Guys,
I used to be a big fan of this site and everything it stood for. Somewhere along the road things took a wrong turn. This is mainly a chance for me to get my thoughts out and perhaps there's a lesson in here and perhaps a way forward.
If anyone has ever suffered from chronic (long term) pain, depression or suicidal ideation following a pretty large downfall / stressful time, I'd be grateful for your thoughts especially.
Where I used to be
I graduated from uni a few years ago with an excellent law degree, job set up at one of the top law firms in the country, great weightlifting routine and strict high protein diet, good set of friends and the whole "great catch" mentality. I had a high level of interest from girls and had potential girlfriends being intimated because they thought I only went for models.
I left this site completely about 3 or 4 years ago because I was set on this lifestyle and thinking any sort of theorising about life was a waste of time; I adopted the Nike just do it attitude
What Happened
First, I had to do something about my ongoing sciatica problem (I have now experienced severe shooting leg pain for 6 years, which is reduced/cancelled by painkillers which i have been on for the same length of time). So I had surgery at the start of last year, taking a month off work and being told I shouldn't lift weights for a while. The surgery didn't work completely and I've been told I have permanent nerve injury, which means I'll have leg pain for the rest of my life. I was still OK about this. While this was pretty bad news, the good thing about it was that the exercises prescribed are good for the abs. I had the whole what doesn't kill you makes you stronger attitude and that you can't really know if something will be good or bad in the long term.
Second, after the surgery, I got rid of my "no dating at work" policy, and started going out with work colleagues, eventually got really close to one girl who I thought was ideal for me, things escalated quickly, she was thinking she was in love with me, she told almost everyone at the firm we were together. Then she had her doctor sign her off work with stress and depression because of her boss; she was thinking about quitting law altogether (think she now has)
I tried to be supportive but was having a difficult enough time myself trying to balance 7am to 8pm days at work (including commuting) + 4 days/week gym training. My concentration at work started to fall and I started to make mistakes. For several reasons the relationship ended after a couple of months (although it felt more meaningful than even my 2.5 year LTR) and I tried to distance myself from her. Then one night I thought I had made a massive mistake at work, started to get freaked out realising that I had made a stupid decision going out with this girl who had told a lot of the people at the firm about us.
Because of various things I had read/some of the things that girl and others were telling me about stress/depression/antidepressant medication and because of various changes in my ability to think clearly or remember things, I lost a lot of confidence in myself. I thought I had almost had a stroke or something.
At the start of the year, I was trying to cope with this break up (the girl is now going out with someone else, which I thought was perhaps a good thing for various reasons), a change of department at work and change of living location. Ultimately, things got too much for me so the doctor signed me off work with stress. Bad thing was that I went into work anyone, because I thought that would be the end of my career. Instead, I discussed the fact that I was having difficulty with the employers (which as I now see it has ended my chances at this firm) and kept going.
Breakdown
Then I got a fairly important role on a deal taking place in a different city. I couldn't concentrate properly during the thing and once things were "completed" and I was on the plane home I kept thinking about possible mistakes and thinking that I had been given too much responsibility, had messed up and that this multimillion pound deal was going to fall apart because of me. Everything became far too much and I thought that I was never going to recover my concentration or intelligence, never get rid of my leg problems and for the past two weeks had been literally pulling my hair out and shaking.
So I got extremely drunk the next night in front of a lot of friends at a flat party at my flat (about 15 guys, 15 girls) with the intention of killing myself while drunk - I had a fairly detailed plan worked out in my head.
I remember "waking up" from the drunkenness finding myself in an uncontrollable state, screaming my suicidal plans in front of everyone - there goes most of my social life, which I had been trying to isolate anyway. Eventually my family was called and took me home.
Doc signed me off work again and again I couldn't stay off work, agreeing with the employer for a couple of weeks off work later in the month. My long-term proper GP found out about the weird suicidal shyt in my medical records (knowing that I was suffering chronic leg pain), phoned me up and advised that I do not work immediately and get signed off. Again I resisted and went back to work, although went on the antidepressants prescribed (lexapro, escitalopram - which make me extremely tired) and saw a psychiatrist, who was hopeless. I took a couple of weeks off work to get some rest and have now been back at work for about a month.
Where I am now
My law contract ends in about 5 months - I need to get there to become a fully qualified lawyer, otherwise I'll have wasted the last 7 years of my life.
I'm slowly regaining confidence in my abilities, but still have a pretty bad suicide ideation - I've been searching google constantly for suicide stories, especially re lawyers - think I'm getting pretty messed up in the head now.
I keep looking back to when I was happy, when I had what I thought was everything I could want. Now I don't really give a shyt about anything. I even called up an ex-gf i had dumped looking for a quick shag last month when drunk which I successfully managed to avoid.
I still don't know how get over this properly because I think I've blown my legal career although I can see myself trying to stumble over the "finishing line" in 5 months.
i used to be a big fan of self-improvement but that's all gone. I now can't stand anything Tony Robbins has to say. Probably has something to do with my obsession with the film fight club - self improv is masturbation; now self destruction...Am probably going to hit rock bottom at some point, hopefully i care enough to bounce back - it seems extremely hard knowing that I had so much potential then threw it all away because of a few stupid decisions.
Lessons if any
Don't date at work, especially not someone else who is going to feed your mind with a lot of destructive shyt. And delete the word "stress" from your vocabulary. Excitement is a better alternative.
Don't take the film fight club's principles too seriously. Anti-corporate thinking in a corporate lifestyle career will just make you hate all your co-workers who want to take a bath on this and start some blue sky thinking on that. Going forward, that's the way the world works and it should just be dealt with.
Think there was a post by fragmentor about letting go that used to give me inspiration http://www.sosuave.net/forum/showthread.php?t=24014&highlight=mano
Anyone with similar experiences or know of famous people with similar experiences of depression but then recovery/words of man the f up welcome.
Cheers
ex-Kaizen
I used to be a big fan of this site and everything it stood for. Somewhere along the road things took a wrong turn. This is mainly a chance for me to get my thoughts out and perhaps there's a lesson in here and perhaps a way forward.
If anyone has ever suffered from chronic (long term) pain, depression or suicidal ideation following a pretty large downfall / stressful time, I'd be grateful for your thoughts especially.
Where I used to be
I graduated from uni a few years ago with an excellent law degree, job set up at one of the top law firms in the country, great weightlifting routine and strict high protein diet, good set of friends and the whole "great catch" mentality. I had a high level of interest from girls and had potential girlfriends being intimated because they thought I only went for models.
I left this site completely about 3 or 4 years ago because I was set on this lifestyle and thinking any sort of theorising about life was a waste of time; I adopted the Nike just do it attitude
What Happened
First, I had to do something about my ongoing sciatica problem (I have now experienced severe shooting leg pain for 6 years, which is reduced/cancelled by painkillers which i have been on for the same length of time). So I had surgery at the start of last year, taking a month off work and being told I shouldn't lift weights for a while. The surgery didn't work completely and I've been told I have permanent nerve injury, which means I'll have leg pain for the rest of my life. I was still OK about this. While this was pretty bad news, the good thing about it was that the exercises prescribed are good for the abs. I had the whole what doesn't kill you makes you stronger attitude and that you can't really know if something will be good or bad in the long term.
Second, after the surgery, I got rid of my "no dating at work" policy, and started going out with work colleagues, eventually got really close to one girl who I thought was ideal for me, things escalated quickly, she was thinking she was in love with me, she told almost everyone at the firm we were together. Then she had her doctor sign her off work with stress and depression because of her boss; she was thinking about quitting law altogether (think she now has)
I tried to be supportive but was having a difficult enough time myself trying to balance 7am to 8pm days at work (including commuting) + 4 days/week gym training. My concentration at work started to fall and I started to make mistakes. For several reasons the relationship ended after a couple of months (although it felt more meaningful than even my 2.5 year LTR) and I tried to distance myself from her. Then one night I thought I had made a massive mistake at work, started to get freaked out realising that I had made a stupid decision going out with this girl who had told a lot of the people at the firm about us.
Because of various things I had read/some of the things that girl and others were telling me about stress/depression/antidepressant medication and because of various changes in my ability to think clearly or remember things, I lost a lot of confidence in myself. I thought I had almost had a stroke or something.
At the start of the year, I was trying to cope with this break up (the girl is now going out with someone else, which I thought was perhaps a good thing for various reasons), a change of department at work and change of living location. Ultimately, things got too much for me so the doctor signed me off work with stress. Bad thing was that I went into work anyone, because I thought that would be the end of my career. Instead, I discussed the fact that I was having difficulty with the employers (which as I now see it has ended my chances at this firm) and kept going.
Breakdown
Then I got a fairly important role on a deal taking place in a different city. I couldn't concentrate properly during the thing and once things were "completed" and I was on the plane home I kept thinking about possible mistakes and thinking that I had been given too much responsibility, had messed up and that this multimillion pound deal was going to fall apart because of me. Everything became far too much and I thought that I was never going to recover my concentration or intelligence, never get rid of my leg problems and for the past two weeks had been literally pulling my hair out and shaking.
So I got extremely drunk the next night in front of a lot of friends at a flat party at my flat (about 15 guys, 15 girls) with the intention of killing myself while drunk - I had a fairly detailed plan worked out in my head.
I remember "waking up" from the drunkenness finding myself in an uncontrollable state, screaming my suicidal plans in front of everyone - there goes most of my social life, which I had been trying to isolate anyway. Eventually my family was called and took me home.
Doc signed me off work again and again I couldn't stay off work, agreeing with the employer for a couple of weeks off work later in the month. My long-term proper GP found out about the weird suicidal shyt in my medical records (knowing that I was suffering chronic leg pain), phoned me up and advised that I do not work immediately and get signed off. Again I resisted and went back to work, although went on the antidepressants prescribed (lexapro, escitalopram - which make me extremely tired) and saw a psychiatrist, who was hopeless. I took a couple of weeks off work to get some rest and have now been back at work for about a month.
Where I am now
My law contract ends in about 5 months - I need to get there to become a fully qualified lawyer, otherwise I'll have wasted the last 7 years of my life.
I'm slowly regaining confidence in my abilities, but still have a pretty bad suicide ideation - I've been searching google constantly for suicide stories, especially re lawyers - think I'm getting pretty messed up in the head now.
I keep looking back to when I was happy, when I had what I thought was everything I could want. Now I don't really give a shyt about anything. I even called up an ex-gf i had dumped looking for a quick shag last month when drunk which I successfully managed to avoid.
I still don't know how get over this properly because I think I've blown my legal career although I can see myself trying to stumble over the "finishing line" in 5 months.
i used to be a big fan of self-improvement but that's all gone. I now can't stand anything Tony Robbins has to say. Probably has something to do with my obsession with the film fight club - self improv is masturbation; now self destruction...Am probably going to hit rock bottom at some point, hopefully i care enough to bounce back - it seems extremely hard knowing that I had so much potential then threw it all away because of a few stupid decisions.
Lessons if any
Don't date at work, especially not someone else who is going to feed your mind with a lot of destructive shyt. And delete the word "stress" from your vocabulary. Excitement is a better alternative.
Don't take the film fight club's principles too seriously. Anti-corporate thinking in a corporate lifestyle career will just make you hate all your co-workers who want to take a bath on this and start some blue sky thinking on that. Going forward, that's the way the world works and it should just be dealt with.
Think there was a post by fragmentor about letting go that used to give me inspiration http://www.sosuave.net/forum/showthread.php?t=24014&highlight=mano
Anyone with similar experiences or know of famous people with similar experiences of depression but then recovery/words of man the f up welcome.
Cheers
ex-Kaizen