Society makes me sick

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I think you're looking at things a bit wrong. Arguably, the best songs are vague. Sure the artists could go with an extremely specific idea and write a song about it so that there is only one possible interpretation, but I think that actually takes less talent. The best songs are just vague enough so that many interpretations can be made and therefore a greater amount of people will be able to find a meaning that is meaningful the them and that they can relate to.

Well I have PTSD because a student at my school was shot, I've had relatives die.....pets have died, and of course even some of my favorite musicians have died and I even attempted to. I am not sure what sort of perspective that is supposed to put things in...or what exactly you mean by angst. I mean I feel like anyone in my situation would be frusterated.

When I was your age, all the stuff inside of me and all the stuff outside of me just sort of blended into this white noise of misery. I didn't feel I could do anything because I couldn't pin anything down. I didn't know what I wanted and I was afraid to know what I wanted because then I would have to do something to get it, and then maybe I would end up not wanting it after all. That was the place I was in when I was your age. Perhaps for you, it's different. But you sound a lot like I did..

One of my more morbid strategies when I was having a bad day was looking at a picture of the Brooklyn Bridge as seen from the observation deck of the World Trade Center. I'd been up there once a long time ago, so I knew that view well. On that morning on September 11, some people up in that tower were faced with two choices: jump and die, or burn to death. When thinking about a choice like that, getting chewed out by my boss or having to pay a big bill for repairs on my car just didn't seem that bad.[/quote]

Hmm well again, that does not really decrease the pain I feel in any way I can see........I mean yes that would be a terrible choice to have to make, but I already once was faced with what felt like live in constant misery or die. I did not suceed at the choice I made and now it still comes down to that when I am feeling suicidal. Except there is a third option.......kill the pain though one could argue in some ways that is slow suicide.[/quote]


It's not the same. You made a choice to try to take your life. I've been there too. It's different when death chooses you, and all you can do is wait for it. I remember at the same time my father's body was being carted out of the house by the undertakers, wrapped in a sheet like so much dirty laundry, my boss called me to give me her condolences and to tell me that I was entitled to three days of bereavement leave. Like any of that sh*t mattered. This was my father that was leaving the house. We didn't always get along but I still loved him, and now he was a thing, a lifeless piece of meat. But hey, I've got three f*cking days off, what do I care?! (sarcasm)

I guess what death has taught me is that all of this stuff, EVERYTHING, is not that important. It does no good to worry about it.

And I wouldn't say their lyrics are sacred, but pretty damn good none the less....also though that is true of some, there are quite a lot of cover songs no one seems to have a problem with. Hell metal bands pay tribute to each other all the time...more out of respect not because they are trying to outdo each other. Music isn't just some marketable industry, its an art form and I like art not the corporate scams a lot of popular artist of today are.

I did not say it was the same, just that it was kind of a simular kind of thing....I mean to me either way I was damned. I realise there is a significant difference between suicide and unexpected death. Also I am not sure how not to worry about things....when I am constantly bombarded by things to worry about. I mean I wish I could become numb to it all but for whatever reason I seem to lack that ability.

Rock Stars are actually too specialized to really know what they are singing about. For example take the Pink Floyd song "Welcome to the Machine". I have modified this song to include a working description of a machine. This is because I know more about how machines work since I am not a musician.

That song isn't about a literal machine as far as I know, so I don't think that is a very good example of a rock star not knowing what they are singing about. If I had the impression the artists I listened to were just singing a bunch of meaningless garble I wouldn't be listening to them.

Yeah, I think that song is about becoming a cog in the machinery of society (society, that thing that makes Sweetleaf sick, which is where this all started).

Although a working description of a machine sounds pretty cool too. I'd love to see that posted.

Yeah its exactly about that, though I belive I was feeling alienated from this society before I even knew what Pink Floyd was. That is why I found the lyrics made a lot of sense to me.

Yeah, OK, they're a great band. The Division Bell is a pretty good album too. And my best Floyd tune of all time is probably "On the Turning Away."

And, when I was 22, I LIVED in a The Wall T-shirt. Had most of the lyrics from the album written on note cards and plastered to my walls. Covered the backs of my notebooks in quotations, and (ashamed to admit it) wrote a couple in Sharpie on walls in alleyways and gas station rest rooms (and once on a library table, I think). Had it playing in my head pretty much all the time.

Fantasized about carving a line or two into my skin with an Xacto knife, listened to it play over and over and over again while I traced the lines on the palms of my hands with a rug needle or punched myself in the face or put cigarettes out on top of my feet (that one took a while to heal) or fantasized about spitting in various people's faces for how easily it all came to them and how blithely they abused it (and me, and other people). OK, I think I was 19 at the time instead of 22, but-- same ballpark.

I can see the value of catharsis. I remember it well. I still use it-- sometimes. I found another copy of The Wall at a yard sale, and I bought that Motherf***er. I can't listen to Hazel Dickens without thinking of Daddy, and what happened, and a few people I'd really like to smack and how I'd like to do it...

...so I walk around singing her songs, loudly and badly, while I do housework.

I don't ever recommend shoving your feelings down, inside, aside, whatever and trying to force yourself to be happy. It doesn't work. But-- there's other things to do with being sad, angry, and miserable than let them ruin the rest of your life. They'll be happy to do something with you...

...or you can do something with them. I don't make them disappear. I would if I could, but I don't know how. I see people try-- they mostly lead empty, miserable lives. I grab them by the ears and do something with them. And, in case you can't tell from my attitude around here (not exactly nice, and nothing remotely like sunny), it doesn't always work. I'd say it has about a 60% success rate. Which is about 30% better than anything else I've tried (but somehow magically 100% better than abject depression day after day after day).

I know you don't want to hear this, but it's true (or at least, true for me). After a point, thinking about it just made it worse. I started wishing I could rip out my metaphoric eardrums so I wouldn't have to hear it in my head any more. I got sick of thinking about how this is how it is, this is what I am, this is the way it's going to be.

You never know what you can do until you do something. I couldn't do anything when I decided I was going to either live or die and made up my mind to just jump. I got laughed at a lot. I found a lot of places where I wasn't welcome. I found a lot of stuff I didn't like doing or wasn't good at.

I also found a few people who liked me, a few places I actually fit in, and eventually a pretty good handful of stuff I turned out to be decent at or really enjoy. I looked around one day, 5 years later, and realized I'd built a life I enjoyed.

I haven't done anything great with my life. I'm not particularly excellent at anything. If I've changed anyone's life, I don't know about it. Raising kids and vegetables and taking in stray cats and liking old people and fixing broken things-- these are not things that anyone's ever going to write a book about. Rosa Parks, I ain't.

But it makes a difference to me, and the people around me...

...and that's all most people ever do. If it's a positive difference-- even after a lot of trial and error-- it's more than a lot of people ever do.

OK-- I've lived for 34 years and I've built my little it-may-not-be-much-but-it's-mine very valuable nothing of a life.

Now I have something to be afraid of losing. And people have tried to take it away from me, for no better reason than that they think someone with Asperger's shouldn't be able to do that and I have to be lying or hiding something or someone else is really doing it for me. Or they see that I'm different and assume that I'm evil, stupid, weak, or otherwise deserving of being s**t on. It happens. More often than I want to think about, more often than I know how to deal with, often enough that I seldom leave the house without at least thinking of the possibility and praying it doesn't happen TODAY.

Someday, they might succeed. Some woman with better social skills might decide she wants my family. They might pass a law that says people with developmental disabilities can't raise kids. Hubby might decide he's fed up with being a "rose in an emotional desert," and he's willing to raise the kids alone just to make me pay for wasting 15+ years of his life. Something might happen to knock me down again, and this time I might end up stuck on the f*****g Risperdal for life or never find the way or the will to get up again. Even if I get through it all, my kids might turn 18 and disappear into the "normal" world never to be seen or heard from again, hubby might die of a massive coronary (he's sedentary and eats for s**t and is 100+ pounds overweight, at 31), and I might get through it all to end up dying alone in a storm sewer somewhere.

All that stuff could very well happen. They're realistic possibilities, because society sucks and people suck and luck sucks. I get scared almost every day. Even with a full life and chemical assistance, there's never a day goes by that I don't at least have to talk myself out of being scared. You've got it bad, I've got it bad, my in-laws have it bad, my best girl friend has it bad. We all have it bad, at least sometimes, because life down here on Earth sucks.

Then again, I might live to be 75 and die quietly in my sleep, looking forward to playing with my grandkids, and spend a happy eternity sitting on a cloud watching my progeny prosper and thrive in a world that discovers the need to care for what it has and to value every life as precious and significant.

Yeah-- the bad stuff's definitely a hell of a lot more likely. Especially over the stuff after the last comma (considering I'm a believer in reincarnation insofar as I'm fool enough to think I know what happens next anyway). But-- It hasn't happened yet. I have now. That's not sunshine you can't hear in my voice, dear one. That's blazing determination.

It's not easy. It's never going to be easy. I have a theory that anyone who says life is easy is either stupid, lying, or admirably simple (and I'll bet it's painful even for the admirably simple-- Daddy was one of the simplest people I've ever met and he still ended up crying sometimes). Our lives-- probably harder than a lot of other people's. There's this complicating factor.

You're going to screw stuff up. Some people screw up less, others screw up more. Anyone who tells you they never screw up is either lying, lying, or lying.

I know one thing you care about-- and I'll bet you'd be really good at it, too. The world is full of people with various mental illnesses who need nothing so much as someone to listen, and smile, and say, "Hey, I like you." Might turn into a career in social work or counseling...

...and then again, it might never go any farther than just that. Has a pretty good chance to change someone's life for the better anyway. That's all Daddy ever really did for his mother...

...and he was the biggest and most important piece of her whole world. The ground literally fell out from under her when he died, and nobody's been able to put it back (not even me, and I'm the only other person on Earth who understands what it was he did).

You either DO SOMETHING-- something, anything, even if it turns out wrong, even if it's not very much-- about the stuff that makes you want to puke. You keep doing things until you find something that works, and then you keep doing it.

Or you decide you don't give a f**k any more, or you find some way to run from it and pretend it doesn't exist (which I don't recommend any more than shoving your feelings down-- very time and energy intensive, and not very effective, after watching most of my relatives do it), or it continues to make you sick.

Honestly I shall have to get back to the rest later....as that all is a lot to take in, but certainly worth thinking about...For now I can say I once had a bad mushroom trip watching The Wall. All because I knew what it meant to me, how I felt what I had gone through and as frusterating as things get and as hard as it is to keep going I am curious to see what other life experiances I might have.....but even so I get close to giving up on it because the pain I'm in is just too much. I mean hell I am even getting worse anxiety attacks or PTSD flashbacks from that crap that happened at my school(not quite sure what the difference is anymore) but it sucks I can be doing fine and all the sudden I have this sudden feeling of 'IMPENDING DOOM! IMPENDING DOOM! and of course increased heart rate more difficutly breathing and it feels like everythings going to fall apart any minute if that makes any sense I mean I don't even know how to deal with that.....other then have a drink or smoke a bowl to calm down. I mean it can come out of what seems like nowhere.

I have two of The Wall T-shirts, The album on vinyl, The DVD, the poster that came in the DVD, most their other albums on CD and of course Dark Side of The Moon on both vinyl and DVD and only the vinyl of Meddle. A Dark Side Of The Moon shirt and pants, a couple other posters, a lighter a wrist band, The recent biography about Syd barret and a couple other Pink Floyd related books and tickets to The Wall which Roger Waters is preforming on the 7th. Probably a bit excessive but that is how I get about music....I have other music collections as well but Pink Floyd is probably the largest. And I might as well carve lyrics into the bathroom stalls at the concert venues they are all carved up anyways.

Hmmm...Can you say "Special Interest"?

I know one thing you care about-- and I'll bet you'd be really good at it, too. The world is full of people with various mental illnesses who need nothing so much as someone to listen, and smile, and say, "Hey, I like you." Might turn into a career in social work or counseling...

I would tend to agree. And before you say you are too messed up to think about other people's problems, thinking about other people's problems is a great way to get out of your own head for a while. Hey, I'm bat-sh*t crazy and it works for me! Actually, you are doing this a lot already as a regular contributor to these forums. And what you had contributed has undoubtedly made a difference in people's lives.

Honestly I shall have to get back to the rest later....as that all is a lot to take in, but certainly worth thinking about...For now I can say I once had a bad mushroom trip watching The Wall. All because I knew what it meant to me, how I felt what I had gone through and as frusterating as things get and as hard as it is to keep going I am curious to see what other life experiances I might have.....but even so I get close to giving up on it because the pain I'm in is just too much. I mean hell I am even getting worse anxiety attacks or PTSD flashbacks from that crap that happened at my school(not quite sure what the difference is anymore) but it sucks I can be doing fine and all the sudden I have this sudden feeling of 'IMPENDING DOOM! IMPENDING DOOM! and of course increased heart rate more difficutly breathing and it feels like everythings going to fall apart any minute if that makes any sense I mean I don't even know how to deal with that.....other then have a drink or smoke a bowl to calm down. I mean it can come out of what seems like nowhere.[/quote]

Those are classic symptoms of PTSD. When you reach out to people on this forum (and I think reaching out on this forum is a good thing to do), a lot of people will tell you what you SHOULD do. So now it's my turn. Seek help. You can't deal with this alone. I'm not sure where you are, but there probably is a program (in California it's the Victim Witness Program) which would pay for counseling for someone who is experiencing PTSD from the trauma of criminal acts. The daughter of a friend of mine was assaulted by three young men recently, and she qualifies for help under that program.

However you do it, get help. Treating your symptoms by self medicating will not make you well. And for God's sake, STOP BEING SO HARD ON YOURSELF!

Society is what it is. Your frustration is timeless. Google Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Throw a temper tantrum because society won't be what you want? Rousseau started a revolution and look how that turned out...

Your frustration is temporary. You will grow up and things will get even more muddled until you don't care anymore.

Hahahahaha!

Society is such a huge thing. Do or don't do something out of line with accepted standards and you will call attention to yourself - good or bad - it depends on the mood of the collective. However, these days, you don't have to do much to fit in someplace. You just need to find your place or make your own and invite other outcasts in. Soon, you'll be in charge of your own society and your charges will hate you.

I just choose to be happy. Screw the rest of you downers. I'm having a good day today no matter what.

I guess I should not listen to Radiohead either...



I can't tell if the "protagonist" of this song is going to do something really drastic or manage to figure out a way to simply not give a crap about anything anymore.

Yes I would say Pink Floyd is a bit of a special intrest..as well as just music I like in general.

Also I see your point sometimes helping others or attempting to does make me feel a little more satisfied with myself and such....I guess what I was more trying to express is I do have my limits because I do tend to be rather sensative about things so its not very hard for me to start obsessing over other peoples problems as well as my own which then results in me being more anxious and worn out.

Yeah I tried going to therapy within the past year....and it was paid by whatever victim program thing they had for my highschool or the county or whatever. But it didn't really help at all and about the time I was getting frusterated about that I had reached the limit of what they paid for and could not afford to keep going. Also I found some mental health center in my area that might be helpful.....still haven't gone there mostly because it would be over an hour on the bus to get there and and hour alone but in public on the bus before something as stressful as that might prevent me from having the confidence to even walk into the building, not to mention I can't even seem to force myself to pick up the phone and make an appointment to begin with.

Also I don't expect self medicating to make me well.....I expect it to take the edge off. I mean what I was describing before kind of came down to I was about to lose it because that whole impending doom feeling was just gradually getting more intense so I needed something to help calm me at that moment. I mean there was no way I could have just sat through that, its more likely I might have started banging my head on the wall or destroying everything in the room I was in at the time in a frantic attempt to make it stop.

Oh and just to be clear the bad trip I mentioned was a year ago, and I dealt with that just fine I think my prozac experiance was about 10x worse. but the PTSD issue I just described there was more recent....just in case I wasn't clear that those were seperate events in my post.

I do try not to be so hard on myself, but yeah I guess its pretty difficult...I mean any minute I can be made to feel totally helpless and anxious all because I have one of the worst mental disorders one could possibly have. But I guess on the brightside I guess I have an answer to my curiosity about how PTSD feels...I wondered that when it ended up being discussed at school a year before that crap happened when were studying WW1.

Well that's good I am glad you have that choice in hell its not such an availible choice....and though I am kind hurt you say 'screw you' over feelings I can hardly control I won't say screw you for being happy.

Yeah I could even take prozac to speed up the process...and now that I know growing up is synonomous with becoming a burnt out drone that doesn't even care about anything at all I'm excited.

So that's why I'm comfortably numb! Because I'm a burnt out drone!

If that is what being a burnt out drone implies to you.....but I was more directing that like at myself like how would I knowingly do something to just not care anymore without feeling like a completely terrible person deep down inside? so that is probably what I would think of myself as if I did that. I was not calling anyone here a mindless drone.

Maybe I can have one of my friends/family members call that potentially helpful mental health place I looked up.....If I can't, and trust me its pretty frusterating not being able to do something as simple as pick up a phone to scedule an appointment all because phones make me nervous in general and its very hard for me open up to someone I don't know about my issues especially over a phone and in person isn't much better. Also I could get a ride there maybe and that way I wouldn't have to go alone.

Not sure it will do any good but if my PTSD is going to be acting up like this every day....I have to try and do something and maybe I should put the job thing on hold because I can't very well work if I'm all unsteady because I feel unbearable anxiety and doom coming on. I mean most people even those close to me don't know how much energy I've been using just to hold it together on the outside so I can appear functional around them because I really don't want to talk to them about whats wrong. Other then that I've been pretty much living at my friends house because I can only put on that act for so long before I have to get away and that is one safe place I have. But I even ending up trying to avoid people like my brother, sister and cousin because I don't want them to see me at my worst.....though they probably did anyways on that bloody camping trip I went with them on. And then I don't even know how to explain that I do want to see them but I just can't deal with it sometimes and thats why I might seem to be avoiding them......which bothers me because they may take my avoiding them wrong. But yeah even right now I feel the anxiety coming on this has gotten much too frequent and severe.