How do you treat your depression?? Lets Share!!!

I'm on 40mg paxil, weening off slowly.

Also using essential oils for treatment, as well as meditate and yoga. Works like a champ. Also diet (gluten free) and brisk walks are helping as well, I try walking during normal sunlight, to try and get my Vitamin D therapy in, with the days getting shorter and all we all need some sunlight to boost our mood.

I try motivatg myself even when its the hardest thing ever and bananas I hear are good so try to have 2 for breakfast everyday

I medicated it. Now that I'm off the meds (over a year now!) I work out, and complain lol. I don't let things fester, I get it out and get over it. Then I go distract myself, usually with shopping, a drive or a workout.

I hear a handful of walnuts can cure depression!

I find if I exercise regularly it keeps my depression (chronic) under control. Eating or shopping both make it worse cos they give me something else to feel bad about.

Swisse brand MOOD tablets. Plus some St Johns Wort.


IF not for those 2 little tablets every day I would be dead.

Some of these answers show me that many of you have not experienced depression. That is a very good thing. For those that have, however, exercise does help, but there is no shame in getting medication. If you had a heart condition or diabetes, you would take your medication, wouldn't you?

Clinical depression is an illness of the brain - not the mind.

Who are you to hold claim to objective truth in the matter of depression? You don't know any of us, and assuming people who don't get treated with pills don't have depression is offensive. I'm not going to get into my background, but I assure you I had clinical depression - Which I treated through sheer power of Mind, after refusing meds for many years, even while undergoing inpatient rehabilitation. I am not a special snowflake; We all have this power, and you are severely underestimating the power of the human mind.

I know you weren't talking to me, but I saw the post and felt the need to reply. There is nothing wrong with taking meds either, if it works for you, I'm glad it makes you happy. But it's certainly not necessary. I could get into the FDA, about how America and the UK are some of the only places in the world where they are allowed to advertise drugs, but I won't.

Thank you for this answer. That person's response rubbed me the wrong way as well. I have gone the medication route and at this point in my life, there is a reason why taking medication is not an option. I don't always have a hard time managing without medication, but this past week in particular has been pretty tough. I could feel myself slipping away and somehow, though it took clawing and biting, I was able to regain a fairly good mental place, for the time being at least.
I appreciate the thoughtful answers people have posted here. Whether you are only sharing ideas on how to relieve stress or improve a slightly saddened mood or you have methods that have helped you out of deep depression I am thankful for you sharing your experience in the hopes that it might help someone else.

Some of these answers show me that many of you have not experienced depression. That is a very good thing. For those that have, however, exercise does help, but there is no shame in getting medication. If you had a heart condition or diabetes, you would take your medication, wouldn't you?

Clinical depression is an illness of the brain - not the mind.

Who are you to hold claim to objective truth in the matter of depression? You don't know any of us, and assuming people who don't get treated with pills don't have depression is offensive. I'm not going to get into my background, but I assure you I had clinical depression - Which I treated through sheer power of Mind, after refusing meds for many years, even while undergoing inpatient rehabilitation. I am not a special snowflake; We all have this power, and you are severely underestimating the power of the human mind.

I know you weren't talking to me, but I saw the post and felt the need to reply. There is nothing wrong with taking meds either, if it works for you, I'm glad it makes you happy. But it's certainly not necessary. I could get into the FDA, about how America and the UK are some of the only places in the world where they are allowed to advertise drugs, but I won't.

Easy, because clinical depression is an actual, physical, scientific, spongey-gray-bouncy-brain-quantifiable-thing. As in, it affects certain areas of the brain, certain neurotransmitters and neurocepters that fail to fire properly because of actual, physical miswiring in the brain.

Situational depression looks and acts differently in the brain than clinical depression. Quite physically, on an MRA scan, it acts differently. So yes, there IS an objective type of depression out there and THAT is what Contrarian was talking about.

Whatever your story is - if you were able to change it using sheer willpower, than whatever chemicals and transmittors were or were not going wonky at the time were not the result of genetic failure (as clinical depression is.) It was something else entirely.

I was diagnosed with depression by a clinical psychologist. I attempted suicide... many times, and almost succeeded. I cut myself, dressed in black, and hated being a human being. I felt like an alien. I spent 11 months in in-patient rehabilitation. I spent 2 weeks in another in-patient rehabilitation after my mother found my suicide note and they called the ambulance. I was coming off drugs when they took me. I avoided people, because I felt unworthy of love and affection. I've held a shotgun to my head, alone, many times - Loaded with buckshots. This period lasted 6 straight years.

I ask you again - What, WHAT, makes you think you are certified to tell people they don't have clinical depression because they don't use drugs to cure it? Are you more knowledgeable than ALL of the psychologists, sociologists, and physicians I visited throughout that period? I tell you what- I might just be offended if I didn't realize being offended is a useless emotion. My friend, by all accounts, I had objective, clinical, diagnosed depression. My brain wasn't acting right, and now it is! And I didn't use drugs.

Also, I didn't say I changed it using sheer willpower, I changed it by investigating my conscious (and unconscious) self. My mind. I meditated, I did yoga, I pushed myself to sheer physical exhaustion doing martial arts, I put myself in uncomfortable situations, and I changed my eating habits.

I was diagnosed with depression by a clinical psychologist. I attempted suicide... many times, and almost succeeded. I cut myself, dressed in black, and hated being a human being. I felt like an alien. I spent 11 months in in-patient rehabilitation. I spent 2 weeks in another in-patient rehabilitation after my mother found my suicide note and they called the ambulance. I was coming off drugs when they took me. I avoided people, because I felt unworthy of love and affection. I've held a shotgun to my head, alone, many times - Loaded with buckshots. This period lasted 6 straight years.

I ask you again - What, WHAT, makes you think you are certified to tell people they don't have clinical depression because they don't use drugs to cure it? Are you more knowledgeable than ALL of the psychologists, sociologists, and physicians I visited throughout that period? I tell you what- I might just be offended if I didn't realize being offended is a useless emotion. My friend, by all accounts, I had objective, clinical, diagnosed depression. My brain wasn't acting right, and now it is! And I didn't use drugs.

Also, I didn't say I changed it using sheer willpower, I changed it by investigating my conscious self. My mind. I meditated, I did yoga, I pushed myself to sheer physical exhaustion doing martial arts, I put myself in uncomfortable situations, and I changed my eating habits.

"Investigating my conscience self, my mind". That sort of sounds like you used sheer willpower. So tell me how that's not willpower?

Simply because one is NOT on drugs doesn't mean you're not depressed. But IF your depression can be chased away with a bath, a walk in the park, a good book - that's not clinical depression. Or at certainly least, if that's ALL it takes to chase away the blues.

Depression is more than a sad affect for a few days or even few months at a time. It persists when there are no outer circumstances that would justify it and it persists when all other normal avenues of changing your emotions have failed. This is why people seek therapy - because nothing they are doing is working.

You may be knowledgeable. And so am I. If you have researched your condition, you would already know what I've said above.

Why did you not know that?

Researched my condition? I lived with it for 6 straight years. This is not a few days or a few months. It really sounds like you are completely disregarding my personal experiences as false for no reason other than my experiences differ from yours. Hey, if I didn't experience it, it must not be true! Said every *kitten* and bigot, ever.

Talking about whether it's willpower or not is a logical fallacy, it's called a straw man argument, so I won't address it. Bad form.

I think I'm done with this conversation though. I wish you all the best.

this thread reminds me of one of the biggest issues with depression: most people who have suffered feel very alone and like noone understands them.

Hopefully lots of people sharing like this can only be of use.