Managing Emotional Turmoil: Strategies for Coping with Anxiety and Stress - Psychiatry

Easily feel overwhelmed by stress?

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Hello, doctor.
My emotions fluctuate greatly; I get easily angry and often feel depressed, and I frequently have negative thoughts.
I always feel that when others ask me questions, they are trying to pick on my flaws or mock me.
My parents have mentioned that I have prefrontal dysfunction, which makes it hard for me to control my emotions.
Since elementary school through middle school, I have been very irritable, prone to crying, and somewhat neurotic, feeling unwanted.
There was a year when I went to the hospital, but I’m not sure if it was a psychiatric ward or something else; the doctor just talked to me or let me play with toys.
However, another parent stopped taking me, so I don’t know if I was cured.

In high school and college, I felt that my emotions were not fluctuating as frequently as before.
My parents also said I wasn’t getting angry over little things as easily.
However, in recent years, I have become very emotional again.
When I walk outside or take the MRT, I get irritated if the person in front of me is walking slowly, and I feel like kicking them.
I feel uncomfortable in crowds, and when others bump into me, I feel disgusted and annoyed.
I worry about many things, and my parents keep telling me not to dwell on things, but it’s hard for me to stop, and I often end up making my parents angry because I can’t let go.
At home, a family member often makes meaningless sounds or mimics people from the TV, which easily irritates me.
I can’t stand their derogatory attitude towards our dog; just hearing or seeing it makes me very annoyed.
I can clearly feel my heart racing, and my stomach feels tight.
So, whenever I come home and see that person, my stomach tightens, and I feel a heaviness in my chest, as if something is stuck in my throat.

What troubles me the most is that I share a room with a family member who often comes home late at night.
I already have trouble falling asleep and tend to stay up late; even when I try to sleep early, it takes me a while to fall asleep.
However, any noise before I fall asleep can wake me up, but the person I share the room with doesn’t mind making noise.
I get very irritated and ask them to be quiet, and they just mumble back to me, which makes me even more frustrated and depressed.
We always end up arguing.
I feel like they are trying to pick on my flaws, and they always retort back.
I don’t know what they think now, but in the past, they always pointed out my mistakes.
I often mix up words or phrases when I speak, and my family would deliberately mimic my mistakes, which makes me defensive when talking to them.
As a result, they sleep soundly while I lie awake for two to three hours, unable to sleep, my heart racing, filled with negative thoughts, constantly thinking about dying or suicide, or wanting to harm the person affecting my sleep.
I feel so jealous that they can vent their emotions and still sleep soundly, while I struggle for hours to fall asleep, which makes me angry and unable to calm down.
My stomach remains tight, and I feel a lump in my throat, making it hard to sleep.
Sometimes my body feels cold and I break into a cold sweat.
I check my pulse and recall news stories about people dying suddenly from staying up late, always worrying that I might not wake up again after falling asleep.
There are so many things I want to do, and I don’t want to die so early; I feel so unwilling.
Sometimes, just when I finally fall asleep, I get woken up by that person’s alarm clock, and I feel palpitations.
I need to lie down for at least another hour to fall back asleep.
When I can’t sleep well, I might only get 2 to 4 hours of sleep, but usually, I can sleep for nearly 10 hours if I wake up at a fixed time.
However, when I can’t sleep well, it feels very painful; I’m clearly exhausted but can’t sleep.
I can only cry and scream, punching and kicking the wall, but this only makes my heart race faster and makes it even harder to sleep.
Yet, holding it all in is so painful.
This cycle repeats every year, and I feel so tired.
I want to leave home, but I have people I care about at home, and the burden is heavy; I can’t leave.
I don’t know what to do.
When it comes to school presentations or reports, my emotions become very unstable for a while after the presentation ends, and I easily cry.
I often fantasize about dying during the presentation; if I were dead, I wouldn’t have to face the questions and gazes from my teachers and classmates.
I’m very afraid of death; I wouldn’t commit suicide, but I sometimes find myself reaching for a knife or standing on the road, thinking about letting a car hit me.
I’m very sensitive to changes in my health, which makes me very depressed.
I don’t know what to do.
Listening to music only temporarily alleviates my emotions, but I feel increasingly dependent on it.
I notice that most other students don’t wear headphones while commuting, but whenever I think of those troubling things, my mind automatically fills with negative thoughts and fantasies of criticism and arguments with others.
I feel the need to distract myself with other activities, even though I know the problems won’t be solved.
I really want to stop, but I don’t know how.
I want to break free from this endless cycle.
Doctor, what should I do? Thank you, doctor.

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Bu Bu, 20~29 year old female. Ask Date: 2017/01/08