a place to vent rather than hold everything in and then blow over a small detail.
I can only imagine how exhausted you are trying to get through this time holding everything in, its no wonder when you blew it completely wiped you out. And dont worry about apologies, I’m sure the people that matter understand completely and dont need to hear sorry.
I just wanted to say that I am thinking of you and hoping that things brighten up for you very soon.