Maybe a little progress

I used to post here under a different name, but have been away for probably a year or so and am now returning.

First, the good news. I am finally a healthy weight. I've lost a little over 60 lbs with 10 more to go. Went from an obese BMI in 2012, to currently sitting near the top of the "normal" range...if I can lose 10 more, I'll be exactly where I want to be.

I feel a lot better with the weight off...I feel healthier, I breath better, I might have a tiny bit of confidence, I sleep a bit better. But, I'm still exhausted all the time. I was hoping getting physically healthy would boost my energy, but it really hasn't. I'm staying with family right now and only work a couple days a week. Absolutely no reason to be exhausted. If I go for a walk, take a shower, and eat a few meals, it seems like a productive day. I'm a male in my early 30's...I feel like I get as much accomplished during an average day as an 80 year old in a nursing home.

I just switched doctors and had my thyroid checked. The overall levels were okay, but one of them (T3) was low and I was just put on synthroid for it. Only been a week, so too soon to know if it will make me feel any different. I keep hoping that after a few weeks on the thyroid pills, my energy will return and my depression will lift. Probably a long shot, but I've read stories from people who got their life back after their thyroid improved. I was also diagnosed with Raynaud's which seems to be triggered by stress and cold.

I should really be in therapy, but haven't been able to do it (mostly because of money reasons that I don't want to get into in this message). I've tried antidepressants in the past, but hated them. May have to try again eventually, but I keep hoping something else will help me so I don't have to take them. I've been taking SAM-E daily for a year or so...it really seems to help some. Not as much as I would like it to, but it seems to give me a little bit more energy and improve my mindset a bit. I credit the SAM-E with being the thing that gave me the ability to lose the weight. But, it's clearly not working as well as I thought, because I just took the depression quiz and wound up in the "severe depression" range...pretty much the same score as I was before the SAM-E and weight loss.

I guess that's all for now. I just wish I could go back to feeling like a normal person and move on with my life. I'm getting tired of coming up with explanations as to why I seem like a complete failure...why I'm barely working...why I'm living with family again in my 30's. I've never felt comfortable allowing my family to know about my mental problems, so I just continue looking like the worthless, lazy, mooching son who can't get his life together. That alone is exhausting. I guess that's why I hope the thyroid treatment ends up helping. At least my family can understand a low thyroid...I can point at the lab result and say, "see...look...the numbers are low...".

Oh well...I'm not really sure what the point of all this was. Just needed to share I guess.

Yay for progress however small. Stay safe

Wow, that's not a little progress, that's HUGE progress! Congratulations!!

- vital

http://forums.psychcentral.com/4262681-post105.html

Thanks. Yeah, I guess I had just hoped that by the time I hit a healthy weight, I might have enough energy to make it through the day like a normal person. Other than the hypothyroidism, my recent checkup and blood work all looked good. I hope that once my thyroid is under control, I will feel better and have energy.

Sometimes I'm not sure if I'm exhausted because I'm depressed or if I'm depressed because I'm exhausted. All I know is I want to be productive. For the longest time, I just thought I was lazy. But, that's not it...laziness is when I just feel like I'd rather be watching TV. What I experience most of the time is a desire to do the things I need to do and get stuff accomplished and live a normal life, but just end up losing track of the day and getting nothing done because I move so slowly and just lack the energy to get much done aside from eating a few meals, taking a walk, and taking a shower.

There are all these goals I have in life and things that I want to do, and I just keep on watching them slip further and further away because it seems like I move at the rate of a snail, and it takes a massive effort just to get myself to do anything.

I guess, now that I'm in reasonable shape, and the doctor thinks I'm healthy other than the thyroid problem, the exhaustion must be coming either from depression or hypothyroidism. So, I guess I'm at least narrowing down the list of possible reasons I'm living my life passively.