Depression

[Cagliostro]

Exercise really is great. I made it a point to keep exercising after my fiance dumped me in 2006. I lost a heap of weight (not eating anything also helped that but I wouldn't recommend that), and felt good about my physical body even if I couldn't feel good about much else. I'd feel good for an hour or so after exercising, but it rarely lasted longer than that.

[StevieG]

Exercise is good, mmmkay!

I'm susceptible to ... maybe not depression as such, but something close. But I've always played sport of some kind. I've played soccer since under 8's, and squash since about age 10. Cricket since early age, badminton, volley ball, tennis, hockey, football (Aussie rules), touch football. I've always had a natural ability in these areas (NOT swimming - I sink...)

I think it has an important influence - getting exercise. I'm just starting to put on some weight now - love handles, a bit of a gut, geez it affect self-esteem. I don't think exercise can be stressed enough!

[Harbinger]

Although I abhor his music, I like the way rapper Usher describes being fit.
"It's a gift to yourself."

That's actually pretty profound.

[Loredoctor]

Exercise really is great. I made it a point to keep exercising after my fiance dumped me in 2006. I lost a heap of weight (not eating anything also helped that but I wouldn't recommend that), and felt good about my physical body even if I couldn't feel good about much else. I'd feel good for an hour or so after exercising, but it rarely lasted longer than that.

I support this post wholeheartedly. Besides exercise releasing endorphines into your bloodstream which make you feel good, there's the long term effects of having a better body.

[Cambo]

I woke up today to find myself in the other place, with a trail of footprints from where I ran away.

Had to find this thread tonight. I need it. My own lurking depression has unexpectedly jumped me. It's great to read all of your thoughts and experiences. It gives hope. Which is a rare enough thing when I'm deep in the grey. Also, I need to force myself open. This is compulsory. Instinct would have me close off. Instinct closed me off for three years. This is fatal. I refuse to allow myself to languish in mute self pity. But it's hard...

Sigh.

I mentioned the grey. I assign colours to my moods. the depressive ones are blue, grey and black. Blue is fairly self explanatory. It's simple, it's no particular problem, I just get sad about something for a while. It's even almost pleasurable in a perverse, bittersweet kind of way. The grey...that's when everything turns to dust. Colours are muted, pleasure and pain dulled, mind numbed. I walk around in a fog. Haze clouds my vision. Everything good and bad about the world is obscured, until nothing is worth anything anymore. The life is gone. There is nothing.

Nothing ever grows and the sun doesn't shine all day. Tried to save myself, but my self keeps slipping away.

Those are the good days. If it stops there, if I make it out from that desert, that is a good episode. The grey is awful, a featureless, timeless ordeal. But at the back of my mind, behind all the numbness, apathy, nihilism, a part of me still fears. The only thing left to fear is the black. There is a moment of transition, usually, between grey and black, a moment of godawful clarity as it bears down me. My mother once told me the monsters in my closet were all in my head. How right she was. Soul agony. That's what the black is. It makes me curl into myself, away from its touch, only to find it already inside of me. It burns like acid. Thick corrosion covers everything. I walk through it, I breathe it, I speak it. It burns.

There is no place I can go, there is no way I can hide. It feels like it keeps coming from the inside.

Please, not the black tonight. Let this be a good night.

No matter what, I survive. I have taught myself how to live long ago. This may read like despair. Certainly when I'm like this I display an unusual mixture of self-pity and narcissism. But this in itself is an act of defiance. I decline to be taught that I am alone. I decline to deliberately isolate myself. For now, that is all I have in me.

[Orlion]

Sounds similar to what I go through at night from time to time (the black, that is) Instead of colors, though, it's concepts. Oblivion and eternity, both frightening concepts, both things I don't want to face. So I don't, but sometimes it takes a while before the concepts decide they don't want face me.

It's less frequent now, at least. I remember it'd happen almost every night for years, and no one was capable of helping me because no one understood even slightly that this could be a problem.

I've since found out that it seems to be fairly common... common enough, anyway that there tends to be people who know what I'm talking about.

[Zahir]

I've had relatively minor depression all my life, to which I've tried to develop a habit of looking for silver linings. At least that is how I see it. Several times in the last decade I've been on antidepressants, most noticeably in the wake of my fiancee's sudden death when emotionally speaking I crashed. Big time. I was on seroquel for a few months. Look it up.

I still have waves of paranoid fear and deep sadness, coupled with bouts of enthusiasm (a doctor told me I might be borderline bipolar). I've found friendship and activity helps the most.

[Cambo]

I don't need to look it up, Zahir. I have some of it in my top drawer. That's what they put me on when I was full-scale psychotic. It must truly have been an emotional crash, and my heart goes out to you.

As it does to Orlion. I too would face the black on a frequent basis for years. During those years, I was also never entirely out of the grey. Like you, no-one helped, for me because I never allowed anyone to know the existence or extent of my problems. That loneliness and isolation was one of the worst things about it. Happily, though, one of the most helpful things I've found is that so many people do know what I'm talking about. Many of them have it worse than me- a dear friend of mine is bipolar - and still manage to lead great lives and be great people.

[Linna Heartbooger]

Btw, thanks for this thread... yeah, I think depression has A LOT to do with disconnectedness from others... it's so completely scary to go out among people and show your real self, or even a bit of that. (at least for me) Grr. To seek love and friendship, and know that people can deny you that or not even care.

And then there's the vicious cycle of feeling like we can't do work or it's meaningless to -> not doing work -> robbing ourselves of something that could give us a bit of satisfaction.

I've been finally starting to do something about my depression, (mainly getting counseling, exercising, going outside, and trying something called "theophostic prayer" which alternately scares and fascinates me) and I think this thread; (which I noticed maybe a month or 2 ago) even just bringing up the topic, helped to push me to that. So, thanks...

[aliantha]

Good for you, Lina. Hang in there.

[Cambo]

Seconded. I'm a great believer in counselling, they do fantastic work. What's theophostic prayer?

[Cagliostro]

I believe counseling can help some people, and not others. I think I'm a bit immune, for some reason. I've worked at a mental health place (as computer helpdesk), and I can see how it does good, but it doesn't for me. I had a few things put the right way around, but for the most part I had it mostly figured out by the time I got there. I enjoyed it because I could really talk to someone about things though, and that is half of the problem.

Something I also found helpful during my worst was to do something each week that scares you. For me, it ranged from driving in downtown Denver (which does scare me as I've gotten lost so many times, though only kinda) to auditioning for a musical (which thankfully paid off in multiple ways).

[Cambo]

My counsellor has told me very few things I didn't already know. The value is that I can tell her things that very few people know.

[Avatar]

Yeah, like Cag, (or perhaps moreso), I'm not a great fan. Never did me any good. Prefer to drop some acid and sort my own brain out.

If it works for you, that's great. If it doesn't, don't sweat it.

--A

[rdhopeca]

Counseling didn't do anything for me or my family as far as I'm concerned. My sister had behavioral issues when I was a teenager and the counselor essentially blamed it all on me, for a variety of reasons, such as, my sister idolized me and I didn't pay her enough attention, or my father was out of the house too much working and I tried to "replace him" in the family structure, etc etc.

Personally, in a non-abusive household (meaning I never physically or verbally abused my sister) it is unconscionable to place the blame for a family's dysfunction at the feet of a 15 year old.

I did try it later in my early twenties for a few months when I was sorting some personal things out, but they never told me anything I didn't already know, and trusting the counselor was difficult due to my previous experiences.

[Cambo]

That sucks rd. That counsellor had no clue what they were up to.

Av, I'm sensing you may have an issue with counselling beyond that it simply doesn't work for you? Sorting yourself out is always good, if you can manage it. I did the first time I had major mental health issues, needed some help the second time, which is where the counsellor came into the picture (along with the prescription drugs). After that, I've simply come to see my counsellor as a friend who lets me go on about myself way longer than other friends .

But I agree with Av that if id doesn't work, it's no biggie. There are other paths to mental health.

[Linna Heartbooger]

aliantha and Cambo- thaaaanks for such speeedy encouragement.

I figure, if kings and presidents seek counsel for their decisions, why shouldn't I seek counsel on how to rule my own soul?

So Cambo, as far as theophostic prayer- it ideally goes like this: You enter in to a memory of pain, "look around," feel what it was like in that moment, recognize "what [lie/lies] do I believe about this situation?" and then at some point ask Jesus, "What truth do you want me to know about this?" to replace the lie.

So for example, someone having panic attacks when they encounter a trigger of a painful memory might be unconsciously believing the lie, "I am about to die," because he/she felt that way when the first memory was formed. And yes, prayer is also used at the beginning to guide a person back to the memory that the various crap is linked to.

Another big part of the idea is that, as much as I can try to self-talk myself or get someone else to talk me into thinking, "you're okay," it's probably not gonna be super-permanent. But if the One who decided I was supposed to exist will tell me, "This is actually the truth," I'd expect that to CHANGE me in a way that is more significant.

I've had 3 sessions so far; I can't say, "yay, so much healing has happened!" I think a few real things have happened, but I am quite proud to say (haha) that my internal defenses are AMAZING.

Personally, in a non-abusive household (meaning I never physically or verbally abused my sister) it is unconscionable to place the blame for a family's dysfunction at the feet of a 15 year old.

Umm, YES!!!

It stinks that counsellors, all of them, will inevitably have their own issues.

[Linna Heartbooger]

Something I also found helpful during my worst was to do something each week that scares you. For me, it ranged from driving in downtown Denver (which does scare me as I've gotten lost so many times, though only kinda) to auditioning for a musical (which thankfully paid off in multiple ways).

very nice, I'm impressed. If that aint "working on ones problems," what is? Also- you got to be in the musical?

After that, I've simply come to see my counsellor as a friend who lets me go on about myself way longer than other friend

hahah. =)

[Cagliostro]

Something I also found helpful during my worst was to do something each week that scares you. For me, it ranged from driving in downtown Denver (which does scare me as I've gotten lost so many times, though only kinda) to auditioning for a musical (which thankfully paid off in multiple ways).

very nice, I'm impressed. If that aint "working on ones problems," what is? Also- you got to be in the musical?

Yep. It was Bat Boy: The Musical. Based off of the character from Weekly World News. It was fun, and it gave an assist in meeting my now wife.

And rdhopeca, it's true. From working on the computer repair side of a mental health place, I realized why the majority of therapists got into the business in the first place. For every one person in trying to honestly help people, there was at least 5 or more there to figure out their own problems. So when picking therapists, if you don't get a good sense with one person, move on to the next. They generally won't take it personally.

[Avatar]

Av, I'm sensing you may have an issue with counselling beyond that it simply doesn't work for you?

Hahaha, perhaps. Perhaps my issue is partly that I seriously doubt another person is capable of the same insight into my state of mind and my motivations as I am. Perhaps also I've never entirely trusted them, or the premises they work from. Perhaps I am something of a control freak in some non-traditional senses of the concept. Perhaps I simply had to come to terms with my issues (which btw manifested in black depression among others) in my own way. Perhaps this accounts for my conviction that the solutions are internal and not external.

The truth of all predictions, is always in your hands.

--A