Posted by wendy b. on April 2, 2002, at 9:31:32
In reply to Re: To old-time PB posters YE OL' TIMERS UNITE! » judy1, posted by kazoo on April 1, 2002, at 21:57:37
As usual, Kazoo has taken the conversation to another plane entirely - THANK GOD!! (Even at a stressful time, Kazoo, I hope you are healing...)
I, too, was once referred to by Dr Bob as an old-timer. Wow. If I remember correctly, I lurked for 6 months, starting late in '00, then started participating toward the beginning of '01, and posted a lot during that year, cuz I was having some whopper of a major depressive episode, followed by many months of struggle with alternating depression and hypomanic episodes. I had a lot of issues with meds, asked questions on plain vanilla PB, and settled into a routine with neurontin as a mood-stabilizer, wellbutrin as my happy-pill, xanax for insomnia and bouts of anxiety, etc.
People were sympathetic and helpful, although I felt my role was more of a support to others, and I have issues with asking for others to support me (this is one of my big probelms, working on it in therapy). I hung around here with people who understood, though, and it WAS a fantastic support to me, in that I felt I was not alone, that others had gone through the same mood-disorder things, and many had worse problems, like suicidality... I learned a lot about how people cope with things like cutting, etc., why they do it... Sometimes I felt I was a fly on the wall, almost spying or eavesdropping into the lives of others. (It met my need for High Drama?) Other times I felt very needed, as Judy says, all-night suicide watches, etc. Like the back cover of a book with the reviewer saying "I laughed a lot," or "Riveting!"
I found, however, that I was sitting on the internet and the board a lot. Trying to find work and trying to get certified as a teacher, and all the stuff that goes with single parenting put a brake on my spending time here. I am trying to date (via match.com - check it out, lonelyhearts!) and have met about 5 different men. Nice to even just hang out and drink coffee with new people. So trying to work toward getting my needs met, too, not just caring for my daughter and work.
I am also involved right now with two court cases. One in Family Court, my 10-yr old daughter wants more input on her visitation schedule with her dad. So the court appointed her a law guardian, and the ex and I each have attorneys. Hopefully it won't go to trial. The other case is sueing my former employer, Cornell University, in a federal ADA suit. That one has been difficult, emotionally, going over all the horror of being isolated and hounded by my boss after taking a 2-month disability leave. I was a mess with anxiety and depression, exacerbated by the boss's treatment of me. When I came back, everyone I worked with treated me like a leper, and I was fired after being told I was insubordinate and unable to do my work. So you can imagine how upsetting it is to go over this stuff, which happened almost 2 years ago, making timelines, answering discovery questions from the other side. A miserable job, making me more anxious and depressed. Therapy has helped a lot with this, though... So this has eaten into my time too, thus I have been an infrequent contributor lately.
As usual, Phil is right, the bickering and incivility just go with the territory. We're a bunch of nut-cases trying to work things out. Of course there are going to be people who are breaking down, having trouble with meds, etc., which might make their behavior argumentative, irritable, anxious, unkind. I know anger and irritability have been major symptoms/outcomes of my depression.
Part of learning how to deal with others might just be for people to be uncivil, have that pointed out by Dr Bob, and other members, and then work on appropriate alternate behaviors, and then keep posting. I have seen that happen many times here. There is the possibility for growth in this setting, kind of like group therapy, and I think people should take advantage of that on PSB. Sort of like practice here, before going to the 'outside world' and dealing with the humans in our family and work lives. So there will be difficulties on the board as people sort things out. Encouraging people to ignore certain posters who press their buttons...
Speaking of which, remember 'SalArmy 4Me' ? you old timers? He pressed a lot of people's buttons, we had some real fallout from that time. A lot of people experienced such frustration with him, mostly about religion and and its relation to a public message board, PSB and PB members asked him to refrain from prostletizing, and got very angry at the born-again, Salvation Army stuff. He often recommended medicines, and cited Medline abstracts (impuning that he was a real expert), that may or may not have worked for people, and loads of people got angry at him for that. I did too. The other biggie was that he encouraged people to self-medicate, and to buy meds online without prescriptions, and often cited web sites of foreign providers. Then he switched identities, and Dr Bob got frustrated too (for more, look at Psychobabble Administration, about 8 months, 1 yr back... Fascinating reading, there.) But I had to ignore him, just read his name and avoided whatever he posted. Lots of people couldn't do that, though, and I couldn't for other people who pushed MY buttons. Because we felt the Board was "ours," and rightly so. Once I e-mailed Dr Bob and said as much, and he encouraged me to feel that way, and for us to monitor each other and call each other on uncivil behavior.
So I guess it goes in cycles, and the Board may have some real incivility going on right now, I do notice it. But the benefits outweigh the inherent difficulties of the structure and the setting of a cyber-group-chat-therapy-help-support type of deal we have here with Dr Bob. He tries to run a tight ship, and people who want another captain have gone elsewhere, and that's probably all to the good. I think it's worth staying and fighting for this place, where we can hash out our 'stuff,' feel safe doing so (i.e., without getting blasted off the screen by others). So I come back often, even just lurking has its merits for me and for my life right now.
But this was one thread I had to respond to. Thanks for listening to me on my soapbox... (I know, I get that way).
All the best to everyone, oldies and newbies, and in-betweenbies...
Wendy
ps: Kazoo - it IS better to be an old-timer than a two-timer...
> Is it better to be an "old timer" than a "two timer"?
>
> I was once referred to as an "old timer" by ... well, I don't want to mention names here, but there's a "Dr." in front of his name ... anyway, I was aghast with such horror that my dentures fell out. It took me weeks to find them since I can hardly see through these coke-bottle glasses, and I can't hear so well either ... what's that?
>
> As people get older, their brains, the center of thought, do, too.
>
> So ... I forgot the question already.
>
> kazoo
poster:wendy b.
thread:21221
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20020325/msgs/21311.html