Hi , does anyone Else have Clinical Depression. If so , how do you live with it. Coping methods , distractions , ETC...I would like some advice. I have been doing a lot of different things to live with it my whole life , so , I can share my methods if anyone is interested. Any advice is greatly appreciated
Hi Arizona. I have PTSD which kind of waxes and wanes. This means I have lots of practice in dragging myself out of down times. I do not like the Depression label because using it discourages me and makes it harder for me to cope. That does not mean it applies to other people, though.
I wrote down things that have worked for me and have shared them with others. The things I do seem to work for them too.
The starters I do are comfort foods, including beverages. Tea and hot chocolate are important ones for me. I also have a list of things to do that make me feel better. I also have comfort clothes. I need backup comfort clothes because those get worn to pieces.
Sometimes i feel the need to have an entire day devoted to making me feel better. Those can have varying components. A current favorite day of making myself feel better can be staying in bed until I feel like getting up. I keep a container of dry food by my bed to bribe my cats to go along with this plan. They have to put up with me cuddling them extra to get the treats, however. They seem to understand their responsibilities for cuddling extra to help me out and purr extra loud and long.
Once I get up I eat whatever seems easy and appealing enough to make me feel good. I keep comfort foods around most of the time, or the ingredients. I make most of my own mixes, which helps make some comfort foods easier to get when I need them.
I usually binge watch movies at home, or look at interesting youtube videos on how to do things, while eating popcorn and rocking my cats and brushing them and massaging them. I may do a project or finish one. Finishing projects is one of the things I keep on my list of things to do to make me feel better. I usually have several projects to complete on my list.
Some examples of projects to complete are: 1) lining drawers and shelves with nice washable wallpaper 2) making cat beds or removable tops for winter, making comfort food mixes and putting them in labelled containers 3) simple and fast sewing projects, or almost completed sewing projects, or 4) sharpening knives or scissors while watching movies and eating popcorn and rocking and cuddling my cats.
I try to add more stuff to my list of, things to do when I feel bad to make me feel better, whenever another item occurs to me. This is because I find it much harder to think of these things to do when I already feel bad. It is a lot easier to just pick something from an existing list when I feel bad.
I have more stuff I do, but this is a sample of them. I hope this helps.
