Well.... I understand how the unhealthy coping mechs are attractive - they're something we tangibly have control over and can see results from. Drinking lets you forget or loosen up and have fun (that's how it works for me) but overall it's horrible for you. Starving yourself both gives the satisfaction of physical pain, not being visible to others, and short-term weight loss. In the long run it's terribly unhealthy and will backfire.

Why not focus on "Be the healthiest I can physically be" as your coping mech? Where you eat a normal amount (3-4 meals a day, where you intake about 1500 calories throughout that) and eat healthy foods (why not challenge yourself to go vegan, or gluten-free or something?). And to stay in bed for about 8 hours doing your best to sleep normally.

Then when those are all done, start working on other things to maintain health. Like yoga or meditation, or taking some sort of classes/activity that might seem interesting to you (or something that WOULD have been interesting to you back in the day as I'm sure you've lost sight of those in the depression, right?).

And then living that way. At least after you've been living like that for a few years, you could actually go in and tell your T and pdoc "TOLD YOU!". Because right now... of course they're going to tell you to stop! What you are doing is hurting yourself, and over the long run it will only be contributing to making your depression worse and making it stay around for even longer.

It's rather unfortunate that there really ISN'T a cure for us. The most we can do is keep trying meds until we find the best combination to help stabilize, and to do our best to live healthy and stable lives.

What sort of coping mechs have you been using to try and help with your negative thoughts? That's what my T is currently working on with me. I've no idea how he's going to actually be successful in this, but I'm giving it my best anyway.