Do We CHOOSE to be depressed?

Crystal

The answer to that question is YES!! We always want the easy way out , a pill, a religion , a shrink to make us happy.NO ONE can make you happy but you.Start taking control of your own life and your own brain and stop depending on others. Xena posted this the other day. http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/forum/thread.aspx?id=36573&site=3

Satanus

You are right. Our whole lives are choices. Every day we make thousands of choices. From the time of our birth, and maybe earlier, we make choices on how we react to stimulas, to feel good or bad in some way. That's why two people can go through a very similar trauma. One can seem to come through unscathed, the other shattered.

SS

Scully

People CHOOSE to be depressed the same way people CHOOSE to have cancer.

While it's true that a positive outlook and not looking to others for our own happiness contribute to one's mental and emotional well-being, these in themselves will not correct a chemical imbalance of neurotransmitters in the brain.

You wouldn't dream of telling a diabetic to stop taking insulin and instead just 'do something else'. To tell someone who is clinically depressed to "just think happy thoughts" or to "snap out of it" is highly insulting to those of us who HAVE BEEN THERE. I'd venture to guess that you've never walked a mile in our shoes. I would therefore respectfully suggest that you have no idea what you're talking about when it comes to bona fide cases of clinical depression.

I suggest you leave the medical diagnoses to those qualified to do so.

Love, Scully

Mimilly

Amen Scully.

I've battled depression all my life - and it's a BATTLE. I never chose this anymore than I did the color of my eyes. No one would choose this. No one.

Mim

Sentinel

No one chooses depression. Someone might chose to be moody and difficult. Women suffer alot with hormonal changes during their entire lifetime. They have what we call "ups" and "downs". These are not usually of a serious nature. It is the result of many chemical things going on in the brain and body.

Simply being depressed sometimes means that you are tired of trying, you need extra love and attention, and you are tired. Yes, you can decide to be moody and irritable, just as you can decide to do something positive, like go for a walk, see a good friend, take in a movie, skip a day of work or school. You usually quickly pick yourself up and work it out. Minor depressions can even be triggered by too much sugar. They come and they go.

Real clinical and chronic depression is a serious ailment. It doesn't go away. In those cases, people do need a doctor or therapist, or maybe even a pill. To simply infer that those in this state can "get over it" is not loving. Many of us that suffer with this type of depression cannot simply do that. We need some help. Self help is great if you can do it. Most times, we need assistance. The pain and hurt is too deep, and lasts too long.

Been There Many Times,

Sentinel/Karen

Elsewhere

Crystal,

You just spouted the largest pile of male bovine excrement I have seen in a very long time!!!!!

HOW DARE YOU????

I have had to battle depression for most of my life it is a LIVING HELL.. There were many times I came very close to ending my life just so I could experience relief from pain. It is a LIVING HELL.

It is only in recent years that I have recovered from it after leaving the bOrg after admitting to myself and everyone else that I am an Atheist. The act of having to disappoint my friends and family and DA myself just made it all worst, knowing that my being an Atheist would cause godly people to hate me for hates sake. The loving congregation did not do SHIT to comfort me they just made sure I understood that they considered me dead at their little Armageddon.

HOW DARE YOU????

bigfloppydog

I totally agree with Scully on this one. Ones who get depressed, just plain and simply cannot just "snap out of it" or for that matter, make themselves happy.

Try one day, not even that one half day of total depression, and see the affect it has on a person.

It is a definate up and down hill struggle, and unless you experience it, you have no! idea what it does to a persons emotional being.

Nowfree

PEOPLE DO NOT CHOOSE TO BE DEPRESSED.

Suffering with clinical depression is NOT like feeling "a bit down" or "not having a good day".

Yes I agree that some people SAY they have depression, when in reality they may just be going through a temporary bad patch, feeling a bit unhappy, generally fed up.

That is not clinical depression.

Some people with clinical depression react well to therapy/social support/medication/ECT and are able to function and cope with life at a better level than they may have been able to do previously.

Everyone is different.

Please do not insult individuals who are constantly battling with this mental disorder - it doesn't help them.

Nowfree

outoftheorg

Do we choose to be depressed?

I had a sister "dead now" who lived her whole life as a person obsessed by gloom and doom.As I recall, she never once spoke about joy or happiness without in some way putting a gloomy message in with it. With her nothing was bright and happy. I do not think whe was ever depressed in any way.

It is my experience that depression starts when lifes problems get beyond our ability to handle them. When one finds no REAL love and acceptance from those they associate or live with and no understanding and personal support.

I also think depression can be brought on by a chemical disorder in the brain. I think several causes are possible. Physical-emotional-environmental stresses of many kinds.

Also like all illnesses, some people will exploit their situation for pity or attention and don't really want relief from the ailment.

Real clinical depression is a dibilitating illness. It is real and terrible. Unless one experiences it they have no idea how terrible. I always thought suicide to be an act of anger or revenge or a cry for help. Which I am sure some of them are. But after my experience with the severe emotional pain, so terrible I lack the words to describe it, I understood why some may choose suicide as the only way they see out of the pain. Unless you have lived through it don't embarass your self by judging the feelings and fears of others.

Outoftheorg

Mimilly

Saint Satan - As for YOUR comments per two people going through the same experience and one being scathed and the other not - NO!

No two people experience life in the exact same way. We are all individual in our genetic make up - our weaknesses and strengths play the part in how we turn out as well as many other factors.

Pain and experience are selective. They cannot be compared between individuals.

Notice how many people have used the word 'BATTLE' in this thread to describe how it feels to have to fight depression? It's like being shoulder high in wet concrete and having to move through that each and every day. Sometimes it feels like the concrete hardens and you've got no more to give. Would YOU choose to live like that?

Please re-think your post.

Mim

Do We CHOOSE to be depressed?

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