Do you ever feel like you almost *want* to be sicker?

[thegreen]

So this is something I feel shame about. There is a part of me that wants to will myself to behave in less healthy ways so that I can justify asking for help or feel like "ok, I've reached a bottom. I've done this, now I'll get better." And I feel really guilty about this because it's like I'm seeking drama or trying to make my life story more interesting or reveling in negativity instead of just being an adult and living my life in as healthy and wholesome a way as I can. Paul and everyone talks about asking for help, and I have done this before in truly dark times, but right now I really I feel like I need to go deeper before I can justify coming up for air.

For example, I'm dabbling with eating disorders right now, but it feels like I'm doing it to myself willfully instead of being taken over by it. I have dealt with eating issues for the last 20 years on and off and I have gotten nasty skinny before. But right now I'm just on the verge of being too thin, not there. Basically, my body has very little extra fat, but it's not grossly thin either, so it's actually about as good as it could be by our society's standards and I'm satisfied with how it looks. But I sort of want it to be sickly skinny and messed up looking so some hypothetical person might look at me and try to stop me or take care of me or tell me I've suffered enough.

The best image I have for this feeling of wanting to be sicker is that I'm swimming away from shore, not knowing if I'd have the energy to get back in even if I did turn around, but not feeling like I can tell myself to head back to safety either. And just wanting someone to come by in a boat and tell me, "Enough, turn around and head back in to land." I know I should be able to tell myself this, but I feel like I need someone else to do it. Preferably an older man, probably because my dad never made me feel taken care of or loved. In the meanwhile I have small kids of my own who I should be focusing on and a loving husband who should be enough. It all feels needy and pathetic. And sick, but more of a contrived and phony sickness, not even a real one! How fucked up is that? Does anyone know this feeling?

[ocadhla]

I've felt very similar before. Something I struggle with often is the feeling that I shouldn't feel as bad as I do because I have a decent life. I feel like if I could project what I feel inside to other people, that someone would have to come along and save me. I say save instead of help because I've sought help: I've seen therapists, I've dipped my toes back into religion (very briefly, apparently I had let the water get too cold), taken medication, improved my diet, started exercising again, etc... But I still feel shitty, I still feel like I'm not enough and most importantly; I don't feel like I can justify my existence. If someone were to ask me "Why are you here? What gives you the right to be here?" I feel like all I could do is hesitate for a minute, then awkwardly say "Well, I'm here. Sorry, I didn't really have a choice in the matter".

I have gotten better though, and I am conscious and thankful of it every day. I also have no one to thank for this than myself. I'm the one who sought therapy, I'm the one who choked down pills everyday, I'm the one that pushed myself to exercise even on the days that I slept for 15 hours and could barely find the emotional fortitude to get out of bed.

Your topic resonates with me deeply. That is exactly how I felt when I was driving myself deeper and deeper into depression. Maybe you'll get lucky and someone will extend help. But if you're anything like me, the sicker you get, the deeper you will isolate and the further you will drive away the ones who are more than willing to help you if you were to ask for it. You do need to ask though. From the outside, it is often apparent that someone is slipping downward but it is so obvious to people who are close to you that they might assume that you must be aware of it and are trying to correct it, and that by offering help (or even inquiring about it) they might insult you.

I think (and sincerely hope) I've gotten through the worst (at least for this episode). And honestly, if someone would've offered me help when I was sick, I would have immediately told them I was fine. Maybe this is just me, but even at my worst, I didn't want to burden anyone else with my troubles and thought that asking my friends and family for help would do just that. I realized that by asking for help, I was helping myself. I was fixing myself. And, personally, nothing pleases me more than when someone feels close enough to me to tell me what is bothering them. I only hope that I can help them as much as they help me by confiding in me.

I hope this provides some insight for you, if not, feel free to disregard the entire thing.

[fifthsonata]

yes. it's pretty commonplace for eating disorders - we could be having a heart attack and still not pick up the phone to call 911 because nothing is really wrong. there's a dualism in your brain - one knowing you're sick, and the other, denying every bit of it. i've yet to receive effective help that didn't trigger me into something worse. to get help for an ED you must be emaciated and/or at risk for cardiac failure. it wasn't until I'd lost 34% of my body weight that I received legitimate medical treatment.

so in our culture, we're not really "sick" until we're nearly dead and non-functional.


when it comes to depression, i feel like it seems the same way. you're not "really depressed" unless you're nearly catatonic and can't function. nevermind you fantasize about suicide and your mere 8 hours at work drains you like you just ran a 30 mile race. you can't muster the energy to even put your shoes away when you get home.


so it's no surprise, at least, to me, that you feel this way. you want someone to step in, to justify your illness to yourself, and rescue you. to let you know that the self-doubt, it's wrong, and there IS something wrong and you deserve help. I feel the same way.

[minigrogs]

This is something I struggle with. I am in therapy at the moment. Still struggling with body image issues and depression. I am like a little over 5'4, at my heaviest I was like 180, smallest like 118 (back in high school). Now I am like 135ish. I feel so fat though. In high school was closest I was to actual eating issues of anorexia. But not really there. My mentality though was messed up. And I would throw out lunch. Avoid lunch room, sit with teachers or something. I think I wanted someone to notice In college, issues felt the worst. I gained a ton of weight, and was perpetually obsessed with it, and eating, or not eating. Constantly crash dieting. Mind set was the worst. Finally, I admitted to people I had an issue. Of course it was a coach, and not a counselor who I was willing to speak with it about.

But to the point of this topic, at the moment I feel the duality of wanting to be happy, but also wanting to be sicker. Get too small, and have someone really worry about me, and make me stop.

It is like almost a curiosity in some messed up way. Or desire. And the truth is at same time, I only tell certain people when I am down cause i dont want to worry the others. My parents rarely know. I just hide most of the time. I feel shame about feeling this way too. And I feel like come on just get over yourself and be healthy. Like who are you benefitting by being miserable, whiny and needy. Not yourself. But I also know I am searching for something right now. I just don't know what it is. As others have said, I know I need to fix myself, but have this desire for someone to come and cure everything, and make me better and perfect. But because I am human and others are human that will never happen no matter how "sick" i get. No one can "cure" me but me. And no one can make me "perfect" as there is no such thing. And getting sicker to try to make someone play that rule, is ludicrous. Yet still tempting.

[Nevina]

Yes.

I find such a freedom and relief in the times when I've been very physically sick - in the hospital having surgery (I've had many, including open heart), or even just a very bad flu. It's so wonderful to have a concrete reason to not be doing all the daily things I should be doing, so for a brief time I can let go of the guilt of how "lazy" I am. I know I'm not lazy. I'm paralyzed by anxiety and overwhelm. But that's not an acceptable reason unless I'm utterly non-functional - and since I haven't reached that point mentally, I love the brief respites I get when I am non-functional physically. Plus, it's so wonderful to be in the hospital and being cared for and everyone treating me gently and just feeling so nurtured. I love having surgery for that reason.

And yes, there are days when I wish I'd just get mentally sick enough that I can no longer work and people would have more compassion for my lack of daily living skills. But something in me keeps that from happening because I know how rough it is for my friends who are on disability, they have no money, not much freedom to live as they wish they could. This year I've felt closer than at any other time in my life that I might slip and fall down the hole for real.

[ghughes1980]

This is a great topic for me! There are times when I crave the sickest times in my life because there where portions of my childhood where I could have died due to the severity of my disability. It sounds sick I know but it does take the guesswork out of life as it where. And it puts control into someone other than me and that is relieving. It's like a mini vacation from worry. I would gladly give over control to doctors and transfer the worry from my fucked up way of dealing to them for the duration. I was also always a bit inwardly disappointed when surgeries didn't kill me. I can remember I was about 8 or 9 lying in the hospital all bandaged up after a shunt revision thinking:" Oh great now I gotta go back to school and that hell in 2 weeks. Why couldn't they have botched this?" Or at the very worst: "Why couldn't they just fuck up my brain a tiny bit more so my daily thoughts are "I like soup and puppies!" Ah wishing! If only things would work out the way we dream.

[Cheesehead]

I gotta tell you all that there is a way deep down part of me that finds the idea of my brain just getting to the point of mentally shutting down and becoming a vegetable sounds like bliss to me. Getting mentally away from the world sounds like the most wonderful of vacations. I've actually joked about saving up enough money to buy myself a medically induced coma as a gift to myself. But then I immediately return to "normal" and remind myself of what a pathetic, weak, whiny, no good, spine-less, disappointing, annoying person I really am. And to stop throwing the pity-party for myself, suck it up, stop being so selfish and get my fucking shit together cause everyone else is all that really matters.