21 have spoken

Posted by Trevor [e-meo] [virtual dwelling] @ 05/15/2002 07:40 PM PST

I can't really say I know how you feel, 'cuz I don't. I'm in a state of depression right now, and my parents refuse to take me to the shrink. So I go on the internet and rant. I must say, I've followed your blog for half a year, and I think you have an exciting life, whatbeit. Yeah, so, thanks, cuz now I know I'm not the only one out there who is kinda down....ok....ALL the way down. And I like your ethnicity post, THAT I can identify with.

Posted by Josh [e-meo] @ 05/14/2002 09:49 PM PST

Co Kim,

Having spent almost 4 years living in Viet Nam and having been married to a Vietnamese lady for 27 years now, I feel I can safely say that I understand almost nothing about women, and Vietnamese women in particular. You guys are marvelous mysteries. So I will not try to diagnose your condition. However I am intimately familiar within my family with the tragic results of untreated depression. Two male members of my immediate family could not bring themselves to admit that they had a problem and seek professional help. The events were ten years apart but they both eventually reached the point of no return and took the ultimate step.

You are different though, Co Kim. Throughout your website, your poetry, your stories and correspondence you demonstrate amazing openness and candor that should be a great asset in dealing with your condition. Perhaps if my father and brother had your level of insight and maturity they would still be here. You have made the important first step of finding help and I wish you all the best in your struggle to regain control.

Thank you for building an interesting and creative site and for sharing part of your life with us.

Posted by TT [e-meo] @ 05/14/2002 07:13 PM PST

Hi Kim.. I dont know you or anything, and I dont know what problems you have personally faced, or know how much help that you have actively seeked out for and for how long. But, I do hope that you feel better. Bipolar disorder is one of more rare mental illnesses out there. If the psychiatrist was able to make that assumption on the first diagnosis, it would be a good idea to get a second opinion. I dont think ONE psychiatrist will know you skin deep during the first time because you are a unique individual. It is difficult to determine who exactly is mentally ill and who is not mentally ill temporarily or permanently. Psychiatry, yes is a very respected field, and medications may help to alleviate problems. However, taking medication includes risks and many many side effects. You, yourself should look into all the choices you have and choose whatever you find the best choice on how to tackle your situation.

I consider you strong to be able to admit and to actively try to fix your problems. I hope that all goes well and I hope for the best for you, and that you will be able to find assistance to help you feel better. Take care :)

Posted by nancy [e-meo] @ 05/14/2002 05:16 PM PST

as said by stephen himself:

"Just from my personal experience, guys are ALOT less stress prone, and alot more easy going. Crazy situations like this are more often spawned by females. Males take much more dominating roles and are more likely to take out their stress in physical releases (violence, sports whatnot). Girls tend to hold it all in and go nutzoid. :)"

i believe you've gotten yourself confused about girls holding it all in. like everyone else has put it to you on this board, the reason why 80% of girls are, like how you said, have something going wrong is because males tend to internalize their problems where as females are more likely to voice their issues.

i'll give you that more females attempt suicide and have more tendencies to be depressed. but if you check every single statistic book out there, it is clearly written in plain english for dumb ass simpletons like you to understand that more males are successful in putting their lives to an end. and it is more males who have a tendency to have greater and more serious problems and disorders than females. more males that commit violent crimes, hit their wives, rape and abuse 80% of women who you said "go nutzoid" and and pull dumbass stunts like the incidents that have occurred throughout the entire history of the human race.

and these are the top dawgs you're talking about.

as for what you said about "crazy situations are spawned by females," think again. sure we do stupid things and bust drama here and there, i'll give you that. but you don't hear about women pull shit like beat up our exgirlfriends and force them to lead us to our other guys' house and attempt to kick the shit out of him in front of her, or rape innocent women, or kill someone with our own bare hands very often. it isn't very many girls you see taking magnifying glasses and frying ants on the street in a hot summer day, or see a girl with a computer cleaning can spraying black widow spiders and then cracking it with a large object to kill it.

and the reason why you see that more males are easy going is because they bottle up their problems and don't talk about it. and everyone knows what keeping in problems does. and as joyce had said, males manifest their into alcoholism and drug dependency, as well as the violence and abuse that i had mentioned before.

but just because it isn't being spoken about doesn't mean that problems don't exsist in males. you obviously don't have very many friends, males or females, or else you would've already known this yourself.

Posted by aileen @ 05/14/2002 01:43 PM PST

first of all, kind of related to what dave was saying in response to stephen, if you study the epidemiology of psychological disorders, you'll find that while women have a much higher rate of depression and related disorders, men have the same over-representation when it comes to substance abuse disorders and alcoholism. most psychologists will tell you that this is because men and women simply express their emotions differently. women will express their inner turmoil as depression whereas men let it manifest into alcoholism or a drug dependency. so your claim, stephen, that men are so much more straightforward than women, and your implication that women should try to be like men, has no basis whatsoever. try some sensitivity and get off your high horse.

to kim, i'm really sorry about what you're going through, i know that things like this are incredibly hard to deal with. i have one cousin with bipolar and several more (as well as myself) who are clinically depressed and are or have been on medication. there are times when depression is something that we can fight on our own, but it's important to recognize that sometimes we just can't do it all by ourselves. i think it shows a lot of wisdom that you can tell the difference.

i hope you do start feeling better soon.

Posted by joyce [e-meo] [virtual dwelling] @ 05/14/2002 11:49 AM PST

whenever i need help, i ask someone who can help me to do so. that's what my mom and dad always told me to do.

so let's have a picnic!

Posted by ameer @ 05/14/2002 09:20 AM PST

i think what will really save you is knowing that you won't care what ppl think about your decisions or therapies as long as you feel better with yourself.

Posted by rounin [e-meo] [virtual dwelling] @ 05/14/2002 09:13 AM PST

oops *fixed*

All
this arguing reminds me of this

Posted by Jason @ 05/14/2002 01:42 AM PST

All
this arguing reminds me of this

Posted by Jason @ 05/14/2002 01:40 AM PST

Kim, I've been reading your blog for a while now and I feel grateful you share your life with others.

For those who think you're just being weak or helpless, they're very wrong. A strong person is one who can admit he or she needs help and PRO-actively seeks help. In your case, you knew you needed professional help and you are a much wiser person for doing so.

And props to you for sharing what's going on. Keep it up, I think its theraputic for you and for us to read.

Posted by Jon [e-meo] [virtual dwelling] @ 05/14/2002 01:38 AM PST

oh yeah, to stephen, obviously you are a very socially inept computer boy because you don't know what you are talking about when you say girls don't express their emotions.

how much _wronger_ (SP-- don't care), can you get? Oh my god, if you ever been with a girl, you'd know girls talk a lot more about their feelings than guys ever will. guys bottle shit inside, girls express. guys bottle their emotions, creating tension and murder. see?

Posted by dave @ 05/14/2002 01:18 AM PST

how can a sudden death, a murder,
a car-jacking, an overdose...

how can a rape, an assault, a gun aimed to the heart, a beating,

how can they be avoidable. life is about uncertainties, life is about chance. i can't avoid living. i can't avoid events. they come.

and yet-- we delude ourselves when we have no negative plight, we delude ourselves into thinking it was a matter of skill and personality-- when all it was was simple, pure, dumb luck.

Posted by dave @ 05/14/2002 01:07 AM PST

to stephen the retarded:

i was talking to my girlfriend, and she pointed out that most of the crazy, sick, twisted people out there are males. most pedophiles, rapists, murders, violent offenders are all men. i'm not sure what you mean by men being stable. this is what i mean by the sexist comments. i mean it's one thing to make a broader sociological statement about women being less in power generally than men in our society, and quite another to make a stupid claim that has no bearing to actual reality. obviously, stephen, you can keep going with your very lucky suburbia life or at least middle class life and be as naive as you are and get your life experiences from other people's blogs that you WISH you knew in real life. i know theresa, i know kim, i know a lot of people you wish you knew, and i've gotten to know them intimately and i've gotten to know their fears and flaws, and seriously, you don't mean shit. so why doncha just shut your hole and stick with your brain stem because your entire frontal lobe just ain't doing it for you.

Posted by dave [virtual dwelling] @ 05/14/2002 01:00 AM PST

In response to what Stephen was saying, I do believe, sadly that even in this day and age, a lot of girls do take a more passive role in dealing with the shit that goes on in their lives because they were raised to think that way. They were taught to swallow their grief and to internalize it instead of outwardly acting them out. And I do agree that a lot of the stress we manifest is created in our own minds. What is it that Shakespeare said ... "Nothing is either good or bad, but thinking makes it so." However, I think it is totally ignorant to just assume that these mental problems are just "BS where you were FORCED 100% into your condition." Some people had the luck to grow up believing they have worth. Some people were told since they were little that they were wonderful people. Others didn't. They were criticized, belittled, and broken. A person's sense of self begins with upbringing and environment. No matter how you try to separate that fact, it stands. Who you are stems from how you are mirrored in others. Negative responses create a negative self-image. For some, this can create serious repercussions.

It's easy to judge when you're off in la-la land. Personally, I find that people who can self-reflect a lot more interesting than those who just go through life judging without imagining themselves in others' shoes. It's one thing to be a person that likes the simple things in life. It's quite another to be a simpleminded fool.

Posted by Michelle [virtual dwelling] @ 05/14/2002 12:37 AM PST

'the grass may appear greener on the other side, but chances are it tastes just as bad.' who's to say a normal life's any better than the one you're living now (i'm using normal loosely; defining ob/subjective accounts of who's to define the paragon of banality takes effort)? yeah, it's likely that you'd be more content and better off without these problems you're going through. it appears these experiences have caused you to grow, at the very least intellectually. i know not whether humanity holds my opinion on it, but i'd rather endure hardship and emerge a honed diamond than bypass malaise and remain uncut.
as always, imp-

Posted by impaired @ 05/13/2002 11:50 PM PST

Respecting everyone's opinion is important, but please dont tell me that "stephen" down there didnt just say that. kim, u are very brave and dont let anyone tell you otherwise. You're able to identify that you are ill, address the issue openly (inet-wise), and make the move to seek help. for that, you are greatly respected. keep the courage.

Posted by natalina [virtual dwelling] @ 05/13/2002 09:58 PM PST

hey if you were so smart... why would you get into so much shit to begin with? everyone has control over their lives... its not like some BS where you were FORCED 100% into your condition.

if that was so, then the entire fate of the world would have been decided 100 billion years ago. everyone makes choices, some not so smart, some wiser then others. Alot of luck plays into it as well, but even so, a properly played move can change your fate.

Maybe going to see a shrink will turn things around... maybe they'll make things worse. Who knows.

Just from my personal experience, guys are ALOT less stress prone, and alot more easy going. Crazy situations like this are more often spawned by females. Males take much more dominating roles and are more likely to take out their stress in physical releases (violence, sports whatnot). Girls tend to hold it all in and go nutzoid. :)

Posted by stephen @ 05/13/2002 09:41 PM PST

Everyone offers their advice, some good some bad. But it all boils down in the end to you gotta do what you gotta do for yourself. If you think you need professional help to get better, right on. If you want to move somewhere, transfer school, whatever. As long as its something you want. Only you know what you need, or what you think you need. but yeah addressing issues is a huge step.

Posted by Jack [e-meo] @ 05/13/2002 07:06 PM PST

Kim, When I started out getting my psych degree I would often get the end of a lot of jokes about being a psych major. People never really understood where it fit in as a science. And a lot of people said that psychology was the easy way for people that weren't smart enough to take medicine or neurochemistry. People don't really recognize the kind of effort and research it takes to understand the brain and how it works. And most people don't recognize that the brain, like all other organs, can malfunction and sometimes requires maintenance and care. We spend our lives developing mental systems in order to understand and interact with our world, but we rarely address that these very systems and our minds may go awry once in a while. Seriously, it takes a certain kind of person to really have an understanding and a want to address it. Everyone else is still caught up in the self-centered narrowmindedness of themselves. So, consider yourself an enlightened person in your own right. At least you address your problems and don't choose to be a ignorant crackhead, like so many of your detractors.

Posted by rijah @ 05/13/2002 06:21 PM PST