[Sezzie]

Does anyone have any good advice about overcoming depression? Damn it's a tough one to get over when you've been severely depressed on and off for a number of years!
Does anyone have any inspiring stories to tell about how they overcame depression and got the life they really wanted. I so need some inspiration right now! I need something to hope for and believe in!

-Sezzie-

Hi Sezzie,
I don't remember how I got out of my depression but it had to do with the will to survive. I was put into a position that if I didn't help myself I'd end up in a homeless shelter, a mental institution or dead.
I choose to help myself and little by little things changed.
I don't know if you've ever seen the movie "Life as a House" but in one part of the movie the main character says ...and sometimes the change is so slow-you don't even know that it's happening...
that was how it happened in my case, there was no bolt of lightning, it was all just very slow. It was so gradual, I didn't know it was happening at the time it was happening. It's hard to explain. It's not like I just woke up one day and said "oh, I'm not depressed anymore."
I think doing things for yourself in a positive way, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant leads you to recovery. You seem to take it for granted but it all adds up. Making your bed, taking a shower, eating a good meal, cleaning up after yourself, going to work even when you really, really, really don't feel like it, standing up for yourself, releasing negative relationships from your life, etc...anything that requires you to push yourself a little. In the end-after it's done, regardless-it all adds up and it slowly begins to heal you.
Hang in there, Sezzie.

[Sezzie]

I just find everything so stressful. I've got sooooo much stuff to learn all at once and then remember it (studyin pharmacy) and i've also been severely depressed. It's so not happening. I feel like I'll never get there. I want so many things out of life and it just seems so impossible with all the pressure and all. It's hard trying to recover from bulimia and severe depression and everything else at the same time. I just don't feel like i have a future- dats depression talking!!!!
-Sezzie- the no-hoper

[sujunew]

Hey Sez, the best thing to do is take 1 thing at a time (easier said than done of course!). I don't have the answer you're looking for, and I doubt anyone else will either. It is such a personal battle. I hope that ppl who have climbed out of that deep black hole will be able to give you advice and tips on how they fought their battles. Coming into winter isn't going to help things much- everything seems so much more grey and the weather is so much worse. Like I said, I'm sorry that I cannot contribute any inspiring stories but I really hope that you can find something each day, just 1 thing, to focus on or do. Kia kaha

[patricia72]

I wasn't in a good place to give support yesterday...
one day at a time, small tricks, support..... wish there was a majical cure....
sending you positive vibes and hope you feel better soon,
Patricia xx

[DaveyJones]

Sezzie,

If you have been depressed for years with little or no relief from antidepressants, you should consider the possibility that you have a form of bipolar disease rather than "true" depression. I was misdiagnosed for nearly 10 years...in the last six months I have quit taking AD's, and I have very few dark days anymore since I am being properly treated for bipolar II.

Think about asking your pdoc, if you have one...it has truly changed my life for the better.

Good luck!

DJ

[Hopefull]

Dealing with mental problems, working and going to school can be tough. I cut back on my work ours which has helped some. But, I have no advice that you probably haven't heard already. If you have been struggling with this for years, you should probably be giving me the tips because I have never experienced major depression ( unless this so called adjustment disorder is really just plain old depression which I think it might be).
So, I will just say what you have probably heard many times. You sound like you are working on an important goal in your life-pharmacy. I tend to plan ahead on the days that my planning compacity is on-line to compensate for the days when my ability to think about the future is non-existant. This trick helps me to get my homework done on time. I tend to break my school tasks and home assignments down to make them feel more acheivable. I tend to get bogged down by my tendency to drowned in negative thinking/loss of hope (long history of negative thinking-Dysthymic Disorder). I wish I could say that I have succeeded so you can. But, I can't say that. I can only say that we are all on the same journey of self-improvement. May you have good fortune on your journey to a better you.

[Sezzie]

I'm so thankful for all the advice that you guys gave. I really thought hard about the little things i could do that would make a difference to my mood. I started doing little things that i could do to build up a feeling of competence and well-being. I started eating balanced meals and have not purged in four days now! which has totally altered my mood miraculously. I sorted things out with my therapist by being honest and telling her what i need to get me better. I've got such a long way to go before i consider myself rehabilitated but i've actually got some hope back over the last few days. I just think that if i can get over one mountain (bulimia) then it might be possible for me to climb the whopper (depression). I'm trying and hoping. I'm going to a psychotherapy group and i now have regular appointments with my therapist. I also have a really great caring GP. And just to think only four days ago i was crying hard out and i was severely severely depressed with no hope in myself whatsoever. I'm so unsure of where all of these bright spirits are coming from. I'm trying not to think of how long it will last. Just trying to practise the skills i've learned from the last week- just started really. My therapist is utterly amazed at what i've achieved in such a small time- she thought i was going to be a tough cookie to crack! I also thought this and am so amazed. I hope i'm not jinxing myself by saying all this crap. I did notice my personality strengthening over the last two years with just talking to my old counselor. I've become more able to express myself and my opinions. I don't care about what people think of me so much and i certainly aint shy no more! I've become better in that way- but i was still so inhibited because the depression didn't shift none. I became worse and ended up in hospital last year. Just got through the last couple of weeks feeling worse than i have ever felt in my entire life (even worse than i was during the time that i OD'd!!!) but the thing that's ok is that i made it through relatively unscathed. I very much think that if i hadn't started actually doin stuff that last Friday and continuin with the bad stuff i do then i would have only just survived not too many weeks or months longer. I'm grateful to yee Gods or whoever has been looking out for me. I aint bipolar because the first antidepressant i tried did work for a while and then i stuffed it up- bein the experimental type and all. I didn't feel like the real me- possibly because i had never known that amount of a good mood in my entire life and it didn't really feel like me. The other two i tried have had no effect. I'm thinking i will go back onto Fluoxetine (the one that did work) and just be a good little girl and take it properly. I kind of felt like it made me feel a bit manic though! I think i'll give it another go- even though i'm a notorious stuffer-upper when it comes to medications. Medicines just interest the hell out of me- because i'm studying them. I just gota be good about it now- for my own sake- I'll just have to save my experiments for the lab! The thing that i really need to work on is keeping away the purging. I sat down last Saturday and just wrote screeds and screeds about the pros and cons of binging, then purging, and the pros and cons of my avoidance behaviour which has led to so much depression. I wrote down some therapy goals. I did some real hard and gutsy thinking about how i can change. I wrote down my coping plan of how i will survive in a crisis. I talked to two therapists and my GP. I got lots of hugs in- that helps. I wrote down how i could make things better so i would be less vulnerable to do the purging. I really need how to plan and organise things in my life such as studying. One of the things that helped me to stop the b and p-ing is that i went back to the very first time that i did it and i remembered what my thoughts were while i was doing it. The first time that i did it i had taken an OD and purged to try and save myself. I then really wanted to continue with the b and p-ing just because i'd been obese and a yo-yo with my weight- so how i kept going with it was by harnessing the really dramatic thought from the OD: "I'll die if i don't purge". It totally worked for me to start purging- so i thought: "Hey, i'll use this to help me stop". I think about how much damage the b and p-ing has done to my body and how it could end up with me being dead. The biggest thing that has helped me to stop it was that i thought about how i certainly would not be able to finish uni and how i could end up in hospital if i continued down this path. Basically i just found that i wanted too much out of life and that bulimia was stealing too much away from me. The bad long- term effects far outweigh the short- term benefits. I'm using dramatic thoughts to get me out of it. What i'm thinking now is that how can i use this to help me get out severe depression when it hits? I'm feeling much more positive about getting over the depression now that i'm moving in the positive direction with overcoming bulimia. I'm thinking that if i can get over that first mountain then i may be able to get over that bloody second one as well. It has been a very unproductive two-nearly three years for me (in terms of studying- didn't finish that many papers) of major depressive episodes and i look back at myself and i think now that i actually have been productive in more important ways than just getting through uni. I know a lot more about myself, and i'm more comfortable with myself. I think that i must have really gradually changed over this time. I need to keep up with all the skills and during the times that i find that my motivation is low i need to find things that will help me keep on going. The other thing that i think about now when i go to b and p is that i really don't want to be stuck in therapy till my dying days. I really feel like such a big baby who needs taking care of, but one day (possibly next year) i want to get out there on my own and stand on my own two feet. I'm hoping that all of this therapy will set me up for life- and for a bloody great one after all the carry-on that has occured over the last two-three years (but was depressed for most of late chilhood and all teenage years- but not as severely). I'm now totally valuing the time that i've spent being depressed and bulimic. Not that it was nice at all or anything and i could have died- but i now have a greater understanding of mental illnesses and of people in general. It has made me much more caring and mature than i could have been without these experiences. It's given me a goal of specializing in psychiatric pharmacy maybe one day- or the thing that i'd really like to do is become a psychiatrist- crazy huh!!! I've spent almost three years totally being depressed, crying and arguing in front of them about medications and therapy- you'd think i'd be repulsed by the idea- but no- I've come out with great admiration and total jealousy for them- the buggers that they are- I want to be able to help people like me and you to get better and stay that way- I really hope i get to do this some day- but uni is a bit stuffed up for me at the moment and has been for ages. It's gona take a whole lot of praying and hail Mary's and hallelujahs before i get there. Oh well- at least i'm dreaming again. I just wanted to share this with all of you guys- because i just wanted people to know that it is possible to fall out of the right side of the bed one morning in a dramatic way. It seemed like it happened over night to me- because one day i was feeling the big s word that we ain't supposed to talk about on this site and completely without hope, feeling helpless and useless and that nothing could be right with me ever again. I completely felt i had no future and that i could not change a thing about any situation or problem i was facing. The next day i felt slightly better during the morning- went to see my doc about the extreme s feelings i had experienced and blood in my vomit- then later went on i got an epiphany. The afternoon started out with me just filling out a sheet of how i could cope during a crisis. Still was a bit reluctant at this point and unopen to the idea that i could change. I kept going by writing out the pros and cons thingos and so forth. The message here is to keep going in life ppls even if you think you ain't goin nowhere fast. Did soooooo much thinking and soul searching and realising that i haven't just been put on this earth for nothing. I realised that i haven't just been given these horrible experiences for nothing- it all must have some meaning and purpose. Even if you think that therapy is a whole lot of crap (as i often did) and don't think it will work (as i often did severely) or that you are just one of those untreatable sods (as i did soooo severely) just keep plodding along- you know- even if you believe these things with all your might. Even if you are indifferent about living right now. Just do something today that means that your life will just be that tinier bit better tomorrow- it's honestly better than not dipping your feet in the water! and it means that there are possibilities for your life now. Take some action and initiative peeps. It's all gota come from you on your own steam. I thank depression right now (silly as it sounds, I know) as it made me more of a passionate person about caring about other people than i could ever have done without depression. I'm getting a bit scared now about how carried away i'm getting now- and i'm just hoping these good feelings will continue. I'm hoping that i will never ever again fall into that abyss of depression and extreme extreme overbearing despair ever again. I know all this must sound very weird- and understandably so- one day i'm the big 's' word and then the next i begin my life again. I feel like i've had to begin my life over and over again after each episode- but this time it's different i think. My thoughts are more powerful and stronger than they've ever been and i'm more determined that i've seen my last days of depression that severe. I've got to slowly lose the extremely high ideals, perfectionism, pressure, and other crap now so that i'll be less likely to suffer again. That's what i'm going to find hard- but my t says today that it's doable. I accept that. I'll work on it now. I'm not going to lose all those high goals for my life but i've got to learn to accept myself in the now and figure out other ways or things i could do instead if i don't reach those dreams. I've mostly layed to rest some sexual abuse that plagued me for a bit, and some of the really regrettable sexual things i did because i really thought i was undesirable, and really huge self image and body image non-acceptance. I accept that all as my history but i believe more than ever that something good must transpire from the chaos that has been. It has to. My faulty belief was that past behaiour predicted future behaviour and that the great 'change' that we all so desire was just an impossibility- I'm learning very slowly to change that one! I want a good life and i deserve it and so does everyone on this planet. Shame that a good life doesn't come easy for all- but the least we can do to make other peoples lives better is make our own lives that one little bit better. So i figure now that it's really not that selfish to think about myself and take care of myself- because in doing this I'm really thinking about others too! Ha ha- this post is really funny- because when i wrote that last entry i was so desperate and now i'm actually writing the response that i was after from other people. I'm hoping that at the very least this posting will help those who are stuck in the thick of it at the mo realise that it's more possible to get out of it. I was there in that firey heat, and yes you may not believe me when i say it now- but i was incredibly negative- like you wouldn't believe. I thought that nothing much was possible for my life at all and that i was set up in life to fail! The greatest thing that you can ever do is always ask for help- like constantly get help when you need it. Build up social support- even if you don't feel like being social just force yourself out there. I was never one to really offer my voice in conversation to anyone but now i can't get enough of the stuff- it's the most important thing to be connected to people- it really is a life-line. You can't do without it. I stand up for what i believe in now and i don't let anyone run me down anymore. I can't believe i'm the one who's actually giving advice because i was so so so so so so so so depressed for ages ages ages ages. You get the picture. I didn't have the greatest help with therapy at first- but i sorta kinda realise now that my old therapist helped me to become a more expressive and open person than had been prior to meeting her. The new things i am doing in therapy now are giving me life skills and my new therapist is helping me by prodding (being shear positive in the face of my utterly disgraceful negativity)me back into life. She's helping kick start the young-timer (I'm 21) who feels like an old-timer back into it!. I asked for something from you guys for me to believe in in my last posting (to get me thru) and i totally got my answer from myself- the answer that i have come up with is to believe in myself. I realise now that even during all this mess and struggle and strife I did always seek help and in subtle and not so subtle ways i didn't give up. I'm desperately hoping now that i can maintain a good life. It's not always gona be good i know but i hope that after this solid year of psychotherapy i'll have an even greater understanding and knowledge of how to deal with any crises that may arise. I'm sorta lucky that i had my big depressive fall-out early on in my life (not really!!!) because it has made me have to learn how to deal and so maybe i'll be better equipped with dealing with other things that crop up during life. I need to learn to accept that i can't influence the weather- i can only influence how i react to it (if y'all know what i mean). I want this change and need it to remain. The other thing it takes to get out of depression is guts- you gota have guts people and stare the big demonic depressive monster square in the eye- and a responsible attitude (if you can while bein depressed?- hard i know) in putting yourself out there and getting as much help and insight to saturation point. Another prob i have which you guys may be able to identify with is that i worry a lot. Worry wart Sezzie. I want the future all laid out for me on a nicely set blanket thank-you very much and s**t me it just aint going to be like that. I have a worry jar that i keep near me now where i write down the things that are getting stuck in my head and impeding me. I write them down and shut the lid on em and then allow myself to get on with what i was intending to do before my thoughts crept up on me and overtook the reigns. After i've done what i initially needed to do i go back to my jar pull out my worry and then kinda think about how i can solve it if it's a humanly possible one. This idea may help you guys too. My wise and admirable lecturer said to me "You just gota ride the waves like the surfers do. Take it as it comes". She said something along those lines anyway. I hope you guys get something out of what i've shared here. I really hope you are all blessed with journeys that take you to better places in life that you may not be even able to imagine at the moment. I still have so far to go before i consider myself rehabilitated but maybe i will get there. I need to stop thinking that i am a loser, stop avoiding life, let go of grief about the past. I must make a better life for myself now. One where i'm not constantly seduced by my emotions. Need to live a life worth living. I'm hoping that i can salvage my studies!!! Need to stick with them- just like i have with trying to get out of depression. Can't let it slide so badly again- just can't. I completely believed i would end up dead- i thought that death was my destiny. I was just meant to be one of those people who die young wasn't I?. I hope to high heaven that this doesn't happen. I hope, I hope, I hope. I hope that i get through what i need to get through during this next year. It's this next bit of year that's so crucial to get through- and the first half of the next year. I just can't slide. Please no!!! I need to stop giving myself problems!!!! Drugs and what ever. I know it's gona be an extremely tough year- but if i could just make it then that'll be it- then i'll know that i can get through anything. I'll be armoured up for life. I'll be thick skinned but with a soft heart. Gotta get there. Sorry I'm just mumbling- been writing for so long- it's just that i want me to survive. Better stop avoiding study now and get back into it! I just wanted to share with you guys the radical change i experienced over the last week and that i am utterly amazed! It's gona be so important for me to keep up a reasonable mood. I don't have to be this excited all the time- but i do want to maintain a reasonably good mood. You guys must be wondering if i'm manic- I totally asked this of my therapist today because that's what i thought too when i woke up that Friday and possibly saw the light (to some degree anyway). And NO i'm not manic. Not at all in fact. I must be getting better. This must be what getting better feels like. It has to be. I need to get through this year so desperately. I need to finish my papers at uni and not give that up. Can't lose faith. I'm so scared right now that this is not gona last. I'm just at the beginning of getting some life skills and i really need to change my catastrophizing and black-and-white all-or-nothing thinking. It's not conducive to life having so much pressure and stress on one's shoulders. Any advice for those hearty people who made it this far into reading my posting? Any advice on how i can keep going?- cause that's my biggie prob- i give up too easily, don't learn to stick things out- when the motivation burns out i'm gone, or if things get the slightest bit tough I'm outa there with rockets mate. How do i quit the quitting? This is suuuuuuuccccchhhhh an important answer i need right now peeps. I need you guys! May we all lose the fog that's in front of our eyes!!!
Love and hugs
-Sezzie-

[wisewoman]

Sezzie, you are doing some really good thinking through a bunch of stuff and taking actions and making plans. Up until now I believed that I was the queen of long posts and someone a long time ago told be to break the m up into paragraphs and indents etc so it's easier for the reader. Now I understand! Funny it took all of this time. Stick to what your doing, it's working, you are insightful and determined, that goes a long way. Use a fe paragraphs so I don't have to get my ruler and magnifying glass out! Me eyeballs getting old! Take care.

Hi Sezzie,
I hope you're still feeling uplifted and positive. I think your trying to maintain that positiveness is key to your getting through those hurdles. You'll probably, realistically, feel a little down and out again and that's to be expected. I hope it doesn't make you forget about what you've written, though.
Some of what you wrote inspired me.
Perhaps you can print out what you wrote and highlight some of the things you said to look back on to help you to remember how you're feeling now and that it's in your grasp-should you come to doubt that in the future.
I'm giving you big hugs and well wishes.
Please, keep us posted on how you're doing.