So, what is depression like for me?
Sep. 9th, 2004 10:58 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xiphiasSince people are talking about depression, I figured I'd maybe try to write down a little bit about what my depression is like.
One of the main ways my depression shows up is an inability to Do Stuff. I find myself doing some sort of repetitive, pointless time-waster just to be doing SOMETHING, but if I don't have something like that to do, I'll just sit in the corner doing nothing.
Computer games are one of the major time-wasters I use, but not having computer games doesn't help, since I'll just end up sitting on the floor doing nothing, instead. But I've spent six hours playing endless games of computer solitaire. I flunked out of college through playing Nethack over and over again.
The games I play like this have to be ones I can play without thinking. Not necessarily play WELL without thinking -- I played a third of the games of Nethack played at Brandeis, and rarely made the high score list -- but I have to be able to do it mindlessly.
Sometimes I'll read, instead. But I rarely remember what I've read.
Or I'll play guitar, but that rarely lasts long, because that actually takes brainpower. So I'll pull out my guitar, and play for about ten seconds, and stop.
Medication allows me to, sometimes, get out of this state. But my better mood-states are always fragile. And I can feel them collapse.
Sometimes, I can be in a good mood, and I can feel the mood crumble, as if it was a tower of blocks that someone knocked over, or, perhaps, as if it was a very brittle sand castle. Sometimes it feels more like my good mood is some sort of viscous liquid that drains out of a grate in the bottom of my soul.
When I'm in a good mood, I have to protect it carefully, because I know that any sudden shock will make it crumble, or drain.
If I'm busy, or dealing with people, it can give some sort of protection from my mood crumbling, sometimes. But being busy is exhausting and can make a later crash worse. It's a balancing act. I rarely get seriously depressed while I'm working, but often do when I'm done.
And it can hit very suddenly. I can be feeling perfectly wonderful, and then it can hit, and, within ten seconds, I'm depressed.
I generally try not to show when I'm depressed, because it would upset people. I mean, I have friends. Who like me. And, because they like me, they don't like to see me in pain. So I therefore try not to let them see me in pain, even if I am in pain. I see no reason why other people should be less happy simply because I am not happy. Happiness is valuable -- I think that people who are depressive know that more deeply than people to whom happiness comes easily. And, because it's valuable, I don't want to see any of it wasted. If my unhappiness will harm other people's happiness, then I don't want to expose other people's happiness to my unhappiness.
Happiness doesn't come easily. It takes work, and care, and medication, and, even then, it's delicate and fleeting. It's rare, and valuable. And because of that, it's a worthwhile thing to try to bring happiness to other people. Even if I can't experience it very well myself, if I can bring it to others, that's worth doing.
Because my depression is primarily biochemical in nature, I have gotten used to thinking of emotional states as being entirely distinct from outside events. I rarely think of questions like "why am I unhappy," because I've gotten used to there being no cause. So I think of emotional states to be just things that happen, like the weather. One can't really DO anything about them -- they just show up. I can, sometimes, through a force of will, hang on to a mood-state, but I can't CREATE one. And outside events can't, either.
I'm beginning to learn that that isn't true. There are times that I get unhappy because bad stuff happens, or happy because good things happen. But I'm not used to thinking that way, so I don't look for causes like that. If someone insults me, or attacks me, and I become upset or depressed, I'm likely to think of those events as entirely unrelated -- even though, logically, I'm beginning to realize that they probably ARE related.
Oh -- and, when I say "unhappy", I mean "a state of feeling like there is a yawning empty void inside the middle of your soul."
One of the main ways my depression shows up is an inability to Do Stuff. I find myself doing some sort of repetitive, pointless time-waster just to be doing SOMETHING, but if I don't have something like that to do, I'll just sit in the corner doing nothing.
Computer games are one of the major time-wasters I use, but not having computer games doesn't help, since I'll just end up sitting on the floor doing nothing, instead. But I've spent six hours playing endless games of computer solitaire. I flunked out of college through playing Nethack over and over again.
The games I play like this have to be ones I can play without thinking. Not necessarily play WELL without thinking -- I played a third of the games of Nethack played at Brandeis, and rarely made the high score list -- but I have to be able to do it mindlessly.
Sometimes I'll read, instead. But I rarely remember what I've read.
Or I'll play guitar, but that rarely lasts long, because that actually takes brainpower. So I'll pull out my guitar, and play for about ten seconds, and stop.
Medication allows me to, sometimes, get out of this state. But my better mood-states are always fragile. And I can feel them collapse.
Sometimes, I can be in a good mood, and I can feel the mood crumble, as if it was a tower of blocks that someone knocked over, or, perhaps, as if it was a very brittle sand castle. Sometimes it feels more like my good mood is some sort of viscous liquid that drains out of a grate in the bottom of my soul.
When I'm in a good mood, I have to protect it carefully, because I know that any sudden shock will make it crumble, or drain.
If I'm busy, or dealing with people, it can give some sort of protection from my mood crumbling, sometimes. But being busy is exhausting and can make a later crash worse. It's a balancing act. I rarely get seriously depressed while I'm working, but often do when I'm done.
And it can hit very suddenly. I can be feeling perfectly wonderful, and then it can hit, and, within ten seconds, I'm depressed.
I generally try not to show when I'm depressed, because it would upset people. I mean, I have friends. Who like me. And, because they like me, they don't like to see me in pain. So I therefore try not to let them see me in pain, even if I am in pain. I see no reason why other people should be less happy simply because I am not happy. Happiness is valuable -- I think that people who are depressive know that more deeply than people to whom happiness comes easily. And, because it's valuable, I don't want to see any of it wasted. If my unhappiness will harm other people's happiness, then I don't want to expose other people's happiness to my unhappiness.
Happiness doesn't come easily. It takes work, and care, and medication, and, even then, it's delicate and fleeting. It's rare, and valuable. And because of that, it's a worthwhile thing to try to bring happiness to other people. Even if I can't experience it very well myself, if I can bring it to others, that's worth doing.
Because my depression is primarily biochemical in nature, I have gotten used to thinking of emotional states as being entirely distinct from outside events. I rarely think of questions like "why am I unhappy," because I've gotten used to there being no cause. So I think of emotional states to be just things that happen, like the weather. One can't really DO anything about them -- they just show up. I can, sometimes, through a force of will, hang on to a mood-state, but I can't CREATE one. And outside events can't, either.
I'm beginning to learn that that isn't true. There are times that I get unhappy because bad stuff happens, or happy because good things happen. But I'm not used to thinking that way, so I don't look for causes like that. If someone insults me, or attacks me, and I become upset or depressed, I'm likely to think of those events as entirely unrelated -- even though, logically, I'm beginning to realize that they probably ARE related.
Oh -- and, when I say "unhappy", I mean "a state of feeling like there is a yawning empty void inside the middle of your soul."
(no subject)
Date: 2004-09-09 09:33 am (UTC)I'm amused that Ian posted this now. In the interval between the last time I read LJ this morning and now, I was thinking of having a discussion very similar to that with someone I know who is clearly exhibiting all the signs of depression and (as far as I know) doing nothing about it. And probably won't, even if I suggest it, because, well, when you're depressed you don't want to *do* anything. Depression isn't happy, but it's comfortable, and it's all too easy to rationalize not doing anything unless there's someone in your life with sufficient clout to drag you to a doctor and make you take the drugs he prescribes, or some event in your life that kicks you into doing something (it was 9/11/01 for me).
And I was going to post about that frustration, but here is as good a place as my journal. (The person of whom I'm thinking doesn't read either, so far as I know.)
(no subject)
Date: 2004-09-09 09:35 am (UTC)That's what I did this go-round, as I finally realized how low he was sinking and how long this bout had been going on. [It's been so gradual a decline that it was hard to notice until it got pretty bad.] Then *I* made the appointment for him (he was somewhat upset that I did so) and accompanied him to the doctor, and he's now starting on an additional med to see if that helps.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-09-09 10:46 pm (UTC)I resented it at the time, and still think it was perhaps the wrong call, but I appreciated then and appreciate now the /effort/ involved.