Depression and what it's really like

valentine's day goes off the rails and straight into train wreck territory sometime around puberty.

only if you let it, imo. for me nothing saps the spirit like christmas. i'm so glad the holidays (tm) are over for a nice long while.

I've never celebrated it, aside from making valentines for my friends and buying discount candy the day after, but it will be my first uncoupled one in awhile. But yes, Christmas is the soul-suckingest holiday.

Kids at my elementary school were hooking up in the 4th grade and Valentine's Day ceased to be about fun cards dropped in decorated milk cartons, punch, cupcakes....really early on. I can totally relate to the Charlie Brown Valentine's Day special. In high school girls were walking around with huge bouquets of flowers, bear and balloons. It was insane. They all got married or pregnant before 20 though so looking back there was serious courting going on. Valentine's became cool when I started making cards for friends.

My friend is throwing a potluck! Valentine's Day is saved! (Provided I don't have social anxiety and panic at the party. Fortunately this is a friend who is aware of and sensitive to my issues.)

And yeah, I remember kids in middle and high school getting balloons and candy grams and crap delivered to class. Why is that BS allowed? Totally disruptive & annoying.

carnations

Those are for funerals.

haha really? in my high school they were delivered to objects of affection. (i did not get any, sigh)

The only carnation I ever got was one my best friend got for me.

I wish to destroy everything with my mind right now. I dont know how to control all this bitter, bile filled rage I am feeling so I'm just turning it inward. Hoorah.

rage sucks away your time and energy. the best thing you can do is apply all that time and energy to something that's actually productive. then you can concentrate on what you're accomplishing instead of all that bile you feel.

Yeah I know thats what I need to do. The bitterness is eating me alive and it blows. I'm trying to focus on writing music but lately Ive fallen back in a hole a little. I'll just keep on getting back up til I stop falling down.

don't make the productive thing too high-stakes -- if making music means a lot to you and you're not getting the result you want, that can be a disaster for your self-esteem. "productive" = something fun that your whole identity is not wrapped up in.

I had to coach myself to stop worrying about being "productive" because it was becoming a toxic concept to me. I just aim to make good uses of my time, now.

my 'product' is avoiding despair

in some ways it is simple but in others very much not

part of the way i self-treat my depression is to set a series of small, easily accomplishable goals for myself, instead of letting myself get intimidated by the big picture. that's being "productive" for me -- knocking out those little goals. then i feel like more of a human being.

feeling like a human otm

there can be no humanity for anyone, ever

that is not true at all

isn't it though? isn't it

no. for better or worse, i am always a human being until i'm not

gb you make a great point abt the music re identity and achievement and that occurred to me too. so on Ns suggestion today we're just gonna clean the house, that always makes me feel less gross abt myself .

whoa N's gonna clean?

Haha :) We both did a pretty good team effort! That did cheer me up.

ugh yeah definite rage/bile/bitterness up in here the past two weeks

Picked up a copy of this:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0415998735/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00

to keep me busy; I'm going to go shopping for soldering irons and breadboards and shit over the weekend. Between this and Korean class, hopefully I can keep myself from stabbing my eyes out with promotional Uline pens during my 9-hour cubicle shift (where as of today, I no longer have line of sight to another human being or a window).

Shit, I started telling my therapist my life story and she started crying. I"m starting to realize things were fucked up for me way worse than I thought. I wish I just had depression at this point... damn. Good perspective shift: if you just have depression, you are very lucky and I am jealous of you.

ugh, forgive that, things are just crazy right now.

It's okay man. I feel lucky all the time: my condition's under control, my meds work; I've never been committed or attempted suicide; I'm not an addict; I'm not dead. You probably have things that you can feel lucky about too! Keep working.

there have been times in a group or individual therapy setting where I've described my past and my feelings, and people in the room have responded to the pain.

It's a weird thing. Somehow I want to reassure them that it really isn't that bad, lots of people had it worse; and yet, on the other hand, I'm grateful for the recognition.

This painful stuff is painful. Wrong stuff is wrong. People can see that on paper and feel that in their hearts. We, on the other hand, don't always know what to do with it.

Thanks silby. I know I have some things to feel lucky about, but it's weird coming from a rare and unpleasant background and have so few people understand what it's like. Adds a little to feeling like an outsider in your own community or something. I'm sure I'll get over it at some point.

Agree ZT. It's hard coming to terms with the reality of it, it's pretty painful and almost nonsensical. It's encouraging my therapist actually responded on an emotional level, literally the first time I've seen that in my almost 30 years of life... of course she's the first person I've ever told about this stuff. So much crap happened that was absolutely illegal! Like, my parents should've been thrown in prison for the shit they pulled... it's freakin' crazy to see it that way! At least it's progress. I'm pretty sure both my parents are sociopaths at this point, there's just something completely inhuman about it all.

...
I've also started lookin into school options, but it's rough- everything for "mature students" is shoved off onto satellite campuses and the courses are all business/IT/accounting shit. It's bad enough knowing I'll never have a real student life without the realization that getting a liberal arts education is no longer a possibility.
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- muus lääv? :D muus dut :( (Telephone thing), Tuesday, February 5, 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

One always feels on shaky ground questioning somebody else's thinking, but I have to ask: are you sure it's no longer a possibility? I went to a liberal arts program and had several classmates in their 30s and 40s. One had worked as a firefighter, another had been a cabbie.

Others do not live your life and so they cannot know the depth of your feelings or the dimensions of your need. That means their expectations are grounded in pardonable ignorance - and ignorant expectations ought not be in the driver's seat, steering your life away from what is important to your happiness.

aimless i c+ped this and put it in a sticky on my desktop

ty

yw. I can also snatch flies out of mid-air with my bare hand.

I have been dealing with postpartum depression or postpartum anxiety, something. There are no thoughts of hurting my baby or myself which seem to be on every postpartum depression list. I get out of bed in the morning, shower, dress, put on make-up [don't cry through my day at all] and take care of August daily. When I think of depression and what I have read of postpartum depression, doing those things should be difficult and a struggle if done at all. Throughout the day I am happy to be with August, happy to be a stay at home mom and being able to even catch a tooth appearing. I try and get housework done but don't always accomplish what I'd like until J. gets home. I did think I would have some amount of free time during the day to read or sew or make something for August but if I so much as move a few inches away from her while she sleeps, she immediately wakes up. So I have an opportunity to read or sleep but no art projects. Things will be fine and seemingly without issue. That is, until we leave the house. Doing any sort of shopping, being at a grocery store or mall can wreck my world. The whole hell is other people comes into play....Returning home from shopping leaves me feeling depressed but I can still function. I get over it within 24 hours. Seem to be becoming an agoraphobe.

Reading a blog the other day, the writer described her sister, a new mother, being completely exhausted and unhappy to the point of being dysfunctional. There was an intervention and friends and family took over everything so she could just sleep and eat for a week without worrying about anything. The writer then requested tips and advice. I recommended a nutrition book that is supposed to help wit\h postpartum depression, one that I just bought. It stresses fish oil and omegas and B vitamins. After my comment the writer wrote that she was sorry for ever giving the impression that her sister was suffering from postpartum depression and then went on to say she is fine, we speak daily. Just a small testament to the stigma attached to the condition. She went on to say her sister might have postpartum anxiety.

Seems it is hard to get a clear idea what postpartum depression is. It is based on hormones yet anti-depressants can help. However, many women say anti-depressants threw them way off. The book I am reading makes a good case for bad nutrition prolonging the condition, worsening it, explaining how easily it can happen after having a baby, losing so many nutrients and never really having the time to replenish, constantly falling behind.

On this site to find out what depression is really like.

Has it helped, *tera?

There's an awful lot to read here. Depression comes in a variety of flavours, but the common theme is that none of them taste good. Ask if you have questions.

Agoraphobia seems nail-on-head from your description. You say that when you return home you feel depressed, but do you feel depressed, miserable or exhausted, or some combination?

There is also a thread about anxiety, idk if you've seen it: Severe Anxiety

good luck, tera, facing depression's no easy task but it's possible to get through. i've finally peeled away my depression only to reveal ... post-traumatic stress disorder! apparently there's even a new type of ptsd/disorder in the works for situations like mine.

i always knew i'd be one of those guys sitting inside a glass cube in a lab with diodes attached to my head while three doctors in lab coats jot down notes on clip boards.

*tera, a healthy diet surely can't do any harm and may help, but I would look at addressing more directly what happens when you leave the house. it is very hard to fix a problem when you don't know exactly what the problem looks like.

For example, do you become anxious at the thought of leaving the house? Are you taking the babby with you on these shopping trips or are you alone? What sort of thoughts are dominant while you are out there? Are you seeing friends or family with any regularity? What fresh hell do these other people seem to present you with?

It sounds to me a bit like you have not just experienced a huge change with the arrival of your baby, but almost like there is no connection between the before and after. As wonderful and astonishing as a new baby is, you can't build an entire life around one. It's too tiny a space. Perhaps you need to (slowly) refamiliarize yourself with all that buzz and hubbub, so you don't lose the ability to cope with it.

^^ a lot of guesswork involved here, so I could be way off

Is there anyone who can accompany you when you have to do outings with the baby? Do you think it would help your anxiety? Do you think part of it is just being in with the baby all day & the outside world is a jarring contrast? It's good that you're noticing and taking action now. As someone who is just getting over agoraphobia enough to do simple things around town I would urge you to not let yourself get to shut-in point. Not that the world ends if you do, it's just really really hard.

Zora: still reading through but yes...

We were in Texas when I started down this road and still in Texas when I started feeling more like myself again. My energy levels rose, felt more like myself again, even called my midwife to tell her, hey, I am amazed but I am feeling so much better and just, well, great! Her response was negative, that was annoying to me. She had told me she was coping with her own PPD for several months. I was confused though, she was running a PPD group.

When I found out we were moving to Paris, TX I panicked. I had heard it was very racist. I have discovered there is a strange, hidden, deep rooted fear of that..NOW. Living in small town TX, I was well aware of it. Living in Austin, I rarely saw it, experienced it. If I did, I was "at home" in Austin,TX. I would say that whole Paris, TX thing triggered something back: fear, anxiety....I ended up spending three weeks in Austin with friends and one week in Paris,TX, only, before moving to OK. While in Austin I realized it's fun having a baby in Austin, friends and family there, lots to do and see...culture shock set in moving way from it.

I would say shit hit the fan and full blown episodes of just fear, loneliness and anxiety set in once we moved to OK. The first town was miserably small and depressing. The second town, where we are now, offered a bit more in spirit. Our duplex is next to a house where children come to play and I love their energy. They are older, too old for August but we watch them play. Their mothers are not too friendly. The one day one of them started a conversation with me, her friend gave us both the [school recess] cold shoulder and went inside but not before making her friend nervous and weird about speaking to me. I'm an interloper. After that I just say hello from afar. They don't let their kids come around me for too long.

Hear the "n" word frequently around the town, not mumbled or whispered, full on conviction and had a bad, personal confrontation at the bank a few weeks back. I've checked out the downtown, looked online for resources and things to do but no Mommy and Me and now...not sure I want to hang with anyone here.I have always done well alone when I had no baby. I would write, take photos, explore, create, workout, read...it was easy to keep myself busy or amused by my surrounding whatever they were. But this is different. Walks introduced me to chained pit bulls in yards or large, stray dogs of questionable demeanors. Pepper spray, I thought, but baby in a stroller, wind...hmmm not a great idea. So my walks were super short and August just fell asleep anyway so we just sit outside now.

I am invisible when we leave the duplex. People see J and the baby but not me. Women have blatantly flirted with J as if I don't exist and I am standing right there. Then I question if is that real or did I imagine it and think of 1950's movies with Tom Ewall and how funny it was when his character would recall a scene in their mind, their perception of it being wholly different...For me, there is this current of everything being in a fragile state. The other side of that is everything is a threat. How August is fragile in many ways, how a marriage and relationships can be and become fragile, how free range skankiness can bring that all to mind...how I am very fragile right now and rudeness, a racist remark, being treated unfairly can wreck me far more easily than ever. There are just all these weird layers of fears and anxiety about things that I never gave a thought about before. Leaving the house I am forced to face things I don't want to face or think about and the thoughts and observations, surge, gush and just cascade when I leave my comfort zone. No panic attacks, just a lot of turning words, thoughts, perceptions on myself, more if they are real and not left vague. Fears. Fear of losing August or J are right there. I use to live alone, I use to walk alone in the dark, I married three times, rock climbing, spelunking...what fears did I ever have? None. Fear like this is new to me.

I feel clingy, I don't want to return to Austin with friends and family there, I don't want to see my grandmother in Del Rio either, not right now, not feeling this way. There is a fear I would like it so much and feel better, I wouldn't want to experience culture shock and this again and not return to traveling as a family unit. Or, I would miss J too much and just not have a good time at all, not benefit like I should from it. I did make a call and found a therapist in the next town who seems great. I would like to see her, just need to either go with August (which I think could be fine but she isn't too thrilled about) or try and find a way she could see me when J can care for August.

Aimless, you are right, there is no connection.

emilys: It is jarring but not in a panic attack sort of way. Not yet. Just afraid of how my day will be wrecked and by who. This is stemming from experiences already had, real or perceived. The bank confrontation was real. Bugged me more than I thought.

Spectrum: PTSD has been suggested but unsure of how it fits in with depression right now but something to talk about hen I get to see this therapist.

Wow. You really have got it all to deal with right now. New baby, with all the stress and exhaustion that brings. A major relocation, which is also a traumatic life event. Your support network is not around you when you need it most, you are in an environment you experience as hostile (apparently with reason), and your normal coping strategies are no longer available to you.

Anxiety seems to me like a perfectly rational response to an incredibly tough situation. That said, I'm sure you are doing the right thing by seeking help urgently. Anxiety wears grooves in you over time.

I hope the therapist you've found can give you some of the support you need. Are there really no parents' clubs you could join? Other groups that might be more welcoming than the city at large? If the idea of making new connections feels impossible, could you have anyone from home come and stay with you for a while? That could give you some of the companionship you need, without disconnecting you from OK altogether.

^^ Zora otm. Between the adjustments to a new baby and to a new and unwelcoming environment, you are dealing with a situation that is hugely stressful, and doing it without your friends, family or normal coping mechanisms available to you. Feeling this as threatening is understandable. Even through the distance and opacity of the internet I can feel how draining this must be.

I would hope J is both aware of how fragile you are atm, and is doing everything possible to lend you support and courage. But that is a big burden for J to bear alone. Seeing that therapist would at least give you another ally locally.

As for the people elsewhere who love you, I can easily guess that you downplay how you are feeling when you speak to them. That would be 100% normal, too. With the baby and all, they want you to feel good and optimistic, so letting them know how wretched and fragile you feel just burdens you with a vague sense of guilt over making them worry about you. I've been there, too.

If you can, I'd encourage you to pick the strongest and most reliable of these people who love you and start calling them and talking about this. You need their voices in your life and the reassurance they can provide in addition to J. And there is always ILX, too., as a makeshift backstop.

Facing fear such as you are facing now is 100x harder alone than with help. Asking for help always feels FAR worse in anticipation than it does in reality. You'll be amazed how many people out there will be HAPPY if they can do something for you. And don't feel like you should be able to sort this on your own. Numbers count and the bastards are too many for you to vanquish all by yourself.

Good luck. Come back here whenever you like. Someone will always be hanging around, you know.

aimless gives good advice. Zora too.

I dunno how practical this is atm since August needs most of yr attention, but at some point in the future maybe seeking out a group or club relevant to one of your artistic interests might help alleviate some of the alien-strangeness of yr town? so that way you can at least hone in on ppl who share a similar passion, rather than just "ppl who have babbies"
there's usually a clatch of cool ppl somewhere in town who don't talk about n-words and who won't point and whisper at u. you just gotta find where they gather.

again, the practicality of that isn't exactly workable for you right now, but something to think about later on, or at least investigate to see if such a thing exists.

*tera
my wife had post-partum depression and it's no joke. medication helped immensely and very quickly and she was able to go off later on...i would talk to your doctor about it immediately.

Thank you, shakedown, it helps to know when it works.

also, obv everyone is different but i wouldn't spend too much time getting in your own head about "why am i feeling this way" etc etc or talking about diet or whatever, if you think it's post-partum it probably is and the reason is that your body and mind has been thrown in disarray and it's a medical condition. the sooner you see a doctor the better, i wish we wouldn't have waited as long as we did.

medication helped immensely and very quickly and she was able to go off later on...

If *tera gets a similar outcome, this would, of course, be excellent all the way around. And this having been the outcome with your wife, it is easy to see why you recommend going to a doctor asap.

However, the majority of doctors I have dealt with are mediocre at diagnosis, poorly trained in treating mental disorders, and spend far too little time asking questions. A decent therapist might be a better gatekeeper for determining what's up with *tera than, say, a family practise physician in a small OK town. If it were me consulting a doctor about it, I'd at least try to see a woman doctor if at all possible. A woman doctor might be inclined to take it more seriously.