I woke around 4:15 a.m. this morning, did about another half-hour's worth of dozing/aware dreaming/thinking (all at once like when you dream you're awake and getting dressed only to wake up for real; very confusing. I was dreaming/worried about "possible" burglars; not sure if they were just a worry, a phantom/"idea" or really there, and when I woke at quarter to five, looked to make sure my balcony door was locked :-) But I didn't get back to sleep, did a couple hours of lying awake trying to solve my/the world's problems before I finally got up.

What I was thinking about was how I worry about getting "old" and being alone, sick, old, resource-less and then the counter thought of how all that is in the future, as if you're starting first grade and thinking what it will be like to graduate high school. One of my stepsons does that a lot; asks his father what it is "like" to be 50, 60, etc. when he's 20+ years younger and I realize we all do that, "imagine" the future. But no matter how well we imagine it, it's still future and not now and we get use to/deal with now because we're "in" it! I remember wishing to be 12 years old when I was younger but what that "meant" to me when I was 8 and what it "really" meant when I was 12 were totally different?

I was depressed for a zillion years (felt like :-) and it was horrible but I lived through it and am not depressed now. I think my biggest problem was lack of "stimulation" from other people, I didn't seriously talk/communicate with anyone, didn't see friends or family much, was too much by myself and didn't "do" anything but live in my head. But it was my life for awhile and now doesn't bother me much, kind of like a bad year in elementary school doesn't bother you when you get to high school, you're too busy worrying about the year you're in. I went to work for my husband and then he and I started a relationship which was excellent stimulation for me; someone else to commune with and a whole relationship/new life worth of activity and I moved out of the depression. I think "getting" old will be like that. I might get depressed again or sick or all those things but when they happen, it will be "now" and there won't be any "worry" because it will be happening, not just being anticipated negatively. Just like now that I'm in the aches and pains of 56 which I couldn't have imagined correctly at 26, I'll be 76 which I can't imagine now at 56 so I might as well stop trying and just work with the problems of 56 instead. Being afraid of getting old or dying seem kind of silly now; if you die "too young" it's usually from a sudden event so you're dead before you have time to think (so there's no worry there) and if you die old, there's probably a way of working up to it like working through one's ages so it's not so scary when you get there?

I'm not depressed now but looking back on 15-35 when I think I was seriously depressed, I'd work on communicating with other people. I'd do my homework out on the dining room table while my stepmother worked in the kitchen (or living room) or with my father in his den, I'd work to be around people more instead of holing up in my room. I'd join groups/clubs whether I thought people wanted me there or not, volunteer, go places where there were other people (library?) if I could (we're talking 1965-1985, before PCs/computers, videos/games, credit cards, cell/cordless/personal phones, anything "automatic" pretty much) and just work on being more outgoing in general. I think there's a "habit" of doing/not doing things, of being active or studious/"quiet" that can go further than "interest" or genetic disposition alone would take it. I do know that I've been working hard since 1991 to learn to "study" -- in my first school years, 1955-1972 I didn't get a single "A" because I didn't "understand" what was happening, what I was doing to myself. I allowed myself to drift through life and now I'm having to not only learn opposite behavior but work against the 35-40 years of "weight" trying to keep me there.

I don't think you can just snap out of your depression, ouch, but if you're serious about wanting to work with it, you have to work hard at its opposite, no matter how you feel, how hard it is initially? Does that make sense? In 1991 I had trouble completing a class, taking final exams (use to skip too many classes and then just not go to the final at all, I'm still working off an "F" in my GPA for a course for my current degree where I just stopped going and didn't bother to withdraw correctly), doing just about any task and had to work really really hard at it. Now though I'm enjoying myself and love the work and do it well (get straight A's). I don't think you can move fast suddenly from a standing start, you have to build up the momentum through hard work first.