Depression-Where Are You?
The confusing and hard part about having the disease of depression/anxiety is to understand when the deepening of the disease is coming or has already arrived. If a trigger occurs (for me it is medical test results) then I have notice. Without notice, it is much harder to know when the disease is creeping into day to day life with its normal ups and downs. After all, depression/anxiety is a cunning disease. The facts: right now I have a legitimate reason to be anxious and a bit blue. How can I tell when my anxiety and feeling down are just part of the ups and downs of normal life rather then part of my depression/anxiety disease?
Depression/Anxiety are often a twin diagnosis. If anxiety focuses on future events and depression focuses on the past, the only thing left is the current “moment”. When I am anxious, I feel speeded up and jumpy. I want to go out and do things. Almost simultaneously I find myself getting depressed and moving inward. The two states are symbiotic, depression dampens the strength of the anxiety while anxiety livens up the depression. Nothing is done consciously. I have lived with depression/anxiety disease for so long that the symptoms feels a bit too familiar, and it is hard to gage what stage of the disease I am in, and thus, what I need to do about it. Where does that leave me?
My best option is to take my depression pulse. I ask myself, on scale of one to ten, what is my depression/anxiety level? It a bit like taking your body temperature. For me, if I am at level 3, I can cope if I follow good mental health practices like trying to stay in the moment or meditation, (similar to having a body temperature of 98.5). Once I hit level 4, I have pushed the bell at the depression/anxiety house (parallel to taking one aspirin with a body temperature of 100). By level 5, I have opened the door to the depression/anxiety house (not unlike taking two aspirin and staying in bed with a body temperature of a 101). At level 6, I step into the depression/anxiety house but still have my wits about me (similar to thinking about calling the doctor with a body temperature of 102). When I hit level 7, I move into the depression/anxiety house for a short stay (similar to calling the doctor with a 103 body temperature). By level 8 or above, I live in my depression/anxiety house and the disease is in full swing, (parallel to being hospitalized with a body temperature of 104-105).
The best way to start helping myself is to determine what level I am at on the one to ten scale. Currently, I am between the 4th and 5th level (opening the door to the depression/anxiety house). I need to shut the depression/anxiety door. This is a full alert and all my depression/anxiety tools are needed to stay in the “moment”.