I certainly hope this helps any of you who deal with such terrible and debilitating feelings while in an airplane. It most certainly works for me, to this day…

: )

I think my perspective might be a bit skewed. I’ve had major surgery multiple times for various things, I’ve been through physical therapy/rehab for almost a year, learning to walk again etc.. I have vivid memories of literally blacking out from the pain. So after dealing with those things, seeking help for anxiety, or things like that seems a lot easier. But I realize that I’m a bit unique (fortunately) in that way.

To construct a (crappy) physical analogy, imagine that you get this debilitating physical problem, and every time you try to go to the doctor to get it dealt with someone runs out from the shadows and punches you in the nose, or shoots your kitten, or busts your kneecaps, or all three. So trying to solve the problem, which may not be solvable anyway, has resulted in immediate and real pain. Pretty soon you just convince yourself it’s not worth the trouble, it won’t work anyway, and maybe you’re just not worth it anyway. And oh by the way, you’re terrible for thinking that way, and pathetic for not doing something about it. When the asshole kneecapping you on the way to the doctor is really some asshole part of your brain you can’t call the cops on, it’s hard hard hard.

I’m not at all saying you’re being insensitive or anything, just trying to aid understanding. It took me a while to start to be empathetic to this kind of thing also.

Other people’s subjective experiences are hard to judge.

and ps, after a couple of years all the type 1 “I have diabetes, well whatever” people – they’re dead.

My family has a history of classic obvious (rather than DSM-IV) mental illness including schizophrenia and manic depression ending in a few suicides and lots of institutionalization (good genes, eh?) My impression is that although I think its a natural instinct to want to try harder and for other people to want the sick to try harder, this effortfulness is itself very harmful.

I was actually thinking about his watching Joba pitch yesterday, (when I was posting a lot of pitch speeds here). Just as “overthrowing” is a typical pitcher’s problem, it was a huge relief to me to see Joba throw his two-seam at 92, 93 to some and then take it up to 96 with the heart of the order. He didn’t just go “all out.” Which I think is typical of young pitchers (and people) when things are going wrong.

I set a sustainable, enjoyable pace with my diabetes even though that means I’ll probably (if I’m lucky) lose a couple decades of life to it. Oddly, the acceptance and reduction in anxiety (and happiness) has actually made the clinical part of management easier and my clinical outcomes much better.

Finding that balance is not only personal, but can be very very difficult for other people to understand.

Re: the self-disgust, I think Steve was mad at himself for not fighting through it. He has been through so much medically since I’ve known him and he works with such a sense of obligation and duty, that any foible like this, he feels like he let people down. I can relate to that. The incident I noted above, he actually apologized for not being able to post anything that day. … It’s just the kind of guy Steven Goldman is. He’s truly a good dude, and a fabulous writer.

On the other end, I often find myself frustrated with the SO. Seemingly simple tasks (a cab ride to the airport, taking the subway to meet friends) become huge, huge deals. It can be draining for both of us. Almost all of our fights have been about issues surrounding this, which is frustrating as well. The best thing I’ve found is to get oneself into treatment, be that therapy, medication or some combination. Unfortunately, not everyone wants to be treated, to “change” if you will. And that is the impasse, the difficulty.

Its odd the status that mental disorders get in society. We want to treat them the same as any physical illness, but its hard to imagine someone being physically ill with a crippling disease and not doing everything in their power to fix that. With mental disorders, anxiety, alcoholism, anorexia, etc. it can sometimes be ok to not seek treatment. I’ve never understood that.