I hope the job applications turn into interviews and a job in the near future.

I can relate to a lot of what you wrote - I think, for me, the loss of confidence has been the worst part of depression. I don't know how I will become the person who can work again. I haven't worked full-time since having my children, and had to stop my part-time business because of depression; and now I have moved away from that which has quite handily allowed me not to have to try to pick it up again. But I can see that, ultimately, I need to be doing something which I can be proud of and which is fulfilling. Just don't really know how to get there - at the moment I'm working on the principle that I will get there given time, and that it can happen to me in the future - just because it's not what I can cope with now, doesn't mean it will always be that way.

I think that after a long break for whatever reason, returning to work is always going to be - ha!- hard work - just being in the same place for a set number of hours, being nice to people(!) all day, trying to remember new procedures and so on. So perhaps give yourself permission to find those things hard? - that it isn't you, or depression - just a normal reaction.

I hope it works out for you.