I haven’t commented on it till now (too depressed. KIDDING!) but the thing I’ve enjoyed most about this series is how it’s shed light on all the varying ways depression can present itself. I’ve experienced many of them, but knowing other things that I might experience in the future arms me with information that might be useful in recognizing things earlier on. It took YEARS for me to accept the fact that I was depressed and needed help. The very word “mental illness” was too traumatic for me to even consider…I was stigmatized by it…thinking it was a personal failing to be depressed.

It was a little over a year ago, when I was SO down, so bleak, and had thoughts of just ending it all that I finally conceded that I needed help. And I got some. It astonished me that I could have, even for a second, entertained those thoughts, because I know that it would devastate my kid’s lives…even if I couldn’t value my OWN life enough to press on. I’d do just about anything for them, including starting an SSRI.

Various doses of Lexapro seemed to work well enough to get me over the worst of it…but it was therapy that helped me most of all. The pills weren’t magical, and I never felt exactly “happy”, but I plugged along regardless.

Still, after 8 months of medication, besides enduring the unwanted side effects, I realized they weren’t really doing for me what they were expected to do. I had increased the dosage to the max but was still a mess at least a couple weeks a month. A bestie who was also on Lexapro and I talked about it, and she pointed out that her experience was vastly different than mine with them, and maybe they weren’t the answer for me.

This led me to consider my hormone’s role in my mental/emotional state. Talking to a doctor friend, we decided that based on how things were going, my hormones very well could be a major factor in how I was feeling. Evening them out became my goal, and after weighing all the options, I ultimately decided to get the Mirena IUD.

Since that time (6 months now) I’ve never had that “in the blackest pit of Tartarus” feeling that I used to have so regularly. My baseline mood has improved. I don’t think I’m COMPLETELY healed, but I’m in a much better place than I usually dwell. I still feel tired most of the time and am not as “productive” as I think I “should” be, but I’m better than I have been a lot of my life. Of course it’s a day-to-day (or hour-to-hour) thing, which could change without notice

This whole crazy journey of being depressed but not knowing it, then becoming aware that I am depressed but not willing to accept the fact because I couldn’t handle there being YET ANOTHER THING that was “wrong” with me, to finally making peace with it and finding ways to deal with it has been really eye opening. And because of my experiences, I’m more aware of why my child’s moods might be what they are.

If the powers that be weren’t already planning to, I hope they’ll consider doing a segment on children with depression. I would love to hear people’s thoughts on helping our children avoid some of the struggles I had my whole life. I’m still early in the journey of dealing with this, and sometimes I am at a loss. It’s one thing to have my perspective as an adult on things, but if there’s anything that causes me more anguish than worrying about my child’s well-being, I don’t know what it is. Beyond therapy and talking, what has worked for others? My child has an ironclad opposition to taking any kind of medication, no matter how sick; a daily pill won’t work (even if it comes to that), so that’s the thing I’m trying to work through at the moment. But the low self esteem, the isolation, the feeling like no one likes them, the lack of interest in participating in various activities, the worthlessness…it kills me to see them struggling the way I did. And I’m committed to not just standing by and doing nothing, like my parents did with me.

Thank you again for all the thoughts and experiences you’ve shared. ♥

Each of us has to discern what is what, imo, between what we can DO, what God has to do, and what may come later after we have endured well this mortal journey.

A book that has helped me tremendously is Weakness is Not Sin, by Wendy Ulrich. FWIW.

BUT other times, it’s simply in not giving up, in trying to stay on the path, that glimmers of truth have come simply as a gift from God.

I think you may still be misunderstanding me, and maybe it’s because i’m not explaining myself well enough.

I think perhaps you are reading my thoughts as declaring fault, something to feel guilty about, etc. That somehow if you are depressed, it’s because you simply don’t “get it” yet, that you are not doctrinally savvy enough yet. That you are not righteous enough. That you need to just go study doctrine more and voila! You’ll be better.

But that isn’t what I’m saying.

Distortions in my mind are, by definition, a misrepresentation and/or misunderstanding of truth (maybe that’s a better word than doctrine) — whether voluntary or involuntary (we don’t always *know* that we are seeing through a glass, darkly, and we can’t change — and aren’t responsible — for what we don’t know!). That is a commentary on human nature. We ALL have distorted thinking, which means at some level, we ALL have misunderstandings of doctrine (truth) in our lives.

Depression, by definition, includes and can exacerbate distorted ways of thinking. I think that is the key point of this particular thread — that depression can add another difficult layer to this veiled journey called mortality and the desire to feel the Spirit and understand truth.

I applaud any efforts to hold on through that darkness. And I know that sometimes it’s the very belief in and understanding of doctrine that makes that possible — a real, deliberate act of faith — even when the feelings of *happiness* that we sometimes associate with that doctrine feels so very elusive if not nonexistent in the darkness of depression.

I think it’s also great that there are discussions about what options there are to consider (meds, therapy, etc.) to try to stabilize thinking enough so that glimmers of light and truth are more able to pierce the veil — both the veil generally of mortality and the veil associated with depression.

Does that help?

I think the better option is to simply forgive people for their mortalness (including ourselves!!) and just do our best with where we are in trying to find truth that can unlock Christ’s power in our lives.

Of course, I understand that. This is one reason why I have been more open about my struggles and going to therapy, etc. I feel that if I hope for more honestly and openness open around me, I have to start being open myself.

I know you don’t realize this, but when you say people are misunderstanding and that is causing depression, you are saying, “If you could just understand this right [like I do] then you wouldn’t be depressed.” That’s pretty judgemental. Your comment doesn’t use those exact words, but saying our own distorted views are messing everything up is essentially the same thing.

I’m sorry if you feel my words are judgmental, but at the same time, I feel you are sort of putting words into my mouth…not really fair to get upset at something I didn’t really say. I will try to say it a different way to see if it helps clarify my thoughts.

I’ll expand my thoughts using Kathy’s response.

There’s an undeniable connection between many of the internal distortions I’ve struggled with and the common rhetoric of church members.

I absolutely understand this. We all have distortions fed by humans around us; that’s sort of the (VERY HARD) nature of mortality. It’s hard to learn to discern truth from error when we are ALL fallen.

My point is that ultimately, I believe that the source isn’t the *cause* of the problem (although for each person, understanding what may *contribute* to unhealthy patterns of thought can be helpful to be able to avoid “buying into” distortions when they come up, because they will…again, because we live in a fallen world).

I’m not saying, “If you just figured it out better, you wouldn’t be depressed.” That wouldn’t be fair, and it makes it sound as though there is a quick fix to depression, which of course there is not. (And how.)

But I do think there is hope in the reality that just because falsehoods are around us, and just because it’s hard not to get sucked into them, when we do come to see the distortions (which I think is part of mortality’s journey and can come in different ways at different times), we can learn to practice not giving power to them anymore, regardless of where they come from (the culture, our families, our own personal thought patterns, the media, whatever). If and when we have the knowledge to do that, that is, which is a big if and when…. And it’s not a competition. We each have a journey here, and layers come off in different ways and at different times. I’m not trying to make this a competition, ok?

My short point is this: I think trying not to blame those influences that do have an impact increases the chance that we can muster power to ‘act and not be acted upon’ as much as possible within our own limitations.

That doesn’t mean we are evil if we still get stuck; that’s often part of what being mortal means. And God doesn’t always rescue us from our stuckness…sometimes that takes years and time and maybe eternity to really happen. So I’m not trying to be judgmental, just trying to talk about what I think helps maximize the chance that we can learn to discern and do what we can about weeding out distortions.

For me, even the possibility that I don’t have to keep playing falsehoods over and over in my mind, regardless of the source, that notion to me is freeing, not condemning of myself or anyone else still stuck in patterns of thought that damn. Because we all are stuck in some way.

But if none of this feels helpful, then just put this into the ‘well that works for you but that doesn’t work for me’ category. We each have to find what works for wherever we are. You probably have things that work for you that wouldn’t for me, too, because I still have plenty of layers in my own life that I’m hoping can be peeled off my soul.

Seriously. GPs are adequate in some cases, but I can’t overstate how helpful it’s been for me to consult a specialist.