[teacupgold]

You hear about various forms of Depression a lot through TV or friends, or just rumors around school when you're younger, but when I was diagnosed with Dysthymia I was surprised. Mainly because I had never heard of it before. No one I know has it, and I've never met anyone else who is dealing with this specific kind of depression before. I know others have to have it, of course. I just, I guess, wanna talk, compare, know I'm not alone... and just talk about it, I guess. I mean, you can only get so much with the articles and medical jargon. I actually would love to talk to people going through this too.

I hope this makes sense...

[phaset]

This is what they had down on paper when I was younger. I think the description still fits somewhat for me... Nothing ever got better. I think I've also had a few periods of major depression, which complicates it a bit for me. My therapist at the time wasn't a big fan of labelling things.

I know right now I'm not as bad off as other people with depression as I can still go to work and enjoy some things. That being said, and I feel so guilty for saying this, other depressed people seem to go up and down over time (months or years) but I feel like I never get a break from it. It's either bad or worse.

I hate the label and the description. Mild depression is such a load of crap.

[teacupgold]

I agree with you. There is no real break, making me feel as if I cannot talk about it, because it is always going on, and then that just makes me feel like I'm whining about it. It may be 'mild', like they say, but I'm with you. I do not like that term at all. Others may have it worse, but this is hard to deal with. There is no mild about it when it is something you're always dealing with.

One thing my therapist said to me as a way of explaining it was that my baseline for emotion generally runs 'lower' than that of a typical person. Meaning my lows are really low, my highs might seem 'normal' to others, but otherwise I'm just stuck at this 'lower' emotional bracket. Does that sound right?

[Rohag]

Hello Teacupgold!

Dysthymic Disorder Symptoms by PsychCentral Staff

I understand the just-released DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th Edition) has changed the dysthymia diagnosis. The following is from DSM-5 Changes: Depression & Depressive Disorders by PsychCentral's own Dr. John Grohol:

Dysthymia is gone, replaced with something called “persistent depressive disorder.” The new condition includes both chronic major depressive disorder and the previous dysthymic disorder. Why this change? “An inability to find scientifically meaningful differences between these two conditions led to their combination with specifiers included to identify different pathways to the diagnosis and to provide continuity with DSM-IV.”

[teacupgold]

Oh wow, I hadn't known that they'd went and done something like that. Is this new diagnosis being recognized by psychologists everywhere?