Why do you think you have depression?
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Why do you think you have depression?
| Sat, 09-18-2004 - 1:16am |
I am a newbie but lurked here for awhile. I suffer from depression. I uesd to have panic attacks but they subsided and I know have depression. I suffered for 5 years. The day I turned 30, the depression hit. (Is 30 the majic #?) I read alot of your post and see myself. There are days I don't want to go on living, yet I do. I work a very stressful job, I raise 2 kids, make that 3 I have a husband (LOL) But I feel like I have a black gloomy cloud over me. On top of the depression I am a negative thinker so I dwell on things also. I feel irritable and just don't have any fun anymore. I don't know if anyone else gets this also but I feel deperonsalization alot, not out of body of anything like that, just not feeling grounded, KIWM? A therapist told me that my mother raised me depressed. Thats' I have depression now. Funny,. I didn't feel deppressed until I turned 30.
Wjat about you. when or where did the depressions start? What meds are you on? I am trying to fing the rright one for me. Look forward to chatting with you.

Hi and welcome!
I dont know if 30 is a magic number or not, I just think as we get older we start to look at ourselves more deeply.
*hugs
I thank GOD I had a break down a few weeks ago. I went to the doctor, was diagnosed and put on meds. I finally came out of my denial. I was put on Zoloft and Xanex.
My family is so happy that I finally got help. My parents are wonderful people. My bf doesn't understand, he thinks I just need to relax and stop thinking so much. My dad has even offered to talk with him about it and tell him that this is a REAL illness. My bf is a wonderfuly supportive man and I think he's just in denial. He supports me in everything, but just doesn't like the fact that I'm on medication for this. Maybe it's just fear. I don't know.
As to my personality - I am a twin (female) to a brother. We were described as - they would point at my brother and he would laugh. They'd point at me and I would cry. True my brother was the clown in the family, I was the emotional, moody one. I think I would have thought of myself differently had they described the possitive traits rather and not compare us to other people in front of us. Clowns like to be acknowledged as people with feelings too. Even where abuse doesn't exist, I still believe that what children are told about themselves plays a part in molding how they see themselves in the bigger picture and how they think others see them. Children really need to be taught right from young to start thinking for themselves at their own level rather than being told who and what they are from an adult's perspective. 2 cents.
There is no set formula for depression. It's a very inexact disease. What works for one---may not for another. Both my sisters have mild depression. They both take 10 mgs of Celexa a day and feel fine. They can't understand why I take so many different ones and still struggle. Actually I don't understand either! Debbie
I am exhausted from these last ten years, it would take a novel to tell you what I have been through with my mother and her problems, my MIL health problems for two years until she passed away, my oldest son's alcohol & drug problem has been unbearable to me, because it is like seeing your child commit suicide in slow motion, it is killing me inside.
I was for most of my life a happy, satisfied person that thought I was very blessed and thought that if you showed love and care for people that they would return that love back to you and the hardest truth I have had to face is that is not true, but in a strange way
I have learned so much from my depression, the most important of those lessons is about faith, I mean real faith, foxhole faith, not the faith I thought I had just because I believed in God, but the kind of faith that is there when you can't see for the darkness all around you, my home was not my safe place anymore, it was a war zone, I knew for real what "living by faith and not by sight" meant.
I'm working hard and praying hard, and all of you on this board is a blessing from God to me. Thank you.
Lynette
To answer the original post, I agree that what works for one person may not work for another...your doctor is the best one to decide which, if any, medications you should try. I take two antidepressants and a mood stabilizer, and I'm still struggling...but I guess I'm doing somewhat better than I have been in the past.
Nice to "meet" you,
Rose
Edited 9/19/2004 12:18 am ET ET by rosa444
I think it was family circumstances/history, too. My grandmother and father also suffered the loss of a parent in addition to financial hardships, and they too suffered/suffer from depression. My great-grandfather probably did too.
As for finding the right medication, it's variable. Effexor is the 2nd antidepressant I've tried. Before that, I was briefly on Paxil, but it caused me so many problems I had to come off it. I wasn't on it long, so it wasn't too difficult. As for the Klonopin, which I took when the anxiety was far worse than the depression, it calmed me down, but it made me so mellow I didn't care about much of anything.
Good luck finding what's right for you.
I grew up and grew out of a lot of the negative stuff and during my senior year in high school was pretty much back on track and college bound. I had a long term bf (who is now my dh of 10 years and I had it in my head that I would go to college, get married, have kids and live happily ever after.
It didnt work that way and it took me till about the age of 25 to figure that out. By then, I had been married for 4 years to someone whom I cared a great deal about, but was not in love with. We already had a baby on the way and I was not going to back out of the marriage. We continued on and my post partum was rough for a while, along with some medical issues. I started on antidepressants about a year after he was born. When he was 2, I got pg with our 2nd child, a girl, who was still born. That and financial woes sent me over the edge. Every thing that had once been 'mild depression' was now full blown and in the last 5 years has continued to be.
I have been on about 5 different anti-depressants and the Effexor that I am on right now seems to be helping. I also take Xanax for anxiety.
HITTING 30: What I found, was that even though the depression was only slightly worse, my patience has decreased, my anxiety/anger management has gotten worse. Now, I cant say that it was hitting 30 or just getting really tired of the same ole financial stressors that had the biggest effect on me.
I love my children deeply ( I did go on to have another girl who is 3 now) but I am glad that my child bearing days are over. I dont think it would be healthy for me (or my family) to go through another pg and having a sleepless infant in the house. I love to be with others, but I really have to work hard to take care of myself so that I can be a good mom/wife/teacher.
I think what depresses me about being in my 30's is that I am not where I thought I would be. I always felt that if I did the 'right' things and went to college and got a degree and did things in the 'right' order, things would work out and I would live happily ever after and just roll through life dealing with things that came along in a carefree manner. Instead, I am a college grad who cant pay her bills, is about to have a car repo-ed and is so far behind, I may never see the light of day. Instead of being the patient mom I wanted to be (like mine) I am short tempered, exhausted, and just going through the motions. I hate to even put it to words, but I have traits of my father that I hate. Obviously, I dont sexually abuse them, but he was always short-tempered and too tired to mess with us in a positive way.
I didnt mean to go on and on!! I think some of us have inborn depression that is just increased by the trials of life that we have to go through.
Joy