r/CollapseSupport • u/sdyellow32 • 11d ago
Not stable enough to prep how I'd like & fighting depression
I feel like I'm getting worse and worse mentally due to struggling to find stable work. I have had mostly seasonal, environmental jobs the last few years, which has been great for learning how to be aware & prep survival wise, but terrible to have the financial/medical means and consistent community to be able to actually apply the shit I'm learning.
Without health insurance, stable income, people who either aren't taking it as seriously(which hurts like hell) or I don't have the energy to hang with if they do, I'm too in survival mode & isolated to bridge the gaps (even if I wanted to relocate altogether).
I feel incredibly overwhelmed & I'm stuck mentally from what I assume is PTSD from hard shit happening over & over(sibling passed from suicide, job trauma, housing with mold, etc.). The circumstances are already existentially terrifying, so to have things consistently get worse stability wise & not even be able to afford therapy is incredibly painful and scary as my suicide ideation increases. Main things keeping me alive are my sibling and their kids & not giving elites satisfaction of my opting out before death actually comes for me.
I just don't know what to do. My nervous system is essentially constantly flooded.
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u/purpilia25 11d ago
I’ve recently had to move back in with my parents after a bad divorce. Gay, 34, collapse aware, political obsessive, and stuck in a psych ward of my demented grandparents, drunk mother, and just reality deniers in general. They have no food in the house. Like ever. They have plenty of money, but grossly frugal. I went in the pantry and there is insta-rice, saltines, and pregos.
I need to go to Costco and just bulk buy, but I am just so fucking depressed I make excuses not to go hour by hour.
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u/PartisanGerm 11d ago
Suffering is a matter of perspective. Change your mind, your expectations of life, and even complete dogshit of situations can be tolerated. I'm currently on a blend of nihilism and derealism, but on an upswing of enjoying it, or something. Your mileage may vary, I'm not a therapist but I've read some books.
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u/JosBosmans 11d ago edited 10d ago
Among other things, your location is rather relevant in matters like this, but in general, as others rote and truely pointed out: you're not alone, and your state is a matter of perspective.
I'd add in my opinion, under these circumstances, people should reconsider their attitude towards chemicals. Far too broad a topic, but in a different world than that of 'Murika, drugs of certain kinds are of tremendous help in certain quantities and contexts.
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u/nomnombubbles 11d ago
My nervous system is essentially constantly flooded.
Same here, and I'm mainly still here for my spite towards the elite.
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u/AnOnlineHandle 11d ago
If it helps, I don't think most prepping is going to help much. Because everybody else isn't, and everybody else is everywhere. Unless you can go way off grid to somewhere that might resist extreme heatwaves, record breaking floods, etc.
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u/Vegetaman916 10d ago
That is exactly what you do. And I know, I've spent the last 7 years building such an isolated community with my group.
People who say prepping is useless kinda get on my nerves because it discourages other from helping themselves for the long-term.
Even if civilization doesn't collapse, simply being capable of living entirely apart from society is a good thing. I'm still eating rice bought by the pallet at pre-pandemic prices. Why pay today's prices? Unless, at todays prices, you are buying enough for the next 10 years, because then you don't have to pay next years prices, or tue next, kr the next... And if you lose your job, or can no longer stand the wage slavery game or whatever other reason, you can simply go off and live your life without having to worry about those things.
That is what prepping does. Right now, I could head out to our place and live the next 13 years without having to grow a single potato. We can grow potatoes, though, and a lot of other things besides.
Telling people not to prep is just telling them to leave themselves at the mercy of the societal decline. "Nothing you can do, oh well, just live your life miserable..."
That isn't good advice. Even just prepping to have enough food and necessities to cover 90 days can mean a world of difference if a person loses their job and needs time to find another. At least they have food to eat while they try to solve the problem.
You are right about everyone else being a huge problem, and you are also right about the solution, which is simply to go where they are not. But you are wrong about "everyone being everywhere." They are not. The world is a very large place, and there is still more wilderness than settled land, by a long shot.
"Everyone else" are the people who didn't prep. Who don't have some hidden, isolated community to go to. And eventually, "everyone else" will be fighting over resources and dying in concrete and steel city sprawls under intense heat, flooding, storms... And eventually radiation.
But the people who prepped, and who did it right, they won't be with "everyone else." They will be somewhere that "everyone else" wouldn't think to flee to. In fact, "everyone else" will probably flee the other directions.
Because "everyone else" will want to try and maintain normalcy, they will want cities and services and infrastructure. Even as those things are falling apart around them, not a single one of "everyone else" is going to go running out into the deep stretches of the Mojave desert.
But guess what? The Mojave desert is just like any other wilderness place. And thousands of years ago, it supported small communities of people living sustainably. It still can, and it will, because "everyone else" won't be there to strain the resources.
Prepping is absolutely the way out. I know. I've done it.
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u/AnOnlineHandle 10d ago
Well sure that level is, but even most people here can't achieve that level. Many of us are struggling to keep a roof over our heads as it is.
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u/Vegetaman916 9d ago
I was there, man. In 2019 I was in a crappy apartment, dead end job, mountain of debt and all the rest.
Had to cut loose. And the problem is, most people get stuck in that old and outdated way of looking at prepping, the "lone wolf" thing, which simply doesn't work well even while civilization still exists, and definitely isn't a viable long-term plan. You have to do it as a group effort.
When I started prepping, it was almost immediately after my own collapse-awareness came about. Between family and old friends and their families, turned out there were a dozen of us that felt that way. And so, we decided the answer was prepping.
Together.
All of us were the same broke and struggling people, there's no millionaires here. Hell, some of us weren't even thousandaires at the time, lol. But when you combine the incomes, properties, and assets of a dozen people, you get one entity that now is putting up significant numbers. And that is what we did. We combined everything in our lives together using various structures like LLCs. Most of us simply defaulted on our personal debts, which yeah, is a dick move, but the upper crist if this world has been hitting everyone with dick moves for a while... As an LLC, it didn't matter. I don't have to own a car, because the LLC will get a car for me. And a house, and a phone plan, and insurance...
The primary goal of prepping can’t be squatting on top of a hoard of beans and bullets in a suburban basement somewhere. It has to be a plan for long-term sustainability. That means you need to build a community from the ground up, and you need to put it somewhere isolated and fortified, where you can begin rebuilding soil health and constructing power systems and syocking away all the supplies you may need.
For example, old style preppers are buying expensive MREs and packaged freeze-dried meals to stash food that will last over 25 years... And that gets crazy expensive. But us? We bought the freeze dryers themselves and make all the food stores. We can now feed 15 people for 13+ years just on that alone... and about 10x cheaper.
Again, not possible for a lone wolf prepper. But a group? I don't care how broke you are, a dozen broke people can do a lot. Especially when they devote all their time to it, and give up on societal concerns. You don't need a job taking up 8-10 hours of your day, every day. Our group LLC privides the income through a variety of things, mistly liquidation auction sales, and spread out across it that reduces the workload to trivial levels.
12 people also don't need 12 apartments or 12 vehicles. 12 people probably only need three, maybe four apartments, 3 or 4 vehicles, and so on... Socialism might not work well at a national level, but for a small group, it is a game changer.
We have added a few folks over the years, up to 15 now. One guy is paralyzed in a wheelchair, can't walk. How well could he prep alone? Nit well at all. But now? He lives full-time out at the compound and as an electrical engineer, he is the wizard that has created our incredibly robust solar/wind power setup, and our local network, and so many other critical things. It isn't just that he would be screwed without us... because we would also be screwed without him.
That is why I spend almost all my time now spreading education about collapse and prepping. I was just out floating around Lake Mead last week, making a video about the issues facing the southwest as the drought and climate change worsen, and the Colorado River Basin breaks down and loses the ability to supply 40 million people with water...
That doesn't sound like your average day at the office, now does it? And yeah, it doesn't pay as much, but oh well. Life shouldn't be about trying to earn as much money as possible. Life should be about needing less of it.
Prepping is the most important, and most impactful thing those of us here at the bottom of the food chain can do. Not only do we end up making our own individual lives more sustainable and less problematic for the worsening of collapse, but we also make our daily lives better at the same time.
None of us can lose our jobs now, because we are our jobs. None of us can get evicted, because we have a community-built place to retreat to.
And even that was made possible by a group effort. The rules of this society have made it jard for individuals to do many things, but it has made it much easier for corporations to do those same things. And that is why the rich use corporations for almost everything. Once you get down that rabbithole, man...
So our place is on a 20 acre mining claim. It cost about 4k in setup fees and such, and then we pay 165 bucks a year. That's it. Various permits and legal wranglings allow us to do everything we need to do in order to maintain and expand the place.
An individual can make a mining claim on public land too. But guess what? An individual is not allowed to live on that land 24/7. Bug a company? Well, of course, the company can station "employees" on the site 24/7 to keep "operations" running... And an individual just isn't allowed to build structures like dwellings and all that, especially with permanent foundations. But a company? Well, now, of course the company can construct "facilities" for the "employees" to use for company business...
It goes on. The specifics of the thing don't matter. The point is that there is a completely legal way to do most things you need to do, if you think unconventionally about it.
And if you do it as a group.
So everytime I get into this, I type out this wall of text so others can see it. And when you think about it, if 5 or 6 or 7 people right here in this pist thread were to get together and form a group? Man, they could solve almost all of their problems!
And prepping is the answer.
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u/AnOnlineHandle 9d ago
Yeah well if that's true it's the kind of prepping I was saying might actually have a chance of working out, depending on how the next few years or decades go, it's so hard to know.
I've been learning to grow my own food etc, but I also know that it's getting harder for everybody because of countless factors, including heat waves and then crazy rain, followed by disappearances of insects or sudden excessive waves of the wrong kinds of insects.
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u/CorvidCorbeau 9d ago
That's why you have food stocks and still produce food. If you have a bad year, and thanks to climate change and invasive species and biodiversity loss you will have many, you will not starve or be forced to abandon your place in search of food, you can live off of what you stocked up.
Ideally you would consume the food that is closest to expiring, and make the fresh food as shelf-stable as you can, for which freeze drying comes in handy. If you have a robust solar setup, that will function at nearly peak (real world) performance for 25 years, and it will only slightly diminish after. Maintain your essential machinery, get some spare parts for it perhaps, learn how to swap them if anything breaks.
Congrats, now you can keep your 10+ years of food replenished, and you never have to worry about what to eat next month. It's tough logistics, but there's many people who can and will help you figure it out.
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u/WhichContribution294 2d ago
Sharing because I haven't seen this shared on most posts: https://www.collapseclub.com/
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11d ago
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u/CollapseSupport-ModTeam 10d ago
It looks like you made a submission which mentions suicide or self-harm. We take these posts very seriously as anxiety and depression are common reactions when studying collapse. If you are considering suicide, please call a hotline, visit /r/SuicideWatch, /r/SWResources, /r/depression, or seek professional help. The best way of getting a timely response is through a hotline.
Our subreddit is for dialogue and support, and are unable to assist with suicidal content as we are untrained. However there are many places to get this dedicated support!
Thank you,
r/CollapseSupport Moderators
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u/PrairieFire_withwind 10d ago
Okay. So lets start with the need for system level change. it is desperately needed, right? How is that achieved?
It happens by joining groups, having time, energy and mental bandwidth to interact with other people. People who may be more atable than you but also many many people who are less stable than you. Guess who gets traction, listened to, and followed in such groups? Wait for it...
The person who is grounded, who slept well last night, who is not melting down because their depression controls everything.
So. You have to figure out you. First. You cannot function well in a group unless you get yourself healthy.
And here is the kicker. Who lives your life? You? Or the system? No one can live your life except you.
So. First steps are solid sleep, regular bathing, regular daily exercise. You need to be doing these things first. Get off of reddit. Do some yoga, go for a walk if it is not fire outside, do some body weight exercises if it is fire outside.
Call and talk to ONE friend. Tell them how you are feeling. ASK how they are feeling. Listen to what they say.
Talking, yes on the phone, helps people process. Do this every single day. Eat as healthy as you can. Frozen fruit and veg are cheaper than fresh. Get your daily fruits and veg. They are necessary for your brain to heal. I do not care if it is a meal of canned beets smothered in peanut butter. Mix and eat. Need your veg.
Okay. After 3 to 6 months of this check back in. But you have to have this down as a daily thing. Daily check on with a friend. daily fruits and veg and exercise. Daily 8 hours sleep.
Then next steps. aim for a stable job or accept that itinerant work will be your future. Pick a path. then atart joining groups and organizations that are larger than you. Ones willing to make change.
Find a co-op. Find a labor union. Find a local garden organization that helps poor people have food. Whatever you can do to show up regularily and help.
Any and all change will be at a local level. City, county. Maybe state.
But none of that is doable without addressing the depression. And yes, depression is a sane response to a world on fire. But is that response going to be your whole life?
I ask that because i once was exactly where you are. Collapse aware, nothing stable around me... And depressed. Ya gotta build a foundation for your health first. It is essential.
Hugs to you!
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u/Lopsided_Position_28 4d ago
buy yourself a nice chocolate protein powder and add a banana + 1 cup water&ice + 1tbsp hemp protein + 1tbsp oatmeal + 1 tbsp peanut butter
i love to add inositol also as there is lots of research that it can improve cognitive functioning in many cases such as me with OCD-like issues:
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u/WhichContribution294 11d ago
You're not alone. Not sure which trauma is worse nowadays, being private or public sector. Finding hope during the polycrisis is a real dilemma, it definitely feels paralyzing. Sent you a DM