Hey Kali, welcome to the group. i hope you find what you are looking for here. this is a good site. i have found it to be very helpful. good luck Kali. take care.Kat

Hi Kali, I just wanted to join your fellow members in welcoming you to the site. We hope that you find the new program here helpful. Please let us know if you have any questions about the site. We can be reached at support@depressioncenter.net We look forward to hearing from you again soon. Casey __________________________________ The Depression Center Support Team

Hi Kali and welcome to the Support Group. I am sure you will find it and the program helpful. I was very interested in your comments about being "very nervous about getting better" and using "...depression as something of a badge or crutch...". I think in some ways I feel this about myself as well. There is nothing really wrong in having these feelings because if you are aware of them you can take them into account and work out what you gain and lose by being as you are, and what you might gain and might lose by "getting better". You would then be in a position to "negotiate" as it were between all these different competing concerns. If you "lost" something by giving up being depressed could you in fact get it back in a different way when you were "better"? I don't think I'm explaining this very well, but I think it's really important! To give an example, suppose someone is overweight because they "comfort eat". This of course can have adverse consequences on their health, but it satisfies their need for comfort. If they then go on a diet what happens to their need for comfort? If this is not addressed the diet is unlikely to work. What they need is a better way of getting comfort so that they no longer need to get it from overeating. It is strange isn't it? On the one hand it's undoubtedly a question of real human suffering, doctors, tablets, therapists etc, and on the other hand the strange form of comfort that there can sometimes be in such misery! I think it can be even harder for people who have been "ill" for many, many years and in a way have "accepted" that they will always be like this. The medical profession often doesn't offer any hope, merely a list as long as your arm of "disorders" the person is supposed to have, and an equally long list of medications to supposedly "treat" them. Sorry, I don't mean to create any more doom and gloom than we already feel, but there are no easy answers and certainly no one can answer for anyone else. It does seem however that you have the self awareness, and I hope that I and others have it as well, to really think about these things in an intensely practical way as far as your individual circumstances are concerned. I think I would certainly like to get better but working it all out and get

Kali, Welcome. I hope that you find this program useful. I am just half-way through the program and I have found it very useful. The community of people bring a wealth of knowledge and experience to the site. In regards to meds, I found that anti-depressants didn't work for me, but anti-psychotic drugs did. With all medication it is trial and error and don't give up. Take care, Sharon

Hi, I sort of stumbled on this program. I was looking for some more "solid" type of self-help for my depression. I have been depressed off and on for a long time, and I am quite tired of it. My doctor has diagnosed me as depressed, and had prescribed anti-depressants for me at one point. I had serious negative effects from them, so I am leery of drugs now. I would prefer to change the behaviours at the root of the problem rather than just medicate them. Anyway, not much by way of intro, but there you have it. One other thing I would like to mention, I am very nervous about getting better, because I think in a lot of ways I use depression as something of a badge or crutch depending on the situation. Anyone else think like that? K