My depression, thankfully, is pretty mild. I did try medications for a while, but the side effects were awful, and I no longer wish to try that route. I "get by" pretty well without medication, most of the time, by structuring my life in certain ways.
It doesn't always work; the past several months I've had many more depressive episodes than usual, probably because:
(1) My job keeps me so busy I lose sleep (the hope is that next year I will be a second-year teacher and it won't be so bad), and when I am that chronically tired, I may fall into a bad funk where Nothing Feels Any Good for 2 or 3 days, and
(2) Part of the positive structuring involves pre-planned social activities-- social interaction with friends perks me up but having to plan takes too much energy-- and I've had so little free time and energy that I don't get my necessary weekly dosage of friendstime. (Last night I slept through Psinging, for example.)
Now, assuming I don't have to do any planning and if I can spare the time, then being kicked to "get out of the house and be social" can be quite positive. So that's the proviso.
I suppose another proviso would be if I do keep my teaching job next year and the year after and yet I still am chronically run-down and falling into depression frequently. Then I'll have to get out, and someone might have to poke me to do that. But I think things will get better (as long as I can be re-hired for future years, which may not happen due to town budget problems).
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re Antidepression Man, I'll opt out... mostly
Date: 2008-02-02 04:31 pm (UTC)My depression, thankfully, is pretty mild. I did try medications for a while, but the side effects were awful, and I no longer wish to try that route. I "get by" pretty well without medication, most of the time, by structuring my life in certain ways.
It doesn't always work; the past several months I've had many more depressive episodes than usual, probably because:
(1) My job keeps me so busy I lose sleep (the hope is that next year I will be a second-year teacher and it won't be so bad), and when I am that chronically tired, I may fall into a bad funk where Nothing Feels Any Good for 2 or 3 days, and
(2) Part of the positive structuring involves pre-planned social activities-- social interaction with friends perks me up but having to plan takes too much energy-- and I've had so little free time and energy that I don't get my necessary weekly dosage of friendstime. (Last night I slept through Psinging, for example.)
Now, assuming I don't have to do any planning and if I can spare the time, then being kicked to "get out of the house and be social" can be quite positive. So that's the proviso.
I suppose another proviso would be if I do keep my teaching job next year and the year after and yet I still am chronically run-down and falling into depression frequently. Then I'll have to get out, and someone might have to poke me to do that. But I think things will get better (as long as I can be re-hired for future years, which may not happen due to town budget problems).