u/Informal-Debate-3496

I know no one here can diagnose me and if this kind of post is not allowed I apologise. I'm just asking because I'm lost and want to know if this sounds familiar.

The firts time it happened it started in the evening as moderate stomach pain. I tried to ignore it and go to sleep, but I couldn't fall asleep as the pain was getting worse. It was located on the right and under the ribs, kind of radiated to my back. It got so bad I couldn't go get a painkiller. Couldn't do anything. Breathing felt hard and every position was uncomfortable. I started making weird suffering noises and luckily I was staying at my mom's so she heard me. At times I was yelling from the pain. It was worse than any pain I've experienced and I get migraines that make me throw up and unable to speak. My mom took me to the ER where they gave me a gram of ibuprofen and paracetamol. They took bloodwork and made me pee in a cup. Everything was okay. After suffering for some hours the pain went away and they just said ok we don't know what's wrong with you, but since you're fine now it's probably nothing. And I was just happy the pain stopped.

But then it happened again. And again. And again. And two of those times I've been seen by a doctor because I happened to be in a psych ward. But every time they say it's probably just my "body getting used to food again" because I have an eating disorder. And I know that's a fucking lie. I FEEL the pain in an organ I think. I KNOW it's not just some air in my stomach like they say.

Finally a doctor kind of listened to me last week, but he said he'll refer me to get an ultrasound in January or something. These have all happened within the last two months. I don't understand why no one cares that I'm in terrible pain.

Could this be gallbladder related? I'm only 22 and underweight so I may not "fit the profile". I'm more scared of fatty foods if anything. But I also read that weight gain AND loss can cause gallbladder issues. And obviously some people just get unlucky so even an otherwise healthy person could in theory have gallstones.

I'm currently staying at a mental hospital. For the past two days I have been spending time with a woman, another patient, here. Yesterday I didn't know much about her, but after I had spent some time with her, a nurse came to my room and told me that if it gets to be too much with her they will do something about it. I didn't understand what they were talking about. Today I learnt she is a part of a MLM and she tried (and is probably still trying) to get me to join as well. Specifically forever living products.

She first wouldn't speak about her job. She said she really wants to help people but that currently she doesn't have the strength to do that, because she needs to take care of herself first. Despite bringing up negative things all the time, she also constantly reminds herself and I that we need to focus on the positive things. We went on a walk and I shared about my life and I guess that made her comfortable to share about hers as well. She started telling me things about the company she works with. How it was started and how their mission is to help people and how it is a family business. How she found great help from their aloe vera products for her skin and gut health. She gave me a business card and asked me what I need help with. She said people often get discouraged from working with them when she tells them about her long journey with the company, because they think they're unable to learn all she knows. At this point I didn't even understand it's a MLM. I don't know much about the topic and this is the first time I've got into direct contact with one. I asked her how she got into working with them. Did she contact them after finding help from their products or did they contact her? She explained that a friend of her mother's introduced the company to her. At this point I started to finally figure it out. She went on to explain how I can join to get my ID number and get 5% off and the more that I spent or something the more percentages I get off. I was not interested in their products or joining.

As we were headed back inside, she started saying something that I can't get out of my head. She started to tell me the main reason she is in the mental hospital, but then went quiet and backed away just like she had done previously when she was about to talk about her job. This and the weird thing the nurse said yesterday made me think this is causing her some distress. And obviously these things could be completely unrelated but I can't help but wonder if being a part of that MLM is actually what lead to some problems in her life. She has worked with them for 15 years. She uses their pricey products every day. It's her only job, so I don't understand how she can afford it. She only speaks about forever with people in real life so it's not like she reaches massive amounts of people online.

Is there something I can do to help her? Or does she need help? I don't know.

I am currently in a pretty good place with my mood. I've been diagnosed with depression for years but I don't think that's what I have. I also haven't been taking my meds because I suck. I genuinely don't know how I could get myself to take them, because no matter where I place them or how many alarms I set, I somehow get distracted and forget. I don't mind really, because like I said I'm doing fine with my mood right now.

But the depression always comes back and each time it seems to get more severe. I experience weeks or months of low moods and during those times my life completely falls apart. I push everyone away. I have no interest in any of my hobbies. I barely take care of myself or the apartment. I see no future for myself, and last time I took a bunch of pills in hopes of never waking up again. I think that is it. I have nothing and things will never get better.

Until they do. Overnight. For no reason. I literally just wake up without the depression and start getting my life back on track. I contact the people I pushed away and make plans. I often get some kind of new interest or hobby and I make all sorts of purchases for that because I'm sure it will be my life's purpose and passion. I barely sleep but I feel just fine. I get this feeling that I'm just too good to be depressed and life can't get me down because I'm invincible. Normally I'm pretty insecure (I also have an eating disorder and body dysmorphia is a pain in the ass) but during these times I think I'm the most pretty and beautiful person there is. And I do get a lot of compliments too which just boosts my mood even more.

I used to be in a relationship, but once during a time like this I got drunk and made out with a stranger. That was really out of character for me because I really did love my boyfriend and I think I still kind of do. I then ended the relationship despite my ex wanting to work through it. It was the final blow because he didn't deserve my unstable bs. I had pushed him away and left him multiple times before when I got depressed and then reached back out when I was feeling better.

Because of the negative affect on my relationship I told a doctor about this. She made me fill out a questionnaire for bipolar and I showed high signs. But she then told me I should see a psychiatrist and I understood she'd make a referral for one, but she never did that. I got to a bad place with my eating disorder and I needed hospitalisation so this thing just got left behind. After that I've moved and haven't had a primary care doctor or anything like that. So now it's just kind of unresolved.

And I don't know if I should try to speak to a doctor about this again. Because I'm doing relatively good currently. And I don't even know if I experienced hypomania or not. And I have the bigger elephant in the room, the eating disorder, to take care of too. And if I were to get diagnosed with bipolar what would that do for me? Since I can't get myself to take my meds what would be the point?

Oh and also, my father is diagnosed with bipolar but I can't really compare myself to him or anything like that because he has never really been in my life.

I'm exhausted and my life is a mess. I'm in debt but I spend money to b/p every day. I'm angry and stressed out all the time and I don't see a way out. I'm supposed to start a new UAS program and move out of my mom's house in August but honestly I think I might kill myself. I don't see myself ever recovering. I've been inpatient for months and months over and over again. I just got home from an inpatient stay that started as a general hospital stay because of low potassium, and then turned into a week of being in a useless psych ward where they didn't give a shit about if I ate anything at all. Nothing helps me. My potassium is probably dangerously low again because I purge so many times a day that I can't even count them. I don't want to live anymore. I have dreams but I can't even achieve them because I don't have money to finish my UAS program anyway. I've fucked up everything and I'm all alone. I just need to find a way to do it.

Forgive me if I'm using completely wrong terminology as I haven't yet started my studies and English isn't my first language. But I'm just extremely happy that I got into a school to study MLS.

I first saw a microbial culture years ago when my biology teacher was talking about her education. It was just a small picture of the dish and she didn't even really talk about that so I didn't get a clear idea of what it was. I just thought it looked cool and I wanted to know more about it but I was too shy to ask. I didn't think I'd have a future as a biology teacher, and I didn't know what that thing was, so I accepted the fact that whatever it was, it wasn't a part of my future.

And then I learned about the existence of medical laboratory science. But none of it was practical. I just knew that there were different paths and the work could be something in a laboratory. And that it requires good eyesight. When I read the descriptions of the program I felt like my skills and interests really matched what was needed. I have always been interested in blood so I thought I'd do something with that.

AND NOW I LEARNED THAT MICROBIOLOGY REGULARLY USES THOSE THINGS I SAW BACK THEN IN THE BIOLOGY CLASS??!?!

I'm not even kidding I want to get those petri dishes even though I can't do anything with them just because I'm so excited and I think they look super fun. I just want to look at one. I want to hold one. Ok I'm super weird I apologise. I also like the vials used to collect blood samples.

I'm starting my MLS program soon and I'm curious to hear how others got into studying that!

I had never even heard of it a couple years back. I was in a university studying English and struggling with it a lot. I was never a good writer or creative in the way that is required to analyse texts. I only started it because a counsellor from my upper secondary shool suggested that since I did well in English (which is very different from studying English at a university), I could study that. But I didn't end up liking it much. The amount of times I cried over essays I had to write was a lot. In classes I found myself scribbling down random math problems just to see if I could still solve them. All that for what? No clear career ahead of me. Possibly no jobs at all. I didn't want to be a teacher and machines are taking the translation jobs. Besides, I only know 2,5 languages and the very basics of a few others, so as a translator or interpreter I wouldn't have been that needed.

Because of my own health issues, I have a lot of blood tests. I've always found blood fascinating and I like watching all the things happen in a lab. For some reason I thought people drawing blood were all nurses. But one day when I was having my blood drawn I noticed that the name tag of that woman said "MLS STUDENT". And when I got out of the room I immediately googled what that was. And something just clicked right then and there. All my interests and skills matched that much more than any other careers I've considered. And studying that seemed much less vague than studying English.

So after a stressful time of sorting my life out and taking the exam, I got accepted into my top pick of schools and I am starting my program next month! Of course I can't know what it's ACTUALLY like, but from all that I've heard and read I think it will be a great fit for me. And maybe I'll finally become a respectable member of society😭

I'm 22 and I've had an ED since I was 12. It started as anorexia but in recent years I also started to binge and purge. I was first inpatient when I was 15 and then put in a group home for my ED. There were good years where I was recovered, but in the past year I've been inpatient 3 times and on 3 shorter hospital admissions for low potassium.

I should be recovering as fast as I can now, but I can't stop purging no matter how hard I try. I'm living with my mom, and I thought telling her would make it better. It didn't. I just learned to be even more secretive about it. I'm physically at a point where they would take me in no question, they could even hospitalise me against my will. I've just been so many times that I don't know if it would do any good.

And the problem is that I'm starting my dream studies in a month. I can't go inpatient because I'll probably lose my place in the school. I've already registered for the semester. I'm so lost and don't know what to do. I thought thay if I got into the school I'd recover. I need to be strong and have energy to study. But it didn't turn out thay way.

I feel so alone. I have no treatment currently, because I'm also moving in a month and they stopped my treatment here and referred me to the ED clinic in the new city. I only have another type of doctors appointment and some blood tests coming up, but I can't even talk with anyone.

I'm annoyed with the situation. Multiple doctors have told me that there's a possibility I have bipolar 2. My father has it and so does my sister. I clearly have periods of bad depression, but I'm not sure about the hypomania. I often experience a miraculous healing from my depression. It's very sudden and a drastic change in every aspect of my life. I have been depressed for months and seen no way out of it, when suddenly everything changes for the better in a single day. I get a burst of energy (despite only sleeping a few hours a night) and start all my hobbies again, sometimes new ones too. I text all the people I pushed away when I was depressed and make plans with them. Got together with my ex multiple times at times like these (and broke up during the depression). I feel super confident and like everything always goes my way in the end.

Anyway, nothing is done to investigate further. I have a serious eating disorder and everyone ALWAYS focuses on just that. They have said that they should refer me to a psychiatrist and that I need to get properly tested for bipolar, but then never followed through. And I'm always having different doctor because I've been bouncing around from place to place so currently no on even know my situation fully.

And I get that I'm in a critical condition because of my eating disorder. In theory I should be in a hospital against my will now because I meet the criteria. But I have had this disorder for 10 or so years now. I think they should try to treat something else, if there is something else that is. When I get depressed my ED gets worse, but when the depression disappears I usually do better with my eating as well.

I don't know what to do because I don't even have a doctor currently. My treatment in the place I'm at just ended, because I'm moving next month.

It's been almost a year now, since the cheating incident and the breakup. And I still feel like someone is watching my every move and somehow seeing every thing I do, whether it be online or irl. Even typing this I'm hesitant because I feel like someone is keeping tabs. And then I feel stupid and self centered because who would want to stalk me? How arrogant can I get? But I feel like I need to talk about the whole thing and I really don't have friends so here I go.

I (f22) was some kind of friends with him (m22) for years. It was hard to figure him out. Sometimes I felt like he liked me a lot and other times it seemed that I wasn't worth his time. We were in the same class for some time, but ultimately lived in different places. He was kind, funny and super interesting. He helped me a lot during a really unstable time in my life. He was the first guy that I could trust in my life besides my grandfather.

When I moved away for university I couldn't get him out of my mind and I invited him to my place. And that's when I confessed that I have feelings for him and have had for years. Well apparently they weren't one sided after all and soon we started dating.

We were both each other's first partners. And in a lot of ways the relationship was good. He was good. I however, had and have a lot of emotional baggage. I struggle with my mental health and I need a lot of space and room to myself. For that a long distance relationship was pretty convenient. I would isolate myself from time to time and even start questioning the fairness of that towards him, but he insisted that as long as I would come back when I'm feeling better, he'd be there for me.

And I don't know if it was an actual problem from his end, or my delusion, but I started feeling watched. He knew things he maybe shouldn't know. I often got a weird feeling, but there was no proof of anything.

One time I had told him I'm going to bed, but I ended up commentig stupid shit back and forth with my sister on our Instagram edit accounts. The next day my boyfriend called me out for not going to bed when I said I was. I was a bit confused when he said he had seen our conversations. Those were random comments on old posts, and not even on our main accounts. Even him knowing of the existence of those accounts was a little weird, because my sister especially liked to keep hers very private. But I might have told him when I was drunk some time.. We will get back to me being drunk because I think I have a problem.

When I moved to a new apartment building the hallway had a qr code to join the telegram group chat for the building. My bf saw it and jokingly (or so I thought) asked if he should join the gc. I think I laughed or something, but later he joined anyway.

Another time was when a guy I went to uni with dm:d me on insta, asking me if I knew the guy, with a screenshot of my bf's profile attached to it. I explained he was my bf and asked why he's asking. To which he said that the guy keeps viewing all of his stories but doesn't follow him, so it just felt a little strange. I felt frustrated. I think at that point I confronted my bf and told him I feel like he's everywhere and he doesn't need to be in my apartment building's gc. He said he had just been curious to see what people talk about in groups like that, and that he was looking at the guy's stories because he had "good memes".

Everything like this made me feel suffocated in the relationship. Someone was violating my space and I wasn't happy with it.

If we got into an argument or I left him (because I did that a couple of times, mainly for the reason that I felt like I couldn't give him a 100% and wasn't fit to be in a relationship) he'd contact my sister. He also did that when I was struggling with my mental health a lot, and I get he was coming from a good place, but to me that was crossing a line. Once he even shared a letter I had written to him with my sister. (I think it was to convince my sister I'm not thinking clearly when I want to leave him, because the letter says otherwise).

And now we get to my mistake. I should have left him and never looked back. It was just so difficult to break up with him because I didn't know what I wanted and somehow he convinced me that he knows me better than myself. But I was already halfway out of the relationship and had been for a while. One night I went out with my sister and cousin. I clearly should not be drinking alcohol, because I honestly don't remember much. I met a guy and I liked talking with him, because we spoke English together (it's neither of us first language). We danced and I remember him accusing me of being a witch and saying something about my eyes. Apparently I kissed him. (I do not remember, but that's how he says it went so I believe it). I also have no recollection of wanting to continue the night somewhere else with him, but apparently that also happened. But we did not. We went our separate ways and I thought I'd never speak to him again.

I felt guilty afterwards. Obviously. It was really out of character for me to do something like that. I was hesitant on telling my bf about it because I knew how much it would hurt him. I don't understand how I could do something like that. The relationship was done either way. I ended up telling him. And then things got even weirder.

I don't remember exactly how things went but my bf figured out who the guy was. He told me he had seen the guy was at the place we were at from twitter. They don't know each other, but the guy was/is? a part of an e sports team or their management or something. So my bf had seen the team at the same place, and then later connected the dots because the guy I kissed had tweeted something about my eyes. (what a coincidence right... I don't really believe in those)

But oh boy did it get messy... My bf (or maybe I should start calling him ex already) messged my sister, my cousin AND THAT GUY. I had nothing to hide so it was fine, but I felt bad for dragging an innocent guy who didn't even know I was dating into our relationship drama. And I was mad. Do I have the right? No. Because what I did was horrible. But why the fuck do you always have to contact every single person in my life?? And why did I once again feel like he was lying about the way he found the guy?

And would you believe it, even after all this, HE DID NOT WANT TO BREAK UP. I left him. Because someone who loves you doesn't behave the way I did. I can't explain it. I have no excuse. I feel bad and I hope my ex finds or has found someone who can maybe love in the same way he does. If someone is as obsessed with him as he was with me maybe it could work. He's a good person and didn't deserve this. I really hope he's doing well and I often want to reach out to see how he is, but I stay away because I've caused enough harm already.

But even still, a year later, I can't shake the feeling I'm being watched. I'm afraid to post on social media. I can't even explain why. Can I ever get over this? And do you think I can ever date again? Or should I even date? Given my cheating history. I never thought I would be that kind of person.

I've noticed the paranoia comes and goes, and right now it's not that bad. But I've had periods of time when I find it hard to leave the house because I feel like everyone is looking at me weirdly and scheming something. I had to check my whole apartment, including the shower drain, because I was afraid there were cameras.

This was long and messy. I just needed to type out my thoughts and vent. It would have been even longer and messier if I had included the suspicions of me possibly having bipolar disorder, but it's not diagnosed and I figured it wouldn't make much difference anyway.

For some reason I was sure that if I got into the school I wanted I would easily recover. I'd have a reason to take care of myself because I need to be well to do well in school. I was almost sure I wouldn't get in though, because it's really difficult, especially for someone like me who already got accepted to one university and took that spot. Well I did get in. Everything in my life got so much better. I got a new pet and I'm soon starting my dream studies in a city I love.

But the eating disorder didn't go anywhere. I don't know how I could be so stupid that I even thought it would. I just convinced myself that I'll have other things to fill my life with and I won't "need" it anymore. But I'm still struggling so much. I binge and purge every day and I'm really underweight. I don't have proper support because it's summer and they're transferring my treatment to another city as I have to move. But they've told me I'm at a point where they could legally force me to a hospital already for my low bmi. And I'm terrified to find out what my potassium is in ten days because I've been hospitalised for it many times in the past six months.

I don't know what to do:/ I have a little over a month until my school starts and I don't even want to go there looking the way I do now. Everyone can see I'm unwell and it's embarrassing. But I just can't eat like a normal person. If I try I end up throwing up because it has become so normal for me that I can do it without trying. And when I feel guilty for eating that's just the easy way out and I take it every single time.

I'm scared they'll hospitalise me and I'll lose my spot in the school or something. I also can't be hospitalised because of the pet I have now. My mom doesn't want to take care of her. I was just so sure that none of this would be an issue because I was supposed to be better. But I can't do it on my own. I'm not recovered and I can't do it alone. What do I do?