to ask if you are suffering from depression, how it affects your life?

[rodriguez66]

I know some people are sort of high functioning depressives, able to hold down a job, appear happy, have a functioning social life etc whilst others are physically incapable of even getting out of bed in the morning. I have been the latter lately. How does it affect you? What are your internal thoughts when you are depressed?

What a sad and painful thread, but I belong here too.

Teal I wonder that too - why does it make us so very physically tired and weak?

I am sick sick sick of it.

It's like your body is trying to live but your mind is trying to die. Mine is v much linked to an experience that refuses to fuck off out of my head. Obsessive thoughts. Therapy just keeps it alive so I think people need to be v careful entering therapy as for me talking about it keeps it going, confirms I'm ill and it's all hopeless.
It's really is fucking rotten and I feel for everyone here immensely.

Teal that's EXACTLY why I don't want therapy and never have. The idea of focusing on the bad stuff and hauling it out from its hiding place makes me instinctively sure I'd feel worse. What's the point? It can't be undone. We can only live now and look to the future. I don't see the point of blame.

I have reactive depression following a particularly shitty and traumatic year. I'm on ADs. I'm holding down a stressful senior job, have a child, caring responsibilities and a husband who works away quite a bit. I've had very little time off with the depression but it was on the back of a physical illness that had me on sick leave for nearly a month

I'm very tired all the time and feel quite tightly wound. I'm more irritated with people than usual. I get an upset stomach and night sweats from the medication. I've lost weight.

Like teal person centred talking therapy is not for me. I need time with the drugs working to level myself out and heal after pushing myself to the edge last year.

Talk therapy I found was like picking at a wound. It's alive in my head I don't want to make it more real by talking about it.
Also it's neverending. You talk about one thing then something else pops up then something else. I think it makes things worse although Im not an expert in getting better my episodes are longer and more severe as I get older.

I'm high functioning - have to be busy or else I ruminate and over-think things but being busy and having lots of things on my 'to do list' makes me anxious and stressed and prone to procrastination. I have a part-time but high stress job that I have a love-hate relationship with. Feel lazy for being part-time but honestly don't know how I would manage full-time (55+ hrs a week).

Have spent my entire adult life biting down and getting on with it to the next goal...that may magically make me happy...but now I've got to that final pot of gold I've found it's empty.

Often feel lost, anxious, thinking there is nothing to look forward to, lazy, tired, fake.

Yo-yo dieter and have spent the last decade overweight and often obese due to trying to find comfort in food and alcohol. I feel more in control when my weight is going down - it is never maintained - but increasingly struggle to start that process.

I've recently started counselling and it is a relief to talk to someone - no idea if it will work though. Whilst I don't actively hide it I am very conscious to avoid being draining to those around me so it isn't something I discuss - I try to avoid most negative talk and 'put a brave face on it'.

Find it very hard to cope with people who drain me - which, now, is DH's family who are covertly very dysfunctional. I'm finding that much harder than the very obvious dysfunction and grief in my own family but accept that it may be because of my own childhood that I feel this way. We're going to explore that.

Does anyone have the answer? I can't even write on here atm but I wish I could. I have two beautiful dcs (20 and 22), I try to hide it. My sick record at work is ridiculously bad. I can't get out of bed to face my life which I know many people would absolutely adore. WTF is wrong with me :(

I have been thinking about how long I've been feeling 'like this'. Years I think, so long that I've kind of gotten used to it. Looking back, I've always struggled with work. My first job at 17 was pretty full on, mon-fri 8-5. I hated every second of it and found it really stressful, even though the work it self was fairly easy and the people I worked with were lovely. Every job since then I've struggled with and I've dreaded having to get up for it. Another job I had some annual leave and just never went back afterwards. My last job I became a sahm so handed my notice in during maternity leave.

I know work is something that most people have to do, and it's something that I will have to go back to at some point, and in a way I want to. I'm just terrified that I will never find it enjoyable or even tolerable. I've always thought I was lazy and work shy but maybe it's the illness. The thought of spending the next few decades working and hating every minute of it makes me think it's just not worth it. Secretly hoping we win the lottery so I never have to face this dilemma again.

I really admire those of you who are suffering and are managing to hold down a job too. I don't know how you manage to stick at it.

I'm probably at the skin of my teeth atm IWS. I'm wondering if I just need to do something more creative.. and get paid. wow, no chance probably. ffffff. (I'm almost 55). .... I have a hamster wheel in my head, and lights like a rabbit in my eyes. Aaaargh.

I have a finite amount of energy every day. At the moment the overall total amount of energy I have is minimal, so it gets spent on personal hygiene and going to work every day.

Someone else said that their world got smaller - that's the same with me too. Hanging out with friends and family doesn't interest me at all and I don't get any enjoyment from it, so I try to limit it to mandatory occasions to keep the bare minimum contact ticking over. Ceased contact with broader acquaintance group.

After a busy week I can often go Friday evening to Monday morning not talking to anybody and lying in bed (I live on my own), not washing, house a tip.

I have disordered eating and I have put on 6 stone in 2 years which makes me fucking hate myself. I wish people would see it's a cry for help and an invitation to ask me about my mental health, but I have such an iron mask of happiness that maybe people assume I am fine.

I deal with suicidal thoughts quite a lot, especially when I think about a long lonely future (no social life + fat = Reduced likelihood of finding a partner and having a family) - I feel powerless to change it though when all I can do is take one day at a time.

I got up the courage to go to the GP once, with a written statement about how I felt so that I could disassociate myself from the moment and actually express myself coherently. He was dismissive and said my dad feelings were probably due to a poor relationship ending a couple of years previously (I know - wtf?!) That kind of crushed my confidence in reaching out for professional help. It's down to me really. Just plodding on.

Dad feelings?! sad feelings sorry

Monty, if it's any comfort I'm in a very creative profession and can't work at all when ill. It distresses me that something I got so much pleasure from just feels as exciting and inspiring as a lump of dried concrete when I'm ill. Creativity doesn't necessarily help. Funnily enough I long for a dull office job. Nothing too taxing, regular hours, someone else responsible. In reality I'd probably hate it but I imagine it to be secure. Saw an old friend the other day who has a brilliant mind (Oxford philosopher) but also suffers depression. He has held down a boring job for years. He says he hates it but he has at least stuck with it and I so admire that.

I just wanted to say that you writing on here has really affected me and given me a window into this world. Some of the writing on here is incredibly eloquent and speaks so authentically, about something very difficult to put into words. I don't think I have ever seen it described so clearly.

Undertone please try again. Please print out what you have written here and take to a GP. life can be better than this. It can.

A couple of years ago I became depressed. I could feel myself sliding into it day by day. Along with the emotional numbness and lack of enjoyment in anything, I also completely lost my libido, my appetite and I would wake several times every night. My memory was poor and I couldn't make any sort of decision. I'd find myself standing in the grocery store staring at the shelves unable to choose what to buy. I was on Sertraline for about a year, and it really helped. I haven't had to take it since.

Before I became depressed I had often wondered if I was depressed at a low level but now that I know what being depressed really is like, I've started to believe that it's just my personality type. I'm not very energetic, I don't like socialising or going out very much. It doesn't mean I'm ill, it's just who I am. I also think I mistook anxiety and OCD tendencies for depression.

Thanks Nota. Yes, you're probably right. The grass is always greener etc.

Just marking my place. So many of other people's comments sound just like me .

On the causes as well as reactive depression if your spouse dies etc, it tends to be aboutbalance of chemicals in the brain - seratonin etc. That is what pills correct - as they render the balance more similar to the levels in people without depression. For milder cases other things which also get that balance better of seratonin, dopamine and your beta endorphin levels such as eating good foods, not drinking alcohol, getting sunshine, moving outside can help. My family who are psychiatrists tend to find that those with clinical depression do best with a mixture of pills and therapy. Most clinics will have eating guidelines too usually suggesting cutting out sugar, carbs and drink.

I haven't read the full thread yet but am marking my place to comment properly later. Such an interesting thread and really relating to how I feel.

I've had awful depression the last few months. For the last 6 weeks I've been taking Omega 3, Vitamin D3, Vitamin B complex and zinc. I'm 80% better. I'm also taking Sertraline but I've been taking it for over a year.

I can be both....at the moment I'm very much on the low side. The only reason I'm getting out of bed in the morning is because the DC have to go to school & i'm determined they won't be late/will be clean & tidy (still succeeding at this). I'm struggling through all the basic housework & not getting the enjoyment I know I'm capable of feeling when I interact/ play with the DCs. I need to go back on meds, just need to make that appointment & get the first week or two of feeling like shit on them out of the way.

I've come to terms with the fact my depression will never go away, will always be part of me (diagnosed at 12 now 27 but honestly I've always felt/been like this). That doesn't mean I don't still struggle day in day out, tablets or not.

I have written & rewritten this oost a dozen times now. Above is the concise version.