ok, depression, as you said in that other post (and im not trying to copy you) depression is a disability. well maybe you didnt say that exactly but tyhats how i feel. i was just wondering ya know will it ever go away? I honestly believe it is something in ur mind and it doesnt really matter whats going on around. Your surroundings just make it worse. You can be a prefect person with a perefect life and still wanna kill yourself or feel all down on yourself right? well, then why does everyone say "your life aint that bad, get over it, it happened years ago" when thats not even the goddamn case? does it ever end?

hello angelroze,

I think you are right about depression being a disability. Many people don't like to be labelled as 'depressed' because they see it as some sort of failure. This seems strange to me, but if a person with bad eyesight was called disabled they might refuse to wear glasses because it made them feel a failure.
My doctor tried to simplify it for me. It's not a disease where cells are damaged, or an infection. It is a dysfunction. This means that something which is capable of working properly is not working properly for some reason or other.
Reasons.
Some people get depression because of a hectic or stressful lifestyle [called burnout] or due to a very strong emotional event in life, like a death of a loved one [or dependent person] or redundancy [any traumatic events can be the cause]. These are all reactions to the outside world, and the depression is called reactive depression.
Others get depression because of an internally caused problem, and this is called endogenous [from within] depression.

Lifestyle or emotion effectively can drain the neuro-trasmitters that are an essential ingredient in our nervous systems [brain and nerves], meaning that brain signals don't get through properly if at all. Endogenous depression is where there are too few neurotransmitters because the body itself can't produce a normal quantity for some internal reason.
Neurotransmitters are used for every function of the nerves and brain. There are hundreds of different functions and hundreds of different neurotransmitters.

But the first point to realise, is that it is normal for people to have up and down days. It is when they affect your quality of life significantly that you need to seek medical advice to see if the doctor suspects depresssion as the cause. He can make judgements just by talking to a person, sometimes.
Some people do have depression and it does go away, but I suspect that only occurs when the causing events go away and the body has some time to 'catch up'.

I permanently take antidepression tablets because my depression is internal.

People say 'simple' things to those who are depressed, purely and simply because they do not understand depression and that you can only pull yourself one step up a ladder. When you are depressed you are 3 or 4 steps down the ladder and don't have the wherewithall to get back up! You need to see that they want you to get better, but don't know what is needed to make you better.
You need to realise also that other people don't necessarily know all the details of things which affected your life in the past. Sometimes, even when they know all the facts they cannot 'feel' the effect that thos experiences had on you, and so, to them you should be able to get over the things.

You also refer to copying.
If ever I copy anyone I make a reference to their words. Copying is the best form of flattery. If you happen to say something that copies what someone else has said but you didn't know about, then how are you to be guilty of anything? The problem in that situation, is that you can't prove that you have not copied. This is where your reputation comes in. People who know you should know what your intentions are from past experiences of dealing with you.

I can tell you now that I won't complain if you copy anything that I write. This is simply because I try to write what I think is the truth, and I believe the truth belongs to everybody, wherever they find it.

Finally, please realise that I am no expert in these things. I do like to help others by expressing my own experience and knowledge and understanding. I believe it does help others to decide for themselves what seems sensible and what is hogwash. Do seek professional help or advice if you want the best information.

I hope you find this info useful, and will be happy to answer more questions if I feel able to.
Bye for now and best regards, Bill.

Bill is right on target with his reply. I can only add that I too suffer form endogenous depression and take pills to help me live. And I say it helps me live because before meds I was to the point of not wantiong to live, not wanitng friends or happiness or anything at all. Meds and therapy are helping me be me again. It is not a cure, I do believe without the meds I would be back to the hell I was living in, but I can accept the fact that I have to be onmeds for the rest of my life just fine!
Please dont suffer alone, seek help, talk to us here...look into meds. Do what is necessary to feel better!

Love,
Dara

They tried to put me on meds, but I refused. I guess it wasn't endogenous - I've been right as rain for a few months now...

even when u say depression can occur due to external traumatic events..i feel ultimately if we r able to deal with it as other people r able to then there's no question of depression is there?so when we r not able to deal withit ..due to dysfunctional reasons...that's when i suppose depression occurs

Unknown,

I can't agree totally with you on this point.
I only 'couldn't cope when I was 46!
Yet, when I look back over my lifetime experiences, I realise that I was depressed (Idon't mean I felt sad - I mean some of my bodily functions were depressed) from being a teenager or even possibly before that!
Since I had never known any other state of existence other than a depressed state, I did not seek a cure, let alone an explanation.
I didn't even know I was depressed - I certainly didn't feel depressed in the normal understanding of the word. I coped with as much pressure and emotion as everyone does until I reached a threshold I suppose, beyond which I could not cope.
Six weeks after going onto Antidepressants, my experience of life was just so different that I thought I was dead! I had never felt so relaxed, ever in my life! This feeling has remained with me ever since; 15 years now.
So, I claim that my bodily functions were depressed from a very early age.
Somehow I managed perfectly well with this bodily environment until I 'went over the edge'. Meds brought me conditions and sensations I had never had before.
Not everything is balanced, however, but I won't go into that.

Rhymer,
i was also diagnosed as being depressed sicne my childhood but this is what my doc made me believe that i'm as normal as others only i wasn't able to cope with some incidents like others..but i guess maybe u r also right....

i am depressed 24/7/365 and have tried over 40 drugs and substances for it which fail. there is no treatment for this condition besides death. i hope there is a treatment someday soon

Tone, have you tried exercising? Running, weight training?

If you sleep a lot, have you tried moderate sleep deprivation? Studies have shown it can have a beneficial effect on depression.

nah those dont work either, sleep dep causes more cognitive problems and increased agitation and restlessness. my doctor even tried to tell me that once, to sleep deprive myself . . makes me feel like im going to jump out of my skin and im not talking about extreme deprivation either just a moderate amount. sometimes to cut out two hours of sleep here and there is of limited enhancement, other than that .. no way.

exercise? blah you have to have energy in order to do that. yea, i used to weight lift at one point in my life. i cant run because of leg/hip problems, walking makes my legs hurt no matter how much i do it, and i do it a lot. i think swimming is the best exercise because of no joint impact, but i dont think its a very good antidepressant at all

Tone:
Was there a particular event in your life that set-off your depression, or is this a chronic condition inbedded in your genes. I'm just curious because I don't know too much about the subject. And up untill now I thought a happy pill was able to cure even the most extreme case of depression; like Xanax, for example. I also thought that deep depression was a condition almost exclusive to the female population. It sounds to me like you are a victim of your sorroundings: a poor little rich boy, or something like that (without getting too personal here)? Do you feel just like it sucks to be you? Has the thought of suicide crossed your mind? And how do you deal with that? Fell free to to tell me to f**k off if I'm being too nosy.

i heard its much higher in the female population. i dont believe there are any good happy pills available, otherwise we would see severe depressives taking them and becoming normal rather than continuing to complain. Forums are filled with depressives who take drugs and are very dark mooded or continue to have some sort of dysfunction due to depression interfering. SSRIs drugs for instance dont make people feel good, they increase suicide risk, dull emotions, cause sexual dysfunction, and dont target any mechanism of reward/pleasure/motivation.

Poor rich boy? im 25 and poor period. surroundings? i am very bored and lonely, theres nothin' ever to do. Indications are i was born depressed as a chronic condition embedded in my genes. And though i have the thought that being bored and lonely makes it worse, i doubt overcomming that would raise my consciousness set-point much higher. After a certain amount of environmental needs are met, set-point cant be raised any further. But i do have enviornmental deprivations to the point where altering them would raise my happiness. By bad coincidence i have both environmental depervation below fixed set-point threshold AND genetic condition

The reasons for knowing it being neurophysiological in basis are because there are too many non-emotional symtoms, like a general dysphoric feeling in my head area, insomnia, concentration destroyed, opioid drugs and stablon having an impact on it, father sucided and mother is bipolar, etc. lots of indications show.

I've never met anybody like you in person. I guess you all spend all your time alone. Thank you for sharing these thought and moments in this forum. I suppose it's therapeutic for you. But I do see a bright spot in all that darkness: your faith in Abolitionism. Can you explain why you are so excited about it? What does it mean to you personally? I want to know, because any information coming from you is very valuable to me. I deeply respect it and it teaches me more about myself. Thanks.

The world is going to be a very different place soon. I believe technological growth is exponential not linear. Technology is going to be turned more inward. It will happen. THis is going to be an entirely new thing compared to the external comforts technology has given us thus far. Since its going to happen anyway, it is important we have the right kind of ethical directive in what to do with it.

The other reason i have faith in the abolitionist project or precursors to it which will maybe not eliminate pain but greatly reduce it is because its already proven to me that states much better are possible. Its proven through my own use of drugs and countless other people too. Its all simply mechanisms in the brain, there is just no reason to think it would be so out of the question to raise human being's well-being setpoints higher. Thinking it would be so hard just comes from the fact that we havent altered ourselves in anyway yet besides crude pharmacuticals rather than actually looking at things that show it could be feesable. i mean, for instance humans have a reward pathway and it has a fixed number of neurons and receptors and evolution just made us the way we are because it so happened by random to 'choose' a platform based 99.9% on negative feedback mechanism to control us for the avail of survival.

What does it mean for me personally? That its paradigm of thought would contribute to precursors to it which would at least reduce mental pain and depression in my life time. And it means the satisfaction of knowing we can liberate ourselves from the prison of blind nature and create our own reality which is very difficult if not impossible to vaugly imagine. No more intense suffering for anyone (and eventually any sentient being).

Spend all my time alone? People alienate me when i act completely normal and friendly so what can i do? besides severe depression makes it difficult to do much lately.

You are quite welcome

Keep it going Tone, you're valued here.