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Dont know whcih next step should be

hi all, i have been trying to ignore the fact that i am living with a long term illness and lately its all been catching up with me , the thought of the future , not wanting to even imagine the amount of hospitals ill end up lying in and i will be honest i use a substance which allows me to escape reality and not be a ill person even if its just for a few hours... now you would say that im just covering up the problem....

i am told to see a therapist and talk and possibly get some medication from them now am i wrong in saying that , that also is just covering up the problem ? its not like i can go my problem is having crohns lets just get rid of it lol

sadly i admit i nearly did take my own life the other day and i spend quite a few nights crying to sleep , im 24 years old i shouldnt be doing that lol

any help or ideas please?
 

nogutsnoglory

Moderator
It's not the same because the substance you're using is not helping your disease it's just masking the symptoms whereas IBD medication will actually reduce the inflammation in your intestines improve your pain and appetite and hopefully put your disease into remission.

May I ask what substance you use? This is a no judgement zone but of course we are concerned whenever we hear of someone resorting to chemicals to get by.
 
lol no chemicals i use cannabis in raw form mostly in vaporizer , which helps with infammation and pain , i wouldnt say my problems are physical and its more the mental side the feeling trapped, angry as in why me? why was it me that had to get this illness. guilty as in i feel like theres nothing i can do and the shear unhappy thoughts i get when i wake up and feel like great here goes another day...

what im fighting to admit is that maybe i am depressed ? im sure as hell not happy i know that lol and if so what do i do? i cant talk to family id rather talk to to a stranger. but if end resort is tablets to cover it up then im basically stuck in one position
 

nogutsnoglory

Moderator
Have you checked out our medical marijuana sub-forum? We have many users here using cannabis for their Crohn's.

It's not abnormal to be depressed with this disease. I have reached a breaking point and cry multiple times a day now. Have you seen a psychiatrist? It would be good to talk to a professional and possibly get on an anti-depressant. Be sure to let them know you take pot in case there are interactions.
 
yes i think i will have to give in and see some professional thanks ... sorry to hear your in a rough spot also heres to overcoming it :)

yes i have seen the sub forum i just feel this has been building up since the beginning and now becoming to much do i have to go see my doctor first to get a appoinment or referal to a psychiatrist or u have to go find a private one?
 

nogutsnoglory

Moderator
It would probably depend on your insurance. If you don't need referrals you can just call your insurance and find out which psychs are covered in network otherwise your regular doctor can definitely give you a name and referral. Good luck.
 
Personally, I've not found talk-therapies helpful at all. I think because I have real problems, whereas some people seem to be depressed not because their life is terrible but because they think irrationally and so a therapist can point out where their thinking is distorted. Because I've had a lot of really bad things happen to me, there's no way I can logically be happy with my situation and my past; there's no way a therapist can talk me into being content with things unless they were able to get me believing in delusions. (Though I have seen mental health professionals who seemed convinced they could.) I don't think I have any mental illness so much as the only real way for me to feel about my life is anxious and unhappy. I like to be practical and try and fix things in my life, just talking about things doesn't change the problem, and so doesn't make me feel better.

However, I have found medication helps my mental state and emotions more than I ever thought it would. I've heard people say that anti-depressants and similar medications just make them numb and stop them feeling anything, good or bad. But with the one I take I still feel emotions, including still feeling unhappiness. But on the medication I can cope with my unhappiness, which enables me accept the bad things that have happened to me. It's really hard to explain what I mean - when I read about the medication it seems my experiences are not what typically happens to people taking it.

So my advice would be to first consider whether your situation warrants the extent of depression you are feeling. And although only you can decide this, I would suggest that if having Crohn's is the only reason you came close to considering taking your own life, it's possible you are more depressed than you need to be. I don't mean this to sound flippant - your depression is no less real even if the extent of it isn't completely rational.

Because Crohn's is a real problem, anything you can do to reduce your symptoms should help to make you feel better mentally. Finding the right doctor, trying different meds, finding ways to adjust your life so that you can manage your Crohn's more easily - anything you can do about the physical illness will help put your mind in a better place too.

But because there are a lot of people with Crohn's who don't feel as depressed as you, a therapist may be able to help you see whether you feel worse than you need to be. For example, if you are depressed because you expect you'll be spending a lot of time in hospitals, a therapist may be able to help you concentrate more on the times in the future where you won't be in hospital, or perhaps help you see why being in hospital may not be quite as bad as you imagine.

As I said, my experience is that medication can help a great deal, although there are so many different medications and they can affect people so differently, it's impossible to say whether you would benefit, the only way to find out is to try. It certainly doesn't have to be covering up the problem. Medication helps me deal with problems and the emotions they cause, it helps me see and feel with more clarity rather than blocking reality out.
 
Thanks for such a detailed response :) in all for numbing all emotions I don't need them lol ye I will be booking a doctors appointment next week so will see what my doctor says and I'm not comfortable writing on here the underlying problems but ye it's enough to make me feel trapped and I need to do something

Thanks hopefully I get sorted out soon :)
 
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