Therr's a term "on the spectrum", which denotes any number of mental disorders. Whether anxiety falls in with many otber, always more severe I think, ailments, I don't know. But actual anxiety disorder, panic attacks, is not to be trivialized. It could be said that common occurrences of anxiety are on account of an immature mind. Ok but no one is perfect, and everyone can be pushed beyond there limitd. Think ptsd, which certainly is a relative of anxiety.

Anyone can feel anxious. But chronic anxiety, the level of which can only be defined by an individual, can stick with you a hell of a long time after certain stressors are abated. Faith, exercise, sunshine, pine smells and even cuddly bears can alleviate some of the symptoms. But oftentimes tbe effects are temporary. Some people can't exercise. Some people can't even go outdoors. There are manuals that describe subjecting yourself to gradual exposure in those cases.

Medications can work wonders for some people, but they just can't be abused. If you need them, take them. I knew a lady that took xanax everyday. Who had a history of drug and alcohol abuse. But she just didn't abuse the xanax. I know a guy who has delusions and ocd. He only takes the xanax as needed. But is on other meds everyday, including ritalin. He couldn't cope without them.

One last story. A lady friend's neighbor was so depressed she couldn't feed herself. She volunteered for an experimental trial of meds, which shocked the heck out of me back then. But they fixed her up. People always adhere to the occasional horror story, where some psycho goes psycho. They blame the meds he was taking for a.week. But some meds take time to take effect, 6 weeks or more, which seems horrible if someone is suffering. But to administer doses too big would surely wreak havoc on a person's mind. And medicating is also trial and error. One thing works for one person, but not another.

Someone should use just enough meds to get them by. It's not about getting high. It's about getting by.

RaiderOfLostVoodoo wrote on 2022-03-16, 00:42:

chris2021 wrote on 2022-03-15, 21:12:

Therr's a term "on the spectrum", which denotes any number of mental disorders.

Wrong.
On the spectrum = autism

Either way, an implied point is correct : that there are several related disorders and conditions which often co-present or overlap to some degree. It's not unusual among highly technical folk to find people who share some mild autistic traits, and also suffer chronic anxiety, depression, self-esteem, social issues and more. With commonalities to other conditions like ADHD, and even (in some ways) ones like Tourettes, or Schizophrenia, etc. These days it's rarer to find a patient with just one isolated condition, because a lot of this "disorder" stuff shares so many commonalities. Blurred lines are not abnormal in modern psychology.

Disabling PMs + the block button's pretty effective.

I didn't give my status but I feel better. It's always pressurising to start but the environment has become more pleasant than what was discussed/anticipated. Thanks for your concerns!

BitWrangler wrote on 2022-03-15, 18:47:

DaveJustDave wrote on 2022-03-15, 17:43:

Take up road cycling. 3-4 hours at a time out in the sun, empty your mind and keep your heart over 130bpm. Does wonders for your mental health.

That number varies with age, and people who had a 486 back in the day probably should not be at 130bpm unless they are already fit. 110 would be where most of us should be at I think for the first month of beginning exercise or so.

I mean I would take it with a grain of salt. 130 is just an arbitrary number i pulled out of the air. The gyst is, get your heart rate up a little, find a nice empty stretch of road. No need to push - go at your own pace. Riding a bike, especially on flat empty stetches, keeps your hands and legs busy while it relaxes your mind. You'll find that the rhythm just helps relieve anxiety, and the feeling you get afterwards is great.

Everyone's a bit different. I'm old enough to have owned an 8088 back in the day. Been cycling for about 17 years and it has done absolute wonders for my mental health.

Check your psa.

BEEN_Nath_58 wrote on 2022-03-13, 17:30:

I will be having severe anxiety for the next half of the month, as I have been feeling it today itself. Could be good if you share some ways to eliminate them!

I used to have them a number of years back. What helped me, was to know what would trigger and then get away from the situation. But it can not be a solution for every situation. Once I got them (panic attack) then a cup of coffee and a cigarette outside, would kill it and calm me down. But it is not a solution that works for everyone.

Best solution is to find a professional person who will listen to what battle is going on inside you.

You can say that again! During my last period of smoking I could feel my heart start to pump harder with a few drags. And while cofee rarely has the effect of keeping me from sleeping, caffeine is generally to be avoided if you're prone to anxiety. But to each their own. On the one hand anxiety can be a byproduct of fatique and might be aided by stimulants. But I should think in most cases anxiety is a product of an over abundance of energy, and it's best to figure out how to syphon it off. And surely not exacerbate it with stimulants.

I have met people who claim to be relaxed by nicotine. But for the life of me I can't understand it.

DaveJustDave wrote on 2022-03-15, 17:43:

Take up road cycling. 3-4 hours at a time out in the sun, empty your mind and keep your heart over 130bpm. Does wonders for your mental health.

I second that. I'm riding to work 90 minutes every day and I feel in tip-top shape. Since I've started doing that my stamina has increased immensely and I can reliably fall asleep in the evening (had massive sleep problems before).

What also might've helped is the fact that I quit an exploiting job last year. Juck employers that don't value your time and expertise and try to underpay you.

Blanrimel wrote on 2023-05-04, 19:49:

I'm new here and stumbled upon this thread while hunting for similar info. Sorry for reviving a months-old thread, but I wanted to add my two cents. Anxiety is a real pain, and I feel for everyone who deals with it on a regular basis.

Thank you for replying to this thread, it was the right thing to do. 🙂👍
I think the same, also. A family member suffered from anxiety for many years.
What's also bad is the fear of experiencing anxiety itself. Only a few people know how serious this really is.

I know of a few harmless things that may help a bit: Warmth (hot water bottle, taking a bath); pressure (wrapping up in blankets, for feeling safe); music/singing; cooking/eating (doing something, ergo therapy more/less); playing games; take a walk in nature; essential oils for relaxation (mint oil etc).

But of course, these little tips are no substitute for a real therapy/healing. It's.. complicated.
The matter is quite extensive and therapy is very individual.

I also tend to suffer from anxiety, one because of having a stressing childhood (nobody's fault, just plain bad luck), two for having ADHD, which indirectly may cause anxiety.

What really worked for me (not counting ADHD related treatment):
1- Treatment, which includes therapy and medication (really, it does work), unfortunately this isn't something everyone can afford.
2- In my case, getting a bit away from video games as I always used to play them for escaping rather than fun. It might not be everyone's case, but for me it was giving a lot of anxiety, specially competitive ones.
3- Reducing my game collection also helped. It may not seem like much, but having all that stuff was making me get obsessed over finding things to do with them like creating a game room, thinking on ways to display it somewhere or ways of hooking everything on a CRT to make it as accessible as possible so they don't end up unused in a closet. But now that I got rid of most things, there is nothing to worry about.
Until last week I had quite a few games for many consoles like the SNES, Genesis, Sega CD, Sega Saturn, Dreamcast, NES, N64... sold everything to a retro gaming store, except for the Sega Genesis games (only the games, the console is gone) and used some of the sales money to buy a Mega SG (FPGA implementation of the Sega Genesis), very expensive, but allows me to be 100% free of CRTs. Not to mention those fragile Sega CD and Sega Saturn jewel cases that now are someone else's problem. The money I got was in theory a fraction of what I could have by selling each item individually, but that would mean at least another year of work searching for specific people to buy each specific item (some games I had are selling for more than $500 in theory, but good luck finding someone willing to pay that money).
As for my PC stuff, I'm keeping for now as I don't have much, mostly CDs in jewel cases, but for sure I'll get rid of one of my two retro PCs.

I've been through 3) already, about 15 years ago.
It did help temporarily, yes. A lot of burden was liftet from my shoulders at the time.
But then everything felt so empty and I ended up rebuilding my hard/-software collection.
It helped keep things clean and tidy. Since then, I longer worry about things.

Edit: In essence, my humble collection is no "collection" to me anymore, but akin to a small library.

Jo22 wrote on 2023-05-05, 12:37:

I've been through 3) already, about 15 years ago. It did help temporarily, yes. A lot of burden was liftet from my shoulders at […]
Show full quote

I've been through 3) already, about 15 years ago.
It did help temporarily, yes. A lot of burden was liftet from my shoulders at the time.
But then everything felt so empty and I ended up rebuilding my hard/-software collection.
It helped keep things clean and tidy. Since then, I longer worry about things.

Edit: In essence, my humble collection is no "collection" to me anymore, but akin to a small library.

Understood, the suggestion of getting rid of things is quite personal and for sure will not work for everybody.
In my case, this was taking time away from things I wanted to do like being with my family, boxing and tolerating my job better. One of the problems with ADHD is that it makes you get obsessed over things, you kind of "zone out" and stop paying proper attention to what is happening around you and for me this was mostly triggered by videogames, a theme that keeps coming back to my head even when I have absolutely no desire to play or collect anything. It might have been useful in my childhood for escapism, but as an adult without any major issues in life to escape from there is no need for that anymore.

And if you think about it, it may have worked for you, too. You had a burden removed from you to the point you got bored enough to want to recover some of the things you had.

I think You need to watch Eddie Murphy's Raw!!! If that is not enough to "fix" the mood, at least for few hours, i don't know what else would suffice!!! That was jokes back than, You could make fun from anything or anybody, without being crucified after!!! 😀
It's helping me all the time! For "harder cases", i recommend Jim Carey ( Ace Ventura, Dumb and Dumber, Liar, Me myself and Irene, Mask, .....)!!!
Try and let me know 😀 Greetings from Croatia!!!

+1

Airplane! is a classic, too! Always cheers me up.

If everything feels surreal, I sometimes let Langoliers play on TV, while doing something else.
Not sure why, but it somehow has a calming effect. It simply makes reality seem less weird, perhaps, dunno. 🤷‍♂️

idk, i just do stuff i like to do i guess. Find old software, forums and websites browsing on the net and play music on my very much dying phone. mostly i just stop talking. of course, as everyone says, this does not and will apply to everyone, so... get a hobby or something (preferably something to do with vintage stuff since this IS Vogons, also preferably something challenging), idk.
btw, don't take random medications, they're messed up, only consult a professional if you think anxiety is such a problem.

Though I admit, this forum is not for personal problems, people with similar hobbies like us with classic computing, also do have other problems.

I suggest those who have problems with personal issues seek professional help .

I'm from medical profession myself but I believe this is not the platform to discuss your problems, though you might feel more comfortable to discuss it with people with common interests.

Please seek professional help. Mental health is very important, as well as your physical health.

It's vitally important to society that we normalise the behaviour of casual discussion with peers about mental health. Whatever the platform.

I'm addicted to stress that's the way that I get things done
if I'm not under pressure then I sleep too long
and I hang around like a bum
and I think I'm going nowhere
and that makes me nervous

@Malik I agree with what you wrote, however, due to personal experience, I feel I must add something to that:
- Not all doctors/psychiatrists/therapist are necessarily friendly or emphatic
- Some of them have serious mental health problems themselves, probably due to long time contact/exposure to patients
- They know about form, but not necessarily about substance.
They have neither been living through certain situations themselves, nor did they take the medication themselves.
That's why, by contrast, a patient is himself his best doctor sometimes (again, sometimes).

Again, I'm not arguing. It's just that the professionals are human, too.
So it might be necessary to keep that in mind, if it turns out that the professional in question isn't a helpful person or makes things worse.

That doesn't mean, however, that all professionals are like that "bad" one.
- I just feel like I must mention that possibility, however.
It's rather hit and miss, I think, like finding friends. Some are a match for you, some are not. It's highly individual.
The relationship between doctor or therapist and patient is based on trust, after all.
That's how it should be, ideally, at least.

Oh well, I probably shouldn't write these lines here because it could demotivate people seeking professional help.
(Which is recommended, to get access to required medication alone.)

But on the other hand, I think I must simultaneously tell them about the small possibility of a negative experience.

Ok, long story short: Just because the professional makes you feel bad or make you responsibility for your own faults doesn't mean it's automatically true.
Some of them maybe simply don't understand you or your exotic hobbies, maybe.
So please don't despair, don't let yourself make feel miserable.

Ratger, if the professional makes you feel worse, consider getting a second opinion by someone else.

Maybe another professional or simply friends or other people with similar health issues.
This helps to get a greater picture on the matter.

And maybe, sometimes, all you need is someone who listens to your worries.
Someone you know who cares about it, if possible.
Really, don't underestimate the need to talk to someone about your problems/worries.
It can really make you feel better and assist the healing process.

PS: A few more words. Some people on the internet are wonderful beings, while others are trying to hurt others because they're being hurt themselves.
So don't please don't take every statement for real. They maybe don't even really mean what they're saying, if they say bad things.