So what if unhappiness *does* breed unhappiness? Would that make it more of a "choice"?

I would very likely have fired a therapist for asking such a question. How utterly inelegant a way to attempt a therapeutic intervention!

I've been in therapy for twenty years and counting, and have just begun to kind of see the possibility of a life without therapy at some point. There have been times when I was utterly paralyzed with depression. I spent a year and a half in bed once. Late last year I was in depression hell again.

It was entirely appropriate for my therapist to work with me to explore my thinking, and it was like pulling chickens' teeth for him, I am sure. All I could see was the PAIN. Depression is PAIN for me, physical and mental both. I needed a new psychiatrist and some medication tweaks. Voila, depression all but vanished once again. Thank God for better living through chemistry.

There are pretty much always things we can do to feel a bit better, even in the depths of a depression episode. For a lot of us, though, doing such feel-better things is like taking a pain medication for a problem that needs surgery to fix. It's not real pain relief, and it's certainly not a real treatment, to do such things. For me the fix is medication plus therapy plus a hell of a lot of self management work. But when all the pieces are in place, my life works.

One last thought, just popped into my head: Does "swimming in your pain" mean getting benefit from it? Dwelling in it? Or might it possibly mean that you are getting THROUGH it? Ambulating through it, so to speak? There is such a thing as swimming to get somewhere, as opposed to splashing happily around in a pool. Think of a Navy SEAL and the kind of swimming they have to do....super skilled, super endurance, able to engage in combat, able to save lives.

Maybe that might give you a snappy comeback for your therapist?