Depression is killing me

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I've suffered from clinical depression, specifically dysthymia, for eleven years now and I feel like it's killing me. I am stuck in a vicious cycle that has made me feel hopeless and helpless. Is there a cure or am I just going to continue suffering until I die?

I am feeling the same way. I've suffered from depression since childhood (I didn't know what self harming was or anything like that, but was compelled to do so everyday) along with anxiety and I never got any help nor did anyone notice/care until I was much older. I think mine has been caused by not getting a diagnosis, my behaviour as a child causing others to abuse me and suffering socially severely throughout my life to the point where I have barely any trust in not being hurt by others.

I am feeling extremely depressed today, and I just want you to know you're not alone.
I am also stuck in the same cycle.

Do you have friends/family/partner to talk to who understand your condition?

I probably shouldn't post as I feel I am really unhelpful.

My mind is constantly streaming negative thoughts and it won't leave me alone. I wake up every day still sad and hopeless. I try to look for answers but I either can never find them or my mind refuses them.

Thus far there is no "cure" for autism or clinical depression

If someone invents a cure in the future, it will be expensive

If the cure is not expensive, then what? Because I am already 34 years old and you can't fix the past

" a day late, a dollar short"




SSRI, MAOI

Electroconvulsive Therapy

Counseling

Support group

Meditation

Books

You shouldn't have to feel like that all the time. I wish happiness for you!
I don't know if depression can be cured per se, but it can definitely be treated. From what I know about it (not having depression myself) different people respond to different treatments, so what works for one won't necessarily work for another. Some people benefit from anti-depressant medications, others from therapy, some even from intense exercise, etc. There was even a theory about deliberately putting your body into routine coldshock could help alleviate anxiety and depression.
Do you see a GP who might be able to coordinate exploring the options for depression for you? Not sure how it works where you are but often you need a GP referral to see other specialists. They could help you to sort through all these options and the others no doubt out there, and find something that helps you.
I hope you can get better emotionally. It doesn't seem like a great position to be in.

The current counselor told me that the insurance pays for counseling, until November next year

Counseling takes one every other week

50 minutes each

And that is it

Used to be on prozac and ativan

Made me less depressed, and exhausted

All drugs have side effects

All drugs cost $$$$

The psychiatrist assigned to me, is pretty far away. Location. It takes a lot of time and energy to get there

It might not be worth it

Used to go to support groups

Seemed kind of random

Nothing good or bad

Emotional rollercoaster being around clients diagnosed with bipolar and depression

And they have much worse lives than me

Anyways



Cold therapy?



At 6am, it is pretty cold where I live, in the winter

So it doesn't sound necessary to go out of my way to go somewhere cold

The other thing is that lately, I am almost always cold

Last night, six blankets. Four long sleeve shirts. Of those, two jackets and one hooded sweatshirt

And the heater was on

And there are many locations much colder in the world

I have dysthymia too.

People think you’re faking it the longer you have it which is ironic.

I saw my Dr on Wednesday this week— she took me off meds and doesn’t want to put me back on.
It’s so frustrating.

She thinks it’s from the marriage/divorce, and all I need is to continue therapy—

but I keep telling her I felt like this since grade 6!

Taking B complex vitamins and D and 5-HTP is helping a little but I do need meds. Even though meds have their own issues.

I honestly need to try electro-convulsive therapy as mentioned above.

My doctor doesn’t believe it’s as bad - she thinks therapy is the ‘best cure’...

I try to come off cheerful so as not to burden people with the contagiousness of depression.

I hope you feel less hopeless and find proper support

totally obsessed with: homophobia from 2004 san diego, social rejection, autism, structural engineering, gorging (eating), having no future, no precious lil "friends"

lately things have been "As Good As it Gets" and i still wanna gorge

preoccupied

obsession

one counseling session, every other week. 50 minutes each. for eleven months. then the insurance does not pay for more. have to pay out of pocket.

counseling is "a day late, a dollar short". the counselor does not have a time machine. the counselor does not have the authority to assign homophobic precious lil "people" 2000 hours community service at the LGBT center.

the counselor can say whatever she wants, and it is not illegal. but so can everyone else. but all the counselor can do, is talk, to me (the client). she can't go hunt down precious lil "people" that allegedly caused me emotional disturbance in the past.

besides talking to clients, what do counselors have a legal right to do, send clients to 5150? fill out insurance paperwork? hold and attend meetings? testify in court?

the counselors physically and legally can't do much.

the counselor keeps telling me something is an "unfortunate thing that happened". but i told the counselor that i want her to tell me how to do them better.

because everything is fortunate, neither, or unfortunate. you can't guarantee you only get the first two.

and the counselor keeps telling me "i'm sorry" about things that are not her fault. it does not matter if it is her fault or if it is large or small.

the counselor told me she is sometimes "happy" for me and sometimes she is "sorry" for me.

but the official emotions are: happy, sad, angry, scared, surprised. (look it up if you do not believe me)

emotions are not: happy, sad, upset, depressed, mad, sorry,

can't she be "sad" without being "sorry"?

within 11 months, i need and want to learn how to cope with emotions better. so that i want and need less empathy/sympathy

but the counselor just giving me praise after praise

the counselor told me i was just like Rosa Parks, in that i went to the mens lockerroom and the waterpolo coach had a problem with it. and as a result, the Dean of the school determined that from then on, trans students could choose their lockerrooms. that was 2004, san diego. a lot of laws have come out since then. san diego was totally homophobic.

Rosa Parks? seriously? the counselor was just sucking up to me. i am no hero. it's like reverse psychology.

and then i wonder if the counselor praises all clients the same way, or just me.

or maybe the counselor's (correct or wrong) interpretation of my nonverbal communication is that i am so emotionally fragile that i can't handle/take/tolerate/accept any response besides lavish praise.

and maybe the counselor's interpretation is correct

the counselor has only acted surprised 2x, in the previous one year of counseling

one of those times was when i told her i worked as a Tax Preparer. but a tax preparer is not the same as a Certified Public Accountant, Enrolled Agent, Tax Attorney, or Bar Exam. a tax preparer involves much less work.

she acted like she did not believe i had the potential to do taxes. but taxes are not rocket science.

the counselor told "you were helping people eat", when i told her i worked flipping burgers. at a restaurant. it's like, wtf?

the counselor made it sound like the "people" physically or financially eat, and i was the only one that could "help" them. everyone else did not have the skill or willingness to "help" them. the counselor made it sound like i "helped" five billion "people" eat, for ten years, two thousand calories a day. and, as a result, none of them dropped dead. and, if it were not for me, they would've dropped dead already. and that would have been absolutely bad.

but, if i was not flipping burgers, someone else would have done it. if nobody else did it, customers would've eaten something else. if customers did not eat something else, customers would have lost a couple pounds. for a couple days. at most.

nothing theatrical/drastic would have occurred, that would not otherwise have occurred/happened.

the more the counselor kisses up to me, i feel like, maybe i really am totally incapable. it's like only one person is so constantly and empathically on my side. and that one person (the counselor) sure does not believe i am capable of anything harder than "flipping burgers".

and she is by far, the best counselor i have had thus far. out of 35 counselors, including professional and volunteer.

counseling is going nowhere

"too far gone", lost cause, going nowhere, failure, burnout, slacker,

no hope

yes i have an iphone. but Apps cost too much $$. sorry.

does the book have a hard copy? maybe i could read it at the library.

in any event i have read plenty of books about clinical depression, bipolar, autism, gender identity disorder, and et cetera. other diagnosis.

kind of wondering though. if the problem is medical/neurological or psychological. that is splitting fine hairs. seriously. maybe i need or want SSRIs, MAOIs. or maybe the problems are so profound that only financially expensive, dangerous techniques could work. like electroconvulsive therapy.

in any event though, the counselor told me that the insurance only covers 11 more months of counseling. one hour per session. one session every other week. then that's it.

unless and until i pay out of pocket.

so. kind of hard to imagine the insurance might pay for more expensive forms of treatment.

I wish I had an answer. I've had it for most of my life. According to the doctors it started when I was 12. I've never found a cure. Weed edibles help me a lot if I eat the right amount. Prescription meds... I can't take anti-depressants. They worsen my depression. I can't take most psychiatric medication because I'm overly sensitive to the effects and the side effects. So I'm only on As Needed, lowest dose for anxiety and insomnia.
On the flip side, I have learned the dance and rhythm of my depression, and have learned how to handle it effectively. I'm able to move out of it quicker, and better, and it doesn't hit me as hard. Especially with the edibles. I won't lie, sometimes I can eat the strongest ones made and it has no effect on me whatsoever because the depression is so bad. But, those days are rare and deep down I know they won't continue every day for the rest of my life, so I just cling onto whatever "life raft" I can with my eyes squeezed shut and wait.

I suppose, that probably sounds pretty depressing by itself. But, this is my life and there are a lot of good things in it worth sticking around for and enjoying. Even if it's just crocheting more things that I don't use that everyone loves but I can't sell because I don't know how lol. Even if it's just hugging my dog, cuddling my cat, breathing in the scent of my s/o, or staring up at the moon at night like I'm in a trance. Playing Skyrim for the millionth time, reading as many books as I can before I die, the taste of coffee, the feeling of a mochi squishy... There's reasons.
I hope you can think of your reasons.

Been there. I've had counsellors give up on me and tell me that they can't help me, I'm incurable. I avoided getting help for years afterwards-until it got to the point where I had to in order to survive. Ended up with a good one finally.
I have my own strategy that I have devised. I call it my three-legged stool for beating depression to death. It involves
1.) Eating healthy food. I often struggle with remembering to eat and sometimes wanting to eat. Healthy food makes you saner than unhealthy food. Remember to drink water-I've seen so many people stuff themselves full of chips trying to satisfy some craving that miraculously goes away when they have a glass of water!
2.) Exercise. Force yourself to do as much exercise as you can-the more strenuous the better. Just going for a walk is better than nothing, and if you're having a day when you can't leave the house then work out-or just find some fast paced music that you enjoy and dance and jump about. It is brutal at first, but endorphins are real and you'll also tire yourself out so you can sleep better.
3.) Microdosing psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) has done wonders for me. I honestly believe that I am alive because of it. I take one Psilocybe semilanceata (aka liberty cap) every 3 days-that's around 1/10th of what you'd need to take to be tripping. From your posts I'm guessing that you're in America-I don't know what kind of psilocybin mushrooms you have over there, but you can do your own research or find someone who does-hell, it's 2018, you can probably find them on the dark web. BE CAREFUL-don't take anything you aren't 100% certain of. A good field guide with lots of pictures is essential-if in doubt take spore prints! No tapering on, and I've come on and off them several times without withdrawls. Side effects that I have noticed are increased propensity for going for walks and writing in my journal. Sometimes things would be a bit sparkly if I had a big one. That and not being able to trip on them at all any more if I were to take a recreational dose instead of a micro one, but that's a small price to pay. And that's IT, at least for me. They help me process things rationally rather than emotionally. They have helped me uncover a lot of repressed memories and come to terms with them.
4.) (I know I said it's a three-legged stool, but I had to add another leg to it to see me through times when I didn't have mushrooms-a combination of any 3 of the four has seen me through a lot of dark times.) Write. Write it all down. Whenever you are feeling overwhelmed. Whenever you are feeling like there is no hope. Whenever you get a sudden urge to do something drastic. Write it down. All the oppressive and intrusive thoughts that go round and round. Write them down and don't stop writing. It's a way of listening to your subconscious-and your subconscious knows things. It's a way of venting when you have no one to talk to. It's a way of ranting without alienating people-you could start by writing down the reasons why your counsellor annoys you! Never think that it has to be 'good' because it's not for showing to anyone.

Remember to congratulate yourself for each and every victory, no matter how small they may seem. Just getting out of bed is a victory in itself sometimes. Sometimes I say things like 'today I got out of bed. Today I ate kale. Today I cleaned my teeth.-Go, functioning wombashkaya!'-even if those three things were the only things I did that day and I have a teetering pile of neglected adulting. Especially if those three things were the only things I did that day.
Learn to be kind to yourself-it takes practice but it is essential. Remember that self esteem is not something that is innate-it is a skill. Like learning another language or playing an instrument. All skills are easier to acquire if you have the opportunity to learn them when you are young. A lot of us never had that opportunity, but it's never too late. The other thing to realise is that the part of you that hates yourself is not something that you were born with. It was put there by all the bad things and bad people you have had to endure. Knowing that it was put there is the first step to being able to chip away at it. It's a process.

Shortfat, I can see why you find your counsellor annoying. When you're staring at the abyss and they won't do anything other than try to tell you how amazing you are it can feel an awful lot like cognitive dissonance. It sounds like they don't have much experience with ASDs-otherwise they'd have a better understanding of your non-verbal communication and they'd realise that it's pointless trying to heap praise upon us. We don't need people to tell us that we are amazing-your counsellor's job is to listen to you, help you process and reframe things, and convince you that you a good person who is worthy of love by using irrefutable logic! And for what it's worth, getting your school to let trans students choose their own locker rooms is freaking BADASS! Seriously. That must have been some fight and you need to give yourself credit for it. That's not necessarily being like Rosa Parks (because I know you didn't like that comparison), but it IS being like YOU! That is BEING you! I think that's pretty amazing even if you don't.
You mention S.D. 2004 and the homophobes a lot in this thread. They must have put you through hell and you are obviously still dealing with it. Does your diagnoses reading list include PTSD/CPTSD? From reading your posts on this thread I think you should look into it. I'll try and find you some links-sometimes, despite my intentions, I forget to bookmark the good ones.

Our labels are not pathologies-they are the names given to all the BS we have to deal with that other people don't and cannot imagine. We are not weak or broken. We are doing the best we can with the capabilities we have in a world that keeps telling us that we are wrong for simply being who we are. We are stronger than a lot of people can possibly imagine.

Electro-convulsive therapy sounds like it could be traumatic as well as expensive. I'm not saying it doesn't work for some people, but I for one have been subjected to enough weird and traumatising 'therapies' designed to cure me to never want to undergo anything like that. I choose mushrooms and radical self acceptance. Find a better counsellor if you can-it really does make a difference.