Ask Lemmy

I struggle with depression and choose to deal with it without medication. I have a loose mental health routine… more like a list of things to do on a daily/weekly/monthly basis.

Daily:

Shower

Eat

Spend a minimum of ten minutes cleaning my space.

If not working, spend at least 20 minutes outside; preferably doing some kind of exercise, but just chillin’ is ok too.

Weekly:

Attend some kind of social event. Doesn’t mean anything huge. I got in to D&D and that takes care of that one most weeks. Regular social activity is important.

Monthly:

Clean the bathroom! (Preferably bi-weekly)

This is not a complete list of things I do to help my mental health, but they’re the ones I force myself to do even if I don’t want to. It helps.

I also follow a general guideline I learned in therapy. Keep track of things you’re doing and put them in to one of three categories: professional development, self care, recreation.

The goal is to spend your waking hours doing these things evenly. (I suppose sleeping counts as self care in the right situation)

I’m a former addict. Been clean for 4 years now. I learned these things in recovery and the whole time I thought to myself “This should be a high school course. You don’t need to be an Addict to benefit from this stuff.”

Anyway, these things truly help me and I hope they can help you too.

I found gaining an interest in hobbies that are difficult gave me a will to live. I want to experience mastering all of these crafts that take decades to master.

Cooking, drawing, woodworking. Becoming a master of just one is hard enough, so every minute is extremely precious. I try to spend as much time as possible practicing and learning.

I can't think of suicide because I worked so hard to male this much progress, and I still want to experience my other hobbies.

One's craft helps one's life. An old Japanese saying.

I think the usual recs are things like start small and consistent and take care of your physical health (not over/under sleeping, good diet and exercise, keeping yourself and home clean, etc), hobbies, cultivate relationships, etc but if you're not able to take the steps to make those things happen you may need a professional's help who can offer things like talk therapy, behavior therapy, medicine, etc. i.e. If I have a sprained ankle I can keep weight off it and wrap it to let it heal, but if it's a break I'd need a doctor to maybe set the break and cast it to get it to heal properly, similar for mental health some stuff you can do yourself but some stuff takes someone else trained to heal or help identify the difference between the two.

Recently someone recommended a book about this topic. I haven't read it (yet), but I found the title quite fascinating. It was in German, so I'm trying to translate:

"Do not believe everything that you think".

Running shirtless at -3 ℃
“On curing sadness with cold showers, excess with Cynicism, and madness with veganism. And if you can't go vegan, eat the rich.” —https://arscyni.cc/file/cynic.html

Reading internal family systems by Richard Schwartz, watching videos by sadhguru, taking time to try to follow the threads of “intrusive thoughts,” by trying to sit in them while focusing on my breath and trying really hard not to think in words, trying to listen to myself rather than talk to myself in my head.

I do also see a therapist, and he helps talk through things that paralyze me from making decisions.

Do you think you would be not depressed if there was something different about your life or yourself at they are right now?

• Go on a run a couple times a week. I honestly hate running, but I always feel loads better after going on a run. Just start with 6 stints of 30 seconds with a 2 minute break in between and build up from there. It might not be a long term solution, but will definitely help get you through some tough days.

• Online there are also lots of free resources available. There are a lot of chatrooms and phone numbers available for people that are struggling. Even if your particular country doesn’t offer any, you can always just chat/call with foreign resources.

• Try mindfulness. At first it might take a couple tries to find what works for you, but there are many apps and videos online that all have a different approach. I personally use the Balance app for the free year they offer and found that 3 or 4 of their mindfulness exercises really help me out every time I feel depressed or anxious etc.

sing. doesn't matter what you sing or how well.

Walks, lots and lots of long walks. Sometimes 3 or more per day. I take my dog with me and he loves it. Seeing his smile while walking brings me a lot of joy.

Does it cute my depression? No

Does it help? Absolutely

Other than that, as many projects/ crafts as i can do. I make myself start painting even when I don't want to. Before I know it 30 minutes has passed and im balls deep in painting. Again, does it help yes, cure ? No

I'm not sure if I was clinically depressed or not. But I definitely went through a couple months where I wasn't feeling myself. My GF moved in with me this year and I thought it was just me adjusting with a new "roommate".

I eventually realized it was the house. It was a mess and that was what making me feel depressed because it was hard to talk to someone about being a slob if you loved them.

So I guess maybe think hard about things that have changed and when you were happy and see what you can do to change them?

I know it's probably not great advice but it's free and it worked for me

Prescription drugs. Schedule an appointment with the doctor and they will have you fill out a couple questionnaires and discuss options. Medication is free with most insurance

I hear you. Not just in money but in time as well. Its very different when your situation is the cause of depression as loosing what little freetime and money you have to try and treat it is just adding fuel to the fire. Meditation. Buddhism as a philosophy, trying to get away from modern corp bs. Its easy to say and harder to do but there is a mindset. You want cheap and easy food treats and media so its easy to say hey its worth getting pick up food or paying for a streaming service. If you can realize how much nicer a clean environment is and how enjoyable it can be to make a nice meal from simple ingredients. Walks, preferably in nature, are great. If you get to a certain point you will despise the smartphone, the fast food, the monthly non necessities. OMG take a hot long bath if you have a tub. Embrace what you can.

That's the neat part, I don't.

Ultimately, you don't battle it alone. You are here. You read this. This is you not being alone. And just like this little exchange, there are other possibilities out there. You just have to try and reach out. Even if it seems hopeless to you. I read a lot of useful stuff in here. Sometimes that alone helps. Sometimes the tiniest steps are valuable. Just keep on. We can overcome.

Some of the things that helped me:

• Regularity. I also have ADHD so actually getting me to catalog daily/weekly things that I need to do was hard enough. But now that I have like 5 todo lists things are looking up.
• Cataloging things. I love photography and writing down interesting ideas. Someone looking through my photo collection might wonder why I take photos of random shit. Simple reason: Something managed to brighten my day and I just had to put it in on the record. I feel happier when I know that those moments won't ever disappear if I can at all manage it. Similarly, if I have cool ideas that made me happy for some reason, I write them down.
• Crap social media is the worst. Be on the social media to fearlessly shout your cool ideas to the void if you have to. Don't be there to passively and silently afraid to speak up and stick around with people you barely know and watch them slowly turn nazi yes-men. (Yes. It has happened. Before Elon bought Twitter. Can't even imagine how shit things are nowdays over there.)

I don't have depression. Journaling help, saying stuff out loud helps. Seems that antidepressants work. There might be other factors that contribute to the depression and can be minimised to help take the weight off.

Maybe see if there are help groups like the ones for alcoholics. I'm sure they also exist for depressed people, or people who procrastinate. Generally they're lead by volunteers and people who suffered through it themselves and not professionals who need to be paid...

i like to read philosophy. buddhist, islamic, hindu, european. doesnt matter. you can find stories of people going through the worst shit imaginable and finding peace. gives me hope

Professional help moght be as simple as antidepressantants. They are cheap and they do help a lot. I have been taking it for about a year and it does help a lot. Currently on a decent dosage of venlafaxine.

Seriously, they don't do much the first couple of weeks, but after that they do help a lot.

Oh.

Slowly and inefficiently, I should say.

I've basically missed the last 20 years of my life.

(And I have "professional help.")