Posted by Impermanence on March 11, 2005, at 1:41:36
In reply to What to do when feeling down?, posted by Shy_Girl on March 10, 2005, at 21:58:04
There's no such thing a stupid posts here, we feel how we feel and this place is the best place to share it.
Hang in there Shy Girl, moods come and go. Remember, you are not depressed, depression is in you right now but will pass. Think of it like a cloud in the sky, a big dark cloud thats moving by your house. It always passes eventually. What you suffer from is nothing more than excessive amounts of stress hormones coming from your adrenal glands in your kidneys. Adrenaline which is the cause of your anxiety and Cortisol which brings moods of depression and hopelessness. I think it helps to have a scientific understanding of your condition, then it doesent seem so bad. It's just hormonal imbalances and reduced availability of neurotransmitters like Serotonin, Dopamine, Norepinephrine, GABA and acetylcholine. Adrenaline is very useful, it causes that fight or flight response in dangerous situations. We know why we evolved with this hormone. But Cortisol, it's a nasty one, my understanding is this hormone would have been useful when parents had to hunt, build and protect and leave the babies alone for long peroids of time. When the baby was worn out crying cortisol would do it's job and the baby would accept defeat and stay depressed and "quite" therefore would be less at risk of being eaten by predators. I can't see much other use for cortisol. Unfourtunatly your thought pattern is causing an unnessesery release of these hormones, there is plenty of things you can do to try and control this. Healty diet with lots of water and fruit, exercise (lots of it if you can or even just an hours walk a day), meditation, medication, active social life (joining clubs ect) and cognitive behavior therapy to learn how to change the way you think in situations.
You must understand that chemical imbalance actually stems from our own thoughts and actions. Example; you found out you won the lotto = elation. A loved one died = sadness. You sliped and nearly fell off a cliff = rush of adrenaline. So the same must be said for sitting at home feeling depressed and hopeless, it just takes an understanding of the process in action in your body and the things you can do to change this over time. The help is out there; doctors, caring souls, gurus, books, drugs, foods, gims whatever, just see the big picture. You don't have to live this way and you will feel better. I like to think of my brain like a computer hard drive. A few unorginized files in there and maybe some spyware and I'm disconnected from the web. But with a programme installed to help my hard drive understand the problems and clean up the mess, a new processer and a wi fi conection, I'd be running great lol. So what I'm saying is there is hope for you hunny. You're not alone, I think it's 1 in 5 of us suffer from depression at some time in our lives. Millions of us feel just like you do right now, some a thousand times worse!!! So you're part of a community of suffering, weather or not thats more comforting I don't know, just know I and many others here are thinking about you and understanding how you're feeling.
Is the glass half full or half empty? Thats up to you, practise and training will help change how you see the glass. When it's half full you don't feel bad!!!
XXX
A wonderful book you must read:
poster:Impermanence
thread:469471
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20050305/msgs/469557.html