DoesItGetBetter?
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- Jul 6, 2011
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So I want to say hi, my screen name, as you can see, is DoesItGetBetter (which is my central concern . . .and fear), and I'm new to the forums. Frankly, I should've joined a long time ago, but I never did. I've been receiving psychological and psychiatric care for something like 2 years now, but I've come to think it was time I found a community of people who are really like me.
The full story of how I came to be here, why I'm here, etc, is far too long to post in full right now, though I'd like to do that at some point, but for this introductory thread, I wanted a discussion on a specific attitude I've come to develop whilst I've been both lonely and not lonely.
From ages 10-14 (at least, I might've actually been very lonely and sad when I was younger, more on that later) I was just outright miserable. I didn't know it at the time. I was only able to realize it after I was able to become happy for what was probably the first time in my life.
A few months before my 15th birthday, I fell in love. The good thing was, she was in love with me too. I was so utterly elated, so happy for the first time that I was able to realize how miserable I'd been.
Feel free to not take my "puppy love" seriously, but for the first time in my life, I had purpose. "Why am I waking up? Because she needs me." "Why am I improving my grades? So I can be there when she needs me most." (My grades had been utterly craptaculat for the past two years.) And so on. (To clarify, yes, the #2 priority was because I needed her, but at the time the reverse seemed so much more important. I take that as the proof I was actually in love.)
So I was happy. And the happiness didn't really stop. My main concern when we were together was that we'd end up "losing interest in each other" or something equally juvenile, but for me, it never really happened. Of course for her, it did. We broke up sometime before Christmas, 2008.
And so I went back to being miserable. Not by choice, really. I tried to take the lessons I learned (primarilly "Life is worth living") from the relationship and try living on my own, with enough, hard-earned wisdom or whatever to get through without being to unhappy, or whatever. It just didn't work. I just felt that hole ever more intensely than I was able to before I knew what happines was like.
And so here I am, miserable. I've been in therapy at least since then, I've stayed at a mental hospital, taken medicines (which I've since stopped taking), etc. I've had an endless parade of people tell me that I should be able to be happy without being romantically involved with someone, as though it's some sort of icing-on-the-cake that comes with happiness.
I'm sorry, but the more I think about it, the more I think it's just not true. If other people are able to be happy alone, and I'm not, and I'm weak, fine, I'm weak. So save me. Give me strength. I just want to know, is this, not necesarilly a "healthy" attitude, but an acceptable one to have if I want to break out of my cycle of loneliness in the long run? I can't help but feel like if I try to be happy just through my future career or through the family and friends i already have, and THEN try and meet someone, I'll never get around to meeting someone, and I'll never actually be happy, even if I might be able to fool myself in the short run.
So basically, is it ok to believe I won't be happy without a woman in my life?
The full story of how I came to be here, why I'm here, etc, is far too long to post in full right now, though I'd like to do that at some point, but for this introductory thread, I wanted a discussion on a specific attitude I've come to develop whilst I've been both lonely and not lonely.
From ages 10-14 (at least, I might've actually been very lonely and sad when I was younger, more on that later) I was just outright miserable. I didn't know it at the time. I was only able to realize it after I was able to become happy for what was probably the first time in my life.
A few months before my 15th birthday, I fell in love. The good thing was, she was in love with me too. I was so utterly elated, so happy for the first time that I was able to realize how miserable I'd been.
Feel free to not take my "puppy love" seriously, but for the first time in my life, I had purpose. "Why am I waking up? Because she needs me." "Why am I improving my grades? So I can be there when she needs me most." (My grades had been utterly craptaculat for the past two years.) And so on. (To clarify, yes, the #2 priority was because I needed her, but at the time the reverse seemed so much more important. I take that as the proof I was actually in love.)
So I was happy. And the happiness didn't really stop. My main concern when we were together was that we'd end up "losing interest in each other" or something equally juvenile, but for me, it never really happened. Of course for her, it did. We broke up sometime before Christmas, 2008.
And so I went back to being miserable. Not by choice, really. I tried to take the lessons I learned (primarilly "Life is worth living") from the relationship and try living on my own, with enough, hard-earned wisdom or whatever to get through without being to unhappy, or whatever. It just didn't work. I just felt that hole ever more intensely than I was able to before I knew what happines was like.
And so here I am, miserable. I've been in therapy at least since then, I've stayed at a mental hospital, taken medicines (which I've since stopped taking), etc. I've had an endless parade of people tell me that I should be able to be happy without being romantically involved with someone, as though it's some sort of icing-on-the-cake that comes with happiness.
I'm sorry, but the more I think about it, the more I think it's just not true. If other people are able to be happy alone, and I'm not, and I'm weak, fine, I'm weak. So save me. Give me strength. I just want to know, is this, not necesarilly a "healthy" attitude, but an acceptable one to have if I want to break out of my cycle of loneliness in the long run? I can't help but feel like if I try to be happy just through my future career or through the family and friends i already have, and THEN try and meet someone, I'll never get around to meeting someone, and I'll never actually be happy, even if I might be able to fool myself in the short run.
So basically, is it ok to believe I won't be happy without a woman in my life?