between being at the 'foreground' and 'background' of your daily experience?

For example, a week may be spent just feeling sub-par, tired, kind of slow, kind of down, nothing really excites you, the future seems pretty blah, but you can still laugh at someone's joke, still enjoy little moments or a good meal, still function - maybe you don't even realize you're depressed at the time...and then other times is comes rushing to the fore and completely consumes you, all you can think about is your own despair, can't function at all, don't want to live etc., then in another week or so it recedes again, maybe you even feel pretty darn good (?)

I'm asking because I used to think my depression would go from 0 to crisis overnight, but I'm now wondering if maybe I've just been ignoring mild depression and thereby missing my window of opportunity to be more proactive...

[Edgar's Mom]

I was just wondering about this very same thing.

Sometimes in depression, I get stimulated by social interactions and become somewhat animated. I'm an extrovert so it makes sense that this can happen. But while I'm talking (usually babbling) and doing things, most people would be surprised to learn I'm depressed. I'm outgoing when this happens, but the entire time I feel it draining and I feel the dull pain inside.

I would describe this state as more agitation and anxiety than being up, but most people looking in wouldn't see that. They would see me talking, interacting and doing things. But it is VERY hard on me to force myself to do this and it takes a huge toll. While occasionally making myself go out and do something will lift my mood, more often it will make it worse and I crash hard when I get home to safety.

My depressions last for months and months but within that whole time I'm not always in bed. The depression itself has it's own cycle ranging from:

"I feel like garbage and I'm not enjoying anything but am able to drag myself around."

All the way down to "I can hardly move or talk and I don't see the point."

The months of depression are spent between those two depressed extremes.

[gayleggg]

Mine can fluctuate a lot from day to day and even from morning to night.

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[Capriciousness]

Oh yes totally. It is never ever just one flat feeling. Never. The depression itself cycles. I can be on the floor in the morning and out to dinner genuinely smiling in the evening. It doesn't mean the depression is "over". It just isn't a flat fixed state. I think that is one of the hardest things for loved ones because they figure if we smile or make pancakes or whatever than it must be over. Nope. Not how it works.

And often looking back I see how what I thought was me baseline and getting depressions was probably actually one big depression.

Ugh read my sig. It's ridick

[loophole]

Originally Posted by gayleggg

Mine can fluctuate a lot from day to day and even from morning to night.

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In the same boat

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Mine definitely can fluctuate like that on a day by day basis. That's what makes it so hard to feel out where I am at when I report to the pdoc also so sometimes I might go for awhile before getting the right help.

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Originally Posted by Edgar's Mom

I was just wondering about this very same thing.

Sometimes in depression, I get stimulated by social interactions and become somewhat animated. I'm an extrovert so it makes sense that this can happen. But while I'm talking (usually babbling) and doing things, most people would be surprised to learn I'm depressed. I'm outgoing when this happens, but the entire time I feel it draining and I feel the dull pain inside.

I would describe this state as more agitation and anxiety than being up, but most people looking in wouldn't see that. They would see me talking, interacting and doing things. But it is VERY hard on me to force myself to do this and it takes a huge toll. While occasionally making myself go out and do something will lift my mood, more often it will make it worse and I crash hard when I get home to safety.

My depressions last for months and months but within that whole time I'm not always in bed. The depression itself has it's own cycle ranging from:

"I feel like garbage and I'm not enjoying anything but am able to drag myself around."

All the way down to "I can hardly move or talk and I don't see the point."

The months of depression are spent between those two depressed extremes.

Yes - you describe it so well!!!! I had precisely that experience last weekend...went out at night to see my husband's band play, enjoyed myself, but after it was over I felt kinda bad, then went outside and felt kinda worse...by the time I walked home (alone) I wanted to die.

Originally Posted by Capriciousness

Oh yes totally. It is never ever just one flat feeling. Never. The depression itself cycles. I can be on the floor in the morning and out to dinner genuinely smiling in the evening. It doesn't mean the depression is "over". It just isn't a flat fixed state. I think that is one of the hardest things for loved ones because they figure if we smile or make pancakes or whatever than it must be over. Nope. Not how it works.

And often looking back I see how what I thought was me baseline and getting depressions was probably actually one big depression.

Ugh read my sig. It's ridick

Everything suddenly makes so much more sense to me...thank you for this!