Can I recommend a book? Please go read The Noonday Demon by Andrew Solomon. I am not clinically depressed, and never gave the condition much thought til I happened to pick up this book. It is fabulous and really, really eye-opening. Some of you who are depressed might not be into reading what’s partially a memoir of very serious depression, but friends and family would benefit.
I know it’s the Pit, and I never do this, but :: hugs :: for everyone in here. This is a serious disease that is not taken seriously enough in our society.
In a nutshell, COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS. People never seem to realise that when you’re depressed it isn’t because you’ve simply forgotten all the good things in your life. (“Oh what’s this? Why you’re right, there is a roof over my head after all!”) Reminders of all the good things in my life compared to all the bad things in other people’s lives only make me feel guilty and hopeless for being depressed despite every reason not to be. What a way to make a person feel like a complete loser. **
[/QUOTE]
YES!! That was one of the hardest things for me when I took a deep dive. I was feeling major guilt for feeling bad. My inner thoughts went something like this:
“Who do you think you are? You’ve got a great family, had an idyllic childhood, your boyfriend is great, money’s not a big problem even though you’re not rich, you’re intelligent, well-educated, etc…how dare you feel sorry for yourself when there are people in the world with no families, no homes, no food, no anything?”
When I finally went for help, though, my therapist explained to me that this almost makes it worse. People who, for example, had an awful childhood have the “luxury” of saying, “There. That’s what has me screwed up.” And then they know what to focus on to help themselves. Those of us with no obvious triggers are left fumbling for answers.
BTW, Paxil and Prozac are for sissies. Effexor rules, baby!
It’s not that uncommon for people to think that, if they haven’t experienced something as intangible and complex as severe depression, then it doesn’t really exist.
I went without meds for years thinking that I should be able to get it together. Finally, I was too tired to keep trying, so I got a prescription to Prozac. It has a massive effect on my outlook. Folks who are close to me say it’s almost like I’m a different person in a good way.
So for anyone who views it as a crutch or weakness in all cases, I say fuck 'em. I’m happy to be alive again.
Listen, buddy, anyone who suffers depression and is still alive is toughing it out. It’s possible to make yourself live an entire life with depression and not take anything for it. But there’s this little thing called “Quality of Life” that makes the difference between a life well lived and a life half lived.
My mother has more than 25 years of depression under her belt. She did nothing for it, she “toughed it out”. And she was miserable. Wonderful husband, fantastic kids (:D)), lovely home, a family who cared, all the comforts she could want, and she’s thinking about suicide in her spare time. She had a lot of spare time, because she didn’t do anything. Nope. We had the most immaculate house, but Mum didn’t have a single hobby to her name. She went out once a week to do the shopping, but that was all.
Enter Prozac.
My mother is a different person - Prozac hasn’t changed her, it’s let the real Mum out. She’s vibrant, she’s happy, she’s out there! She’s got so many hobbies that she barely has time for them all. She’s kicking butt in her karate class. She’s got friends! and she hangs out with them. The house is a mess, but she doesn’t care!! Bad things happen, and she deals with them. Before, bad things would happen, and she’d go to pieces. She’s fitter than she’s ever been in her life, and she’s lost so much weight now that she wants to get out and exercise. She’s wonderful. I’m so glad I got to meet my real Mum, and not that scary lady who intimidated me throughout my childhood with her moods.
Oh yeah??? Well, My Celexa can kick ALL you pansy drugs boooooootayyyyyyyy!
But seriously, I’ve been on the meds for a little over a year now. Dear Goddess, I had no idea just how depressed I’d been, and for how long, until one day, I wasn’t. The happy came back. I was in a good mood. The first genuinely good mood I’d been for more than ten years. I had to go outside and put my head between my knees.
That mild euphoria lasted for a day or two, then settled down in to a “hey, I can cope with this” mood. Some things still sucked, but not everything. I wanted to get up in the morning. I wanted to go to work. I wanted to play with my kids. I wanted to go out and meet people and make friends and have sex with my husband.
I refuse to let myself get that depressed again, and if it means I have to take the drugs for the rest of my life, so be it. If I can get off them someday, fine. But I’d rather take a drug and be human than not take it and be the complete waste of space that I was.
When I was first told my problem was a chemical problem, something physiologically wrong with me, I broke down in tears. Just the thought that there would be a way to stop the depression, or at least alleviate it, made me cry in relief.
I think it may be something that needs to be experienced to be understood. A lot like playing craps.
I am by no means defending everyone who says anti-depressants are a crutch, but in some cases, they are.My sister recently started taking an anti-depressant,and yes I did tell her it was a crutch, but let me explain. I meant it almost literally as a crutch, that is, something that is necessary to function for a time, but not actually a cure.My sister was two blocks away from the WTC when it collapsed and started on the anti-depressant a couple of days later.She refused to admit she saw anything for days, and I think she is either blocking worse memories or just not talking about them.The crutch comment happened in the course of a conversation where I was trying to persuade her to take advantage of therapy for the longer term,along with the medication for the short term. Of course, she may have a chemical imbalance,but there’s no reason to think so based on her 10 minute visit to the general practioner who wrote the prescription.
I’m taking Serzone and Depakote for bipolar disorder. These drugs have literally saved my life. I don’t have the same highs and lows anymore.
Antidepressants and mood stabilizers don’t keep you from getting depressed again, ever. They help lift the fog of chronic depression and mania so you can deal with life.
The people who graciously inform me that my meds are a crutch are cordially invited to felch Ted Kennedy.
Other than Peta, who probably caught on to your sleep problems, did anyone notice?
::D&R like hell::
After I saw this, my wife came in here because she and my MIL were wondering what the hell had me laughing so loud.
I’ve never needed antidepressants, but I’m surrounded by people who do. People who think you could do for yourself what Prozac et al. do for you, give me a serious burn. Ditto people who think Prozac’s a ‘happy pill’ that you take if you’re having a rotten day, to put a smile back on your face. (Beer’s occasionally good for that, though. :))
Best response to these dipshits is Dylan’s line, “Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.” Or what they could understand, if they were willing to do just the tiniest bit of research, but since they think they already know it all, they don’t bother. :rolleyes:
Thanks for the recommendation, I haven’t read this book (yet), but I have another book recommendation, also a memoir of a serious depressive.
It’s called The Beast, by Tracy Thompson. I almost cried while I was reading it, because it explained, clearly, what it felt like to be depressive. I’ve never been able to do that, and I’m a good writer.
I loaned it to my Mom (who is also depressive) and also made my Dad read it. Mom was relieved to have words to describe her inner state.
Dad had never understood what depression is like or about; although he never said “pull yourself together” to me (I think he might have to my Mom, but he is (still) highly protective of me), he did say things which indicated that he thought I should be able to cope with life better than I was.
The only comment he made after reading this book was “It doesn’t sound like a fun place to be”, but he has had a profound attitude change to the subject of depression. It took my having a short stint in a psychiatric hospital to shock him into understanding that depression was a serious, life-affecting illness. It took this book to help him understand what my life had been like on the inside since I was about 8 years’ old.
I’ve made it a habit to be open with all the people in my life (friends and coworkers) about my depression, what causes it, and how the medication helps. In fact, the diabetes example is one I use frequently. I hope that by sharing my story with others, they may recognize the same symptoms in themselves or others and help those people get treatment; I know that my life would have been a lot less painful if I had been diagnosed earlier.
People said the same thing about my husband’s nice Canadian crutches, that if he just tried harder then he could walk wothout them. He insisted that it hurt too much. A man who became one of the best knee surgeons in the country operated, partly out of curiosity, and reconstructed hubby’s knee. He removed 3 very sharp bone fragments that did not show on the x-rays and would have damaged hubby’s knee worse if he had tried to walk. Now he walks without them.
No matter how useful and necessary a tool is, there will he some asshole to tell you that it is not needed.
well, yeah, solvent fumes are fine (afterall, I get to work with 200 proof alcohol)… just avoid the crap that’ll cause permanent physical deformaties by way of involunatary muscle contractions.
Sleep problems? Wha?! :eek: There’ve been sleep problems. :rolleyes: But seriously…
I think part of the problem is that people who are genuinely clinically/chemically depressed and need these medications are the one’s out there working hardest to avoid obtaining/using them. They are trying so hard to “suck it up” and “count blessings” etc. They aren’t going to doctors or to psychiatrists to find a cause and effect a change because they are convinced by well-meaning loved ones and sometimes by the infliction itself that if they just work/try hard enough, they can succeed–they can make the hurt stop…
Meanwhile, these drugs take on some kind of “trendiness” in the media and the surreal worlds of television talkshows, so that people misunderstand the purpose and effect of the actual prescription medication or the biological defect they are meant to treat. Contributing to this may be a few lazy practicioners who perhaps have prescribed them as a be-all, end-all solution to a problem that is not chemical.
Heck, we even know someone who has been diagnosed with depression and is in therapy who said she didn’t want the necessary medication because she wanted to “experience her feelings” as they were intended (i.e. she didn’t want “the drugs” to repress them). If anything, as I understand it, these medications alleviate counterfit emotions, allowing true feelings to manifest for examination, analysis and resolution, which might have otherwise been overwhelmed due to a chemical imbalance.
Part of the answer seems to me to be to educate people that depression is not just a mood, it is often a condition, not a state of feeling, but a state of being.
So, in the words of my big boss, when someone tells you it’s a crutch (in a derrogatory term, not in the enabling a one-legged man to walk like everyone else way), tell them to “Shut their pie-hole!” Then, you walk away knowing that you’re not saying it because some chemical in absence or excess in your system is making your emotions do the wacky, but because they’re a tremendous intellectual feeb.
short histroy-
1994-Entered college on partial scholarship for academic merit. First semester GPA-3.85
Then the pills stop working.
1995-I manage to hang on for 3 more semesters. Fourth semester GPA 2.0
I'm unemployed and on SSI. It's reactions like the ones you mention that hurt the most. So many times, I think I've finally gotten through to a friend or relative. Then they say 'You're not really depressed. You've just convinced yourself that you are.' or 'If you moved in with me for a month, I could fix your problems.'. Every day, I take 60 mgs of methylphenidate(ritalin), 50 mgs of Paxil, and 200 mgs of Welbutrin. I'd smear my head with raw sewage and live roaches if it would help. I haven't given up or stopped trying. If I had, I wouldn't be able to bathe and eat every day-let alone live in my own apartment.
For me, one good thing did come out of the tragedy of September 11th. Two days later, my mother wanted to drive me on some errands (to be sure I was ok, because she worries about me and because I have no car and no license). She was surprised that I didn't seem more depressed than usual. I told her that past a certain threshhold, more made no difference . Break a rib and it hurts. Break another and it hurts more. But if you've got 11 broken ribs already, breaking the 12th doesn't make the pain worse. So we went on with the errands. After seeing how affected everyone was, Mom said to me "I guess this how you feel all the time." After years of trying to understand just what I was going through, she summed it all up in that sentence. To anyone who has not experienced clinical depression, just remember how you felt September 13th. Depression is feeling that way all the time-whether you're waking up in the morning, borrowing money to pay bills, or surrounded by friends on your birthday.
Mr Miskatonic- I often use the crutch metaphor myself. I don't expect the right pill to magically make me better. But I can't make myself better without it. A crutch doesn't do the walking for you. But, its impossible for some people to walk without one. So yes, it is a crutch. So was the crutch my Bubby(Yiddish for grandmother) used after her knee surgery. Take away that crutch and standing takes a all your will power and is an agony. Walking becomes impossible.
Wha?! :eek: There’ve been sleep problems. :rolleyes: But seriously…