The Official being depressed for no (or any) reason thread

[jessia]

if i knew what it was about i'd be happy to ignore it (or deal with it, if i really had to), but i was just like... emotionally/mentally paralysed the rest of the day (and kind of today, even though i was more blah than sad) and couldn't do anything.

now my backspace key is broken. fml.

[Jaya]

Is it homesickness (or something akin to that)? That has a tendency to sneak up on people without them noticing or realising what it is.

[jessia]

nope, unless it's a month early or something. i'm only a couple hours away from home and i've got a pretty solid solid support network here.

[Kansas Person]

I've noticed that my moods drift up and down in ways that don't correlate with external events. Sometimes the weather seems affect my moods. My suggestion, for what it's worth is to monitor your moods and try to learn to cope with them.

[bethanwy]

I've noticed that my moods drift up and down in ways that don't correlate with external events. Sometimes the weather seems affect my moods. My suggestion, for what it's worth is to monitor your moods and try to learn to cope with them.

I'm sorry, but that's just not always possible. It can be very difficult, nigh impossible to cope with my own moods and feelings. Trying is nice, but external help will always work better.

[Peter]

With time you may gain the ability to stand outside yourself and say, 'Oh yes, this person is feeling down because...' or you may not. There are no guarantees.

[Kansas Person]

It was only a suggestion. Long ago, I decided that the most "normal" thing to do in life is to get on with living as best you can, considering who you are and what your circumstances are. I personally have found it very useful to monitor my own moods.

[bee]

Couldn't sleep last night. I took an extra Ambien because I was so frustrated. Still couldn't sleep. Stressed out, feeling incredibly overwhelmed with everything, barely keeping my head above water (or you know, sometimes not even), feel like I'm being a total failure at everything I'm doing.

So I got up and went and had a giant sobbing session on the bathroom floor. (I didn't want to wake Ron up, because he has a hard time getting back to sleep if I wake him, so I snuck out of the room.)

I just need a little bubble of time to freeze everything outside and just relax in it. Where I can't be a failure, and where nobody is expecting anything from me.

[Kansas Person]

Bee: All that I can say is to wish you good luck in dealing with your moods. Currently, I am 60 and have had about three times as many years in dealing with my moods as you have had. From my own experience, it seems to get easier with practice, though I am not you, and thus your experience might differ.

I also find it easier to deal with the subject in the abstract. You seem to be subject to what the Elizabethans called "melancholy", which seems to equate to "depression" in modern psychological jargon. Consider Hamlet, the Melancholy Dane, one of the greatest characters in all of world literature. He wasn't a happy man, but he did the best he could considering who he was and what his situation was. This is all that any of us can do. Neither of us is the only person who has felt this way.

Some years ago, I read "The Anatomy of Melancholy" by Burton, a book that Philip Pullman himself has recommended, though long after I read it myself. To the Elizabethans, melancholy was the "humour" of poets and intellectuals. If both of us are doomed to be melancholy, we might as well make the best of it. I am not joking. There has been debate as to what being "normal" means. Long ago, I decided that the most "normal" thing that anyone can do is to get on with his or her life as best he or she can, considering who he or she is, and whatever is his or her situation. There appear to be advantages to the "melancholy humour" and we should use those advantages! The status of "normal" isn't achievable and might not be desirable even if we could achieve it.

In terms of His Dark Materials, neither Will nor Lyra are really "normal" people. They are simply unique individuals, coping as best they can with who they are and what their circimstances are. This is equally true of you, of me, and of everybody.

[AlexSP]

that's really well put, and i think i know what you mean. and i think i've been doing it for years without noticing; putting my own alex-stamp on my constant sadness and making something useful out of it: humour, music mixes, ME BEING ME, and whatever else.

i think, though, age has a lot to do with everything. in your early teens everything seems so unbearable, but afterwards you can laugh at your silly drama. in your late teens you have different problems that seem oh-so-important but then you can also laugh them off later. and inevitably you sort of shrug your early 20s melancholy off one way or another. i'm 33 next week and i remember the existential horror that was my early 20s (and i still get stabs of it lately, but i have reasons). i have a hard time not laughing in the faces of 20s people with "depression" and all that fun malarkey, because it's just a part of growing up, as much as anything else silly has been. but it's okay. i've cut myself to ribbons many a time due to the unbearability of it all, and i'm not sure most people even get to that point in their oh-so-sadness. it's like getting punched in the face all the time. one day you wake up and realize, the punches aren't going to stop because THIS IS REAL LIFE, so deal with it. and you do, and life goes on, and kittens are kittens and it's all semi-ok, semi-ok.

[Kansas Person]

AlexSP: We have gotten into a Deep, Personal, and Important subject. I hadn't expected to get into something like this on this Forum about "His Dark Materials". Ultimately, we all have moods and have to live with them as best we can. The world and people around us are not controlled by our moods, however much we might obsess upon those moods. Still, we should show consideration for others within our own moods.

In one posting, Bee showed compassion for Ron, whoever he is, not wanting to wake him up unnecessarily. We should all show the same compassion for the people around us. I have great respect for Bee in her compassion.

What I really reject is the "Positive Thinking" Magisterium, which morally condemns people who have "Negative Thoughts", which means the moods that any of us might have. There's a book I would recommend on this subject. It is "Bright-Sided" by Barbara Ehrenreich. (In the U.K., it was titled "Smile or Die".) It is an attack on those Fascist S***s like Norman Vincent Peale. We each have our moods and they are real and not completely under our control. Still, those other people who condemn us for having "down" moods are manipulating us for their own purposes, whatever they might be. My moods are my own and I will deal with them as best I can. What I reject are people who order me to deal with them in a specific way, usually by rejecting them. My moods are real!

[bee]

AlexSP: We have gotten into a Deep, Personal, and Important subject. I hadn't expected to get into something like this on this Forum about "His Dark Materials".

Expect more! We do deep and personal a lot here.

In one posting, Bee showed compassion for Ron, whoever he is, not wanting to wake him up unnecessarily. We should all show the same compassion for the people around us. I have great respect for Bee in her compassion.

I don't know that I would call it compassion. I would attribute it more to my anxiety and my issues with sharing emotional information. In general, I feel like discussing my issues is a burden to anyone who has to listen to them. They're my problems, and it takes a lot for me to ask for help, every single time I need it. Ron, for the record, is my live-in boyfriend and the one in-person member of my emotional support group. The entire rest of my support group is comprised of people of this forum.

We each have our moods and they are real and not completely under our control. Still, those other people who condemn us for having "down" moods are manipulating us for their own purposes, whatever they might be. My moods are my own and I will deal with them as best I can. What I reject are people who order me to deal with them in a specific way, usually by rejecting them. My moods are real!

To be honest, this seems contrary to how I've understood your previous posts on the subject. Maybe I wasn't reading right. I agree to recognizing your own moods and attempting to deal with them, but I also think that there is something to be said for not dealing with them on your own. You'll find that a large proportion of regulars here deal with or have dealt with depression, anxiety, and similar issues. These are not "moods". It isn't just feeling "down" for a little while, and usually it isn't because of outside influence. Depression is not having a bad day. It's persistent and crippling and often out of control. Monitoring it can be helpful, but I don't think any of us could say that by itself really accomplishes an overall "cure". There is no "cure" or quick fix of any kind.

There's a book I would recommend on this subject. It is "Bright-Sided" by Barbara Ehrenreich. (In the U.K., it was titled "Smile or Die")

I've seen the RSA sketching-lecture on this subject. Ronni (AletheiaDolorosa) is currently (or just recently finished) reading that, and on her glowing recommendation, I just downloaded it to my Kindle last week. I haven't gotten a chance to start it yet though.

[Kansas Person]

Bee: My writing and thinking have been getting sloppy in ways that must be confusing. I wasn't making the important distinction between minor mood swings and serious clinical depression.

I know from experience that the meds can help greatly in dealing with clinical depression. Many years ago, one of my doctors put me on a low dose of Prozac, and it was literally a life-saver. About five years ago, I stopped taking it, just to see what happened and it made little difference--my brain must have rewired itself over that period of about seventeen years.

On this Forum, I've been writing more about minor mood swings. With these, autonomy is important to me. I will decide how to deal with them. I might divert myself by going to a movie, taking a walk, or doing anything else that doesn't involve my moods directly. Sometimes, I just ruminate on my moods, though rumination is a practice most done by cows. At other times, I will talk to other people about them. Whatever I do, the choice is mine and nobody else's. I've had other people tell me how I deal with my moods, something that is utterly none of their business most of the time.

It appears that you are dealing with the deeper, more serious form of depression, and thus my thoughts on dealing with the milder mood swings probably don't apply all that much.

To the Elizabethans, "melancholy" could mean anything from a lover's moping to schizophrenia. In the milder forms, it was a common pose. The deeper form was just as serious then as now. (I have a fondness for Elizabethan literature.)

I hope you enjoy "Bright-Sided". Ehrenreich had some fascinating thoughts on the cult of Positive Thinking, including some interesting history as to where it came from, and to where it has led us. She wrote of her experience with breast cancer and how crazy some of the ways people are expected to cope with it have become. A few years ago, I took a friend, who was a breast-cancer survivor, to her hospital for a check up. I was impressed by how artificially upbeat the nurses working there were. It was strange!

[bee]

I know from experience that the meds can help greatly in dealing with clinical depression. Many years ago, one of my doctors put me on a low dose of Prozac, and it was literally a life-saver. About five years ago, I stopped taking it, just to see what happened and it made little difference--my brain must have rewired itself over that period of about seventeen years.

I've been on paroxetine (P axil) for four months now and found it really helpful so far. Not a cure-all, but it certainly is a good addition to my ongoing counseling.

I hope you enjoy "Bright-Sided". Ehrenreich had some fascinating thoughts on the cult of Positive Thinking, including some interesting history as to where it came from, and to where it has led us.

I just started it last night, and I'm really enjoying it so far!

[Peter]

On positivity - my degree is in Electrical and Electronic Engineering and one technique that is widely used in linear circuit design is negative feedback.

Oh no! I hear the cry. It's negative, so it must be bad. We want positive feed back, please, and lots of it!

Well, no. Negative feedback is better named corrective feedback. It notes a signal's departure from wanted behaviour and gives it a nudge back onto the right path. It reduces distortion in audio amplifiers, for example.

Positive feedback does the opposite. It increases a signal's departure from the norm. It has its uses, mostly in oscillators, but do you want to oscillate? Really?

Have I pushed this analogy too far? No - sometimes we need a nudge in the right direction, and sometimes that nudge is of a correctional, or negative, nature. It's a normal part of human behaviour and not to be decried.

</end geek>

[Kansas Person]

Bee: Good luck with P axil. Like Prozac, which helped me enormously, it's another SSRI. What I would suggest is that you monitor and be aware of your own moods, something the doctors might not advise you to do. My doctor didn't warn me that Prozac might cause me to go in the opposite direction of depression and I went hypomanic, which is another problem, though matters eventually worked out with a lower dose. Being abnormally happy can be just as bad as being depressed, and in my case, I found it uncomfortable and puzzling.

Peter: I myself have two engineering degrees, along with one in Computer Science. Considering negative and positive feedback, I must point out that I would rather osculate with an attractive woman than oscillate. (I am much given to word-play.) Does it make sense to tell an electron to Think Positive?

[Peter]

As you may guess, we get a lot of pharma-spam here. As part of our anti-spam measures the names of commonly-spammed pharmaceuticals are automatically replaced - along with swearwords - with substitutes.

Users who have elected to see postings en clair see what you posted. Others see the safe version.

[zemarl]

i woke up and understood something that's probably been obvious to any fly on the wall for weeks. in doing so i realized i've been careless in who i speak to about things that are better left in the dark caverns of the mind to rot and wither into forgetful oblivion.

people are stupid.