Hiding my depression is exhausting

Yep it’s back the overwhelming feeling of anxiety and a low that feels impossible. There is so much going on around me with everyone who knows and helps with my illness I haven’t said anything. I don’t want anyone to know that I’m starting to get bad again. I don’t know if it’s because of the job change though I think that might have something to do with it. I knew at my old job I could be honest about my feelings and I can’t here this isn’t the type of place where you openly share this information. I made the decision not to disclose my illness and I still stand with that decision. I try to explain it to my husband but how do you put it into words even if I start there aren’t words it’s like my brain just stops working. I get up some mornings not knowing what to expect and I thought with all the medicine that I would have the ability to control the moods and know who I am in the morning but that isn’t always the case.  I know that it takes more than medicine for it to work but I openly refuse therapy. Therapy has do nothing over time but cause me more issues maybe it is because I can’t handle the issues and my coping mechanisms suck. I don’t know what to do I’m just so frustrated right now. This was really for me just to vent because I don’t know what else to do. My brain isn’t firing on all cylinders right now. Does anyone else have this problem or understand? 

 

19%

I had my 6 month check up with my psychiatrist today and we were speaking openly about suicide after admitting that I was having suicidal thoughts. We were also discussing the differences in being suicidal and having suicidal thoughts (that is a different post.) He said that 19% of people diagnosed with bipolar disorder take their own life and that equals like 1 in 5. Those odds are shocking for some reason. If you think about the big picture 2.3 million Americans are diagnosed with bipolar disorder. If I did my math right that equals out to 437,000 people. That means there are 437,000 people contemplating suicide most with no support from anyone.I am one of the biggest supporters for the AFSP but how do we fix this? What can we as the mental health community do to combat these odds? There are so many people who can’t afford medicine, therapy let alone see a psychiatrist to properly diagnose and help them. This is something we need to recognize and help each other. We aren’t going to receive any help from the government and there is so much of a stigma attached to us people refuse to publicly support it unless it is a celebrity who claimed to “recover” from it. We need to speak openly and honestly about our struggles. I think we can be the change if we become more comfortable being open and knowing even though they might not understand we can make them care. 1 person loss to suicide is 1 too many. Let’s start the conversation and help decrease these numbers.

My past jobs, self incrimination and not getting sued.

So, in my last post about jobs I openly discussed Wal-Mart which later I was told that they could sue me. My suggestion is to go for it with that being said I want to start by saying this; the situations both legal/illegal will not be tied to any previous job exclusively. I will make a list out of a combination of jobs from 2002-2008 in no particular order. These are all PAST jobs and the bridges weren’t burned. I packed that son of a bitch with dynamite, fireworks threw a Molotov cocktail and made some popcorn and watch that bitch burn down.
I’ve worked in retail since I was 16 years old. I’ve done everything from bagging to assistant front end manager, scan coordinator, stocking basically everything under a store manager and assistant manager. I also worked at a bank but that is a different post. I am just going to list it because for some no additional information is necessary.

• Overnight shifts- There is so many interesting things that happen. You become close to everyone. In the many different retail jobs I’ve had I usually worked overnight. Here is a few bits of info on how it used to be. We would stop working around 2:30/3:00 am and when I say stop work I mean no one did anything regardless if there were customers in the store. We normally sat on the patio furniture after “accidentally” leaving the cigarette area unlocked, solo cups that were “not fit to stalk” and beer that was “out of date.” Do you see why I am not bringing any names into this. So from about 2:45 to 5:00/5:30 no one did anything. We all sat outside and (there was also weed) discussed the worlds issues, mocking managers (yep it all goes down hill from here.) and finding other random items out of date or just for the hell of it. I still don’t understand to this day how we didn’t get fired, arrested or cause major damage to anything besides the patio furniture (you could blame that on customers).
• Stealing- This is a very generic population of sentences. Sometimes when you are paid shit and put up with A LOT of bullshit from customers but especially from dickhead managers you feel this need to be extra compensated. You don’t steal money from your register because that is a one way ticket to jail (unless you were partly responsible for counting their drawers and you wanted them to go away.) There are also the cases when you knew where the cameras were. If there is one thing I ever learned from big box retailers it is how to find blind spots. You also become really good at figuring out the best way to make things disappear, without getting caught. You shouldn’t steal things kids even if they are paying you less than minimum wage and hardly anything for overtime. Is it okay to casually leave the cigarette case unlocked? Use the same receipt for food and drinks purchased that are over a month old but no one notices? Using a customers receipt to get things for free? Rewinding the security tapes so parts of the day are missing? Turn your head when you saw an underaged coworker buying beer? Placing bets on which employees the managers are fucking like it is a fantasy football team? Taking bribes for letting certain things slide? Overcharging people for extra money when you need gas? Ringing up the cheapest item multiple times and places the more expensive ones in the bag? Pretending to scan things but never actually doing it? The answer to all of these questions should be no, but if you are like me and several of these apply to you. I got respect for you.
• Management– There was a lot of money made in inappropriate manager relations aka douchebags 101. I think in big box stores there is this level of useless completely useless garbage that is a requirement. You know those managers that treat you like you are just a number. When I was a cashier I had a manager who liked to snap his finger at us. He did it to me twice. The second time I commanded him to find his ass kissing assistant manager. I also have a list of things you should never say to a manager. This is almost like an encyclopedia of proper customer service skills in grocery stores and big box retailers. If you are interested let me know.
• Customers– LET ME START OFF WITH THIS; THIS APPLIES TO ANY CUSTOMERS I DEALT WITH FROM 2002-2008. I possibly want to apologize for some of this but not everything. Things cashiers want to say to you.
• • • • I MEANT TO CRUSH YOUR EGGS AND BREAD. Yes you cunt nugget and while you are bitching about how hard my job could be and explaining to me exactly how to bag your groceries I took the pound of ground beef you swore was outdated and dropped it on your eggs. I took great pride in this and yes the smile you saw was from crushing your eggs and making you walk back to the dairy section to get them. This also applies to your bread, I have more than plenty experience on bagging groceries but your nagging of my lack of ability to multi task is when I took your frozen box of waffles and dropped it on your bread. Maybe drop isn’t a good word I smashed it on your bread and then laughed when I made you go back to get it.
• • • • I KNOW HOW TO COUNT. I get it we were cashiers and you think we have a low IQ but we can’t money faster than you. We can also add and subtract quicker than you do.
• • • • Fruits and Vegetables- Yes we know there are 20 different types that is why there are numbers on them so when you decide to peel off the numbers because you think it is unsanitary it takes us longer to figure them out. They don’t pay us to memorize everything.
• • • • Meat- FOR THE GOODNESS SAKE PLEASE PUT YOUR MEAT IN A FUCKING BAG!! It doesn’t add weight to your meat. The MEAT IS ALREADY WEIGHED!!! I don’t want your meat blood dripping down my conveyor belt. Just put it in a fucking bag.
• • • • I don’t care about your finances- I don’t care what excuses you give about why your card was declined or your check didn’t go through. Your lack of financial concern is none of my business, but you holding up my line blaming and cussing everyone you know is keeping me from my lunch. I also have to spend 15 more minutes that I’m not at lunch voiding out your entire transaction. We don’t get paid extra for that shit. We also have to put all of that frozen and refrigerated items back.
• • • • Your WIC and EBT- If you came through my line multiple times with your EBT card or wic and you play stupid it is annoying. You know what day your EBT card gets funded. There is a big fucking sheet that tells you about what is sic approved he’ll it is even in front of some of the items. I had a few people who were genuinely confused and unsure of it and usually if you ask a cashier they can explain it but if you keep coming in and acting like a dumbass we make fun of you when you leave.
• • • • Here is a hint: We make fun of you 85% of the time when you leave.
• • • • There is more to this but that’s all I got for now.

DON’T BE A DICK!!!!!!!!!