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Depression is an infinite loop of thoughts. What do you think ?

Thoughts in a cycle. No conclusions expected, unlike "Analysis".
Break the cycle and come out of the depression, there is no way out through the cycle.

sourceofdesire 6 Dec 2
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9 comments

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1

Well, sadness is to depression as a stubbed toe is to a severed foot. At least, in my experience.

I have Persistent Depressive Disorder and ADD, and lately I've been particularly depressed because of the holidays and the pressure to become a nurse before I'm forced to move in with my dad. But instead of getting motivated, I tend to shut down and go without food and sleep too much, like 17 hours a day or so. Or I might not sleep enough, going without sleep for 30 some hours at a time or more.

Sometimes it just feels like a weight on my chest, or there's a heaviness in the air that affects my breathing. I seldom have any appetite, eating only to stave off any headaches.

I don't know if this answers your question, but this is what it's like when I experience depression.

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I think it can be dangerous to think clinical depression — as opposed to just feeling sad — is something we can will ourselves out of. While I do think there are some patterns that can be broken which can ameliorate symptoms of depression, identifying those ruts can be difficult and finding a different path can be almost impossible. Therapy can help considerably. Sometimes medication is needed, especially in extreme depression. But it always bothers me to hear people tell someone suffering from depression that they just need to choose to be happy or to do something they're passionate about to fix their mood. I've dealt with depression and I know the reality: listlessness, lack of energy, no enjoyment in anything (even things I once loved), sapped motivation, can't bear to be around people yet feel extremely lonely, unexpected anxiety when it feels unwarranted. The only thing that's allowed me to deal with it without resorting to therapy or chemical treatment has been the fact that I've lived with it since I was a teenager and out of necessity learned to accept that this is my personality — but if it ever gets significantly worse than it's been in the past I won't be able to ignore it. Fortunately for me, my depression is and has been pretty mild compared to what I see in many people. When I was younger, I seriously contemplated suicide. I'm not currently in that mindset, but that's what's so insidious about depression: at any moment I could spiral into a state of mind in which that seems like the perfect solution to end the continual strain of merely existing. I've heard and read about people with deep depression who one day seemed happy, joyful even, and those around them thought finally they were over their depression — but what really happened was that the depressed person decided to commit suicide and suddenly felt the weight lifted from their shoulders, because they could see the end to their anguish. I'm not a very strong person emotionally. When I see the pain others are in, so much more severe than what I deal with, and yet they manage to get up every morning and live their lives, I realize just how much strength and resolve they possess. They are so much more resilient than I am, than most people are, because they manage to get through life despite wanting constantly to give up.

0

Depression is a complex subject. As I understand it there are two types; 1. situational 2. chemical. Your definition of it as an infinite loop seems to fit the situational type. The chemistry of depression, I am undecided about. Certain chemicals can alter our moods but don't our moods also produce certain chemicals. My question is which is the cause and which is the effect? I have had only one bout with serious depression and I view it as situational, and it did contain that loop you mentioned. That loop was hard to break out of but I was eventually able to do it without medication. I would love to have an answer to my question about cause and effect from someone who really knows. If the loop causes the chemical imbalance then there is only one type of depression.

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I would add this. We CAN certainly work on our thought habits with positive effect. High on the list of helpful habits is to make peace with unpleasant emotions. Sadness, anger, boredom, disappointment, grief, and embarrassment are all normal, healthy emotions. They are potentially messagers trying to get us to pay attention to something important we should tend to. Healthy emotional life will have ups and downs. If we deny ourselves permission to feel bad sometimes, we are in denial, our emotional expression becomes distorted and dishonest, and we lose the ability to honestly process and work through those emotions. That means we can feel stuck in depression and not recognize what causal factors we even need to sort out. We can't connect the dots if we don't honestly acknowledge the real feelings in the first place. In short: do not try to "fix" depression by refusing to feel bad. Instead, acknowledge the feeling and start questioning the thoughts and beliefs we are focused on, with the aim of spotting and correcting distorted reasoning that may be piling on to depressive feelings.

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Yes.
No happiness no inspiration within the cycle.

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I've been there. Not my first choice of words, but it seems accurate. It's definitely not about "feeling a bit sad", as people seem to think it means.

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I work in psychiatry, and I scratch my head at that statement. It seems it can mean almost whatever one wants it to. Vague. Certainly, thoughts shape mood significantly, for better or worse. But thoughts don't exclusively create emotions. Conscious thoughts come from our frontal brain, evolutionarily the newest part. Our core emotion center is mid-brain, much more primitive and not entirely responsive to control by thoughts. Partially, yes, but not entirely. You can be depressed for no reason and despite having numerous positive things available to think about. Some depressed people can fix depression with cognitive coaching. Others flat out need antidepressant medications.

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...I’ve found it to be a spiraling case of caring less … as I’ll slog on through my propensity to ‘take on reality’ 😉 Don’t know that it’s situational or internal, but it’s sure fun to kick it’s butt - instead of the other way around ~

Varn Level 8 Dec 2, 2017
0

That is one possible scenario for the condition of a depressed person. It seems to be a negative feedback loop of feeling and thoughts that's hard to break out of. Yes, the loop has to be interrupted and positivity introduced, for the person to come out of a depression.

AMGT, my next question would be, what neurochemicals are produced that result in depression, and how are they produced?

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