I’m depressed at the moment. I haven’t felt like eating. I haven’t eaten anything since Friday.
My moods have been up and down. I’m not sure if I’m headed for a spell of depression.
Depressed off and on since, at least my late teens, at the latest. Early on, it was a sort of “bipolar” type of thing (I’m using quotes because I’m trying not to diagnose myself). I’d go through brief periods of euphoria, fearlessness, a kind of “fuck-you” attitutude (good news: girls seemed to like me when I was like that). But then there’d be periods of uselessness, despair, despondency.
I don’t remember the first time I got medication. Pretty sure it was Prozac. Can’t remember what I didn’t like about it, but they switched me to Zoloft. This would have been in law school. I remember thinking “this shit doesn’t work,” but eventually I realized I was feeling better, despite the side effects. I couldn’t stay on it, though. I hated begging for prescriptions, and whining to strangers. People really don’t like depressed people (and I don’t blame them - at all). And I’ve always gone to great lengths to hide it. People don’t like people who aren’t fun to be around, and the last thing I wanted was to be alone in a crowded room, or to alienate what friends I had. I isolate when I felt bad enough, which seemed like the right strategy to me. Anyway, I had trouble staying on the Zoloft, but I eventually always went crawling back again.
Anyway, eventually the Zoloft stopped working, or it wasn’t strong enough, or whatever. Plus, and, this was the actual reason I gave the doctor, the sexual side effects were getting out of control.
So he added Wellbutrin, and that drug was a while different animal. For me, it was like (what I imagine) taking a weak version of meth might be like. It ended the sex problem, but I spent all my day grinding my teeth. Eventually, either the drug, or just the stress of being me (job, wife, etc.) put me into something that felt everything in world like a nervous breakdown. I got really really sick, like deathly ill. i lost 15 pds off an already skinny frame and afterwords, I was just a nervous wreck. I could not stand being around people, and I felt like - literally - the worst person in the world. As in, “I wonder, if between me and Tony Soprano, which one of us is a better person”. (I aspired to be as good as him.)
Anyway, I took myself off the Wellbutrin. The doctor put me Effexor, which didn’t seem to work, but he did give me (at my request) some little peach pills called “alprazolam” - and those fuckers were a fucking miracle. For a while, at least.
So now I’m on Cymbalta, and we have to wait the interminable number of weeks to see if that does any good.
I know I’ve got whole other life issues, entirely aside from fucked-up brain chemistry. But it’s one of those things. When you have two broken arms you can’t fix your roof. You have to take things one thing at a time.
It’s a strange thing, mental health. If it were a broken arm, people would make accommodations. It doesn’t work that way with depression.
How do you forget things? I can’t get this shit out of my head. I keep seeing all of it over and over again. I get pulled into the arguments, say what I wish I said at the time, yelling it. It won’t go away. I’m tired of having to drink just to have some peace for a while. I get so angry, and so sad at the same time. So many regrets. I wish I had never met them to begin with.
To up-thread posters: I am miserable too, I tried to commit suicide last March. Now I’m trying to figure out what to do next, keeping in mind that I can do suicide again and next time I won’t fail. If you have an ounce of will power or hope within you, you need to reach out to a doctor/clergy member/social worker/hot-line/friend or family member.
I got approved for some time off, through the end of next week. I’m taking the time to work on myself and will be going to some group sessions as well as other things. I’m going to try and get back into yoga and look into a tai chi class. The main problem currently is my anxiety. The medication is helping the depression, but that’s leaving me with having to face everything that the depression was hiding.
Hey, sorry to drop into this thread from out of nowhere but I need some advice and I don’t really want to start a whole new thread.
The very very short and vague version:
My wife has been suffering with depression for a while now, and around the end of last year it started to get bad enough that I was able to get her to start going to therapy again and she was prescribed some medication that has helped a bit. Unfortunately the episode that got me to get her back to seeing a professional also lead to her losing her job, which had the double effect of costing us our health insurance (meaning that the therapy was now too expensive to continue) and making her mental state significantly worse. She has not been able to get another job.
I have been thinking about applying for disability on her behalf. Does anyone have any experience with this? The bit of internet research that I have done seems to imply that we may want to get a disability attorney but I can’t tell if that is really necessary or not. Any experiences that anyone has had would be very helpful. Thanks
From what I’ve heard, the longer your psychiatric history going into such an application, the better your chances of succeeding on the first try w/o having to through the appeals process. My information is several years old but from what understand, things have only gotten more difficult and from what I recall from when I knew people actively engaged in the process, it was fairly unusual that someone would get benefits on the first try w/o having a fairly well documented treatment history. However if you can document that her termination was psych related, I would imagine that would be very beneficial.
You also need to check into the waiting periods for Medicare/Medicaid though. I’ve heard that the former only kicks in after something like 18 or maybe 24 months from your disability date - whatever that means exactly. IOW, I think there is one date where you’re approved for SS benefits but that’s not the same as being approved for the medical insurance bennies.
Of course I could be wrong about all of this, so you need to verify anything I’ve just said.
edit: for the Medicare waiting period - check out this web page. Medicaid might be different though and will probably depend on your state (not sure)
I recently went through the disability application process after trying to commit suicide. In my case it was through a private insurance company through my employer (not Social Security). I applied first for short term benefits and they put me through the ringer. After I tried to go back to work and became suicidal again I applied for long-term benefits. Again, they were really tough even though I had doctor’s records, hospital records and of course the undeniable fact that I tried to commit suicide which suggests that I’m pretty ill. I was finally approved for long-term benefits but their expected recovery time for me is four months so I’ll have to go through the process again. This is private insurance and my shrink tells me he believes Social Security is even harder to get but that’s just hearsay. I hear it’s easier after age 55 and under Social Security, they keep tabs on you but you don’t have to work so hard to show you’re still disabled after your approved. I have wondered myself about the necessity of hiring a lawyer because apparently private insurance companies will force you to apply for Social Security after a period of time (to mitigate their damages). The one thing I would say is that I believe that they bank on your giving up because it’s so hard to get approved. If you really feel that you are legitimately qualified you just have to keep fighting, and it’s a hard fight.
I’ve had three therapy sessions now, and each time after I leave, I feel really low for the rest of the day. I think it’s because I’m not used to letting another person know this side of me and see me cry, and I feel really ashamed of myself.
This is probably common, isn’t it? Does it go away over time?
Last week I brought my journal to the session because I had written out a bunch of stuff about what I wanted to get out of therapy and what my problems were, and I offered to type it up for my therapist for next time. She said she could just photocopy my journal, so she did, and then I kind of freaked out internally because I hadn’t intended anyone to see what I wrote and I would have edited some things out if I had typed it up for her. Part of me is saying it’s good that she saw what I wrote without the edits because she’ll get a clearer picture of what’s going on, but the rest of me is feeling really ashamed of the self-exposure.
I guess I should bring this up next time, huh?
Thanks for posting this. I went ahead and contacted a lawyer. I am positive my wife qualifies, but she isn’t in any shape to fight for this on her own, and I am working too many hours trying to support us to fight on her behalf they way it seems like we will need to.
The lawyer will potentially take up to 25% of anything we are awarded, but won’t take more than $6k and works for free if she isn’t awarded anything. I figure it’s worth a shot. I’ll let you know what happens.
If you’re interested, here’s the statute that talks about that. It only talks about fees for “services provided before a court” though. Also, I don’t see anything about a $6000 limit. Not saying there isn’t one, but I’d either want to get that in writing or know what the legal source for the limitation is.
That link also links to 2 other statutes you should probably look at. Might give you a headache, but probably worth a look at least.
In the left column are other links to regulations for legal representatives.
I don’t think there is a legal source, I think that’s just to keep them competitively priced in a crowded marketplace. But I’ll absolutely take a look at the statues. Thanks.
I understand where you’re coming from. There have been many spells in my life at the end of that rope. I just try to take it one day at a time and rethink things.
Like I have been very lonely and upset because my daughter has pretty much written me off because I’m getting old and sick and she doesn’t want to be burdened. Instead of picturing her nice house and all the things she has, I remember how moody she is and that her quest to possess everything doesn’t help her change that. Even if she wanted me to be with her, it wouldn’t be a happy atmosphere. She would resent me and probably be abusive. I would be afraid and feel trapped there.
I have a nice apt. that is sunny and warm and has the most beautiful view of the water up close and personal. I try to focus on what I have and being grateful for it instead of ignoring it and dwelling on how lonely I am. Sometimes I start to feel better and have a couple of good days but then something happens and I’m in the pits again. I guess it’s one step forward, two steps back until you win by perseverance.
I don’t want to upset anyone and this isn’t meant to be snarky, but if you survive the pit long enough, it eventually feels like home and you enter the ‘Shawshank Redemption’ phase where what used to be your bad days are actually pretty good. Whether you regard that as a blessing or something very much on the other end of the spectrum will probably vary a lot from one person to another.
Here’s an article that may not seem to relate to depression, but it does. It may seem less than encouraging if not a bit bleak at times, but that’s at all the message. The closing paragraph, which should be just cryptic and tantalizing enough to get you to follow the link:
I’ve been seeing my therapist for a long time, and I still get embarrassed sharing with her. In the beginning, I’d feel so bad that I would email her after session and apologize for crying. It takes a long time to realize that you are paying for those 50 minutes and that time is yours. The rules of the real world and “normal” social interactions do not apply at all.
I am feeling low now. My therapist gave me a homework assignment to do this week (to go to a Meetup) which I did. She will want to know how it went. But I don’t want to tell her truth. Because the “truth” makes me sound like a hopeless, unpleasant, mean individual. But I can’t lie to her. So I’m not looking forward to that awkward moment when the room is silent and she’s waiting for me to open my mouth, and I’m frozen in place. I still don’t know what I’m going to do.
But normally when I start worrying like this, it’s for naught. The key is just remembering this.
Does anyone have any tricks for combating PMS dysphoria?
I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older or what, but lately whenever that time of the month approaches, I get really depressed. I get suicidal and self-harmy and really down on myself. It doesn’t even help to know that it’s just the hormones talking and that it’s temporary. If anything, knowing my period’s about to come just makes me feel worse.
I’m kind of concerned that it’s just going to get worse and worse as I get older, until I’m in the looney bin by the time I hit menopause.
Any advice? My psychiatrist says I could take Prozac just during those special days, but I want to explore other techniques.
I suffer the same thing (and it is getting worse as I get older). The two things that work best for me are sex and exercise.
Ha, I’ve been tempted to email my therapist, too! I feel really embarrassed by how lame (for lack of a better word) I feel like I come across in our sessions, like I’m staggered by the tiniest things and am a barely functional adult. I want her to know that I do manage to keep myself together out in the “real world” and that I’m really more competent than I must seem.
Although that’s precisely one of the issues I’ve been discussing in therapy – that I mindlessly do things that sabotage how people see me (like I instinctively play dumb in certain situations, and then I get mad when people take me at my word and treat me like I’m dumb). I’ve been showing her many of my flaws and now I’m upset thinking that she only sees my flaws and not my strengths. I guess I have to remind myself that that’s her job and she’s aware that she sees only a partial picture of her clients, and it’s okay for me to be expressing that side of myself in front of her.
BTW, I get PMS dysphoria, too – my first therapy session was during PMS time and my next therapy session on Friday should be right around that time, too, and I’ve brought it up before but I will definitely talk about it on Friday to get some suggestions. The only thing that currently helps me is tracking my period like a teenager so that I can be conscious that any unusual feelings or urges are coming from PMS and will go away in a few days.