69 replies to this topic

[grousemouse]

there's just me.

mine is the first set of genes to have a few snap off and roll into the precariously balanced gears of my mind. so unless i procreate i'll take these bad genes back to the grave from whence they came. (imagery courtesy of a zombie movie marathon i'm watching).

'Brians!! More Brians!' says dyslexic zombie.

[Entities]

My family don't talk to each other very much about past experiences.

So all I know is:

My mother had/has anxiety. Also I think she has whatever I have.
I know nothing about my father except he was physically abusive.

[Alien.]

I think some of them may have had gone through a period of depression before; when I first was prescribed Prozac the pdoc told me all the side effects and my mum said "You'll probably not get any of that - all I got was a dry mouth, even that was the really old anti-depressants, I was on them in college - I don't remember what they were even called 'cos I didn't take them, I just dropped out.."

I assumed she was talking about tricyclics.

My nan had depression aswell, my mum snorted when she told us she was going to have hypnotherapy.

I don't know. I don't see depression as a mental illness, really, and there's nothing else. More like everyone has it at one point. I guess I only joined CB 'cos it really hurt [and flouxetine was absolutely bewildering], not because I see myself as mentally ill...

[beetle]

My mother has been Dxed BP. My dad was a severe alcoholic who was probably self medicating some MI. And the story goes that my grandmother on his side was schizophrenic and spent time in a state facility. I never met her or if I did I was just a baby. Teh crazy runs rampant on my dads side. Weird uncles and aunts.

[shadowswa11ow]

Maternal Grandmother - Undiagnosed, but probably either Bipolar I
Maternal Grandfather - Alcoholic
Mother - Depression, at the very least... God forbid she actually do something as crazy as seek treatment

Paternal Grandmother - Depression
Father's Cousin I - PTSD from Vietnam which triggered something like Schizoaffective Disorder
Father's Cousin II - Was in an inpatient psych hospital for several months at one point for an undisclosed reason
Paternal Grandfather's Father - Alcoholic, probably with a mood disorder thrown in there for good measure

Naaaahhhhhh.... mental illnesses don't run in this family...

Edited by shadowswa11ow, 07 October 2009 - 04:08 PM.

[mudpuppy]

I doubt there has been a sane person in my family, in a VERY long time.

Though, I seem to be the only one to have done a damned thing about it.

[Ruby Red]

I have a half brother who's been diagnosed with ADHD and a conduct disorder. I've only ever seen him a couple of times because he's on my dads side of the family and I don't have contact with them, but the last time I heard about him he had set fire to someones trampoline and was sent to a juvenile detention center.

My mum has major anxiety problems although she hasn't taken medication for it for more than 5 years now, and seems to be coping alright. She used to have anorexia as well.

My dad definitely has some undiagnosed issues. I don't have contact with him if I can help it but every so often he'll ring my house and accuse me of trying to put him in prison for crimes he didn't commit, or he says that he's seem me talking with his enemies about how to destroy him business. When I used to visit him as a kid he was totally paranoid and also had panic attacks.

There's been several members of my family with addictions. My grandfather is an alcoholic, my uncle was one until he died from parkinsons disease, my mum used to be but she overcame it and my dad was addicted to marijuana when I was a toddler (one of the reasons him and my mum separated).

Considering that I don't know half of my blood relatives I couldn't be sure if there was more or not.

[crtclms]

Paternal Grandfather: Bipolar I
Father: Bipolar II, narcotics addict
Maternal Grandmother: Borderline PD
Mother: Borderline PD, Major depression
Sister 2: Bulimia
Sister 3: Major depression, possibly Bipolar NOS

And my paternal grandmother was kind of a fabulist, we were never sure which stories she told about her early life were actually true. Some were later found to be false.

[nonsum]

i don't really know much about either side of my family other than my parents other than numerous, primarily male individuals, have drank themselves to death over the years.

my father was on that path. but as opposed to continuing, he got treatment. he was diagnosed with depression and PTSD from events that occurred while he was in the navy during the Vietnam war. he's on medication. he stopped drinking, smoking, and being an asshole. he's continuing treatment, working with a therapist and going to a group. i can't be happier for him. because after years of being miserable, he's working on not.

my mother, who know. she's just out there. delusional even. but high functioning. and stubborn.

[The Emperor]

Oh boy, here we go:

Paternal Side:

Great uncle- suicide

Grandma- Bipolar disorderm, substance abuse

Father- Some kind of anxiety or depression, has not been DX'ed yet(at 53 he's just starting to get help, thank god) substance abuse

Maternal side:

All kinds of wacky that I don't even know the name for!!!

Grandma- 3 suicide attempts

Mom- SOMETHING IS WONG WITH THIS LADY, but I don't know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones??? Anyway, yeah, something there, she's on an AD right now but she probably needs something else. She's not right.


Then there's my twin sister who PROBABLY would have the same DX as me as, she suffers the same issues, EXACT same, but hasn't gone to the dr. for any of it.

And then there's little ol' me, just with a few anxiety disorders. I guess I lucked out.

[Maddy]

bump

[wildgoosechase]

There has been very little diagnosed MI in my family. There is no diagnosed mental illness on my dad's side whatsoever, but my Pappap (dad's dad) was an alcoholic until he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1989. My dad has EXTREME anger issues, but feels completely justified in all his actions. He also never apologizes and is very emotionally removed/socially awkward (unless he has a few beers in him). He'll talk to you about music and cars, but bring up something like a bad break-up with a boyfriend or a manic spending spree, and his jaw drops because he is so uncomfortable.

As for my mom's side, well,... I know a few of my aunts take ADs. My cousin killed herself in 1997; she had MDD. My mom is also diagnosed with MDD. I have the most dx's of anyone, but thankfully I have lived through all of it (so far anyway).

I think my sister has some sort of MI, but doesn't want to be on medications because of the stigma MI has. She is very much like my dad, even though she claims she is just like my mom. ???

[Cetkat]

Dad - Alcoholic, Major Depression (diagnosed my my first pdoc)
Mom - Minor Depression (suspected) / Postpartum Depression (diagnosed)
Sister - Depression, Minor Psychotic symptoms (diagnosed)
Bother - Mild Depression on and off (suspected)

[netsavy006]

I'm the first in the family to be diagnosed with MI.

[OscillateWildly]

My sister is some kind of insane, not sure what. Official dx is bipolar. Clearly some kind of personality/coping issues though. She is just fucked up in lots of ways, like a female version of my father sans alcohol use.

My father has a bit of a drinking problem and when he was younger would go on anxious paranoid rages. He would tear up the house looking for something insignificant while accusing people of hiding it from him. He would shake a lot and he never slept well. He could scarcely tolerate being out in public due to his intense anxiety (e.g. he would visibly sweat and shake on lines in stores).
He also tends to get depressed a bit, nothing catastrophic and obvious, but he goes through his days or moments of lying about in despair. From what I can tell my father has severe anxiety and an alcohol problem and is generally slightly nuts. He uses alcohol to ward off depression and to ward off his anxiety. Alcohol keeps my father sane.


My father's brother killed himself a few months after I was born in april. Easter sunday I think. He was clearly depressed, but didn't seem to have any anxiety like my dad. He was traumatized by their childhood probably (raised in a catholic orphanage).

My father's father was a war veteran and also insane, probably stress induced. For obvious reasons my father never talks about his family but what little I know about his father is that he also had terrible anxiety like my dad (possibly worse), psychosis, as well as depression. This was when tranquilizers were invented and my grandfather lived on them, because of his debilitating anxiety similar to my father's. He was known to occasionally go cracked out and psychotic - my father told me about a time his dad tried to go out and control traffic in the street. My father attributes his father's insanity to PTSD, but I don't think that's likely since my grandfather's symptoms were not very much like PTSD, had nothing to do with war, and are very similar to the sort of symptoms my father (his son) has (severe anxiety and depression). I do think that war stress may have been the trigger that made my grandpa go nuts for serious, though.

My father's mother was schizophrenic and lived/died in a psych ward. She went cracked for serious when my dad was like 7 yrs old and so dad and his brother were raised in an orphanage (thus the trauma I spoke of before). My father blames his mother's schizophrenia on the toxic chemicals in the factories she worked in. She was extremely paranoid and had the kids taken away because she was a danger to them.

No my grandma and grandpa weren't genetically related. THey came from different countries to be double sure. Just bad luck I guess. Or living in the northeast, heh.

--------------------------------------
My mother's family also has mood problems. My mother has a tendency to depression and has a few significant episodes. I have been told by my aunts that her father also has this same depression, but he never had any major breakdowns or anything. His family there were some "attic bound" relatives as back in those days you just locked crazy people in the attic so no one knows what was up with that.

My mother's sister has had anxious breakdowns, and her other sister has had depression w. atypical signs like sleeping tons and eating sweet stuff but neither are significantly depressive. My mom probably has the worst most significant depression out of all her sisters, and she is the most like her father in personality and appearance.

I think my depression is very much genetic and very much inherited from my mother. I am a carbon copy clone of my mother physically. My personality is extremely similar to hers. Is it coincidence that I also have this same struggle with depression? It's almost as if depression is just part and parcel of having my mother's genetics. Same shaped face, same personality, same art talent, same days of staring into the void for no reason. It's part of the bag of treats you get with these genes it seems.



The only grandparent who is NOT insane at all would be my mother's mother... and even though she was without any mental problem, she was eccentric as HELL, double aquarius, if that lets you know anything. She was a tough woman and very unconventional. Her mother came from a tribe and had tattoos all over her face, she refused to let my grandmother be tattooed because she knew that was the old tribal way - this was extremely unconventional at the time, so clearly that against the grain independent forward thinking was evident even in my great grandmother.



So, basically, it would be easier to tell you which family members are SANE. One of my sisters is sane, my brother is sane, my grandmother was sane. My anxious aunt's kids seem sane but are weird as fucking hell , don't know them too well (one is a drunk and an asshole, the other two seem normal enough). My other aunt's daughter is psycho but she is more like her father (who also is crazier than a shit house rat and recently had a psychotic breakdown, no genetic relation).
Everyone else is slightly or extremely crazy.


Reading this back, it sounds like Dr Evil talking about his family.

Edited by OscillateWildly, 19 May 2010 - 02:14 AM.

[Symmetry]

This is hysterical and totally mimics my family.

• My sister is some kind of insane, not sure what. Official dx is bipolar. Clearly some kind of personality/coping issues though.
• when he was younger would go on anxious paranoid rages. He would tear up the house looking for something insignificant while accusing people of hiding it from him. He would shake a lot and he never slept well.
• My father's father was a war veteran and also insane, probably stress induced.
• My mother has a tendency to depression and has a few significant episodes.
• It's almost as if depression is just part and parcel of having my mother's genetics. Same shaped face, same personality, same art talent, same days of staring into the void for no reason. It's part of the bag of treats you get with these genes it seems.
• So, basically, it would be easier to tell you which family members are SANE.
• Reading this back, it sounds like Dr Evil talking about his family.

I totally understand. It's my understanding that borderline, bipolar, autism, ocd, add, all run in genetic packs in families.

Me:
I am OCD/ADD/GAD/and a dash of PTSD (from the unmedicated fam.)

Sister#1:
We share both parents. She has OCD 'with psychotic episodes', ADD, Social Anxiety, Borderline personality disorder, and "chronic and distemic depression" which apparently means that her baseline mood is below normal and she is chronically so. She is completely and utterly fucked up. Is prone to horrible abusive relationships, random bouts of temper, and hears a lot of damning voices. She also works with autistic children and uses her chronic fucked-up-ness in a way that she is what I call the autism whisperer. she works with severely autistic kids who are barely verbal and understands them in ways that routinely shock professionals around her.

Sister#2:
We share a father. She has generalized anxiety and panic attacks. And she sleepwalks. Like pick-up-the-roller-blades-at-3-am-and-go-outside kind of sleepwalking.


Dad:
My Pdoc thinks my father was borderline - or most likely NPD. I vote NPD. there is no way to underestimate his granidose sense of self, belief that he is 'special' and only other 'special' people can get him, and his belief that the rules are different for him. he was a terrible womanizer, and does not mentally age well. I know he still thinks he is in his twenties. He is almost 60. we dont talk.

Mom:
Suspicioned OCD, Anxiety
Mom refuses to believe she has any problems. but she is ripe with them. she is up nights worrying about the damnest things. She counts the words she reads in any given book and writes the word count in the margins. She writes a new list if the slant of her handwriting wavers in the lines of the current list. but to her - she is a genetic anomaly and is completely normal. we dont get along either.

Mom's Mom:
My primary caretaker in childhood. BITCH ON WHEELS. prone to the rages you talked about. abusive, controlling and all around bad bad person. tried to kill me with a butcher knife when I was 16. In her dying stage from cancer, she was on anti depressants and for a moment we could see a glimpse of the soul of a person we had deemed souless my whole life.

Mom's Dad:
WWII vet, major bouts of depression from the war. fireworks were a no no. was in 1950's therapy for 7 years. wonderful man, never talked about what happened. He was a polish translator who worked in the clean up stage of the concentration camps after the war. 3 bronze stars and we still to this day don't know what for because he refused to talk about it.

Cousin (Mom's Side):
Severely autistic. severely.

Uncle #1(Mom's Brother)
rage rage rage. but he thinks he is normal.

Uncle #2 (Mom's Brother)
Anxiety

Thats all I know. But I cant think of anyone who is totally mentally healthy. Now that I think of it. hmmm.

[Stickler]

@ OW-I read somewhere I can't remember off the top of my head that farmworkers who apply pesticides (like, lots of different ones mixed together in the same sprayer-they do that to save time) seemed to have off-the-charts paranoia...but I don't think that would then be inheritable.

My mom has depression, she takes prozac and everybody's happier that way.
I think my dad has depression, and the kind of agitated rages I have. But I also think he has a personality disorder from his awful childhood.

Which is why he made my childhood awful too.

I think the combo of the abuse and the genetic predisposition is why my depression is so spectacularly worse than a lot of the family on my mother's side...who have the sort of reserve that would make them Not Mention It unless it got so bad they couldn't conceal it.

My father's side of the family? My grandfather was a spectacular ogre of a man who poisoned the lives of those near and dear to him.
He was an ex-marine who was justifiably proud of the fact that he was a member of the landing parties who had taken beaches in the WW2 pacific campaign, but there's no telling if that created his sadism, or merely added to it.

[NewMe]

Well were do I start? lol I AM MAKING IT SMALL BECAUSE THERE IS SO MUCH
Mom: BPD and Munchausens Biproxy Syndrome
Father: BP1, BPD and Alcoholism
Sister#1: BPD, Depression and Binge Eating Disorder
Brother #1: ADHD, bouts of depression
Brother #2: ADD and Binge Eating Disorder
Sister #2: ADHD
NOW FOR THE FUN PART...
Paternal Side: (Doing this by name,they are common names though)
UNCLES-
George: Alcoholism and substance abuse along with depression
Bob: Alcoholic and Rage
Rich: BP2
Steve: N/A
Tom: N/A
Marty: Alcoholic, BPD<More to him but I wont get into it
Joe: Alcoholic
AUNTS-
Mary: BP1
Patty: N/A
Debby: N/A *I have 11 aunts and uncles on my fathers side, these are just the folks I know
Grandma: BP
Grandpa: I will just say we are happy he is deceased he was a sick fuck

Maternal Side:
Aunt#1: N/A Uncle#1: Substance abuse, rage, Alcoholism, BP1 Uncle #2: N/A Uncle #3: Cyclothymia
Grandma: Depression Grandpa: Rage
My family is full of the crazies, I suppose because it is so large and there were people with MI who started this cesspool as I think of it. My father's side is full of sick sons a bitches. My grandfather did a lot of bad things to kids and so did uncle Marty, grandfather was killed, Marty was beaten badly enough to leave town and never come back. My father's side is full of the alcoholics, possibly because of what their father did to them? My mothers side is pretty tame in comparison, my mother is not good, she is borderline and has a tendency to make up illnesses and make her kids worse than they already are just for the attention. Now she has started making her self sick since we are all grown up. My father is a piece of work, he is manipulative, evil and not a good person to be around.

I haven't gotten to my cousins and such, the list is just too bug and I cant remember all the names, just faces at this point. Hell I am trying to do a family tree and I have only gotten as far as I have just shown you with a few more names and all my cousins that I know, so god only knows jut how bad it really is.
On the plus side when C and I get married we will make out on wedding gifts lol.

Edited by Sweetpeas, 21 May 2010 - 08:54 PM.

[OscillateWildly]

@ OW-I read somewhere I can't remember off the top of my head that farmworkers who apply pesticides (like, lots of different ones mixed together in the same sprayer-they do that to save time) seemed to have off-the-charts paranoia...but I don't think that would then be inheritable.

Sure as shit hope my dad is right about the factory/chemicals thing. I have no knowledge of my family on my dads mother's side, so I don't know if her sisters/brothers/mother/father/aunt/uncles had any mental illness. The fact my grandmother had no family background is probably a bad sign. Probably suggests her family isn't very mentally healthy.

It's been said for decades that chemicals cause mental illness, "mad as a hatter" came from this (hat makers would go insane from the work). But, then again, there is no way to be sure. Out of so many factory workers, not many developed schizophrenia, or else we would know about it I think.

Either way, the inheritance rate for schizophrenia is EXTREMELY low when it is in a second degree relative. And, the genes for "schizophrenia" may manifest in a totally different way in a grandchild (could be as simple as anxiety, depression, cyclothymia, nothing at all, etc).

I used to be very very worried that one day I would go psycho. I don't worry about that any more. No point. I'm okay.

[OscillateWildly]

Well were do I start?

Damn, I think you may win. Bad contest to win.

Genetic insanity (BP, borderline) on one side, severe behavioral dysfunction (alcoholism/pedophilia/etc) on the other side. That's like PB&J sandwich of craziness.