Motorcycling can do this too. I've ridden with quite a few people who get depressed if they can't ride.
I suppose for the same reason as is speculated in the article; you can only focus on the moment when you're on a bike.
Sky Diving Cured My Depression
21–30 of 70 posts
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#22To me (IANA...) this reads like 'Sky Diving relieved my anxiety which cause(s/d) my depression'.
... which is compatible with the recent understanding that depression is (usually?) the result of being worn out by chronic stress.
Worth remembering that it's not always true - some people have genetic predispositions if I'm not mistaken.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#23I'd love to see a clinical trial on this. What's a suitable placebo for jumping out of a plane, I wonder?
"There has never been a double blind test on the efficacy of parachutes!" -Internet Scientist Not sure I'd trust a parachute without proper testing.
We have some retrospective research though, although I'm not sure the causation was shown, not just correlation.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#24I'm not a fan of the clickbait title here. It trivializes depression. I think the only cure for depression is death. Too morbid? You manage depression with behavior and therapy. You can attempt to treat some of the symptoms with drugs. You can break out of a rut by trying new things. But curing depression... like once and for all? That's not realistic. "Sky diving helped me get out of a depressive episode," or "Skydi…
Depends on a source of depression - some people may have genetic issues with serotonin path (just like ADHD people have with dopamine, or diabetics with insulin). Fortunately anti-depressants help out with this.
There is a nice book, "Listening to prozac", written by a psychiatrist who originally believed everything can be cured by therapy, but finally admitted that some people need to stay on anti-depressants for the whole life, since the source of their depression is neurologic.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#25I find flying little airplanes has a meditative element. One does not ruminate idly while flying, but is effortlessly focused on aviating, navigating, and monitoring in the here and now. Very calming.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#26To me (IANA...) this reads like 'Sky Diving relieved my anxiety which cause(s/d) my depression'.
... which is compatible with the recent understanding that depression is (usually?) the result of being worn out by chronic stress.
I'm not arguing that is bad. Just pointing out that for non-anxiety (I think anxiety and stress are still something different) related depressions this might not help.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#27Definitely, would do it regularly if not for my daughter. Cheapest therapy ever, ~$200. Everything in life gets the reset button. Just so happy to be ALIVE. I kissed the ground on my return, haha. A friend asked how long it lasts, personally was about two months, but there are still residual effects years later.
The article describes me. Your comment too.
As to the article: I found my cure with skydiving, the complete and utter helplessness and giving in to the powers that be made me loose my depressing desire to (believe that I can) exercise control over everything, which would never really work, which would make me feel inadequate, which fueled my depression, which let to less power to control, which... you get the idea.
While skydiving I know I've given up control (on a controlled moment) and that helps me deal with other moments where I observe that same loss.
As to your comment: Since I have kids, I do not feel I can risk my own live as much since they somewhat depend on me and I owe them my presence. Thus I stopped doing it regularly (once a month) and now only do it when I need it (once a every year up to once every 5 years). That's "how long it lasts" for me.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#28Motorcycling can do this too. I've ridden with quite a few people who get depressed if they can't ride.
I'm not a speed demon, I wear reasonable motorcycle gear, and I don't do anything for the sake of danger/thrillseeking.
But getting back in the saddle last year after a long hiatus and using it as my primary means of transport has done wonders for my state of mind. (And my wallet for that matter, which relieves stress, which then comes around to state of mind again.)
I've got more than enough storage to go grocery shopping, I've got music through my helmet (Sena doesn't have much competition, but I don't have many complaints) and I've got nice warm clothes so cold is not an issue.
I do miss it on days when there's snow on the ground or low visibility, but around here that doesn't last more than a few days, a week at most.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#29I wonder what gives you grater chance of dying, depression or skydiving?
Purely on gut instinct I'd put my money on depression.
Re: Sky Diving Cured My Depression
#30I'm not a fan of the clickbait title here. It trivializes depression. I think the only cure for depression is death. Too morbid? You manage depression with behavior and therapy. You can attempt to treat some of the symptoms with drugs. You can break out of a rut by trying new things. But curing depression... like once and for all? That's not realistic. "Sky diving helped me get out of a depressive episode," or "Skydi…
If you take a different perspective, the point isn't to see a one-time treatment that cures an illness, the same way you would with medication and surgery. In that sense death is a cure for anything and it's a total cop-out.
I've made two attempts on my own life in the past decade and I'm incredibly grateful that I didn't get the realistic 'cure' I was looking for in those brief moments; in fact it could barely be considered a cure at all, especially if you believe in things such as karma and reincarnation (and this is true for many folk).
Acceptance gives you the opportunity to enjoy your life while still being aware that there are times and situations where you really struggle and you've got to take care of yourself through them. You can take various steps to pull yourself out of the rabbit hole, even if only for a while, and get a better understanding of how you can manage your triggers or become more resilient to them. It might be a lifelong struggle, or you become resilient enough that you can deal with the dark moments really well or even sidestep them entirely by noticing certain feelings coming up. This means you still feel like a human being with a full spectrum of emotions without having them medicated or repressed out of existence.
The key thing in stories like these is that often the person suffering the depression (or similar mental illness) is motivated to do something they would never have thought of before (or been too afraid of). It's not really staving anything off because if you reframe it, what you're seeing are these creative, beautiful and inspired acts to embrace life like they never did before. Travelling, skydiving, adventure, art, music, going to the cinema alone, meditating, volunteering...
These remedies are otherwise known as 'being alive' and they're an incredible reaction to the often temporary desire to shuffle off the mortal coil. And what's better is that you can very easily enrich the lives of others as well as your own in the process, no matter what darkness is lurking deep inside you. If, with your depression or your mental trauma, you manage to live a full life anyway, then wasn't that as good as a cure, if not better? It's even better than managing it.
This is just how it feels for me anyway; I've been dealing with complex PTSD for a long time and, in the most twisted way, I can say that my life became far more enriched through my efforts to work through that. In that sense I think seeing death as the only cure is an insane trivialization of the matter.