A Few Depression "Tips"

Hi, these are three things I have learned about how to get a handle on my depression. Maybe they will help if you, fellow sufferer, happen this way and stumble over them in your weary, bleary ramblings in the inner darkness.

1. When you feel it coming, don't sit down. If you haven't yet tuned into when depression is coming on (I mean an extra strong, stiff bout stronger than the low grade fog you may struggle through each day in), you've got to try to pay attention to how and when your depression waxes and wanes. Become an expert in your depression (no one else will or can). If you're like me, you'll have developed a habit of sitting or lying down when it comes on. It's only natural. If you can stand up and get moving, do anything but sit, it may not go away completely, but just that gesture and push of energy can be enough to ward off an incipient wave. It's unnatural to resist that urge to cave in, but, hey, so are antidepressants.

2. Exercise. I have tried, vigorously and in earnest: meditation, therapy, antidepressants, reading philosophy, Zen Buddhism, various addictive behaviors and substances to ameliorate, mollify, suppress, dissipate, avoid, cure, deny, and escape from depression. Not a damn thing has worked for me like exercise, specifically aerobic exercise (aerobics, StairMaster, treadmill) and weight lifting. Maybe you prefer a particular sport. I think I partly like those exercises because I can do them among other people (a nice side benefit) but still be fairly solitary. Exercise has become my own personal antidepressant. I wish I had made the connection sooner, which leads me to my third "tip."

3. Survive, by hook or by crook, whatever shit you have to crawl through, until the sun comes out again. Don't feel you need to listen to anything anyone else says about your feelings, your depression, your state of mind. Do you have suicidal thoughts? So have I. Plenty. Suicidal thoughts, I have learned, can help a person in extreme suffering to cope. In deep depression, the thought of dying can be like the mirage of an oasis to a desert traveler delirious with thirst. But survive. Survive. If you haven't had the experience of a free trip to the hospital ER with a police escort because you shared a suicidal thought with someone who reported your thought to the police, listen to my advice: keep your mouth shut. The only thing I learned from that experience was never to share those thoughts with anyone again, even in anger or desperation. There's nothing like losing your freedom, imprisoned in a hospital room for a few hours, to make you feel like anything else, even living, would be better.

Good luck. There's nothing else I can tell you. OK, one more thing. Feel free to scoff at "experts" in religious robes, such as Pema Chodron, who advise you to just "sit with" your depression in meditation and "experience it fully and deeply." I've tried that and I'll tell you what -- see my first and second points above. Getting off your ass is a much better way. Depression is, in the end, something in your brain, as is everything else of which you are aware. I don't believe in "spiritual." That means nothing to me. If you cut my brain apart, I'm done, I'm scrambled eggs, no longer a person, a Buddha, whatever. So, for me, "spirituality" comes down to the brain and the word is just thrown around a lot by those who find it a beneficial placeholder for a more scientific understanding of things. Exercise can have some of the same effects on your brain, naturally, that antidepressants do. So can meditation. But sitting in your own shit and stewing is not the solution, not in my experience. To the meditative pundits who recommend that solution, I would question whether they have really experienced deep depression or if they have, if they really remember what it was like (see Cheri Huber's "The Depression Book," if interested, a true blue Buddhist nut -- I know she knows depression (she attempted suicide with a gun and barely survived), and she recommends, above all, EXERCISE). That goes for a lot of self help books, and even my own advice to exercise and not sit down. Sometimes depression, grief and other kinds of suffering are just so powerful that nothing can stop them, and there is absolutely no remedy. Don't feel bad if you just punt and sleep through a few of those hours, my friend. I certainly have.