More true than you can know.
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Good thing I have a bf who tells me all I have to do is step on a scale every day to see if Iām losing weightā¦ Iām an idiot for thinking that can only have a negative effect on ME because obviously I canāt know myself! All I have to do to get better is train like Iām going for the next Olympicās! And then he gets mad at me because I donāt jump up and get on the stupid bike and trow up my lunchā¦ Because obviously all he wants to do is help me! How horrible am I for not accepting his help!!!
I feel like Iām trying to argue with someone who is convinced the earth is flat!
I wonder why this only happens when he pushes me for sex and I donāt get him offā¦ But no how horrible am I for thinking that!
Itās 7 o clock and I have dinner readyā¦ and heās angry because he wanted to go get cola from the supermarket?! He said he was doing that an hour agoā¦ And Iām the bad person who doesnāt communicate?!
And then 4 minutes later he comes to show me a funny video and I have to laugh or else Iām being hostile againā¦
But the psych called me crazy so heās right and Iām wrongā¦
No one is right or wrong. Youāre suffering. And on some level he is too. My partner and I have had terrible difficulties adjusting our life to accommodate PsA. It takes a LOT of time, skill, persistenceā¦
Let him get a coke. Eat dinner alone. Donāt eat dinner at all. Donāt ride the bike. Or do.
The way you feel right now I would be looking less at right and wrong and thinking more about self care. What do YOU need to do to look after YOU.
Breathe. And be gentle with yourself and your BF.
Okay this is totally inappropriate, but I just canāt keep my mouth shut any longer. But since you have been here, I havenāt heard you say one thing about the BF that leads me to believe he is anything but a self centered Narcissistic bully who has devoted his life to putting YOU down in order to build himself upā¦ You can deal with that (why, when you have a choice, I donāt know) You can deal with PsA and the adjustments that needs (because you have no choice) but you canāt deal with both.
Have you considered the fact that maybe HE is the source of your crazy? You canāt get rid of the PsA and gosh knows you canāt āfixā the PsA no matter what you eat, how much weight you lose or how much time you spend on the Bike. But you Can get rid of part of your problem if only temporarilyā¦ You need to be taken care of right now. You deserve it.
Do you have friends or family you can go to, take a time out with and sort through this stuff?
1.) Itās great that weāre all from different parts of the globe, but itās also frustrating as we canāt give advice necessarily as to what to do in a specific countryās health system that we are not familiar with.
2.) That being said, any psych who calls you crazy (or anything close to that) needs a slap around the face with a wet fish - or, preferably a kick in the balls. To be fair, sounds like your bf does too. Although if you kick too many people you might get arrested - so Iām with tntlamb on this one - get out of there.
3.) And I say āget out of thereā as someone who has bipolar, and is his own kind of crazy! The good news is that these things you are feeling and suffering from mentally will go at some point. I promise. But you also need, somehow, to get help sooner than the psych is offering it to you. I understand that, as in the UK, counselling isnāt going to be available quickly - but your doc should be able to help you in other ways, not least through meds. So, if your psych isnāt helping (which doesnāt seem to be the case), make sure you contact your GP (or whatever they are called in the Netherlands).
I understand that you are panicking about your health - and I fully realise what that is like. When I had an unidentified lump in my mouth earlier in the year, I took over 200 photos of it with my phone (in a month!) so that I could blow them up and see if it was getting bigger. Hypochondria/health anxiety is horrendous, and nobody gets it unless they have been there. I started getting it in 2012 and, at the moment, it seems to be at bay a little bit. But since then I have panicked about swellings, stomach problems, mouth ulcers, cysts, bruises, spots, moles, watery eyes, headaches, and even bits of me that really donāt want to work when you really want them to!
The good news is that none of the illnesses I imagined were real. The bad news is that didnāt help. I am the first one to admit that Google really makes health anxiety worse, but itās there and its tempting. HOWEVER the one thing I would say is do not join a forum like this about health anxiety. It is the worst thing you could possibly do. Being around other people with health anxiety is NOT helpful! You are much more likely to get sympathy and help here than there.
Meanwhile if you want to eat crap - eat crap. If it makes you feel better in the short term, it doesnāt matter. You will feel better a little way down the road and then you can worry about losing any weight you have put on, or about getting back to eating healthy.
As for work - you have to do what you feel is right. Does work make you feel better because you are seeing other people and itās giving you something to do? Or is helping to cause the panic attacks in the first place? But either way YOU SHOULD NEVER FEEL GUILTY ABOUT CALLING IN SICK if you are ill. And you ARE ill!
But again, it WILL get better. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but it will happen. But make sure you are around people who can and will support you. That is the important thing at this stage. 
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So agree with Mr Lamb. Honey your boyfriend isnāt sounding like heās supportive, understanding of where youāre at and most of all just being kind to you. Love and caring isnāt about doing a spin class on a bicycle or what you might weigh at any given time. Or indeed what is for dinner.
So can you please spend a night or two away with a friend or family member whoāll just give you a great big hug and let you rest? Lots of hugs Cynthia, just masses of hugs, xxx
Cynthia, in all of this, even tntlambās blunt summary of what heās thinking, can you see the depth of concern and caring that people here have for you? Can you see how angry people are with the way youāve been treated and mistreated by various forces (for lack of a better word) in your life? You ā our articulate, bilingual, hard-working, āpittigā Cynthia ā deserve much better than what youāve been getting.
Self care is terribly important, and many ā probably most ā of us know what it feels like to need to care for ourselves when we are exhausted and in pain. But as everyone is telling you, it WILL get better. First, get the infected ear settled down. Eat what feels good right now. Sleep when your body is tired. One thing at a time. If your boyfriend canāt accept your need for self care, he needs to go away. (Thatās a very polite way of saying the words Iām actually thinking. 
) If he canāt go away, then, as tntlamb says, can you go visit family or friends where you can crawl into bed when you need to or go sit in the garden if you feel like it? You have an employer who, Iām guessing, has a plan for people who are facing major illness. And if your employer doesnāt, then there is a labour law which will cover you short term until you are feeling stronger. Iām guessing that your rheumatologist and your psychiatrist/psychologist would be quite willing to recommend a period off work for you. Your GP/huisarts might be willing to start that ball rolling immediately, given what youāve been through.
You have a team here who are on your side.
C
PS Iām with Poo: lots and lots of warm hugs.
No one is allowed to tell me I canāt workā¦ They can tell me to take it easy but they canāt tell me not to workā¦ only a work doctor can and he wonātā¦ he just says itās up to meā¦
Heās not a bad guyā¦ I get that it seems that way when Iām angry and bitch about himā¦ And Frase the words so it paints him as ugly as possibleā¦ But he really is just trying to helpā¦ Heās saying exactly what tnt is saying about exercise and healthy foodsā¦ (I get way too angry at tnt sometimes as well 
) He just doesnāt understand that itās not a choice for me to not just be positive and just do thingsā¦ For him itās easy he has an active personalityā¦ the world is only the way he sees it and not differentā¦ he doesnāt even understand that his sister is terrified of their abusive dad because she should feel the same as himā¦ But when he was growing up he spend most of his time out with a friend who told him what an ass his dad wasā¦ She didnāt have that and spend her time inside being scaredā¦
No one who has never been depressed thinks itās difficult to just not be depressedā¦ They think you can just choose to be happy like they didā¦ just like rich white men think all their good fortune is from just working hard and everyone else must be lazy for not being where they areā¦
How can I hold that against himā¦ All heās trying to do is help meā¦ Because he loves meā¦ because if he didnāt he wouldnāt stay with the crazy woman who just re-enacted that scene from the exorcistā¦
My best friend hasnāt said anything to me for 2 weeks after I snapped at her and later apologizedā¦ And before that I couldnāt find any WhatsApp conversation she initiated for monthsā¦
My mom keeps telling me how everyone gets little painsā¦ I donāt have the patience to deal with thatā¦
We were planning to go to a zoo tomorrowā¦ one were you can drive around in your own car and take a boat ride aroundā¦ (we were skipping the walking part of the zoo anyway) but if I canāt work I shouldnāt go to the zoo eitherā¦ itās been weeks since I did something funā¦ I just want to do something funā¦
I donāt understand that everyone keeps telling me I should do fun stuff as wellā¦ not just work and doctorsā¦ but then when I want to do something fun itās all well you canāt do that if it gets in the way of workā¦
I have no clue if Iāll be able to keep up at the zooā¦ or how much walking there is for the parts that arenāt in the car or in a boatā¦ Or even if the walking would be good for me anywayā¦
I just want to do something funā¦ I just want to do somethingā¦
The great thing about forums is that we can take what helps and leave what doesnāt. Itās not surprising that tnt responded as he did because, on the face of it, your boyfriendās ways sound like classic controlling behaviour.
However I realise that the dynamics of peoplesā relationships can be difficult for outsiders to understand and commenting on relationships can be dangerous territory. What I do notice is that you turn anger on yourself e.g. by describing yourself in mean ways. I have a tendency to do that myself and itās utterly hopeless, it never has the desired effect of changing other peoplesā behaviour. If youāre angry with your BF for going over the top, then youāre angry with him. You can still love him. Youāre all right you are, you really are just fine regardless of PsA or whatever else youāre dealing with. So you could tell your BF to leave certain things to you and just concentrate on the fun stuff.
Anyway, have fun at the zoo! Sounds like a great idea.
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Cynthia, this is really hard for me, and you are probably getting sick of the free advice, so Iām only going to do it once.
Getting angry or frustrated at you for not getting your bf off during sex is a classically abusive behaviour. So is having no empathy for someone who is scared because theyāve previously been abused, despite him having a good understanding of the situation. There are a number of other descriptions you have also given in the past that fit squarely in this category.
These things are NOT cancelled out by him being āniceā or āsupportiveā. I notice that he does this in a way that he wants to, as opposed to what you need.
Iām not saying your bf is a bad person, or that he doesnāt love you. Nobody can know what happens inside your relationship but you. But further, from my experience, it is incredibly hard for you to understand what is happening when you are right in the midst of it, and you feel to blame for everything. There is no way in that situation to see things clearly, and understand where responsibility lies for each persons actions.
Get away for a few days. If you feel you have no-one to go with or visit, go by yourself. Smile at a stranger (just the hotel clerk will do) with your eyes, and feel some real warmth from another person you donāt owe anything to. Understand that most of us donāt expect something in return when we give you compassion.
And think about a new psych, or a change in treatment. Iām guessing you havenāt told the old psych about this stuff with your boyfriend because you feel it is your fault, and your psych needs to know. Iām also with Darinfan on his thoughts on this one.
From personal experience, the important relationships in your life can make a massive difference to both your mental and physical help. You deserve that difference to be a good one
Take care of just you for a while, and imagine those warm hugs from all of us 
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Firstly, thank you for letting us know how the doctorās appointment went!! Any infection (especially in the ear) will make you feel just awful, and then when you add that to the PsA it is not surprising you feel really bad!!
The others have covered the wise advice so all I will say is: allow time for the antibiotics to work properly and clear up the ear infection. I know that wonāt solve everything, but, one step at a time.
Take the best care of yourself you are able to, right nowā¦ and yesā¦ if you feel like eating cookies, chocolate, whatever, go for itā¦ especially if it will make you smile (even for a second)!!!
Big hugs to you!!!
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Chocolate is a vegetable
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Chocolate has all sorts of goodies in itā¦ vitamins, minerals etcā¦ and, as a bonus, comes with an extremely good āfeel goodā factor 
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Iām okā¦ I thinkā¦ Iām done spiraling anyway and sitting comfortably on a ledge somewhere above rock bottomā¦ or something?
Iāve spend the last week crying a lot and listening to Linkin Parkā¦ which is always my go to band when I feel badā¦ but now that Chester killed himselfā¦ At first I was jealousā¦ then I was scaredā¦ he was so incredibly eloquent about his depression and describing the problem and how he went about feeling betterā¦ I felt like if you get to that point youāre safeā¦ you can catch the depression before it hitsā¦
I feel like thereās 2 parts of meā¦ one is a scientist who is incredibly interested when doctors do an ultrasound on my footā¦ the other almost fainted from all the information I was getting from asking questionsā¦ one is Dutch and hates touchy feely stuff and has a hard time explaining how she feelsā¦ The other is English and can post things like thisā¦ (This is the real reason why I donāt call for helpā¦ In Dutch it all sounds so sillyā¦)
Thereās not actually 2 peopleā¦ i just spend my teen years online on international forums and learned there how to talk about feelings and stuff and never did that in real lifeā¦ I didnāt have to hide who I was thereā¦ and the Dutch me always had to hide who I wasā¦ because I never felt like I was allowed to be who I wasā¦ I was even afraid to admit that I liked the Harry Potter booksā¦ I felt like everything I did had (hasā¦) To be approved by everyone or else itās not allowedā¦ although I didnāt realise that I did thisā¦ I figured that what everyone agrees on is normal and everything else is wrongā¦ if someone tells me they donāt like Harry Potter it feels like there saying āyouāre stupid for liking Harry Potterā
I donāt take risksā¦ I remember at a bday from a friend they asked when was the last time you fell downā¦ they all had spectacular stories and I was thinking Iām so glad that never happened to me! That would be horribleā¦ Then they came to me and I said I never fell downā¦ they asked why and I said I donāt do things that risk me falling downā¦ one said isnāt that incredibly boring?.. I decided then that yeah it is and that I should take more risksā¦ But I just canātā¦ (although I did fall down a few times sinceā¦ but those were just me walking and then suddenly me laying downā¦)
Yesterday Clemens told me that his co-worker is much more scared then I am of things like hightsā¦ he told a story about how he didnāt get on one of those buckets on a line that go up a mountain to get people up and down. He was walking to it but then suddenly just couldnāt and lay down on the floor and everyone just laughed at himā¦ I think I would just be as scared but I would be more scared of other people laughing at me so I would just get on and feel horribleā¦ to me it feels much more courageous to admit your scared over pretending your fine and dying on the insideā¦ (I have the anxiety heart attack shaking thing right now just thinking about thisā¦)
The psych said Iām not really depressed since I get out of bed in the morningā¦ But staying in bed all day being a freak brings on so much anxiety itās easier to just go through the motions pretending to be fineā¦ and staying in bed all day would make me go more crazyā¦ Iām never inside my head for too longā¦ I grab my phone and just keep my mind occupied as long as I donāt think Iām fineā¦
Anywayā¦ I just wanted to post that Iām Okeyā¦ this isnāt a place I can stay for too longā¦ but for now it feels like a cosy chairā¦ Iām just going to sit at the bottom of the pool for a little while not struggeling to stay afloatā¦
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Wowzer! Totally Cynthia! I love the way you write. Are you half English? Iām no linguist though I did study languages a long while and speaking French or Spanish, even very badly indeed, definitely brings out different sides of me.
I get what youāre saying about going through the motions rather than giving up and therefore feeling even more afraid (of yourself?). I have been having odd anxiety type episodes and have been experimenting with ā¦ not giving up ā¦ more acknowledging that something bad is happening and changing my behaviour a little to make things easier. A bit like acknowledging that walking is difficult enough to require the support of a cane. So far my strategies are none too clever, but Iām trying! Thatās kind of all we can do, right?
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Cynthia - Iām sorry I didnāt see your post before I posted about counselling. So sorry things are bad for you right now. I canāt really add much to the great advice others have shared here, except to say Iām here for you too for what itās worth. If you canāt get away for a while, then maybe lose yourself in a Netflix session, chocolate, and tea, just for a bit of comfort. Try not to be so hard on yourself, you are doing your best xx
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Hi there Cynthia, I am soo pleased to hear that you are OK for now!!! You had us all worried for youā¦
Hang in there and take one day at a timeā¦ itās the best any of us can do!!
Oh, and different isnāt wrongā¦ itās just different 
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Nopeā¦ but all the (good) TV shows and movies are in Englishā¦ and like I said I spend all my time not asleep or in school online on international forumsā¦ Iāve been reading all my books in English since the second Harry potter book came outā¦ so I understand and write English Okeyā¦ but speaking is a different matter XD
Alsoā¦ itās much easier if you can read what you wrote again and correct things after 
I catch myself with stonecoal English too many times XD (stonecoal is the literal translation of coal (steenkool) in Dutchā¦ itās when you speak English but use the words in the order you would when talking Dutchā¦ and pronounce the words as if they are Dutchā¦
@joy66 thanks I bought 92% chocolate thoughā¦ I figured it wouldnāt be as bad for my healthā¦ but that stuff is horrible! would be nice if I could get the hang of that not being so hard on myselfā¦ I would never expect from anyone else what I expect from myselfā¦ Or think others expect from meā¦
@janson thanks!
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Sybil, you hit it when you said
speaking French or Spanish, even very badly indeed, definitely brings out different sides of me.
Cynthia, youāre right. Absolutely. I live with one foot in each of those worlds too. One thing Iāve learned about me is that, somehow, I grew up to be extremely reluctant to expose any weakness, and I have an incredibly high tolerance for pain. Thereās nothing noble about any of that: those were two main factors in my being undiagnosed for about twenty years, and my now living with damage. (The other factor being that I had an unusual presentation of a rare disease.) At my arthritic worst, I continued to get up in the morning and do what needed to be done, despite my deep depression and terrible pain. Looking back, I really donāt know how I did it, but staying in bed was not an option for me any more than it is for you.
Reading what you said about the Dutch thing really struck a chord with me. Suddenly I remembered the themes of my childhood, with a Dutch father and a Friesian mother. (Oh yes, the Dutch are a tough bunch, but the Friesians ā¦ well, they are in a class of their own!).
Talk about emotions at home? LOL you must be joking! I learned to do that much later, and my vocabulary for feelings is English-only. The themes that I remember the most clearly from my childhood were captured in what I realize now are expressions for which translations are inadequate. Oh, the words can be translated, yes, but the nuances are completely lost in the process:
Doe nou niet zo flauw >> Donāt be such a wuss.
Stel je nou niet zo aan >> Donāt be such a drama queen
Kan niet is dood, en wil niet ligt ernaast >> āCanātā is dead, and ādonāt want toā is buried alongside.
The lost nuances are all about toughness. None of those English translations have the edge, the undercurrent of humiliation and ridicule that they have in Dutch. āDonāt be such a drama queenā almost sounds like an affectionate tease to me, compared to āStel je nou niet zo aanā. Shudder
Somewhere thereās a linguist who knows all about that stuff. But right here is one person who gets what youāre saying about language being more than just words.
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