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Anxiety Gaming Wants To Offer Mental Help Via Game Console
An Ominous Cow Erred writes "In an odd approach to reaching out to otherwise shut-in sufferers of mental distress, an organization called Anxiety Gaming is betting that online intervention is the best way to reach people with emotional difficulties. Their argument is that the social nature of modern gaming makes it a valid means of reaching people who might not otherwise seek help through more traditional channels. According to their Facebook page, their future intentions seem to include distributing consoles to homes for foster youth, to encourage them to look to games for positival interpersonal communication."
"Of course these people should be offered all the help they can get. Of course!"
"But MAYBE if they have so much trouble walking as part of a highly mobile species, they should be ignored and allowed to die out."
-- Stephen Hawking
as part of a highly social species
Just because most members of the species are highly social doesn't mean that all of them have to be, or that it's bad when an individual is not.
I'm sure that there are peppy-people-person guidance counselors who haven' gotten the memo yet; but the criteria(or at least criteria for intervention) for most psych disorders includes '*whatever symptoms* are present and cause the patient significant trouble or distress'. Starting "Operation Afflict The Solitary" purely because Being Social Is Good! is pointless and unethical norm-imposition.
Providing a means by which the lonely-but-socially-anxious can acclimatize themselves, by contrast, would certainly be a good thing, even better if it can be done by means that are cheaper, easier to distribute, and lower-stigma than psychologists/psychiatrists.
I'd be a bit sceptical as to whether present-day retail-ready tech is good enough at reading and displaying things like facial nuance that(much to my vexation) are vital to in-person communication; but if they are, this seems like a good thing.
And it's that latter part, i.e. "and causes the patient significant trouble or distress" that is very often overlooked, especially in kids.
I really wonder how many of our kids that "need" some kind of psychoactive drug would be perfectly happy without.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"Give kids toys and they're happier for 5 minutes".
But I'm afraid that kids who have deep seating anxiety or other mental health issues need help thats a bit deeper than this well meaning but rather naive approach.
It's wonderful being normal, isn't it?
One of the kinds of deep running insanities inside of me is called social anxiety (SA, for short). It's a very debilitating demon that's very nature prevents you from going out and getting the help so desperately require (not that the help is going to be terribly effective, SSRIs are a lackluster treatment, tbh).
One of the things that people like me (but not necessarily me) take offense to is normal people equating their petty little social insecurities with our living hell. So while it may be true you need to have the will to change to really get better (always good advice), I cannot help but laugh at your ignorance. If it were really as easy as a bit of bulking I'd imagine SA to be one of the rarer mental illnesses rather than being stuck in the top five. And yes, attractive people have it to.
If you want to play the comparison game, your discomfort is a small hill, and ours is a mountain.
I think one of the best things to do is offer your condolences without saying you understand, because you don't. You can't possibly understand the sheer unimaginable terror that runs through our heads and drives many of us to suicide.
This, basically.
As someone with anxiety issues, online FORUMS are fantastic, as they allow for shared discussion. I'll be damned how the gaming community, not known for there most sympathetic nature as a whole, would help in these situations.
I'm reminded of that all-time great, http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19
Suicide definitely isn't cowardly or selfish. In fact, it's incredibly hard to actually go through with. Is it a defense to try to guilt these people into not killing themselves? It's a shame really, guilt is one of the feelings that can lead them to suicide.
Your insistence to be there for your friend is a greatly admired and definitely a wonderful thing. Your friend is lucky to have someone like you.
Even for my friends there's nothing I can do even though I understand what they're going through. Being supportive is really all you can do.
I had a very bad day recently. Nothing special happened to me, it was just one of those days where you run out of strength to keep yourself together.
I sat down and wrote some text that took me almost 5 hours to write - detailing my experiences with SA. I thought of posting it anonymously somewhere but anxiety took over and I didn't. I'll bite the bullet this time.
Here's an excerpt:
I went to get a university degree, left home and started living as a student. Without my parents or any friends I was left completely on my own. The new city I moved to was larger and it's streets more crowded. I had no way to avoid people now and anxiety was a constant every time I left my student home. I could no longer go into shops or restaurants or school for that matter without experiencing fear. The terror that was once limited to passing people on the street was seeping into all other aspects of my life.
It's hard to explain the intense fear but imagine you have been detained and sentenced to death by a firing squad. They come for you in your cell and are now dragging you to get shot. That's the anxiety mixed with anticipation of what will or might happen next. It's the moments before social interaction. Then they put you in front of men with guns pointing at you. If you can imagine that fear, that's the fear I felt. Or if you fear heights. It's being held over a brim of a cliff and being thrown over it.
At that point your mind is like a swarm of bees. So noisy. You feel like you're in mortal danger and all you can think of is get out. Your mind is racing to find a way to run, but there is no escape. If you move, if you run - they'll shoot you - and in the real world you'll embarrass yourself even more, looking like a lunatic (Don't lose control!). But your mind doesn't accept that answer and doesn't want to give up, you see there has to be a solution to this problem and being that the danger is eminent, finding the solution is most urgent. You are buzzing with countless thoughts that aren't discernible, it's like running full speed in empty gear.
Then there are the physical changes. Blurred vision, uneasiness, feeling like you'll faint. Blood leaves your extremities and you become even more pale than usual. You feel extremely vulnerable.
Overwhelmed with this you need to find the strength to hold back the instinct to run and form coherent thoughts through all that noise to deal with what ever social situation you got yourself into. Often it's hard o not simply shutdown.
There were good days where I had enough strength to carry me through the day, then there were the bad days. I ran out of food one day and would have to go to the supermarket. I dreaded it so much I stayed in my room for the whole day. Starving. It wasn't an isolated occurrence.
To explain, going to the shop wasn't a problem - assuming I wouldn't meet anyone on the way, which might be possible considering it was 50 meters away at most. Interacting with the cashier and possibly other personnel was the terrifying part.
The constant anxiety becomes unbearable. To the point where you start to fear fear itself. You feel anxiety over feeling anxiety in a future circumstance. And what happens often is you start avoiding situations that repeatedly lead you to feel anxiety.
You build this prison for yourself. Meeting people makes you feel anxious? Not going to meet people anymore. Going shopping strikes fear into you, yeah who needs it anyway. School, doctor's appointments, visiting your professors at office hours, phone calls, going to the bank to pay your bills... Yeah. Pretty soon the only place you feel comfortable anymore is a dark corner in your room.
Then there's the depression. Anxiety never comes alone. It's followed by an equal measure of depression. When social interaction becomes something you fear the most you deprive yourself of the outside world as much as you can. That leads to depression. You realize just how broken you are. What comes easy to others to the point that they don't even give it a thought - can take sometimes days of mental preparation for you. Suicidal thoughts are a daily occurrence.
The rest is not important...
As someone who could have used a hand when I was younger, and now suffers from a 'spectrum' of disorders, I can tell you a little can go a long way. Maintenance is the only problem, that is, some form of continuing support but in the long run, catching something early on and giving a hand out to someone on the verge of breaking down can probably pull a good number of them back.
There are large numbers of issues our species is coming to terms with in our online existence. The world is now becoming our community. The problem is no one agrees on anything on a good day. Bad days, well... out come the knives, needles, fetishes and all manner of other coping mechanisms the 'healthy' folk seem to enjoy.
The first thing I thought as a teenager with depression was: "I'm crazy. Yeah that's it. There's gotta be something wrong with me. Look around, everyone else is doing fine!"
Critique of the self was a big thing for me. Also a big tell. HINT HINT.
Another question pops up after a while of the ever growing mental abscess that is anxiety/depression. "I need some help! It's hurts like all hell to live this way and I want someone to help me! Where can I find it!?"
Back in my day... yeah, no. Different by proxy of living in constant neuro-chemically controlled fear and being an introverted nerd to boot? I hopefully don't have to tell the story of how well help from peers, guardians, mentors and physicians was back before the golden age of 'we have an anti-depressant and a great new therapy for that!'
What the hell, I'll tell it anyway!
There was no real help.
And so it grew as I did, voracious and vicarious, making every day a funeral and every night the wake. Some times I'd stop suddenly whatever it was that I was doing and this would come to mind: Is it me that died? My first friend had it too, and she killed herself last year. Was this rain for her... or was it for me?
This is the horror of anxiety/depression. It's relentless mental anguish that if made a distributable weapon would be considered beyond inhumane to whomever had the bad luck of having it inflicted upon them. It doesn't go away, and even in our modern age of mass produced pharmaceutical wonders, it never gets better. We can only make it less, and hope everyday it never becomes more.
Catch it early.
Donate consoles, money, or other physical goods. If you're comfortable with interpersonal interaction join peer groups, outreach programs, volunteer activities. FFS some of you are pretty damn smart people. Become the forward thinkers in the fields relevant to psychology, sociology, philosophy and anthropology. Throw a tech slant on it, do what hasn't been done.
As the young man I once was, I may never have know how bad it could have gotten had I had your help. As the old man I am now, I can only wonder what it would have been like to have had a friend grow old with me instead of one forever in the grave.
Despite volumes of information on how things like depression and anxiety are both physical and mental, sometimes inheritable, linked to genes that regulate serotonin, linked to biological (hormonal eg glucocorticoid) markers, and have drastic physical consequences on the body in terms of elevated stress responses that affect a manifold of parasympathetic CNS responses, and with that increased risk of major illnesses, despite all the information in the world detailing how it is real, you'll still find lots of people who claim it isn't, or that people are just making it up to be victims. They don't get that the brain is a physical thing, and what happens to it affects YOU, everything you do, your decisions, emotions, etc. It's almost like they are naive dualists who don't know they are espousing dualism. /end rant
I mean the top rated posts in this thread are great, but you know the types, the ones who give out terrible and useless advice. It's ironic how mental health issues turn ordinary people who claim to like science into much the same as creationists: utilizing straw men, attacking caricatures of real science, doing anything but addressing the real issues the science brings up.
And yes, as others have hinted, one can be incredibly intelligent, productive, one can be anything really, and still fall victim to it.
"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place." George Bernard Shaw
You can't possibly understand the sheer unimaginable terror that runs through our heads and drives many of us to suicide.
For all the doubters, social anxiety is not a result of emotional weakness. It is a PHYSICAL problem, just like a limp is the result of a sprained ankle. Sure you can walk on it if you have to, but the pain is terrible. We are just starting to put all the pieces together, but it is conclusive that a lack of the neuro-chemicals serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine play a direct roll. Your body naturally lowers these chemicals when you are in a life or death situation, such as when a tiger jumps out of the bush, or someone tries to kill you with an axe. It may take days or weeks for your body to re-adjust back to normal levels. Imagine living in that state all your life. Imagine knowing that being around strangers will lower your chemicals even more, just like a pouncing tiger would.
Many people use drugs, alcohol, over eating, or even video games to help raise their dopamine. It gives you a sense of wellbeing, and can be addictive. For people with physically lower levels of dopamine, they can help bring you back up out of the abyss, if only temporarily. With proper medication to stabilize your neuro-chemicals at a level closer to "normal," an anxiety sufferer can eventually re-acclimate themselves to being with strangers. Just being able to go to the grocery store, sit in a restaurant, walk in the park without panicking can massively change your quality of life. This does not mean that you want to go out to parties or crowded bars. Those things are not necessary for a decent quality of life.
The only thing worse than a Democrat is a Republican.