If you are depressed, see no escape from your life situation and are ready to call it quits forever, consider that It Gets Better. A dragon boating coach I knew used to tell his team during a practice shortly after a spicy chili lunch, “Just paddle through it, people!”.
The horrible thing about major depressive disorder is that one cannot, in fact alieve that “it gets better” during a bad phase. Depressed people all over the world hate those empty platitudes, are sick and tired of them. Just read any damn forum on depression, seriously!
“Get over it”, “hang in there”, etc, etc. It comes across as so predictable, so superficial and callous. We’ve heard this shit a million times; it’s just hard for us to draw a connection between some statistical prospect of improvement and the very private grey hell that we are in. I know this from experience. Downvoted. (And yes, it did “get better” for me, but I’m still angry at getting such vapid non-advice.)
Speaking as somebody who, over the last couple of months, has literally experienced new emotions (“So that’s what that feels like” has been an all-too-common sentiment lately) at the age of 26, depression is… really complicated. I’m still seriously wrestling with whether or not I want to be depressed or not. But I don’t think I could again; the experience has been a bit like… stepping from a black and white world to a color one; the colors are blindingly bright and it’s kind of unpleasant but I think in the end I’ll find this side more satisfying.
That explanation is a huge part of what made me realize I was depressed (I never really got out of the “I’m invincible!” stage of depression, I think, in spite of not knowing what I was immune -from-, except that it made other people act crazy). In retrospect I guess all the people -asking- me if I was depressed should have been a giveaway, though.
Urgh, this is really hard for me to say, as I’m still fucking angry with you over that politics thing and consider you an enemy, but… I reach out to you. I know what the lack of colour and the inability to care and the resentment at other people caring feels like. No-one should go through this. Thank you for responding. I hope it stabilizes.
I should probably get off my ass and make a Discussion post with a personal story and some links re: depression. The cycle of guilt, the suicidal ideation, all that nasty shit some of us struggle with.
The politics experiment, I’ll willingly admit, was a failure, which is why I dropped it. But I don’t think it created any serious animosities.
It would be a useful post to participate in, I think. For a site about rationality, we don’t talk here much about emotions. That’s kind of… an interesting blind spot.
Disclaimer: in similar situations before, onlookers have said that I’m easily riled up, etc. I was extremely upset about that particular conversation, though; not linking to it.
I assume we’re talking about this, which was entirely ridiculous on about every level.
My reading of the thread is that one person who deeply cared about an issue talked to someone that didn’t care about it, but had an obsessive need to be right.
Counter-point: one of the reasons that people advise referring depressed people to professionals is that professionals understand that cheerleading does not freaking work at the point that someone is seriously considering suicide, and that efforts to do so by the general public are often counter-productive.
If you are depressed there are people that can help pull you out of the place you are at. Don’t dismiss them based on fictional evidence of how such help is portrayed in movies or the stigma of people who have never had to deal with this shit. You are not insane for considering suicide. You will not be thrown in an asylum for discussing this with a professional. It’s okay to NOT be okay.
You will not be thrown in an asylum for discussing this with a professional
My experience disagrees. I went to see a professional for antidepressants, was emotionally stable at that moment, and was thrown in a psych ward for a week. I had to lie about my condition to be released. The whole affair failed to help in any way.
If you are depressed, see no escape from your life situation and are ready to call it quits forever, consider that It Gets Better. A dragon boating coach I knew used to tell his team during a practice shortly after a spicy chili lunch, “Just paddle through it, people!”.
The horrible thing about major depressive disorder is that one cannot, in fact alieve that “it gets better” during a bad phase. Depressed people all over the world hate those empty platitudes, are sick and tired of them. Just read any damn forum on depression, seriously!
“Get over it”, “hang in there”, etc, etc. It comes across as so predictable, so superficial and callous. We’ve heard this shit a million times; it’s just hard for us to draw a connection between some statistical prospect of improvement and the very private grey hell that we are in. I know this from experience. Downvoted. (And yes, it did “get better” for me, but I’m still angry at getting such vapid non-advice.)
Related: http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2013/05/depression-part-two.html (the by-now-famous excellent explanation by Allie Brosh)
Speaking as somebody who, over the last couple of months, has literally experienced new emotions (“So that’s what that feels like” has been an all-too-common sentiment lately) at the age of 26, depression is… really complicated. I’m still seriously wrestling with whether or not I want to be depressed or not. But I don’t think I could again; the experience has been a bit like… stepping from a black and white world to a color one; the colors are blindingly bright and it’s kind of unpleasant but I think in the end I’ll find this side more satisfying.
That explanation is a huge part of what made me realize I was depressed (I never really got out of the “I’m invincible!” stage of depression, I think, in spite of not knowing what I was immune -from-, except that it made other people act crazy). In retrospect I guess all the people -asking- me if I was depressed should have been a giveaway, though.
Urgh, this is really hard for me to say, as I’m still fucking angry with you over that politics thing and consider you an enemy, but… I reach out to you. I know what the lack of colour and the inability to care and the resentment at other people caring feels like. No-one should go through this. Thank you for responding. I hope it stabilizes.
I should probably get off my ass and make a Discussion post with a personal story and some links re: depression. The cycle of guilt, the suicidal ideation, all that nasty shit some of us struggle with.
The politics experiment, I’ll willingly admit, was a failure, which is why I dropped it. But I don’t think it created any serious animosities.
It would be a useful post to participate in, I think. For a site about rationality, we don’t talk here much about emotions. That’s kind of… an interesting blind spot.
It may be quite important since strong emotions can be such a huge motivating force to do irrational things before you’ve thought everything out.
They don’t just motivate you to do different things, they cause different thoughts to form, to occur to you.
Wow. I don’t know what went down, but I really appreciate the difficulty you went through to make this sentiment.
Disclaimer: in similar situations before, onlookers have said that I’m easily riled up, etc. I was extremely upset about that particular conversation, though; not linking to it.
I assume we’re talking about this, which was entirely ridiculous on about every level.
My reading of the thread is that one person who deeply cared about an issue talked to someone that didn’t care about it, but had an obsessive need to be right.
What a great link! Thanks! And good to know that it did get better for you.
Okay. Implicit apology accepted. But please feel free to educate yourself further, as this is both a widespread and really grave issue.
Also:
http://www.reddit.com/r/depression/comments/xoowi/my_massive_list_of_depression_resources_part_1_im/
Oh, there was no apology, implicit or otherwise, just a bit of gratitude.
Counter-point: one of the reasons that people advise referring depressed people to professionals is that professionals understand that cheerleading does not freaking work at the point that someone is seriously considering suicide, and that efforts to do so by the general public are often counter-productive.
If you are depressed there are people that can help pull you out of the place you are at. Don’t dismiss them based on fictional evidence of how such help is portrayed in movies or the stigma of people who have never had to deal with this shit. You are not insane for considering suicide. You will not be thrown in an asylum for discussing this with a professional. It’s okay to NOT be okay.
My experience disagrees. I went to see a professional for antidepressants, was emotionally stable at that moment, and was thrown in a psych ward for a week. I had to lie about my condition to be released. The whole affair failed to help in any way.
PSA: when giving high-stakes advice, be especially careful to think about whether you know as much as you believe you do.