Dragging me out of the depression

I have been cursed with depression for most of my adult life. I especially remember that my depression advice would focus on the issue cycle of The Mother Earth News magazine. I would come every couple of months and read it cover to cover and then I would usually fall into a blue period that sometimes turned into depression. I assumed it was because the magazine made me dream of freedom and a different lifestyle, very different from the one I was living. I felt like there was no way to live the life I wanted, that I was stuck, so I got depressed.

Over time, I noticed that when I was under a lot of stress, my cycle of depression deepened. When I was selling books door to door, the job was very stressful and I would work selling for two weeks and then every three weeks I couldn’t face the world and would stay in bed for a week. Then I would feel ready to face things again, sell for another two weeks, and retire for the night for another week. This was not a healthy cycle, it really strained relationships with others. I was lucky that Jeanne could cope with my ups and downs.

When I faced a kind of crisis at the age of 28 and irrationally moved to Missouri with no job or prospects (following the Mother Earth News lifestyle), I found that depression left me for a long period of time. My stress levels were lower and I was living a life closer to the one I wanted. My cycle was still there, I still had a tendency to get a little down, but it was a dip in my mood, rather than full-blown depression. So I had a pretty good few years. I started a window shop business and rented videos from all three stores.

Then I made some “responsible” decisions, went to college and joined the regular workforce and slowly my cycle of depression returned. I believe that the cycle is a natural ebb and flow that we all have and that deep depression was my subconscious mind’s way of trying to deal with life choices that I disagreed with. As I struggled with employment issues and dealing with teenage children, my depression really became a monster that sometimes brought me to a complete halt. I would find myself unable to do the simplest of tasks. I started visiting a depression treatment center, encouraged by a counselor to find out what was wrong so I could get over this once and for all. That was one of the worst moments of my life, because I had no way to get out of the cycle of depression. I wasn’t working, so I didn’t get that positive boost to my ego. Medications seemed to do little to help. And the kids weren’t making life any easier.

Eventually, I went back to work and forgot all the depression center bullshit and my mood immediately improved. They say that men get their self-esteem from work and women get their self-esteem from their relationships. That may be true because I certainly started to feel better going back to work. Still, the cycle continued, at least I found that every time I caught a cold, I stayed sick longer than usual. A cold that would make a normal person miss a day of work would knock me out for a week. This affects your reputation at work and has a negative impact on your career. I began to suspect that I might have allergies that were overwhelming me physically and therefore affecting my mental state.

Nice theory, but when I finally found out I had type 2 diabetes (in 2003), I finally understood why I had these persistent illnesses. Diabetics typically have three times more symptoms than others. Their systems’ ability to fight off colds and flu is lower, so they need to be careful to avoid illness. And being sick opens the door to depression, lower mental states and your ability to cope is reduced when you feel helpless.

My cycle of depression was still going on, but because I knew why I couldn’t give a good, steady job to an employer, I decided to go back to window dressing full time. It had been part-time since the day I sold my business in 1984, now it’s full-time again. One of the benefits of being self-employed is that if I have a bad day, I can go to work later. I can adjust my work hours to match how I feel. Some days I’m only up to 3 or 4 hours of work and some days I’m up to 10 or 12 hours of work. Depression is no longer an issue because I am doing what I love and my stress levels are at a level that I can handle.

But every once in a while, the “artistic temperament” monster rears its head and I have to deal with it. I have found a few ways to cope with depression over the years.

First, when you find yourself feeling down, try to look within and see what is causing the added stress. Getting depressed is normal, that’s when you start not being able to deal with it when you have a problem, so look inside and see what’s going on. Are you facing moral issues that are weighing heavily on you? Does your life not follow the course you want? What seems to be getting you? Once you find your answers, you can begin to dream of ways to regain control of your life, which will lessen your feelings of helplessness. It can be something as simple as starting a savings account for a vacation you want to take, or starting a plan to get out of debt. Your problems won’t go away, but your attitude toward them will make them feel less threatening.

Second, make sure the little voice in your head is positive and not negative. Write yourself a little commercial that you read to yourself every day and throughout the day. It should be positive and express how winning you are and how successful you are, it should reflect your dreams and declare them as if they were already a reality. This little recitation to yourself will push away the negative that can weigh you down and allow you to get to a place where you can handle things again. When I can’t muster the energy to even read my affirmation, I sing a little song I made up (inspired by one I was taught when I was selling):

It’s a great day to be a glass man

the best i know,

It’s a great day to be a glass man

Wherever I go, go, go, go

Cut my own pieces

Put them back together

It’s a great, great day to be a glass man

The weather doesn’t matter.

It’s a really silly song, but I find that no matter how down I get, I can mumble this and it lifts my attitude enough to squawk and then sing it and then believe it. And if I think I’m happy, then I am.

Third, and most important, I have to let God into my life. When I’m depressed, I don’t believe in anything, neither in God nor in Jeanne nor in my own abilities. But if I can open up a bit and talk to God and ask for help, he always helps in some way. He didn’t give us life so we can suffer, we are here to have joy and get out of ourselves and look around and see the good in life and enjoy it and see the suffering all around us and reach out to help alleviate that. suffering that others are experiencing.

Depression is a natural event, in my life anyway. So I guess it must be a natural event in your life too. It’s neither good nor bad, it just is. How we deal with it is what determines the difference between those whose lives work and those whose lives don’t.