Some words about depression

Deciding that maybe I was depressed, and then reading stories by people who have suffered depressive episodes has been terribly enlightening and comforting. The way they describe how they feel, how they react to the world and how the world reacts back resonates so strongly with my life and my experiences. Its nice to know that its not just me, that there are ways of dealing, and that a lot of it you just have to accept and get through. That I’m not wrong – that I feel sad and awful because of how I am made and not because I’m wrong, or bad, or faulty, or because I have chosen not to be happy or that I have chosen to be full of angst. I was trying to compile a list of links to online resources, but I keep crying when I read them so maybe hubby will compile something for me. In the meantime, I do have a link to a list of things to say and not to say to someone who is depressed, which may be useful for you in dealing with me – a lot of these really hit the mark. There are also some books that we have gotten – again, I can’t read them because they make me too sad, but others of you may find them interesting: Malignant Sadness: The Anatomy of Depression, by Lewis Wolpert (a cell biologist); The Noonday Demon:An Atlas of Depression, by Andrew Solomon (one of my friends said that this book was kind of scary); and The Cognitive Behavioral Workbook for Depression: A step-by-step program, by William Knaus and Albert Ellis. I think I only have a mild form as I don’t usually have the can’t-get-out-of-bed problem, but a lot of the other stuff seems to be very applicable. The NIMH also has some information.

On the very positive side, we were doing an inventory of depressive symptoms in the workbook and you can really see how well the therapy has been working. There are a whole slew of symptoms that are centered around low self-esteem, a sense of worthlessness, and feelings that its wrong to feel so sad, that I remember having and don’t have anymore. This is a lot of work from hubby and the therapist. It really cuts the sadness and low feelings in half, as I have not only the feelings of sadness, but also feelings of guilt and self-loathing that I feel so sad when I really shouldn’t. Accepting that my feelings are valid no matter what they are, that I have a right to feel what I feel, has been tremendous for me. Its so important to know that I am not wrong to feel what I feel. Its what I feel, and that’s okay. Its not the same way others experience life, but it turns out to be very similar to the way other people who suffer from depression experience life. It allows me to accept myself and be okay with myself. Sadness happens. Sometimes for a logical reason, sometimes for no reason at all, and that’s okay, I just have to ride it out. You just have to stay balanced on your board and ride the wave.

Another positive note, there are a series of issues related to distorted negative impressions of reality which I realized I harbored many years ago (I kind of think this is due to my Mother – thanks!), and I have worked long and hard (and successfully, I think) to rid myself of. And that’s even before I read anything about its relationship to depression, or self-identified as being depressed. Go me!

I think that classifying myself as depressive is good – it helps me figure out how to deal with the world, and to understand how to mitigate the negative impacts on my life. Also to accept that sadness is going to happen, to recognize these periods of sadness when they do happen, and to do all that I can to keep the length of these periods to a minimum. I hope that those of you in my family can also accept that this is just the way I am, that there is no cure, no fixing, nothing that can be done permanently to make me happy. That attempts at fixing only make things worse for me. That its no one’s fault, and to just accept who I am. I know its hard, but its like religion, you just have to accept.