A question about depression, please excuse my ignorance.

[seaglass]

I was driving somewhere yesterday, feeling sad for I don't know what reason and I remembered something that I had long ago forgotten. I remembered especially when I was a teenager that I could feel this mood of sadness approaching like a dark ocean wave. I looked at it with dread knowing there was no way to avoid it crashing over me and knowing that when it hit it would last a long time. When I was a teen I thought this was normal and I just assumed everyone else had these periods too, I don't see it in my kids so I'm still not sure if it was just me or not.

As an adult, I just assumed I was a sad person. Is it possible to be just frequently/mostly sad and not be depressed?

When you are depressed, does it start with a thought that makes you feel sad and then your mood carries you away and you can't even remember what the thought was and it doesn't even matter anyways? Or is there no beginning or end to it?

I just don't understand why so many stupid things make me sad and I feel like I'm sad all the time.

I am NOT trying to trivialize depression in any way, I'm just trying to figure out if being sad is just my personality type or if I'm just unhappy about the direction of my life or if it might be something more than that.

[DemExpat]

1. With me, depression was not something preceeded by a thought

it was a permanent state that covered all my feelings. In my deepest depressions I certainly felt no sadness.

I don't really mind my regular periods of sadness now, as I know that they always pass. Being able to experience sadness is actually a success of my therapy in my eyes. And I accept that some people are more melancholy than others, just as there are extroverts and introverts.

I think that the only way you can find out the difference - for yourself -is through some good therapy or counselling, or by a sustained period of self-observation and perhaps journalling to discover insights about it on your own.

Being sad all of the time is probably a state that you would want to change somewhat, and I believe that it is possible......with some help to work through the thoughts and feelings and finding some release.

But I personally don't equate sadness with depression per se.

DemEx

[seaglass]

2. OK, that was helpful, thanks.

My feelings of profound sadness are periodic not permanant, I don't know what they are but I want them to stop. I'm a fairly analytical person so I'm sure I could come up with some reasons why I keep feeling as I do. I think your idea about journaling or at least list-making would help me to pinpoint the reasons maybe.

[crim son]

3. "Sad" as a personality type?

That's depression. I know what you're talking about - knowing the sadness is coming and fearing it. Depression most certainly can be episodic. The first time I was diagnosed was when I was 27. I received counseling and was put on an antidepressant. The difference in the way I felt on the antidepressant just blew me away. I have a very specific memory of looking at a flower in a vase and thinking "That's beautiful." I promise you, I had never before been able to see that beauty. Since then, on and off antidepressants as necessary, I have discovered beauty again and again.

People are sad and not depressed because they lose a lover, or a loved one dies, or they hate their job, etc. To be perennially sad for no concrete reason... that's depression and no, you shouldn't trivialize it. Go get checked out. It can't hurt and it might help you, very much.

[seaglass]

6. Thanks for your input crim son. I don't really know what is going

on - there is no longer an approaching wave it just seems to always be lurking there under the surface. It may just be that I'm having a difficult time dealing with life right now.

[mrgorth]

4. I don't know. I think I'm mostly sad...

or thoughtful, concerned, whatever...with brief periods of joy. What I consider depression was completely imobilizing. I lost a ton of weight and couldn't sleep or do anything. I won't take meds for just being sad.

[seaglass]

5. Yeah, I don't really want to take meds and I have never been

unable to function. I am not functioning normally though. Like I said it may just be a personality thing or possibly a phase I am going through.

[EFerrari]

7. Some meds are very gentle. And there are many other tools

a good clinician could share with you.

Imho, believing that sadness is a "personality thing" is a red flag that one could use a sound medical opinion.

Babies aren't born sad, HopeLives.

I don't like taking pills at all. In my case, the smidge of meds I take allow me to feel like myself and to feel like I'm making decisions, not my moods; like my life isn't being so filtered through slightly wacky brain chemistry. fwiw.

:hug:
:grouphug:

[DemExpat]

8. Most of my sad periods at this phase of my life

have to do with existential realities like losing loved ones, time passing so quickly and my husband and I entering into the last phase of our lives, some of the really negative aspects of living in our present day world (along with the wonderful things, of course, just sometimes I get focused on the negatives).....seeing how ideals have not been attained, etc.

But beauty can make me sad, too, when the "essence" of something can be so overwhelmingly filled with beauty that it brings humbled tears and a lump to my throat.

I do think we are born with our personalities to a degree, sensitivities, etc. and that these are things that belong to our essence. I can be melancholy and not feel that it is something abnormal, or sick, or something to ban from my life.

In my depressed and anxiety-ridden years everything was black, meaningless and chaotic. So I am happy to experience sadness sometimes now along with the moments of great joy and gratitiude.

Hope you get some clarity for yourself on this soon - it is not understanding stuff that can be so unbearable at times, not the stuff itself, IMHO.

Sometimes you say your sadness is periodic and sometimes you say its pretty much all the time. If it is a constant, I would check with my doctor and have a talk with someone about this.

DemEx