Depression

[V.Aye.R]

I deleted mine a couple of years ago and haven't missed it at all. I saw my wife's feed a couple of days ago and it seems to have degenerated into a competition between various women who are competing to see who can be the "best mummy" at Xmas. Me and the kids can tell when she's been on there because her mood changes noticably for the worse. 

Sounds like more of that "scarcity culture"@velo army was talking about previously

[RH33]

35 minutes ago, Tony Ferrino said:

I deleted mine a couple of years ago and haven't missed it at all. I saw my wife's feed a couple of days ago and it seems to have degenerated into a competition between various women who are competing to see who can be the "best mummy" at Xmas. Me and the kids can tell when she's been on there because her mood changes noticably for the worse. 

Competitive Christmas tree decorating and elf shelf one up man ship. 
 

[19QOS19]

Competitive Christmas tree decorating and elf shelf one up man ship. 
 

I'm guessing there are people posting the elf every day? We do it but because the eldest loves it. I don't have FB but I'd be shocked if my Mrs was posting it daily. Do things for you and your kids, not for the world to compliment you ffs.

[RH33]

1 minute ago, 19QOS19 said:

3 minutes ago, RH33 said:

Competitive Christmas tree decorating and elf shelf one up man ship. 
 

I'm guessing there are people posting the elf every day? We do it but because the eldest loves it. I don't have FB but I'd be shocked if my Mrs was posting it daily. Do things for you and your kids, not for the world to compliment you ffs.

I only log on every few days. My daughters football all run through a fb page so can’t delete it. 

[Academically Deficient]

Just to add to other's comments:  binning Facebook made me a much happier person. Never been tempted back. The negatives far outweighed the positives for me.

 

[NotThePars]

Yeah, I wiped all my socials and am much chiller about it. 

[D.A.F.C]

What most people don’t understand is that social media and Facebook or Instagram especially aren’t what they seem. On the surface its a nice app for talking to friends but it’s not that. It’s a money making tool and you’re the unwitting employee. It doesn’t care what shite it spews onto your screen it will make you depressed, anxious and jealous all sorts of negative emotions. People are getting paid to make you look at the screen, they don’t care what appears, it’s like a casino and designed to be addictive. With people being stuck in and looking at it more it will get even worse.

Last night I watched Tyson Fury talk about his depression openly on Johnathan Ross and how he lost ten stone and came back to be the world champion within months of trying to kill himself. He got no response, Maya Jama was then applauded for something she did on Instagram. 
Wtf have we become, we value meaningless crap and memes over inspirational life stories? 
Not sure where I’m going with this other than people don’t seem to like hearing raw truths and prefer to avoid talking about depression in real life.

I  think this is why Tyson is telling the bbc to gtf. The media have never supported him and backed Joshua despite his chequered past.

 

[parsforlife]

51 minutes ago, D.A.F.C said:

 

I  think this is why Tyson is telling the bbc to gtf. The media have never supported him and backed Joshua despite his chequered past.

 

Fury’s past isn’t exactly pretty either.  His battle over mental health deserves a lot of credit,  but the other parts of his character are a lot less appealing. 

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

51 minutes ago, parsforlife said:

Fury’s past isn’t exactly pretty either.  His battle over mental health deserves a lot of credit,  but the other parts of his character are a lot less appealing. 

Aye, I think there's much more of a grudging respect for fury due to the reasons you mention. There's a reason many people don't find his story inspirational and I don't think it's due to disinterest in mental health 

[RH33]

Highlighting celeb mental health does help highlight the issues. But many of them have the cash access private clinics others can’t. They’re experience of recovery is going to be so far removed from someone on an nhs ward. 

[V.Aye.R]

He's definitely had it harder as a Traveller.

The Jonathan Ross interview wasnt as described imo, he came across well and the conversation moves to Russell Kane.

[DA Baracus]

On 19/12/2020 at 19:59, buchan30 said:

No sure where to put this but It’s go seem stupid, but tonight has scunnered me as it feels like, being able to play 5s has now been set back months. We are not coming out of this on the 18th of January in a lower tier at all. Maybe a bit of an overreaction, but fitness wise it has been the only thing keeping me going. I actually had an “acht, whats the fucking point” moment. I know everyone has their own reasons for why it’s impacting them and this may seem trivial, but it just feels like that goal has been taken away.
It feels like it justifies all the junk food i eat, because well there is no rush to lose it. And that is a dangerous mindset for me to get into.
Hope this makes sense to someone.

Nah, that isn't stupid at all. Not an overreaction either, as everyone will react differently to the measures, which is fine as everyone has their own circumstances. 

Your reactions and feelings aren't just valid, they're also absolutely understandable.

Dude, our minds are often daft primitive nonsense that make us think that firing in to junk food all the time is a top idea, but they are often DOS software when we're Windows 10.

Basically our minds are sometimes caveman nonsense and that's normal and fine. 

It's also normal and fine to feel a bit pish, especially at certain times. You'll be told to persevere, to hold on, ride it out etc. 

That isn't anything I'd disagree with, but is easier said than done.

Accept your pish thoughts but acknowledge them for what they are. Accept you might feel melancholy for a couple of hours. You might feel angry for a bit. They're all valid, but how they affect you is down to you, even when you feel you can't change things 

On 19/12/2020 at 22:31, die hard doonhamer said:

I'm scunnered with it as well. Good chance that I'll be working from home and trying to home school my kids on my own for at least a week in the new year. I know that it won't be unique to me, but I'm fucking dreading it.

Don't feel that you can't feel shite just because others are in the same situation.

Your feelings are absolute valid. I bet most of the other parents feel the same way!

[DA Baracus]

I agree with the social media stuff. I still have Facebook but barely go on it. I only keep it for a couple of specific things.

Have never had Twitter. It's atrocious and I'd strongly urge folk to get rid of it.

Have never had Instagram and that seems like it could the worst of the lot as it's full of carefully staged nonsense that is in no way reflective of reality. It also consumes folk, especially younger people, who see so much through the lens of Instagram. What I mean by that is that something like a night out isn't about having a good time, but appearing to be having the best night ever for Instagram. The night out becomes about Instagram.

[velo army]

16 minutes ago, DA Baracus said:

I agree with the social media stuff. I still have Facebook but barely go on it. I only keep it for a couple of specific things.

Have never had Twitter. It's atrocious and I'd strongly urge folk to get rid of it.

Have never had Instagram and that seems like it could the worst of the lot as it's full of carefully staged nonsense that is in no way reflective of reality. It also consumes folk, especially younger people, who see so much through the lens of Instagram. What I mean by that is that something like a night out isn't about having a good time, but appearing to be having the best night ever for Instagram. The night out becomes about Instagram.

I for one am absolutely fuckin delighted that we didn't have these when I was in my teens and early 20's. And I mean a huge, bodily felt sense of relief. I'm bad enough for it now with going after the dopamine hit of likes and new content, but as a teenager I reckon it would have sent me over the edge as I was an anxious as f**k kid. So I applaud anyone who kicks it to the kerb, I imagine it detoxifies the soul quite a bit.

I also had a thought recently about the amount of negative threads there are here on the GN part of the forum and how they may affect mental health. I'm talking about the dominance of threads such as "Petty things that get on your nerves", "c*nts on the road", "things you hate about the football" and others of a similar bent. Reading and participating in threads like that might seem cathartic, and I can enjoy the gallows humour in some of the posts, but given that threads of this nature dominate in relation to more positive ones (and I mean overtly positive ones that deliberately get you to focus on things that you like) it shows and also creates an attentional bias towards negative stimuli, which is one of the indicators of depression. I'll own up to having wanted to start threads that encourage a focus on gratitude (an emotion strongly correlated with emotional resilience) such as "things we fuckin love about our partners", "things we absolutely love about the fitba" etc but have shat out of it thus far. I'll get on it tomorrow.

To @buchan30, I'm delighted you posted what you did mate. The fact that you seemed worried about whether your post belongs here speaks to a fair amount of courage in doing so. I don't imagine it's remotely rare either. We all of us have a thing that gives us structure, exercise, a sense of self that isn't "employee" and, given that it's fitba, a sense of fun and play. Having that taken away sounds like a fuckin huge blow to you and it's wholly natural to feel fear, anger and sadness around that. There's also the added thing of physical contact. We all need touch mate, and sometimes as men (if you're not a man then disregard this) our only way of getting it is through the context of sport. So aye, be kind and compassionate with your reaction to this as it's a fairly big loss.

[D.A.F.C]

Agree about negative stuff. People pretend to care and seem sympathetic, not talking about this thread or forum, but then openly abuse mental health.
I've seen people post countless posts or videos about mental health and its ok to not be ok etc then ignore or make fun out of people. I don't even know if they are self aware tbh. Just mindless morons following the latest fad.
Limmy summed it up well with the cancer wristbands. Nah f**k cancer lets move on and chuck it in the bin. Bands aren't cool anymore.
For these people its cool to pretend to care about mental health. Using that for attention and likes on facebook.
Its poison.

[DA Baracus]

7 hours ago, velo army said:

I for one am absolutely fuckin delighted that we didn't have these when I was in my teens and early 20's

Same! I've said to friends quite often how absolutely terrible it would have been. Phones weren't a thing for me at high school thankfully, with the first few only really appearing just as I left.

We had MSM Messanger when I was in 5th and 6th year and even though I barely used, it was already taking hold of some folk who described staying up to the early hours just chatting on it.

I had Bebo but that was played for laughs by most folk and seemed relatively harmless compared to Facebook. I'm sure some folk went a bit mental on it but fortunately it wasn't designed in the predatory way current 'social' media apps are.

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

I haven't deleted my Facebook but haven't logged on in more than a year, I think I'm just worried that there's a few people I wouldn't be able to get in touch with if I completely binned it. The fact I haven't got in touch with them in all that time means that's probably not a worthwhile excuse though.

I have an insta but maybe post once every three months and check it once a week or so. I'd actually say it's less harmful than Facebook, maybe just the people I follow though. Twitter just isn't for me, it's great for getting political news and analysis, following music and football but every time I've had it it's become way too much of a habit to just swipe swipe swipe whenever I'm not doing something else, so must have set up and then binned a half dozen accounts. I think if you have something to say, write about something etc it's terrific, but as I say not for me at this time. 

While they are in no way neutral tools and the algorithms exist to keep you on the site as long as possible, I don't think social media sites are necessarily an evil in and of themselves. But for a lot of folk, myself included, they are absolutely not worth the hassle and can reinforce your worst feelings about people. 

[Jacksgranda]

15 minutes ago, Genuine Hibs Fan said:

I haven't deleted my Facebook but haven't logged on in more than a year, I think I'm just worried that there's a few people I wouldn't be able to get in touch with if I completely binned it. The fact I haven't got in touch with them in all that time means that's probably not a worthwhile excuse though.

I have an insta but maybe post once every three months and check it once a week or so. I'd actually say it's less harmful than Facebook, maybe just the people I follow though. Twitter just isn't for me, it's great for getting political news and analysis, following music and football but every time I've had it it's become way too much of a habit to just swipe swipe swipe whenever I'm not doing something else, so must have set up and then binned a half dozen accounts. I think if you have something to say, write about something etc it's terrific, but as I say not for me at this time. 

While they are in no way neutral tools and the algorithms exist to keep you on the site as long as possible, I don't think social media sites are necessarily an evil in and of themselves. But for a lot of folk, myself included, they are absolutely not worth the hassle and can reinforce your worst feelings about people. 

For people with addictive personalties they're obviously a danger.

[NotThePars]

The best thing I’ve read about the malignant effects of social media has been The Twittering Machine which also contains this great anecdote

[Venti]

56 minutes ago, Genuine Hibs Fan said:

I haven't deleted my Facebook but haven't logged on in more than a year, I think I'm just worried that there's a few people I wouldn't be able to get in touch with if I completely binned it. The fact I haven't got in touch with them in all that time means that's probably not a worthwhile excuse though.

I have an insta but maybe post once every three months and check it once a week or so. I'd actually say it's less harmful than Facebook, maybe just the people I follow though. Twitter just isn't for me, it's great for getting political news and analysis, following music and football but every time I've had it it's become way too much of a habit to just swipe swipe swipe whenever I'm not doing something else, so must have set up and then binned a half dozen accounts. I think if you have something to say, write about something etc it's terrific, but as I say not for me at this time. 

While they are in no way neutral tools and the algorithms exist to keep you on the site as long as possible, I don't think social media sites are necessarily an evil in and of themselves. But for a lot of folk, myself included, they are absolutely not worth the hassle and can reinforce your worst feelings about people. 

Binning Facebook was one of the best things I've done mate. So many people you associate with/are related to coming across as minters.