First Post- Dealing with Depression

Hello All,

Where to begin? I am a 22 yr old male and I thought I would try and reach out for comfort or help from others. I have been struggling with clinical depression for about a year and a half now. In the fall of 2013 I woke up one night with a panic attack that brought on severe anxiety for about 6 months. As the anxiety dissipated, I was thrown into a deep depression. I began to isolate, I disconnected from my significant other often and I lost interest in things I once loved. By the spring of 2014, my girlfriend of 4 years broke up with me and moved on very quickly. I fell deeper into a depression that threw me deeper than I thought I ever could go. BUT things were not their worst until the summer of 2014 when I chose to smoke marijuana with my friends for the first time. I smoked A LOT more than I ever should have and I had a panic attack while high. This triggered a severe episode of depersonalization and derealization that lasted close to a year. While dealing with this my depression sank to levels unknown to me before. I became lethargic. I lost interest in everything, including myself. I have gained almost 70 pounds in two years. I began binge drinking and I lost control of almost every temptation in my life. From food to alcohol to gaming. I did anything I could to avoid my reality because I knew I couldn’t handle it. What is even more concerning to me are the things I did when drunk that have had consequences in my life. When I began drinking heavily, I became easily agitated and would send messages to my ex girlfriend threatening her and her new boyfriend. I would wake up sober the next day and realize what I had written to her or said to her while drunk. It scared me. It was as if there was another person writing those messages. I am incredibly embarrassed to read my messages and to know that those words came from me. Anyway.. to try and keep this organized.. I am today, November 9, 2015, still struggling very deeply . I am at school in the senior year of my undergraduate college degree. Here is a list of the things I am dealing with….
-I isolate
-I stopped making friends
-I stopped going to a lot of my classes
-I over eat almost every day
-I procrastinate on my homework and when I do my work, it is subpar at best.
-I sleep too much
-I either watch tv or play computer games when I am home, which is most of the day. And when watching tv or gaming is boring me, I just go to sleep.
-I occasionally binge drink- maybe once every three weeks. Which is frustrating because I have tried to quit drinking entirely many times and weeks later I fall on my face and cave to my temptation.
-I attempt to set goals and to stick with them. I may be motivated and enthusiastic for a week but I soon lose interest and fall back into my cycle of depression.
- I am scared to reach for help from others partially because I am lethargic and tired and often give up on hope for recovery. Heck even typing this makes me tired and want to put it down and sit blankly and ignore everything. I know my parents are frustrated because I tell them I am going to ask for help and start working on my recovery but as soon as I get back to school, I collapse and quit. I don’t seek help, I don’t reach out. I write goals and then fall back on them. WHY DO I GIVE UP SO FAST? WHY CAN I NOT STICK TO MY RECOVERY? It is so frustrating. I often let things go so long before correcting them that it is another emergency on my part and one that affects those I love, my parents especially. I am at another crossroads and I am not sure what to do. I have been to a psychiatrist and I am currently on Lexapro and welbutrin. I have never stuck with therapy, like everything else, I start for a week or so then stop showing up.

-How do I get better? How do I put my foot down and begin recovering? I feel like I am losing hope… I feel like I have no control over my life and where I continue to go. And the worst part of it is that I feel nothing. I should be scared or frantic or SOMETHING. But I feel NOTHING.

Thanks for reading.. . Blessings to you.

Wiscmax34

Hi Wiscmax,

You might find this thread helpful

http://forums.psychcentral.com/depre...n-escaped.html

- vital

Vital,

thank you for that article.. it is exactly what ive been trying to say but unable to figure out how to say it! thank you!

Wiscmax

You're welcome Wiscmax. You might want to check out Freewilled's experience for example

http://forums.psychcentral.com/4715237-post156.html

and these notes

http://egg.bu.edu/~youssef/SNAP_CLUB/BA.pdf

- vital