Antidepressants: scared of not feeling anything any more

[MustGetBetter]

I've been struggling for several months now with my mental health: very low, constant fantasies of suicide, a couple of self-harm episodes, exhaustion.

I saw a counsellor a couple of times at the end of last year. I don't know whether it was because I need to keep going for it to make a difference, but it didn't really help - I just ended up feeling I was stuck in a dreadful spiral without really seeing a way out, or feeling I was getting any constructive (or at least, practical) advice about how to handle it. I had to cancel my last appointment before Christmas because of a diary clash, and tbh I'm not really wanting to go back - plus actually we can't really afford it.

I can't carry on like this: too much depends on me, and I do want to get better. But the pathetic thing is, I am terrified of going on antidepressants for fear of not feeling happy any more - I'm afraid that while the bad things may hurt me less and feel more manageable, there will be nothing to look forward to or really enjoy either.

Is there anyone on here willing to offer their thoughts on this?

ADs don't have a hugely dramatic effect. They don't transform you; they don't make you not yourself. They don't prevent you from experiencing happiness or a range of other emotions.

In my experience they work like a ratchet: they enable good experiences to start to lift your mood and they prevent bad experiences from causing a disproportionate slip down of mood.

Remember that even without medication your mood is neurochemically determined -- and remember that depression is distorting the neurochaemical balance.

So you are not creating a chemical set-up that detracts from you being yourself. You are merely manipulating an existing neurochemical set-up back owards normality.

If anything you may well be struck by how slight the effect of ADs is, not by how grea tit is.

And I should also say, I'm so sorry you are feeling so low. Do speak to your GP and get some help, whether it is ADs or more effective counselling.

Thanks, Threadworm. I do need to see the GP... but am also terrified (hmm, spot the theme here) of being signed off work. I was signed off for two weeks at the beginning of last year and I don't think work would be at all pleased if I ended up taking time off again. I don't like my job, but I can at least in abstract recognise that I'm unlikely to find anything that suits my circumstances better - hence I would hate to lose it.

So far I haven't felt that I have any right to call myself depressed - just a chronic whinger. I do have a job, three lovely kids who are basically doing fine, a roof over my head. What right do I have to be miserable? I should be grateful for what I have and focus on the good stuff, but the problem is I can't seem to make it count.

I've been on a low dose of ADs for a few months now, and have found them quite helpful.
They were very much a last resort: I tried to get through pnd on my own for 18months or so before this; like you, kept telling myself what right have I to feel miserable
They haven't 'changed' me, just made me feel a bit more balanced, like I was before I was depressed really. The first week I felt ever so slightly out of it, and queasy too, but this quickly stopped and I've been fine since.
I still have all my feelings, just less liable to spiral down with them.
Give them a go, you have nothing to lose