h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I decided to start this thread here for us so we can talk about the *problems* that are in various ways related to our various traumas, and that we still need to overcome, in some way. Some of these problems we may be able to solve largely on our own, while other problems some people may help us with. In this forum we can talk about it all. In the act of talking (well, actually, writing), some of us may be able to see our own problems in a better light ... or by talking to people and hearing about other people's problems, we may understand our own problems better ... maybe we can give each other some advice, or even other kinds of support. Whatever the case, I think this might be of some help.

I want to start by talking about some of my own problems and how I'm trying to understand and solve them myself, and what kind of progress I'm making, and what kind of help I might still need.

A problem that I still have and that affects me very badly is the 'night terrors'. This I experience just about every evening or night. It starts usually from about eight at evening ... sometimes it starts sooner, sometimes a bit later ... and from there on it gets progressively worse. These 'night terrors' might perhaps be a form of extreme paranoia. Generally mixed up in the entire thing there are fears that the world is in very big trouble. I'm fearing that life, everywhere, is going to turn into a kind of Hell. At that time I start experiencing my own life, also as a kind of Hell. I then think that this kind of Hell is the only real existence that there is ... that there is no hope of existence ever being good and happy and free from worry. I worry about everybody and everything on the planet. I worry that war is going to break out everywhere and ravage the planet. I think of soliders fighting a war ... somewhere in a scorchingly hot and dusty desert fighting strange enemies, seeing their friends butchered in front of their faces, fearing for their lives every waking moment, being kept awake at night with drugs because danger is present around the clock, having to work in a condition of extreme perpetual exhaustion and fear, having to kill people, killing people and being unable to come to terms with being a killer of people ... finding yourself killing defenseless women and children ... reaching the point where killing comes naturally to you ... and also facing the responsibility of safeguarding your buddies and feeling that it's your fault when *they* get killed ... I think of this kind of existence, I think of war breaking out everywhere in the world and what it will be like for us ... to fear violent death every time and every place ... and then the wars of power and control outside the spheres of physical violence: wars of information, misleading people, exploiting people, when all of us are under attack from people who want to take advantage of us, when there are lies everywhere and it reaches the point where there *is* no truth anymore, just a choice between whose lies to believe... a condition where about 99.99% of the people in the world are effectively the miserable material slaves of the 0.01% of people who constitute the economic elite ... I think of the rampant destruction of the earth's natural wealth ... until almost all species of plants and animals are extinct, and only a miserable remnant remains that humans believe to be economically necessary ... and where all human languages become extinct, except for English, and we forget how valuable it was to have had these thousands of different languages, thousands of different ways of thinking and seeing, experiencing the world, and we forget what it is that we've lost ... we cannot see anything else any more, except what we're being presented with ... we can't value anything any more except what the advertisements present to us ... this is where the night terrors start, for me, and it very rapidly gets worse and worse and worse. So every day I end in this kind of conceptual Hell. I want to stress that these are not merely abstract thoughts ... it becomes a kind of concrete, actual, real, lived experience.

Is this just paranoid schizophrenia? Doesn't it perhaps have to do with the *fact* that I lived a life where once I had trusted people - my leaders, who were supposed to be wise and decent men - and then discovered that I had been misled and betrayed by them? That I had once thought things were okay ... but then found out that they were *not* okay, in a very, very bad way? How can I trust the leaders of the world, now that I know that leaders are not automatically trustworthy, and that they can have all sorts of evil agendas, and that they can so easily tell out-and-out lies to their followers? That, if they are powerful enough, they can control all information and even *create* information, *create* the Truth that they want their followers to believe, to suit their own agendas? Am I wrong, or not, in believing that this is a threat to the entire world?

Everytime I get in this state, it's a monstrous battle, a fight. I have to fight to find out whether my fears are grounded are not; I have to fight the feelings of helplessness, futility and dispair; I have to fight to try and make it to the point where I can go to sleep and wake up again and live to see another day. When I get into this state I am often very suicidal and more than once I have seriously planned committing suicide. Then there is mixed up in all of this the belief that I am called to fight the bad people, the wrongs that I see. And I just cannot face such a fight, not in my condition, not in *any* condition, because I'm just a single and very weak person, whereas my enemies are many and exceedingly powerful. Maybe there's something wrong in this view ... in the view that it's *my problem*, or evn *my job* to put right the wrongs in the world. But, try as I might, I can't get rid of this sort of conviction ... the mere fact that I'm aware of a certain problem seems to create inside my soul an unshakeable conviction that I should do something about this problem about which I know. The opposite is to believe that I should do nothing ... which is apathy, which I hate ... or that I *can* do nothing ... which is a feeling of being totally helpless, which I also hate. So in a way it seems I cannot win, unless I *can* actually do something to help solve the problem. But, in my present condition ... what? The only thing I can think of is to write about these things.

So anyways, this is one thing that I am still struggling with enormously, right now. It is a complex mix of perhaps justified and unjustified paranoia and other things. I don't yet know if anybody can help me, but maybe by writing about it here I can somehow help myself.

I also hope that others of us here can maybe do the same, for themselves. Or maybe we can figure out ways to help each other.

You care too much, that shouldn't be a problem but there is so much going on that you can't switch off. It seems ridiculous but you need to think about mundane stuff every now and again. I really have no idea how to help you, I am sorry. I sometimes have a drink but you may not be able to do that, and it may not be advisable for many people to seek solace in alcohol. I feel a level of what you do, but not to not a degree. I find it easier to switch off.

I feel for you and if I ever hear of an answer I will tell you straight away.

Its good to be compassionate but don't forget yourself.

Hey Kaz, thanks, and don't worry about me! I'm learning how to deal, better and better each day. And, also, it really helps for me to be able to write about it here, and it also helps me a lot just to know that you've read it, and that you understand! I do not wish to, and cannot in fact, seek solace in alcohol ... it will destroy me, the last time I tried drinking, it very almost did. But really I do not wish for or need this kind of escape. Somebody said, the only way out is through. I just have to keep fighting the same fight even if I have to fight it each and every day! I've been managing so far. But thanks again for your concern!

Keep up the good fight, you're worth it
It must be exhausting to have night terrors.
I have gone through periods, I did not want to sleep because it would be too stressful! Nightmares and stopping breathing.
Fortunately it passed but I cannot imagine what it would feel like to have that for years

I will give it some thought ,see if I remember anything in the way of a tool for it. I sort of doubt it, but maybe...

Speaking of that,do you have sleep apnea? It can cause a lot of discomforts and nightmares while trying to sleep.

I did not realize that is what night terrors are like.
I always thought they were nightmares.
It is good to learn that also.

Willem,

I've been through this too; I came to the conclusion:

Yes, there are more of "them" than there are of "us"; but "we" are stronger!

Good will win; it's what every fairy tale, myth & legend are based on; every civilisation on earth cannot be wrong.

Keep up the you have for the planet & everything in it; it's the only answer; you can never hope to be perfect or save the world, but you can be a good person; which you are. The fact that you are not alone in this HAS to give you hope.

Sweetdreams,

Terri.

This site sure is a special education!

Hi again everybody! I call them 'night terrors' because they aren't nightmares. I'm not asleep when I'm having them. For me they're actually much worse than nightmares are. I used to have bad nightmares, but the ones I'm having now aren't that bad. I think I might write a journal entry on one particular kind of recurrent nightmare I'm having. It's not the kind of nightmare I've ever heard anybody else of having so far. I'd be interested to know the kinds of nightmares any of you experience.

It is rather strange ... after experiencing these 'night terrors' I would expect to have more nightmares, but often after these horrible experiences I go to sleep and sleep and dream quite peacefully. I must say the majority of my dreams are great, and I think dreaming is a very important thing.

Abbi, no, I don't experience sleep apnea, as far as I know. But I do experience something else, and again, I'd be interested to know if anybody else experiences it. It is sleep/waking paralysis. What happens is that I wake up from being asleep, but I find that my body is totally paralysed. It often takes me a very long time before I manage to move. It is a very unpleasant experience.

I have sleep/waking paralysis.
I love hearing about dreams, if you write about them ,I will read them for sure!