Distraction Techniques

[Tutti]

I started cross stitching to help distract my mind. I also started a blog about my depression, bipolar and PTSD and the things I am learning in therapy to help me.

[Netsuke]

It really depends on how down I'm feeling sometimes the things I think will be hard to face and make me feel worse actually do the opposite. For example I was sitting watching tv with my flat mate feeling secretly terrible.. Then he said everyone's coming round to watch the football soon.. I was dreading it thinking I'm going to be an anxious mess but actuality the opposite happened.. We had a gd laugh and my mood completly lifted.

[moakley64]

Then start there. Make that your outside "happy place". I also am without friends. Alas, my problem is that I have pushed most of them away. If you like to garden, go on Pintrest. You can find things for your garden, things to do in your garden, and things that you may never do, but that can be your "fantasy garden". Baby steps! I live in the US in Illinois. We had a Super Walmart open and the first time I went there I had a massive panic attack and had to leave. Since it's open 24 hours a day, I try to go very early in the morning or late at night. Never on the weekend. I also do the same when I shop for groceries. "Happy places" can be anywhere or anything. Your snakes are your happy place. One of my happy places is a gas station that has a cappuccino machine. It has my favorite flavor. Over the years, I have lost a lot of my happy places (distractions). I used to love to read. That's gone. There are a ton of other things that are gone, so I try to find other little things that can be a new "happy place".

[moakley64]

I don't call them distractions, I call them my "happy places". Computer games (hidden objects ones are my favorite because I really have to concentrate), Pintrest, facebook, TV shows. Depending on how I'm feeling, cooking or baking makes me feel better.

[Dave Baird]

Some very interesting suggestions here, although I was a bit taken aback by the judgemental replies regarding porn as a distraction. It doesn't work for me, but the last thing I would do is impose my opinion on someone else who does find it useful as a tool. I left Facebook because there were too many negative downsides (for me). I own over twenty guitars and have hardly been able to pick one up in the last five years. I have a dog who is lucky if he gets out for a walk more than once or twice a week. I can't concentrate long enough to read a menu in McDonalds, let alone a book or magazine. Being around people works for a very short period - it doesn't take much to send me into either stress or anxiety around people, and even in the midst of a huge crowd, I am still alone and lonely, as well as stressed and anxious. The very thought of turning every activity as therapy, and evaluating it as such is incredibly depressing. Maybe I am really just a lost cause, after all.

[ollie1]

Sydney,
lmfao, thought i hit booze to drown sorrows and the bad music i was playing, am male and single so porn goes with out saying lol, keep on rockin in the free world : )

[ollie1]

I was in work and thought of sydney's earlier post made me laugh again, Distraction techniques for males beer, porn and music lol

[smokin]

I always find checking that my animals are ok takes my mind off things

[Sarah76]

I like hidden chronicles as a distraction when things get to much on Zynga

[Tiggigiz]

I read, if I can manage to hold the words in my head and not re-read the same page multiple times
I blog, it started out to document my migraines so I had the information and has fine in from there, I now have a blog for depression, a blog for my poems (not happy ones I'm afraid) and a random blog, tat I hope to build on if I get better

I found that if I can just stop myself from thinking! I can get by for that amount of time.