YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Hi, not ready yet! I actually just stumbled across this topic while researching ADHD and really identify with both ADHD and HSP. My story is dramatic right from the beginning. Very emotional. I am now 27 and just starting therapy so I'm new to the mental health awareness community. As a kid, everyth...

Absolutely. I'm sure the majority of people on this forum have experienced childhood emotional neglect. Seems to be all too common in our awesome western world. My mother is a narcissist and much covert incest stuff with her. It's strange to realize that when she was paying attention to me it was al...

Ditto what Stina says. It's so amazing that you are trying to help your daughter. It sounds so obvious when I word it that way but it apparently isn't. I can't imagine how difficult it is to be a parent let alone one with mental illness, but you're awesome for trying.

The self medicating can appear in tons of forms, I'm discovering myself doing this. I haven't tried meditation but that sounds like the worst thing I could do to help. I prefer to hide from feelings. I'm sure meditation would be good though. So the way I hide, instead of drinking, is either reading,...

Hi red rose engineer! I can't say much about eating disorders, but I wonder if your mind uses it as a distraction. You said it can be a control thing as well. I relate to your struggle but in different addictions. I'm not sure if it means anything or is actually related but I find it curious. I can'...

Wow that was extremely powerful! The tears just punched me in the face. I've been trying to differentiate between bipolar and borderline and this really explains how I feel so much. I'm new to therapy and don't have the words to explain anything in my head all I know is it's chaos and nonsense and s...

That depends on you I would say. If you are a person who beats yourself up in your head already this would be very terrible. Reading this makes me anxious and think about conversations I would have in my head imagining how to tell the therapist off. Overall I think that's a very irresponsible thing ...

There's always someone else who struggles with similar issues as yourself. (which is helpful unless your identity is rooted in your disorders, making it seem threatening). How do you cope with this, Neufena? Or is that why you wanted to further this discussion? I think, for me at least, it has been ...

I don't think it's a blessing at all either. It's very dangerous to appear like nothing is wrong. I ALWAYS blame myself for everything. Minimization I feel like is a given in this group too. Amen to that. That combination of appearing like everything is okay and self blame and minimization is what k...

I've been on better help for a month or so now. So far it has been great for me if only to have someone to listen to me. I'm learning how to talk, which is huge for me. I would say it's more about what your response is than what the therapist does or says. If you're not open to their opinions then t...