I really need some help

[Dapplestar]

Hi, it's my first time here.

I'm posting because I'm deeply unsettled by some of the events in my life and this might be a little long.

This is a little bit about myself, I'm a 17 year old girl who has an anxiety disorder and depression. I dont know if this is the actual problem I have or if there might be something else. I didn't get a chance to properly talk to my psychiatrist about this and my therapist didn't help all that much. My parents are also very stigmatizing, so I literally have no one to talk to right now. It'll be great if anyone can provide some advice or insight. Also, I've suffered through an episode of anxiety before and it was pretty intense enough for me to think that this wasn't just a normal teenage phase or something. I was able to get over that, but it still left a mark so I don't think that what I'm posting here is really just a teenage phase.
I'm shy, introverted and people have called me wierd. I was like this as a child too. I have difficulty forming close friendships and I find it tiring to hold conversations with people or even think of something interesting to say. I sound monotone when I speak to people, i have a little trouble meeting their eyes and sounding like I'm not constrained. I do have a few friends, but I notice that they seem more close to their other friends than with me. I'm also very imaginative and I also have a depressive personality since I was little. I've never saw my personality or my behaviour as a problem, I've always seen it as just me beong a creative and slightly different person. But this isn't the case anymore because I've developed mood issues that greatly interfere with my life. I suspect that my behaviour is one of the causes of them, the other being a different and anxious childhood environment, and genetics probably.
I have an autistic brother who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, but my family is still unsure of whether it is a misdiagnosis or not.
I heard that creative people are more prone to bipolarity and i've noticed that I get overtly emotional whenever I feel excited about something or when I'm watching a movie. Like I get shivers and more energetic. This only started occurring more during high school. I also get pretty deep and emotional thoughts, and I've also read that anxiety can be a mix state in bipolar disorder. People have also stated that my energy changes are pretty drastic, but it could just be the fact that my thoughts are too creative, or
My social skills are just poor and I connect differently with people but I don't really know. I can still sleep and I dont exhibit any obvious symptoms of the disorder, but I do experience severe anxiety and depression, which i've read is also common in bipolarity. I understand that one can be creative and energetic as well as Broody without being bipolar, but now I'm wondering if I am actually a little bit unstable after getting severe stuck thoughts.
What happened was that one night a fragment of a song kept playing in my mind repetitively, nonstop. I liked that song and listened to it a lot before this event happened, but I wasn't thinking about it and I wasn't stressed out about anything before this event occurred. Also the stuck song isn't the issue itself, since everyone gets them and I know that, but it's when it keeps playing in your head regardless of whatever you try to stop it that it starts becoming a disconcerting for me. Basically I tried deep breathing, playing the song to the end, but nothing worked and my brain just went off on its own that night and I didn't get any sleep. I wasn't particularly stressed out at all, or anything. It was actually the night before summer school, but I wasn't too stressed about it. But I was feeling very happy when I was listening to the song and i was having great bursts of creative ideas for my stories when I was listening to this song. Along with that were feelings of excitement, but nothing too big. So is this a subtle sign of an inability to control mood, or a sign that I'm vulnerable to it?
What I found online was that people who suffer from a stuck song episode as long as this are usually mentally ill, like they probably have OCD or bipolar disorder. I suspect that it might have been related to my anxiety disorder and therefore I might have some OCD. I don't know about the relation between this and bipolarity yet, but apparently there's a link betweeen OCD and bipolarity and some of my past and present experiences kind of make me fear that I might be in an early stage of it or something.
I've also read a bit about schozotypal and I identified with some of the traits, but I'm trying not to catastrophiez too many things here. My anxiety and depression over what that stuck thought meant started two years ago. It still hasn't ended yet. I was just going to let the emotions fade away and think them out,but they wouldnt regardless of what I tried, and this was unlike the first anxiety episode I had. I'm still fighting it.
Now, Im wondering if this stuck song episode should be a cause for concern since it is so long and uncontroable. For my other mental health concerns, should I be concerned about them or should I just be rest assured that anxiety and depression can cause similar things such as energy changes? Thank you for reading this post, I greatly appreciate any help.

I also already have anxiety issues before this stuck song event and I've been diagnosed with anxiety disorder as well. But when the song issue began, I was living just fine with nothing overwhelming me or bothering me that much.

 

[janemariesayed]

Hi, it's my first time here.

I'm posting because I'm deeply unsettled by some of the events in my life and this might be a little long.

This is a little bit about myself, I'm a 17 year old girl who has an anxiety disorder and depression. I dont know if this is the actual problem I have or if there might be something else. I didn't get a chance to properly talk to my psychiatrist about this and my therapist didn't help all that much. My parents are also very stigmatizing, so I literally have no one to talk to right now. It'll be great if anyone can provide some advice or insight. Also, I've suffered through an episode of anxiety before and it was pretty intense enough for me to think that this wasn't just a normal teenage phase or something. I was able to get over that, but it still left a mark so I don't think that what I'm posting here is really just a teenage phase.
I'm shy, introverted and people have called me wierd. I was like this as a child too. I have difficulty forming close friendships and I find it tiring to hold conversations with people or even think of something interesting to say. I sound monotone when I speak to people, i have a little trouble meeting their eyes and sounding like I'm not constrained. I do have a few friends, but I notice that they seem more close to their other friends than with me. I'm also very imaginative and I also have a depressive personality since I was little. I've never saw my personality or my behaviour as a problem, I've always seen it as just me beong a creative and slightly different person. But this isn't the case anymore because I've developed mood issues that greatly interfere with my life. I suspect that my behaviour is one of the causes of them, the other being a different and anxious childhood environment, and genetics probably.
I have an autistic brother who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, but my family is still unsure of whether it is a misdiagnosis or not.
I heard that creative people are more prone to bipolarity and i've noticed that I get overtly emotional whenever I feel excited about something or when I'm watching a movie. Like I get shivers and more energetic. This only started occurring more during high school. I also get pretty deep and emotional thoughts, and I've also read that anxiety can be a mix state in bipolar disorder. People have also stated that my energy changes are pretty drastic, but it could just be the fact that my thoughts are too creative, or
My social skills are just poor and I connect differently with people but I don't really know. I can still sleep and I dont exhibit any obvious symptoms of the disorder, but I do experience severe anxiety and depression, which i've read is also common in bipolarity. I understand that one can be creative and energetic as well as Broody without being bipolar, but now I'm wondering if I am actually a little bit unstable after getting severe stuck thoughts.
What happened was that one night a fragment of a song kept playing in my mind repetitively, nonstop. I liked that song and listened to it a lot before this event happened, but I wasn't thinking about it and I wasn't stressed out about anything before this event occurred. Also the stuck song isn't the issue itself, since everyone gets them and I know that, but it's when it keeps playing in your head regardless of whatever you try to stop it that it starts becoming a disconcerting for me. Basically I tried deep breathing, playing the song to the end, but nothing worked and my brain just went off on its own that night and I didn't get any sleep. I wasn't particularly stressed out at all, or anything. It was actually the night before summer school, but I wasn't too stressed about it. But I was feeling very happy when I was listening to the song and i was having great bursts of creative ideas for my stories when I was listening to this song. Along with that were feelings of excitement, but nothing too big. So is this a subtle sign of an inability to control mood, or a sign that I'm vulnerable to it?
What I found online was that people who suffer from a stuck song episode as long as this are usually mentally ill, like they probably have OCD or bipolar disorder. I suspect that it might have been related to my anxiety disorder and therefore I might have some OCD. I don't know about the relation between this and bipolarity yet, but apparently there's a link betweeen OCD and bipolarity and some of my past and present experiences kind of make me fear that I might be in an early stage of it or something.
I've also read a bit about schozotypal and I identified with some of the traits, but I'm trying not to catastrophiez too many things here. My anxiety and depression over what that stuck thought meant started two years ago. It still hasn't ended yet. I was just going to let the emotions fade away and think them out,but they wouldnt regardless of what I tried, and this was unlike the first anxiety episode I had. I'm still fighting it.
Now, Im wondering if this stuck song episode should be a cause for concern since it is so long and uncontroable. For my other mental health concerns, should I be concerned about them or should I just be rest assured that anxiety and depression can cause similar things such as energy changes? Thank you for reading this post, I greatly appreciate any help.

I also already have anxiety issues before this stuck song event and I've been diagnosed with anxiety disorder as well. But when the song issue began, I was living just fine with nothing overwhelming me or bothering me that much.

Hello @Dapplestar and welcome here to the4 forum. I'm sorry to hear you have anxiety disorder and depression. I do too. I have depression and mixed anxiety and PTSD. I've found this forum to be really friendly and supportive so I am sure you will find it helpful too. You always have someone to talk to on here. As we are all mostly suffering from the same illnesses, we tend to understand each other as well. So please don't feel that you are all alone in this world as you have us now.

Forget the people who called you weird. If you think about it, they called you that because you were off in your own lovely world and would have been very happy to not talk to anyone. But life takes us through stages that we have to talk to people. For those of us who are shy it's awful. Being shy and/or introverted doesn't make you a bad person. People like us think more. watch more and of course understand more. It doesn't sound like a teenage phase to me, not if you have always been like this, even since a child.

If you are creative then revel in it. Go create and share it with the world.

Being a teenager, you will, of course, have hormones racing around your body at this time. The diagnosis could be confusing because some symptoms of your body changes will be like depression or mental illnesses. It is true that creative people are more emotional. But they are still able to live their lives to the full. They are those who are in the acting professions, artists, writers musicians and the like. We would be a very plain and boring world if people like us didn't exist. We go to make up part of this world, and those who dismiss us would miss us dearly don't you think if there were no emotional creative minds to write movies or create songs. Even JK Rowling was signed off for clinical depression and during that time wrote some of Harry Potter.

I don't think your stuck song scenario is anything to worry about. It helped you to be creative which could end up being the making of you. If it happens again, try to put a different song in your head.

 

[Dapplestar]

Hi,

Thank you very much for your comforting words, it's great to know that there are people to talk to in this supportive community. I hope that your anxiety issues become manageable too.

I also didn't think that my introverted, broody and quirky personality was a cause for concern at all for a long time. I thought that i was just the crazy artist type lol, but not actually crazy. It wasn't until i started to develop really abnormal reactions to things, and started to experience distressful psychological events that I began to really reflect on my life and whether or not some of my behaviours are maladaptive and indicative of some sort of potential mental health issue, since these behaviors have been pervasive throughout my life, and eventually I developed issues that impaired me and made me feel terrible. I still create and fantasize, but I do that less now since i don't want to trigger anything wierd again.

They're abnormal reactions because the anxiety was unbearable and the trigger for my fear was kind of wierd too. I'm talking about my first anxiety episode and it was when I was afraid of getting sleep paralysis. I remembered some of my reasons for fearing it being that my mental state has always been wierd, wjat if i develop it. Now several months after I got over this anxiety, it seems extremely silly and it's just a sign of my lack of self-esteem (I have self esteem issues). I didn't think too much about this episode and just saw it as a small bump in my life.

I still embraced my personality and my faults and wow everything was really rational, calming and smooth until i discovered a song I liked and started going on a deep, intense and emotionally stimulating journey of creativity which ultimately took me to an entire sleepless night, due to the song stuck in my brain. No one I talked to had songs stuck in their mind for an entire night because they couldn't calm their brain down.

( now that I read that people can get stuck songs for 24/7 for an entire week, it makes me feel a bit better.)

Now I've just come to accept that I do have problems controlling my emotions ( calming down my anxiety and mood) and I probably do have some OCD tendencies (pure o) in me. Here's my thought process in terms of coming into acceptance with the crazy stuck song episode:

1. Theres nothing too abnormal about that intense stuck song episode
2. It went on far longer than those experienced by the ppl i know and the frustration i experienced is too much and not at a threshold that should be considered normal.
3. It might just mean that my brain is more active than other's, maybe a bit of pure o. It doesn't mean that it's a sign of something else like bipolar.
4. Im not completely sure though, it was such a vague distressing scenario that didn't have any clear triggers.
5. I should strengthen some parts of my personality to improve my condition, like my difficulty in making close friendships and vivid fantasizing.
6. I'm living in uncertainty and it doesn't feel normal because I feel like my future is shaky and everything can fall apart fast because of my diagnosis and mental health in general.



I did do a physical exam and they said that there were some hormonal issues, but I didn't know if it was as a result of my anxiety issues or not. My parents didn't think it was a big deal, they don't think my mental health is a big deal.

My therapist didn't help, she was a nice but I felt that i didn't have a trusting relationship with her where I can just tell her anything on my mind. Then I took some time off from therapy because I just wanted time off from my issues and the fact that I'm not getting clear answers for my anxiety about my mental health. She didn't explain things to me well. Now she wants to cancel my session and I don't know what to do .

Sorry if this was really long, these things are all in my head a lot and my environment at home isn't always understanding ( they're not introverted like me for one)

Thanks again for your kind and comforting words.

 

[janemariesayed]

Many of us, if not all of us at some point in our lives have this kind of experience. There will be something that we just cannot get out of our minds. No matter how hard we try. Even the sanest of people can have that problem. The worst thing is when you hear a song on the radio on the way to work for example. It may be a catchy song but it's a song that you hate. You know the type of song that bugs you. You hear it in the morning and it's in your head all day, and for a few days afterwards as well. It's frustrating and annoying but we all have it happen to us from time to time.

Your hormonal issues could well be the reason for your mental health problems. Because you are of the age where your hormones are all over the place it can make you feel the way you are feeling exactly. I would do your best to meet up with friends and get yourself out and about as much as you can. If you are still feeling like this in a few years then it may be something else rather than hormones. In the meantime, I hope you stick around on this forum and tell us how you are feeling. As you know already we are more understanding because we are mostly sufferers ourselves. Try to be a little understanding of your family. They don't know how you are feeling deep down and could be wrapped up in their own emotions to really notice how others are feeling. Some people don't recognise mental health. Can you talk to your Mom at all? I can't as the relationship with my Mum is very strained. I thought if you can talk with your Mum then she may understand more?