Depression affects people in many different ways. From a personal note it affects my sleep patterns and makes the smallest things irritate me. I have even been sick in the morning after spending the night worrying about my present situation.
Most of the time I am not so much depressed at what is happening now but am fearing what might happen in the future. This fear may be about financial matters, a social occasion, health or about my family.
I had basically had enough of constantly being depressed, about being in fear of the future and needed to learn about how to control my depression.
After seeking inspiration from a variety of sources, I had what I hoped was enough ammunition to keep my fears and phobias at bay. I will at times have an off day where I feel quite low and this is where I use my new found knowledge.
How to control your depression
I am a very quiet person and I like to keep myself to myself. Some would say that I border on being a loner, which I would quite agree with. Too many people have hurt me throughout my life and to tell you the truth I prefer being on my own. I am not a peoples person.
I also like to keep my problems to myself. This was my biggest failure, what I needed to do was to talk through my problems and fears with somebody else, a member of my family for example.
This was not easy for me to do and it took a great deal of courage to talk to anybody about the areas of my life which made me feel depressed. I did however go down this route and it did have a positive effect. To talk about my problems was like taking a weight off my shoulders.
The person I confided in was my father. He listened and then came back with some superb advice and a couple of suggestions of what I could do.
This is my second piece of advice. We need to spend less time worrying and more time seeking solutions to our problems. We need to ask ourselves why we are depressed and what can help us to remedy our issues.
My father also stated that I should only do things and go to places that I wanted to. I have always found it hard to turn down invitations to for example a party and have found myself often somewhere that I do not in reality want to be.
He also told me about one of his friends. His name was Mike and he had just been diagnosed with cancer. The doctors had told Mike that he only has a maximum of six months to live and he is only fifty-nine. He asked me to imagine how he must be feeling.
I went home and thought about Mike, I was sure that he would love to swap shoes with me. It is not just about Mike, he has a wife and three children, what must they be going through. I started to appreciate my own health and that of my family a bit more.
By opening up and talking about why I was depressed was the best thing I ever did and is something I will continue to do. My dad certainly helped me to think in a more positive way.
This advice I am sure will not help every person who is depressed as depression is an illness. It has however helped me and I am hoping it will be of benefit to others.
