What do you do to kick yourself out of depression?

[Almaviva]

I'm feeling kind of blah lately, as in the last few weeks. A few months ago, I got quite motivated, I was eating well, I went to the gym a lot, and was pretty happy. Right now I seem to be looking forward to food and not a lot else. I know this will go away eventually.

Does anyone have something they do to make themselves feel more energetic and ambitious?

[file cabinet]

I don't think I do. It's hard to get "pumped" for stuff. Sometimes listening to music helps... or focusing on a hobby.

[candela]

I don't get kicked out of it. I don't think anyone can get kicked out of it without drugs.

Working seems to help me, but I work in a warehouse by myself so I get a slight work out and I get lots of space to myself. Feels pretty nice. Too bad it doesn't pay well.

edit: forgot to say something

[mgb]

I would like to say having some goals, but those are so hard to come by.

I know I am going to keep watching this thread to see if someone has a magic answer because that would be wonderful.

I suppose you could always try counselling to find out what is causing the rut?

[athman]

Try this.

http://moodgym.anu.edu.au/

I'm only half way through it so I can't really say if it works or not. If nothing else, it's pretty good at explaining depression. I'd be interested in other people's views. I think depression lurks in the background for a lot of people.

[Sam172]

Well, supposedly lots of depression can be caused (or is thought to be caused by) being sugar sensitive. Your body chemisty may react in extreme ways to sugar, alcohol and refined carbohydrates (such as pasta and white bread). Supposedly they alter the balance of serotonin and beta-endorphin brain chemicals. So try upping your intake of complex carbohydrates (vegetables, pulses, wholegrains) and protein (lean meat, fish, eggs, tofu). Try and have the bare minimum of sugar, sugary drinks, caffeine, alcohol and refined foods.

You may have vitamin B, selinium and/or magnesium deficiencies. So try getting more of those. Also omega-3 fatty acids are generally found to be in low levels in people with depression. Depression can supposedly be significantly reduced by taking fish-oil suppliments containing 1000mg EPA for 12 weeks ((or if your vegetarian, flaxseed (also known as linseed) oil) (okay, the flaxseed doesn't contain and EPAs, but it has EFAs in it which the body converts into EPA))

- Plagiarized from the november/december issue of 'healthy'

Well, that's some dietary help possibly for you.....if not I found that listening to dance music helps :)

[Boneca]

Hm, I'm no expert, since I'm kind of feeling a bit blah at the moment too. However, I find that being outdoors helps me a lot. (It sucks living in the north of Sweden though, because I barely ever see the sun at this time of the year. :()

Also small things, like music, colours, smells influence your mood. I heard somewhere that the colours orange and yellow will cheer you up, and I've found that is actually true. So simple it's nearly stupid. :)
Zesty smells like lemon and mint make you feel more energetic.
And as a lot of people have said, music. I don't think you can say what type of music works, because that depends on what kind of music you like. I find that reggae and certain types of folk music cheer me up the most.

I have no good tips for long term solutions though. I usually end up changing something major in my life (such as job, relationship, city...) to survive, but I don't think that's a good way of coping in the long run.

The diet thing is interesting, but I don't know. I as good as live on wholegrain bread, wholegrain pasta and pulses, but that doesn't help me. Maybe I should start eating fish. :huh:

[coffeezombie]

Eating chocolate usually helps for me. :)

[t]

ack, i gotta admit it. when i am starting to slip into depression, i have to take st. john's wort for a month or so to get back up again. otherwise, i'll get very low and it'll take me a while to get back on my feet.

[Division56]

ack, i gotta admit it. when i am starting to slip into depression, i have to take st. john's wort for a month or so to get back up again. otherwise, i'll get very low and it'll take me a while to get back on my feet.


*giggles at fc*

[SheepDog]

I had a very serious episode of depression years ago during college. I didn't know myself at the time as well as I do now, but I knew that I was having a very difficult time meeting the expectations that were being placed upon me. School was one thing, but it extended to family expectations, and generally trying to be something I wasn't (and am not). I finally reached the point where I was ready to just give up, in the most final sense of the word.

I decided at that point to let go of all the pressures on me, trying to make me change. Instead of ending my own life, I decided to end the effect of all those pressures on me. This was the beginning of my life as it is now, when I began to let myself be who I truly am. Learning about my MBTI type was very helpful. Learning to recognize the pressures on me for what they really were was also a major plus.

Although that time in my life was a major turning point, it was more of a change in direction than an even that changed me instantly. Nonetheless, realizing that I have to be who I was meant to be has made the difference between living and dying, between happiness and despair.

[INTrPosr]

I'm feeling kind of blah lately, as in the last few weeks. A few months ago, I got quite motivated, I was eating well, I went to the gym a lot, and was pretty happy. Right now I seem to be looking forward to food and not a lot else. I know this will go away eventually. Does anyone have something they do to make themselves feel more energetic and ambitious?

Almaviva, I think that we can all appreciate getting out of that state. There appears to be some responses given, which have worked for me in the past. However, looking at this from a standpoint of MBTI may be hard to do. If any system may help you in this, it would be the enneagram. What you describe when it comes to eating, appears to be stress at the point 7. Read up on point 5, at the stress level. It may provide you some ideas.

Good Luck!

[Jkrs]

I've found that simply taking some time here and there to decompress helps a great deal. (But make sure that you relax during, not spend the time thinking about things that will drag you down - unless you think it will do some good, of course.) That and getting plenty of natural light during the winter seem to do the most good.

If you've reached the apathy stage, it might be useful to note that if nothing matters, all the presure is off. I can't say whether it will work for you, but at that point I'll often find something I'd wanted to do for a good long time but hadn't for fear of failure, and just go try it. Sometimes a success will drag me up again. And then, sometimes it won't.

[PsiKik]

As a short term, immediate solution try some exercise such as walking or cycling.
My strategy is of prevention - I find that I am less susceptible to depression now that I have made a point to eat properly and excercise everyday. The worst you can do is to do nothing. Set yourself some tasks so that you can feel active.

[waxwing]

I am manic-depressive, currently more on the hypomanic end of things. Nonetheless, I have gone through several significant depressive episodes and then there were the times I was simply, "blah." It was always a sort of non-descript kind of feeling, though. When a mood is disproportionate to ones circumstances, it is very difficult, in my opinion, to be able to get out of the depression via a change in external factors. I have found that some things do help me. I probably would not be functioning without the help of Lithium carbonate and two other mood stabalizers. As an adjunct, I take fish oil. I've got a lot more studying to do to really understand how fish oil may or may not alleviate depression in some cases. All I know is that for me, now, it seems to help a bit.

Otherwise, when I tend towards isolation during a depression, I try to keep in touch with even just one person. I cannot say that music lifts me out of a mood, but music is definitely a sort of comfort at times. Listening to lyrics that seem to speak to my own thoughts or to chords that progress in such a way that give me pause...all of these things keep me going. I've found that even when i am a little more manic, or even in a full-blown manic episode, my predisposition to melancholy haunts me. Writing, improvising, hiking, breathing....

Finding the smallest connecting point while doing any of these things usually leads me to two things: a connection within myself and eventually (or vise versa) a connection to the outside world.

I realize I don't have any answers. But I hear you.

[Sir Isaac Lime]

My routine

1) get out of bed
2) take a shower
3) put clean clothes on
4) eat something
5) do chores around the house
6) work/play outside
7) smoke a big ass joint

[cjs55]

I go into minor depressions for 2-4 days all the time. I'm not sure if they are based on a chemical imbalance or not, but it could be very likely. However, when I am depressed, it seems my cognition just goes in negative loops, unable to escape the negativity with any inner process. And then, I break out of it, for apparently no reason at all.

Now a while back I was moderately depressed for ~4 months, and that was just like a more extreme version of what I go through now, that never went away. That was most certainly exacerbated by events around me though, unlike my current minor depressive stages which are often caused by nothing (not always though).

Frustratingly, nothing I *do* seems to break me out of it. The best I can do is listening to music for hours, and just enveloping myself in it. Hopefully, after that, I can try to compose something or be creative on my guitar, which can occupy my mind long enough to break me out of the negative loop.

[Ka.avik]

Many good responses. Sugar swings will do nasty things to the head -- headaches, blah-ness, etc.

Don't sit idle -- even if it's walking to get the mail, keep moving! vacuum the carpet, change the oil. Whatever, just keep you metabalism up -- it can do wonders, if it's not hibernating.

OK, here's what I find myself doing: listening to heavy metal. Yes, I'm serious...deep dark and depressing is the name of the genre. Swans, K0rn, Otep -- There are, for me, two penultimate songs for such a run. "broken home" by paparoach, and indifference by pearl jam. That's just my preference of course.

Once you've exhausted yourself with this catharsis, rest -- and you should find when next you attack a thing, you have more of yourself to come at it with.

Or you could always move to peru, and become a llama herder. But only if that's really where you've always been meaning to go, anyway :)

["InsertNameHere"]

shoe shopping does the trick. Only shoe shopping

[cjs55]

lol

If only that worked for me! I remember once my friends girlfriend decided that the reason I was depressed was because I needed new and more fashionable clothes...

yeah, that went over real well.

[Serotonin]

My depression was mixed in with OCD and panic attacks, and it was a panic attack that tipped me over the edge and (with the help of parents) make the desicion to take anti-depressants. Later I decided to see a shrink.
If your depression affects an important real-world event (say, for example, you have to do a talk or presentation to people and the pain is so great you simply don't show up for it) then I think that's the point you need to start getting help.

[Tybeas]

Well, I don`t think I ever went in a deep depression. Of course I had some deep down times like everyone else but I never was medicated or something about it. Well okay I maybe was depressive at some point but I just might don`t want to admit it... so I prefer to say that I felt and do fell down sometimes...

But I found out something that helps is simply to do stuff, to kept yourself busy. For instance when I was thrown out of the army, what took me out of a "down time" was to go back to school and getting a job. I had some much to do that I didn`t had the time to feel down anymore. Otherwise, I would have stayed home doing nothing but feeling low and useless.

Also even if it`s not big things, I find that days that I simply do a small task that I`ve been pushing back because I procrastinate, for example changing my oil or washing my car, or even just taking the trashes out or cleaning off my room , well that day I fell I`ve accomplished something and I fell great than. Just little things, not big things.

Also, I don`t know if some of you know Big Tony Robbins ? He s kind of a motivationnal coach, he got some interesting tips, could be worth listening. Of course you have to take some leave some but... Anyhow, his point is to get on doing something, you need momentum, start with a small thing, and do it now. Want to get better shaped ? Don`t just plan going to the gym 3 times a week, get on the floor and do 25 right now! Just to give you a boast, a small idea of how great you will fell once you`ve been to the gym, to get you "in it" you know ?

Well just examples, anyway I preach for something I don`t do myself but know I should lol....

["InsertNameHere"]

lol

If only that worked for me! I remember once my friends girlfriend decided that the reason I was depressed was because I needed new and more fashionable clothes...

yeah, that went over real well.
no clothes, just shoes

clothes shopping can depress a person, further.

[INTerloPer]

While I know it goes against a lot of what being an INTP is all about, I find the best thing for me when I get depressed is to talk to others about their problems. Its amazing how willing some people are to blather on and on about themselves and their horrible lives (damn those extro's), and nothing cheers me up more than realising that other people's problems are worse than mine. My only caution is that you should only attempt this with people who you are detached from, or else their woes may infect you too. Also, be careful who you give helpful advice to, because while it is likely to be relevent and true, you will probably be brutally blunt and honest, and most people (other than us INTPs, of course), just cant handle the truth.

[int]

While I know it goes against a lot of what being an INTP is all about, I find the best thing for me when I get depressed is to talk to others about their problems. Its amazing how willing some people are to blather on and on about themselves and their horrible lives (damn those extro's), and nothing cheers me up more than realising that other people's problems are worse than mine. My only caution is that you should only attempt this with people who you are detached from, or else their woes may infect you too. Also, be careful who you give helpful advice to, because while it is likely to be relevent and true, you will probably be brutally blunt and honest, and most people (other than us INTPs, of course), just cant handle the truth.I just wanted to point out that not only do I agree...this is exactly the point I was trying to make on another thread or 2.

For some depression-bound people, there is nothing better to talk about than yourself, which is therapeutic for those people - agreed. :)

[Miss Anthropic]

Prescription drugs are good.....a little counseling never hurts. The exercise, eating well and all that. Interloper's advice about listening to other people's woes is sort of interesting. I agree, in that the best way to get out of a depression is to get outside of yourself. Doing something that has a positive impact on someone else's life is a good way to do it; listening to to someone bitching about their life is a bit more passive.

[MasterMerk]

I've never actually learned how to "kick" it. Mine comes and goes without reason.

[Google Monster]

I tend to not feel at all.

[zomicon]

As I have gotten older I have discovered that I am prone to clinical depression. After a few seriously soul killing episodes, I sought help from both a psychiatrist (chemical help) and a psychologist (therapeutic help). Both are important components to a cure.

When you talk of depresssion, it is important to distinguish between clinical depression and "feeling blue." Most people feel down or lethargic for short periods, some more frequently than others, and I think that has more to do with personality and environment. Clinical depression on the other hand is a treatable disease. Although mental health pros disagree on the causes and treatments, almost all agree that there is a strong biological (and probably genetic) component to clinical depression. The brain regulates mood through several chemicals, the most important of which are seratonin, norepinephrin and dopamine. While no one knows the exact cause, there is a strong correlation between changes in any or all of these chemicals and depression. Anti-depressant meds help to "reset" these brain chemicals to correct levels and thus help even out moods. There is no euphoric component and no high. In fact, they take several weeks to have an effect. They proved to be very effective for me, especially in conjunction with talk therapy to help work out the environmental causes that exacerbated my depression.

I am sure you can find more information out there, but the common signs of clinical depression are below. If you think you might be depressed you should get help, seriously.

*Change in sleep patterns (e.g. insomnia or sleeping too much)
*Waking up in the middle of the night.
*Inability to turn off your brain
*Obssessive thoughts
*Weight loss or gain
*feelings of inadequacy, helplessness, sadness, etc.
*Lack of energy
*Panic attacks and anxiety

There are several others but that is all I know off the top of my head. It is also a clear sign that you might be clinically depressed if *other* people notice these changes in you.

[lexiphanic]

I tend to not feel at all.

Currently the same. Not that I don't smile and laugh, but the emotions don't get close to 'me'.