How it happens with me.

I have had different phases in life and my depression has not always been exactly the same but this is how it has typically went.

I go for a period of four months when everything is great. I wake up at five in the morning without an alarm clock well before I have to be up to get to work. I drink my coffee and maybe write in my journal or watch the news. Then I start thinking about the plan of attack for the work day. I have always bee a foreman so I have to plan things out. Then I go to work and me and my crew carry out that plan. I am literally right in the trenches working with them and getting lots of good exercise. I just have to organize what each person does and do all the layout. Usually it is outside in the California sun and at the end of the day we all feel good about what we got done and go home. I get home at four and chill for awhile get something to eat and go to an AA meeting at 5:30. After the meeting I will go out to coffee with friends for an hour and then go home. I will do my meditation, maybe some AA writing step work type stuff, or read a spiritual book I am into or some fiction. Do emails. Sometimes work related stuff. Weekends vary a lot. I may stay home and not do much. Or I may do a bunch of gardening. I was real into landscaping for along time. Or maybe go camping with friends or on some adventure. I always went to all my pdoc, therapy, and group therapy appointments during the week. All during this time I am trying my best to practice the 12 steps, CBT, make good decisions, spend time with my daughter and so on.

Then totally out of the blue and very severe depression will hit. There is nothing that has changed in my life, no triggers, it just slams me out of no where. Want to do nothing but sleep all the time, won't shower or shave, no energy, no motivation, no interest, sometimes very suicidal. won't leave the house. I always will try to get in sooner than my normal appointment to see my pdoc and therapist when it happens but it doesn't really help. This will last three to four weeks and as suddenly as it came on it will lift and I am right back to what I described above. This happened three or four times a year always at the same time of year. Luckily I had a very understanding boss who needed me and put up with it. I would do as much work as I could on the computer and phone from home.

Starting about 8 years ago things started getting worse. The episodes started lasting much longer. Horrible anxiety with paranoia was thrown in and I had never had an ounce of anxiety in my life. In fact I always handled stress very well. The nature of things has changed. Some is due to situational stuff maybe. But two years ago the exact same scenario took place as I described in the first paragraph.

This is always the worst time of year for me. This is when the most severe one hits always. So I am in a similar spot right now. After having a really good summer. Things started slipping in Sept. What is different now is has been a slow very up and down thing. Usually I am in deep or I am not. My medications played a very large role in me doing so well since last April and I am not sure if they are playing a role in this mixed state up and down stuff I have been going through. Normally I would be in it very deep by now.

I dunno how to really treat it to be honest. If I am doing everything I stated in the first paragraph and it slams me out of the blue what more can I do to prevent it. I have always been in treatment and therapy and active in AA. Practicing all kinds of things that are aimed at personal and spiritual growth that would be seen as very healthy ways of treating depression.

I don't know where this current state is going to lead. The meds might keep it from going to the normal severe. I dunno right now. The current mixed state of some night not sleeping with some agitated hypo mania and then pretty bad depression and then days where I feel real good. That is all very foreign to me.