Depression = Lack of motivation

I know the ups and downs. Feel free to ad me for support!

pearson114 wrote: »

It's difficult to explain to those who have never suffered depression, but to those who have - how did you overcome it?

The most useful points really depend on what your Dr has diagnosed in terms of supporting your management of the depression.

For me, it became a question of recognising that I had to put in place the right habits, and the way to do that was to force myself to do something towards it. So in this case:

• Set up MFP to give you the calorie goal
• Record your intake and aim to land at, or a little below, your goal each day
• If you do want to exercise then give yourself some structure, a plan of some kind. A plan gives you goals.
• Reward yourself for hitting goals

A goal might be completing your logging every day for a week, or completing your planned training sessions every day for a week.

Small steps, then keep challenging yourself to make each step a little longer

Stop thinking that you "should" go for a run. Too many "shoulds" = feelings of failure and that just maintains the vicious cycle.

Make your goals smaller, much smaller. Make them daily goals, heck, even hourly goals if you need to. There is no "tomorrow", live for now. Do what you can, now, and give yourself credit for the small goals you achieve.

Exercise *will* make you feel better. I know it's hard to get to that point, but it really does help. But make those exercise goals small to begin with. Try to turn them in to habits and take it from there. Start with simple things like walking to the shop instead of driving etc. Don't give yourself a chance to think about it or talk yourself out of it. Shoes on and go. If even that feels like too much, perhaps look into something like mindfulness meditation and start with committing to that, then work from there.

Food, break it down a bit. Don't go for massive all out changes. Choose one thing to do and stick to it for a week. Next week add another thing etc etc.

Most importantly, if it all goes wrong, accept it and start again. Don't hold on to the self-blame, don't hold on to the negative thoughts. Just move on.

It can be done, it is possible.

You can do it

First of all, you do not have to exercise to lose weight.. with this said and if you want to ease in exercise or a walk or a run do this on the days when you feel more upbeat or energetic...

Did the doctor give you medication? If so has it been enough time for the medication to be repeatedly administered and have an effect?

For me it was anti-depressants and therapy, they helped me tremendously and gave me some stability that I needed to make changes. It wasn't until after I was on them for a while that I realized just how bad it was because when you're in the midst of it it is so difficult to have perspective. I was on a prescription for about a year, and have been off for the last 2+ and now that I better understand how depression works I'm better able to recognize and be proactive when it starts creeping back.

I was really hesitant to try it, but I would encourage you to have a conversation with your doctor and see a therapist.

I can't help with getting over depression. Mine is here to stay (23 years since diagnosed), meds and therapy didn't help, so I deal along as best I can.

I find that focusing on one small accomplishment helps me feel good about my capability and motivates me to do more.

But the focus really needs to be on the one small accomplishment, and not on the next step. Otherwise, I might feel overwhelmed.

The focus also needs to involve the question: If I do this, am I taking care of myself?

What's an example of one small accomplishment?

Eating a healthy breakfast and logging it right away.

When I plan, prepare, and eat a healthy breakfast and then see it on the MFP screen, I feel good that I followed through with a planned action. I feel good that I have given myself good nourishment. And then I feel motivated to do the same for lunch.

pearson114 wrote: »

gia - I have been prescribed Citalopram, and CB Therapy, although this doesn't begin until June.

The crux of CBT is just what you're asking about. How can you force change in your behaviour to help you with the health related issues.

Personally I found talking therapies more useful to me than CBT per se, but what I've described above is one of the tools that you'll get from it.

Personally I'm not particularly receptive to uncritical cheerleading, so for me things need to be a bit crunchier and outcome focussed. There is a need to understand yoruself, and how you respond. Are you carrot or stick driven? What results do you want and how can you express those in a meaningful way.

Two years ago, when I started to lose weight and train more seriously, I very quickly discovered that I'm not driven by weight, but by running performance. So the latter is what I track and train towards. I'm a little carrot oriented, but more so stick and I'm my own biggest critic, so it's working within that to mitigate how I engage with myself.

As an example, I was in a 10K race yesterday. Beat my previous PB for the course by three minutes, but within an hour was planning how to iprove on that time again next time. The CBT should help you understand yourself and give you some tools to work with that.