![[dr. bob]](/dr-bob-sm.gif)
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 8 of 8. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Angel Girl on December 28, 2004, at 17:32:15
what medication I'm on, I'm getting more and more depressed. I seem to be always feeling very low lately and I'm crying more frequently. Nothing seems to work for me. I don't know what to do. Maybe this belongs on the med board?
I'm feeling very hopeless that I'll ever feel any better. I feel like throwing all my meds in the garbage for all they are doing.
AG (who is VERY tired of it all)
Posted by B2Chica on December 28, 2004, at 18:04:24
In reply to It doesn't seem to matter . . ., posted by Angel Girl on December 28, 2004, at 17:32:15
i love you AG, hang in there.
and YOU matter."looking for better days" b2c.
Posted by fallsfall on December 30, 2004, at 7:05:03
In reply to Re: It doesn't seem to matter . . ., posted by B2Chica on December 28, 2004, at 18:04:24
The holidays take a toll on us. Spend some time doing just what *YOU* want to do. Take care of yourself. It takes me a little time to feel better after the stress of the holidays. My favorite tactic is "Reduce expectations" - let things go, and just be good to yourself.
Personally, I like ice cream.
Posted by fallsfall on December 30, 2004, at 12:52:36
In reply to Re: It doesn't seem to matter . . . » B2Chica, posted by fallsfall on December 30, 2004, at 7:05:03
Posted by anastasia56 on January 1, 2005, at 0:15:21
In reply to Re: It doesn't seem to matter . . . » B2Chica, posted by fallsfall on December 30, 2004, at 7:05:03
there has to be something that will work for you. sometimes it seems you have to pay the big bucks to get a psycho-pharmacologist to figure out what you really need and/or should be taking.
i don't know enough about your background to know what you've tried, etc. Good luck!anastasia
Posted by Angel Girl on January 1, 2005, at 0:52:33
In reply to Re: It doesn't seem to matter . . . » B2Chica, posted by fallsfall on December 30, 2004, at 7:05:03
> The holidays take a toll on us. Spend some time doing just what *YOU* want to do. Take care of yourself. It takes me a little time to feel better after the stress of the holidays. My favorite tactic is "Reduce expectations" - let things go, and just be good to yourself.
>
> Personally, I like ice cream.
fallsfallWell you seem to have hit the nail on the head. "Reduce expectations" - let things go. That's EXACTLY what my sister and Mom have been telling me I need to do. I know they're right (and you too) but my moods just seem to get the better of me and then I either lash out or get very depressed. I wish I knew how to let things go. I'm getting a lot worse lately, depression and anxiety.
All this talk about ice cream lately, I can't resist anymore. On Tuesday, when I go shopping, it will be a priority on my list. Mint chip was suggested in another post and that sounds very yummy to me. :)
AG
Posted by fallsfall on January 1, 2005, at 12:12:26
In reply to Re: It doesn't seem to matter . . . » fallsfall, posted by Angel Girl on January 1, 2005, at 0:52:33
It took me years to learn to let things go. I think the hardest part for me was recognizing that I had limits. That there were things that I *couldn't* do no matter how hard I tried. This was (and still is) a big blow to me. After I realized that I couldn't do things, then I had to learn that if I didn't do things, that the world would still function. A memorable comment by my therapist was "If you had Pnemonia, would you be expected to drive your kids all over the place? Why is it reasonable to expect that when you have severe depression?" There are so many things that we do that we think are "necessary", that really aren't. I used paper plates for 9 months because I couldn't get the dishes into and out of the dishwasher. And that worked fine.
How many things do you do solely because you think that others will look down on you if you don't do them? If it doesn't matter to *you*, why should you do it just for *them*? For instance, let's talk about mowing my lawn. My house is on a wooded lot - there is a line of motley trees next to the street that shield my house from the street. There is enough shade so that my (mangy) grass doesn't grow very well at all. I didn't mow my front lawn until fall. I mowed my back lawn because that's where my dogs go and the ticks are worse if the grass is tall, and it is hard to clean up after the dogs when the grass is tall, and because my shorter dog is unhappy when the grass is too tall. But I didn't mow the front - I kind of like the rustic look, and there were lots of tree branches that I didn't have the energy to pick up (so mowing was hard). But as fall approached, all those trees were going to drop their leaves. It is so much easier to remove the leaves in the fall before the snow has started to decay them. *I* don't want my whole front yard to be covered with leaves on a permanent basis. So in September I started picking up the sticks and eventually mowed the grass - it is hard to blow the leaves through tall grass. And I blew leaves. I didn't quite finish, but I did well enough so I won't have a mess in the spring. The point is that I have neighbors who hire companies to come and put chemicals on their lawns so their grass will grow and then come to cut it once a week so they will have manicured lawns. It would be easy to say "Gee, my neighbors will think XXX about me if I don't have a lush green lawn" and then feel like I had to spend a lot of time and effort and money on something that isn't important to *me*. Being able to blow my leaves *was* important to me, so I mowed the lawn for that reason. But I didn't mow it in June or July or August - that was one of the things I "let go".
P.S. I ate a bowl of Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream while writing this post. See http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20041218/msgs/431999.html for my experiences with ice cream (but note the trigger warning, and don't read it if it would be detrimental to you). This is another example of "letting go". I weigh 50 pounds more than I want to, so I *should* go on a diet and exercise and lose that weight. But right now Ice cream and chocolate are important to my mental health, and I've decided that my mental health is more important than those 50 pounds. So, for now, I don't worry about my weight (and I'm not *gaining* more at this point). Maybe later when my mental state is better I'll go on a diet. But for now I let the "You are too fat" issue go...
Posted by Angel Girl on January 4, 2005, at 18:37:48
In reply to Re: It doesn't seem to matter . . . » Angel Girl, posted by fallsfall on January 1, 2005, at 12:12:26
fallsfall
I'm going to try harder to let things go. Today I phoned my pdoc's receptionist and my pharmicst because I lost it with them on the phone a few days ago. I made my apologies to each of them. I certainly don't need this for my mental health. Letting go has been a major issue for me though, so this is not going to be easy for me at all. I'm glad that you have been able to manage it in your life. I'm sure you feel a lot better for it.
I've been sick the last few days so I didn't get any shopping done but I did call my son and ask him to pick me up a few items. Ice cream was one of them. :)
AG
This is the end of the thread.
Psycho-Babble Social | Extras | FAQ
Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.org
Script revised: February 4, 2008
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/cgi-bin/pb/mget.pl
Copyright 2006-17 Robert Hsiung.
Owned and operated by Dr. Bob LLC and not the University of Chicago.