Hello,

I had a negative experience at support group today-it is virtual on zoom. I've been going for about a year and I really liked the group as a whole and the faciliator. This organization has many different virtual support groups throughout the week, and about a year ago I left another one on Sunday because they kept pressuring me to facilitate and I'm not quite comfortable with that.  I've gotten to where I won't stay in a place if I feel really uncomfortable, I'll just leave immediately. 

I think what bothered me today was what I felt was the lack of common sense and empathy. After all, I think what people are really looking for when they go to these things is to be heard and understood.  Well I didn't today at all.  I might opt to do a group on another day that is run by a different region because they have different rules and parameters to avoid hijacking anothers' discussion/sharing or judging.

Lately, I get pretty sore and defensive over what is probably considered medical gaslighting, especially when people try to say that your condition is psychosomatic and would go away if you would 'just relax' 'just think positive' etc.  I have a couple of conditions, chronic migraines and severe abdominal cramping. For the abdominal cramping I wound up in the emergency room two months ago-it was a $20,000 bill-astounding for something I had figured out by going online, but doctors refused to listen.  After a number of tests and 20k later-the verdict/cure was the same that I disovered on the internet-totally avoidable if I would have been listened to sooner.  It has been treated and resolved since then. And it was not psychosomatic.

Anyway, my other issue, the chronic migraines have been pretty bad.  They were cured by basically a miracle drug that I was taking for a year.  When the calendar year was up, insurance decided to quit covering the drug-the migraines came back and really badly.  These past couple of weeks I was dropping everything to take rescue meds.  I've been told by life coaches in the past that I had too much anger, etc. well instead I used my anger this time to fight the insurance company, and now they are finally going to approve it again via the appeal.  I don't have the meds in hand yet but I am releieved, grateful and happy.

I started my share today to say that I was feeling grateful that my efforts paid off and that my meds would be covered again. I really, really need them.  This is a feedback meeting, and this one woman who is a psych nurse practitioner said, "did you notice that when you weren't grateful you had migraines, and now that you are grateful, your migraines are gone."  I got so mad at this.  I said, 'you know, I am going to push back on this, too, I feel like I am being blamed for my condition and I'm going to step out." I left the meeting, I was so angry.  I don't think I will be back even though I liked the group a lot.  I've had one person decide to stop hanging out with me because I got a migraine and had to go to urgent care for an injection the day I was at her house.  She said I caused it because I 'couldn't relax." and was mad that I interrupted her day.  It was because of the elevation.

I am not sure this meeting is a fit for me. I might do their Monday meeting-people are not allowed to make these type of judgmental or invasive comments, the Monday meeting is based on reflective listening and 'not hijacking' others' sharing. I think this might be the reason why.

I'm just not in the mood to hear it, to basically be told I'm causing and creating my own condition, she didnt' even listen, I didn't get the meds yet and the migraines are not gone yet. It's like, 'you have migraines because you are ungrateful, don't you know?'  I'm so tired of the new age bullsh*t.