Personally, I never recovered from anhedonia. I was institutionalize during my first "breakdown" in 1999 and anhedonia was one of my minor diagnoses. It actually started in 1997, though, when I first began to notice a severe change in my libido. I had been hypersexual most of my life but I began to notice that I became less and less interested in sex. Then taste followed – I was a good cook but I lost all interest in food. I used to be (and this was before Starbucks became ubiquitous) a coffee snob and I loved to have three or four great cups of coffee a day. I don't drink it any longer, and not for 15 or 16 years. I don't enjoy, well, anything any longer. It is a complete inability to experience pleasure.

jo_thorne seems to have pointed out some food for thought but I can only speak from my experience. Even when my depression was under control, via ECT, the anhedonia stayed. I have tried, over these 16 or 17 years to resurrect something that I could feel pleasure again, going so far as to try to find pleasure from some 'new' pursuit as well as taking up the old.

When I finally got out of a nursing home after eight long years, I felt that I could find pleasure in outfitting my new apartment. I spent thousands of dollars on kitchen gear that is still in the box in storage. A recent example: since I have been spending most of my time in bed, in February I bought a new ultra-high def TV that I had hung in my bedroom, buying a new (I already had one) Blu-ray player with it. The cable guy hooked it up and it hasn't been on since he made sure it was working. The BR player is still in the box. I really used to love to watch movies and TV shows – I pay $200 per month for cable that I don't watch, a telephone and Internet service that I do use. But pleasure? No.

So now I just purchase gadgets. I bought a new iPad in February. I bought an iPhone last week. I thought that these things would bring some pleasure. I bought a Garmin GPS mapping system that works with the iPhone and I listened to the directions as I went to my biweekly doctor's appointment. I really didn't get any pleasure from that. I really didn't need the latest and greatest iPhone to lead me to my doctors office – I'm not driving.

I'm overstating the obvious here. Except for engaging with other people, something that frightens me, I've tried everything that I can think of and has been suggested to find a modicum of pleasure in anything and I've been unable to do it.

I was one of those people who had so many friends that I had to keep a social calendar to make sure that I wasn't excluding anyone (that sounds like a bad joke now) and I can't tell you if my social phobias are more anhedonia or depression oriented. The depression is back for its second bout with me and the anhedonia never went away.

So, for me, the disorder is a disorder within itself. I really can't even say that it's exacerbated by severe depression – only that it came slightly before the depression and stayed with me when the depression abated.

Good luck,