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The trigger is therapy. I can't get into the reasons. I'm so burnt out on trying to explain how/why therapy is triggering for me. I just need a community for people like me. I feel so alone in this, and I know people's reaction to me saying "I feel alone" is to tell me that there's "Someone out there who has the same struggles!" but it doesn't help me feel less alone to know that someone else I'll probably never meet is also probably silently struggling with this issue.

I guess I'm just complaining because therapy is an unavoidable trigger for me and I've got issues I'm trying to deal with and I'm a little tired of people trying to like...debate with me about it. Yeah it's helpful for a lot of people but therapy is basically completely off the table for me. So anyway I end up avoiding most mental health or recovery focused communities because I get triggered by the therapy talk and I just feel too broken to be fixed.

I'm posting here again because that's what's been recommended to me. It feels pointless though. I know what I need is an actual support system, but I don't even know where to start. I wish therapy wasn't a trigger for me. It just sucks to get triggered all the time over dumb things like people making jokes that boil down to "(Character/person) needs therapy" and then spiral into a depressive state where it feels like I'm just never going to get better.

I'll elaborate if anyone needs better context, but I'll leave the backstory out for now because I don't have the emotional energy to get into it and still be able to articulate my current frustrations. Basically, I've had multiple bad experiences with therapy/counseling (it really doesn't matter what the title is as long as I'm sitting in an office with a "professional" asking probing questions about my mental health) and now I get emotional flashbacks so severe that I can't have a productive session.

I've tried betterhelp. It helped me a couple years ago when I was trying to come to terms with my newly diagnosed ADHD and autism at the age of 24. Looking back, I just needed someone to listen to me and give me some level of validation because my world had basically been turned upside down and I didn't know if I could trust my own perceptions anymore. Just having someone talk to me about these things like they were normal helped me to feel a bit more grounded.

Now, I'm having a really really rough patch in life. I don't know how to describe it. I don't even know where to start with it. I feel like things have just been building up for a long time and now I'm back at rock bottom with my mental health. I tried betterhelp again a couple months ago and it didn't help. It felt like I was just getting generic advice, and I think I need someone to talk to who really understands what's going on in my life.

I just feel like I'm at a dead-end. Everyone recommends therapy. It's become so popular now that there are memes for it and I can't even blacklist it properly because no one thinks of it as a trigger that they need to tag. I'm just so lost and frustrated, and I feel very alone in this. People understand that therapy is difficult and emotionally draining and sometimes doesn't work on the first try, but they don't seem to understand when I say that it's a trigger for me.

So now the thing that's weighing on me the most is the fact that I have this conflict and I don't know how to solve it. It's a vicious cycle.

Content warnings: School, failure, medication, someone else's suicide attempt, family issues, etc. Let me know of any others.



I went to college for 6 years. I had some good experiences and bad experiences, but mostly it just felt like the next logical step in my plan of life. I went to school til I was 18, I applied for colleges, I went to the one that accepted me, I showed up, and I tried not to screw it up.

I ended up screwing it up. Remember how I said I went for 6 years? It's not because I was going for a graduate degree. It's because I kept failing and having to retake classes. By my 5th year, I was VERY depressed and finally made myself go to the counseling department at my college. Talk therapy still didn't work for me, but I got prescribed antidepressants, which worked wonders. My energy was back up, and I was feeling better about myself. I was still struggling in school though. In the fall of my 6th year, I looked into psychiatric testing because I suspected I had ADHD and/or autism. I tested positive for both, and my entire life started to replay in my head, making sense of all my struggles, strengths, and surprises in life. Sometime in the middle of all of this, my dad started going through his second divorce and attempted suicide. I tried to be there for him, but I'd been dealing with my own suicidal thoughts for a long time and was pretty triggered by the whole thing. His ex-wife also decided to text me during this time to tell me what a horrible influence she thinks I am on her son. And then when my dad found a new girlfriend, the ex-wife tried to put words in my mouth for her own agenda.

Without untangling all the reasons this messed me up, I'll just say that it REALLY messed me up. I got caught in the middle of family drama that I had no interest in, and I was trying to work on myself with all this new information about how my brain works. (Also, American politics in 2016. Enough said.) I didn't have the time or energy for school. I just... 

I got VERY close to graduation. But I failed basically everything I was taking in the spring of 2017. I was so burnt out and felt like I was already failing horribly because of how long it took me to get this close to graduation. I was also realizing that I had never learned how to actually learn things in a classroom setting. I had just done my best to remember information quickly, do what I was told, and not get in trouble. I was a people pleaser, and when I stopped being able to please people with my academic achievements (around middle school or high school?) I stopped being motivated to even try, and I struggled to get passing grades. So I didn't graduate, and I didn't go back in the fall.

In the past year and a half, I've tried to pick myself back up and figure out "Where do I go from here?". I haven't answered that question yet, but I got an email from my college yesterday asking the same thing. They linked me to a page on ReUp Education's site with a few boxes to fill out. I felt somewhat at ease seeing the options that reflected my uncertainty about the whole situation. "I'm not sure when or if I wish to return", "Unknown academic standing", etc. But there's one box where I have to write my own answer rather than picking a pre-made option:

"Tell us a little about what caused you to leave school and why you're interesting in returning."

Man that's a loaded question. I can't even say for sure why I left. Because my family was constantly putting too much pressure on me? Because I was just racking up more debt and failing harder every year? Because I just couldn't handle everything life threw at me in 2016 on top of all the underlying issues I had? Because I never really wanted to go in the first place but I didn't have any other options?? And DO I want to return?? Probably not, but it feels like the responsible thing to do?

So yeah basically I read that question and tried to answer it and had a breakdown instead and ended up writing about the whole thing here because I'm a mess just thinking about it. I'm not sure if I'm looking for advice here, but it feels good to at least let it all out.

Sorry for the political vent. Tw for sexual assault and victim-blaming too because that's what's happening today.

I'm so frustrated with my country. I know that's hyperbolic, but I don't know how else to word it. I feel sickened seeing the reactions of my fellow humans when it comes to what's happening on the news. I knew that things were going downhill after the 2016 election and tried to keep a healthy distance from politics (while not completely burying my head in the sand) but today has been so hard. Not only am I seeing the horrible victim-blaming and claims of women "making false accusations to tear down powerful men", but I'm seeing all my friends who are survivors of sexual assault reliving their trauma all over again, screaming "This is why we didn't come forward! This is what happens when people come forward!" while others confidently state that false accusations are an epidemic.

What's especially horrible to me is the fact that some people defend sexual assault by implying that if we "change the definition" of it to encompass drunken college kids who made mistakes, then no one would be left to run for office. So the defense is that "everyone is doing it so it's ok"?? And these are the people who want to make decisions for us??

I just feel sickened and drained by all of this.

So I've dealt with anxiety dreams for as long as I can remember. It's actually rare for me to have a dream where something bad isn't happening. They range from mild stress dreams (someone is following me and I need to keep moving because they're making me uncomfortable) to full blown nightmares based on my innermost worries and fears (yeah I'm not gonna describe those).

Regardless of intensity, these dreams usually mess me up in the morning. Having someone around to engage me in something other than my anxiety when I wake up seems to help, so I ask my boyfriend to try to wake me up when he wakes up for work. But it's not always possible to wake me up. I'm apparently a pretty deep sleeper and can be combative if someone is trying to wake me up when I'm super tired. I can't help it. I don't even remember it most of the time. I know I'm a hard person to wake up, and it caused LOTS of fights when I was growing up. In fact, oversleeping can be somewhat of a trigger for me and I end up feeling like a failure for being so tired.

So back to my original topic before I get too sucked too far into that other problem... I just want to ask if anyone else experiences these types of dreams that leave you spiraling into anxiety first thing in the morning. How do you recover every day?

I've been trying to develop some kind of routine to help me (I'm autistic, routines are my jam  ), but my current one is kinda inefficient (basically: I spend a lot of time doing things that make me feel ok) and I'm trying to have a more productive lifestyle. Any advice?

The worst feeling is the uncertainty. When you're so used to being different, you know that other people's answers don't usually work for you. You have to find your own, but then you ARE on your own in finding these answers. "Am I really getting better?" keeps running through my mind. It's not like I'd believe someone if they gave an answer, after years of having unrealistic expectations and unfair judgments placed on me.

Right now, the only thing I can do is to keep trying. "Get back up when you fall down" is on my daily habits list. So is "try even when you think you can't do it". I just have to keep moving and hope that I'm going forward. It takes patience, which I need to remind myself of very frequently. ADHD doesn't make it easy, but at least I know that I function better when I'm occupied. Whether I'm trying out a new recipe or doing something creative, I fill my life with things that fill ME with life. Even if I'm not "getting better", I'm not lying in bed all day, wishing I was dead while hating myself for being too much of a wimp to act on it.

The self-judgment is tough too. Even though I know I should pick myself back up after a breakdown, I feel like a useless human being who fails at basic life. Especially when the breakdown occurs slowly over the course of several days. I feel like I don't deserve to get back up and be happy. Sometimes I even feel like getting back up and being happy means that I was faking the whole thing. I know that that's not true and that this comes from years of invalidated feelings, but logic and knowledge don't instantly make feelings do what you want them to.

I guess I need trust. If anything, a lifetime of dealing with untrustworthy people has taught me to recognize the rare occasion when someone is deserving of my trust. There are good people in my life: my boyfriend, my grandparents, the friends who still call themselves my friend after life took us to different places, and certain family members from a healthy distance. But the person who needs my trust most of all is myself.

I'll try to keep this short, but my life gets more complicated the more I try to fix it. Here goes.

So in the past year, my boyfriend and I have finally gotten our own place. Only now have I realized how messed up the multiple households I've grown up in were. I've been on antidepressants for about a year, and they've worked wonders. Once I came out of the depression, I figured out that the problem was deeper than that, and I got diagnosed with ASD and ADHD. I've always been very smart and obedient, which is why I always faked being "normal". I was punished or humiliated for the symptoms throughout childhood. Now that I know how my brain works and I'm becoming more accepting of myself, I feel like I'm on the track to becoming a person who can have healthy relationships and interactions. I still struggle with massive amounts of anxiety though as well as pretty severe trust issues. I'm doing my best to manage it through mindfulness, self-reflection, etc.

The main problem is that therapy/counseling is my worst trigger. Even just thinking about it now, my mind is beginning to cloud, my throat is closing up, and my hands are shaking. I'd rather not go into the entire backstory, but basically my parents have made me go to counsellors (who always took their side) for the wrong reasons during at least 3 separate periods of my childhood/teenage years. I've really tried to force myself to go despite the negative reactions, but I'd have panic attacks in the days leading up to the appointment and be in a frozen haze for days afterwords. I genuinely tried to get something out of the appointments instead of just trying to forget about them the moment I leave the room, but that only caused more anxiety and panic attacks outside of the sessions. This is the third time I've started seeing a counsellor by my own decision, and it only seems to get worse every time.

It feels like absolutely no one else has this problem. And it makes it very hard for me to get advice for other people struggling with mental health because it's everyone's go-to solution and they follow it up with "Therapy is supposed to be difficult" whenever I bring this up. I guess what I'm looking for here is advice from someone who has dealt with this and found a way to overcome it, or maybe someone who has helped themselves without therapy. It feels like mindfulness and self-reflection are helping me, but it's very discouraging when others act like therapy is the only route to recovery, and I wonder if I'm actually recovering or just starting to feel good.