Thanks, Dez, for starting this post. In the last post on my SOOOOOO Depressed thread I asked for people to tell me about their coping mechanisms, but no one replied. Sigh...

Myself -- as Sky said, I'm not really in the mindset to journal when I'm upset and need a coping mechanism. Venting does help, sometimes, but it takes time and discipline to sit down and write. And doing so doesn't necessarily make the bad situation better. I'd rather just vent to a friend, or on this forum. Although, I must tell you -- I'm a writer. I once worked at a place where a bunch of the employees got together to persecute me, en masse. I sat down and wrote a murder mystery book, using each of their names as characters, vivdly describing their hateful personalities and murdering off each one of them, in the story. It gave me tremendous satisfaction and amusement, for a while. Sort of mental voodoo...

You listed a lot. I'm going to go through them and see if anything jumps out that me that I think I could try. Thanks.

I usually just try to pamper myself when I'm depressed/upset. Any little thing, like going to a movie or out to a nice meal, buying myself a small gift, requesting tickets to a tv show taping (I'm in L.A.), driving up to the mountains, etc. Or I listen to affirmation tapes (REALLY focus). There are records/tapes that are impossible to stay upset while you're listening to - like Monty Python, Spike Jones, anything you might hear on Dr Dimento, etc. Or...this is going to sound strange...I look at tapes of the old tv show "Kate & Allie." For some reason, that show always makes me feel good, just by watching it. Or old tapes of Andy Griffith, **** Van Dyke, or some show that was on when the world was less cruel. Seeing the old familiar characters is like visiting with old friends who you know are nice. I can get lost in it for a while. Or I watch "What the Bleep" again ("...if thoughts can do that to water, imagine what your thoughts can do to you...").

Sometimes I take a long hot bath with candles, music, incense, etc. It doesn't make anything better, but it helps me relax a bit. Yoga can help (it forces you to focus on something other than what's causing you pain. But it takes discipline to do any kind of exercise when you're really depressed/angry).

As I said in my SOOOOO Depressed post, I changed my name, once. I legally took on the middle name of Hope, because I thought it was a quality worth celebrating. Also, I thought it might help me to remember to have hope when things were bad. (It hasn't, alas) But it was, as my T said, at the time, a "life affirming gesture," and it picked me up.

I also created a document that was an award for myself. I gave myself an award for being a good, resilient person (the bad that's happened to me throughout my whole life hasn't made me bad, and I thought that was worth celebrating). It does help me to read it, when I'm feeling down. It reminds me of how much I've overcome and that I've had the resilience to do that. Makes me feel proud of myself.

Two more things --
I typed up a list of things I was able to do/get that took me a long time, but I finally did accomplish them. It reminds me that things may be hard now, but that doesn't mean that the things I want won't come, eventually. I've made "some" dreams come true, in the past (even if it took a while -- sometimes a LONG while). It makes me feel better to remind myself that I haven't ALWAYS failed - to take care of myself, to make my life better, etc.

Also, I went through all of my saved emails and took out all of the passages in which people said good things about me. (Thankfully, it took days) I put all of those quotes into a document. I printed it out and put it in a plastic folder. Now, if I'm feeling bad (if some bully is putting me through hell), I can look through that folder and see that GOOD people had wonderful, kind, flattering things to say about the kind of person I am. It helps keep things in perspective.

While I've tried to be creative in my coping mechanisms, I've pretty much worn them out, after years of relying on them to pull me out of depressions. I'll be keeping an eye on this topic, to see what other people have to offer. Thanks again for starting it.