[Timo]

It's incredibly amazing the similarities between the lives of all of us anonymous kindred spirits. And i don't mean this in the sarcastic, negative understanding of the tired, old cliche 'been there, done that,' but that really does describe the situations and experiences of a whole lot of us. Most other people would simply scoff at someone elses problems on their personal journey, but for those of us who've been there, trust me, we get it. As for anti-depressants, brain chemistry is incredibly unique for every living human being. Most anti-depressants are made in bulk, according to one recipe, assuming that variations in dosage are the only thing to figure out at the individual patient level. That said, there are a variety of different recipies for anti-depressants out there, and if one doesn't work, try a different one. I know it's a long, tedious process, but finding the right drug does pay huge dividends. It's well worth the effort.

Hang in there, mate.

[SeaGypsy]

For me that's about 10 oz of herb, 50 cases beer, 1 bottle bourbon 1 vodka pa. Whilst modern medicine is around I get a 50 script of valium to share with the wife over 3 months. I am a self acknowledged poly. Even in straight years I have times where I smoke a spliff on full moon. A while back I had heroin for the first time in 15 years. Every couple of years I like a dose of hallucinogens. Last time I tried anti depressants was as close to death as I have ever come, from a combination of depression and being a 'negative responder' to SRI's. I hate modern psychiatric medicine like the plague. Anything I can't grow or brew (even valium is just concentrated valerian) I don't want. But I am eternally addicted to changing my conciousness one way or another. I just happen to find myself an anti authoritarian who likes chemicals in my blood which the various governmnets would prefer I did not have.

[vision-master]

Message from OZORA

[truecougarblue]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') built a pond and used pigs to seal it.

[FairMaiden]

Honestly, PO.com almost scared me out of having kids. Not that I was gung ho to have them anyway. But I met a great guy and he wanted them. Now we do. They're great but they certainly increase the stress level.

When I was kid, I used to think I wasn't going to make it past 30. I was convinced and like you had no problem with that. But maybe we weren't wrong...I certainly wasn't going to get married and have kids before I was 30...but something changed in me. Something significant I can't put my finger on. I gave up being an environmentalist for a gov't job. A job my pre-30 yr old would have considered "soul sucking" but I honestly don't mind working.

Why is it that so many ppl are depressed?? We are enjoying this opulent time in history with everything at our fingertips and food to spare...yet we are UNHAPPY about it all? I know I'm oversimplifying...but...what the heck?

Weren't we happy once just surviving the winter, or am I romanticizing?

[SeaGypsy]

I think that has a lot to do with the shallowness of modern lives. Lack of relating in an ongoing and convincingly real way. Lack of feeling involved in ones own destiny. Lack of satisfaction springing as expected from material Shangri-La. It's rare to meet a person with a sense of deep satisfaction, at ease with life and doing what they like doing most and are best at. The fact that the machine of organised society does not 'meet all our needs', cannot. The lack of addressing core questions of what and who we are at the most fundamental level. The multiple organisations trying to sell products, beliefs and services based on filling the bottomless void we all carry around in us. The fact that things don't just work, they break. The fact that opportunity even in the wealthiest societies is quarantined by elites.

Yes we maybe were happier when it was something to make it through winter, or the malaria season, but we were then old at 30, heading towards ancient at 40. I would have been dead heaps of times over before the advent of antibiotics.

The camel and the eye of the needle is our entire generation's curse.

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'I') didn't mention that my wife has been dealing with depression the last year and more. I often find myself coming home from a 12 hour day to a pig sty with nary a clean rag in the house and nappies all over the place. That doesn't make it feel like a partnership, more like another job.

[Outcast_Searcher]

An interesting and worthy topic. In today's materialistic society (for most people, anyway), addressed all too rarely.

I dropped out more for moral / personal reasons. As a U.S. citizen, I got REALLY tired of (against my will) supporting both of the wars via my taxes, and the profits of the corporation I worked for (which had morphed from a great place to work which cared about its employees to (more or less) Hell on earth.

Oddly, I've taken up simple flower gardening as my favorite activity (vs. intense intellectual stuff of my past life). I think it's like chess, though. One has the potential to build and even control (to some extent) some small aspect of beauty, even while the world rushes by -- seemingly towards self-destruction. The scope is small enough to be able to use one's ideas to at least somewhat counterract the randomness that the larger world throws at us constantly.

Perhaps as I get older and contemplate ending up IN the ground, it is nice to make use OF the ground first. (I don't hear that a lot from farmers, though perhaps I have missed it).

Maybe later I'll take up growing food - haven't gotten there yet. Still killing things through inexperience.

Anyway, I appreciate and respect the kinds of ideas presented here, and the respectful interchange of ideas and perspectives.

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Outcast_Searcher', '.').and the profits of the corporation I worked for (which had morphed from a great place to work which cared about its employees to (more or less) Hell on earth.

[davep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('truecougarblue', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') built a pond and used pigs to seal it.

[SeaGypsy]

Thanks a lot 6, she's got the best shrinks in the country managing her file, we are past the worst. I got 4 months semi paid leave to look after her, which I worked most of anyway just needed the money too much. My bosses have been fantastic. I am glad to be here in Australia for the support available here, but something deep in me would prefer a much more primitive solution for 'depression'.

OCS, yep, that's what I am talking about. Some call it escapism as if there is something wrong with creating one's own etheric bubble. But so often the alternative leaves so little or even nothing for the actual person.

[PrestonSturges]

Depression is brutal, my exwife's postpartum depression cost us our marriage 20 years ago and she has had a couple multiyear downward spirals since our divorce.

[SeaGypsy]

Mmmm, sad. My wife's was triggered by post partum, but there are deeper issues about guilt/ coming from sleeping on a folded cardboard box and everyone working 6/12 a week to the 1st world/ leaving her family behind. It's complex. We are always behind in our bills because of ongoing need to look after her mother at least and others to some extent. I had to buy every woman in the family a bed before she would sleep on one; now she is living in a nice 3 bed house with running hot water/ heating cooling, universal medical care, etc etc. She is on a guilt trip.

(Some of the really full on stuff I only handle because I have a lot of experience working with psychiatric patients. Also because I married for the 1st time age 42 and am a traditionalist when it comes down to it. No matter what happens I'm in it for the long haul. We have a lot of options still. Currently discussing whether to return to the far north, for career and proximity to Asia reasons mainly. We are currently located at the opposite end of the country, doubling our travel costs/ time/ drama to visit home. BTW I still call the Philippines home and probably will for life. Australia is my home country, but the Philippines is where my heart learns most, where each day counts most. I miss it too as she does and we are figuring some kind of median out.)

[SeaGypsy]

Ok, a few days of contemplation later; here it is...

Everyone who knows me here knows I am a chameleon, that continuous adaptation is my strategy to respond to peak oil and the subsequent ramifications/ now all around us and growing evermore.

So here's the latest:
The state I am living in is offering free training for the heavy transport industry, as there is a shortage of skilled drivers, brought on largely by the demographic chasing the big bucks on the mines.
I'm doing a truck driver's course, which will have me driving heavy rigids in 2 months, multis in 14 months.

Why? (I have been working in community services/ health & education support/ since grokking peak oil in 2007).

When I got into the field I have been in there was a shortage of care and support workers. Since, there are hundreds of training organisations offering the certification to do this work. Jobs I am applying for are in the 60k band, getting hundreds of applicants. The jobs I can easily get are 35-40k, which I can't live on with my family and achieve anything solid towards being able to "Opt out/ sit under tree/ sail around the world etc.

Meanwhile there has always been a shortage of truck drivers here, prepared to drive road trains in the outback, or dump trucks in the mines. It's a $30 an hour job in town, almost double that out FIFO (fly in fly out) on the Western Australia mines. It's 98 hours a week for a week of days, a week of nights then a week off/ gross $3k a week plus. Put up with that for 1 year and you can write your own schedule. Month on month off on $75k is doable.

Part of the inspiration to go ahead and try this career out, is some of the feedback I have had here from y'all. I want to write. I need time out from both my family and the endless head trips involved in social sector work/ along with the ever growing competition/ fading wages.
Sitting in a truck 14 hours a day, I can dictate to a speech/ text application and have thousands of words a day written ready to edit.
I can take care of my family, get chunks of time and money to put into creative living, preparing.

I believe the can kicking is going to perpetuate Australia's mining industry/ farming expansion etc. will secure heavy transport as a career for at least a couple more years. Maybe I get time to write/ publish/ build the dream boat/ the mountain home back in the PI, etc. maybe not, but I'm gonna give it my best shot.

[Plantagenet]

A couple of years earning $30-$60 bucks an hour driving mine trucks in Australia, and you are going to be able to build one damn fine dream boat.

Heck, give it three years and you can buy a nice Passport 40, provision it, and set off on a world cruise.


Good luck!

[SeaGypsy]

And if the doomers are right, I've got a front row seat to Mad Max the Final Series:

[ian807]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', '(')Chuckle)
Thanks for so much feedback!

Without quoting;
I didn't mention that my wife has been dealing with depression the last year and more.

[SeaGypsy]

It's a no-no to use any medication with serotonin re-uptake implications co prescribed with SRI's which is what she is on. Problem is just run of the mill depression, nothing really wild or she would be in hospital. Problem with SRI's when they work, they become a serious crutch, whilst being a long way from free of side effects. Right now I'm sneaking a jack in the box under her butt (telling her I'm doing so, she just doesn't get it). I can see what she is doing is sinking into a mainstream Melbourne Glum. When your wife starts repeating what her $18 an hour nurse's aid friend with a half million dollar mortgage is saying, as if she were some kind of authority, it's time to move on.
She's got permanent status here now, the paperwork is all sorted, we both have jobs to go to up north in a couple of months. The kids are going to be spending more time in the Philippines with the rels. We are going to do a trip though SE Asia and up to somewhere in China later in the year. Life is too short dear friends.

[SeaGypsy]

For my part of the world, this is the gear:

[autonomous]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'F')or my part of the world, this is the gear: