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Tips for the depressed

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Re: Tips for the depressed

#151

Post by haebou »

frausto wrote: post #85
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #3

One of the biggest force multipliers in overcoming depression is accepting that you can modulate your condition by taking small, deliberate actions. It's also one of the most difficult and delicate ideas to communicate to a depressed person. Depression notoriously clouds peoples' judgment and makes simple tasks seem impossible. Depression also encourages a lot of binary thinking, where people tend to give up because…

I've struggled with this quite a bit in my own life. I find the "No Zero" mentality to work well for me. Treat every weekday as a "No Zero" day. What does that mean? It means if my goal is to go to the gym, even if I literally walk into the gym, do a pushup, and leave, that counts. It's more than Zero. Consistent non-zero days eventually help break me out of my depression. And when I miss a day... well forgive myself…

I would have responded with exactly this -- the post that you linked. The four points that the author makes really make a difference if you can internalize them.

Re: Tips for the depressed

#152

Post by cheeko1234 »

syndacks wrote: post #61
ditonal wrote: post #19

I largely agree with all the advice here. I dropped out of college due to depression, then I torched my tech career with a manic episode that led me straight from a FAANG SWE job to an involuntary psych ward patient for a month, which was followed by a half year brutal depression. I’ve done a lot of research and I think psychiatry is pseudoscience and antidepressants are largely placebo. I’m really on the mindfulness…

>I’ve done a lot of research and I think psychiatry is pseudoscience and antidepressants are largely placebo. Care to link any of them? I have a hard time believing they are placebo, as they fundamentally alter neurochemistry.

The book Lost Connections goes in-depth into this.

https://www.amazon.com/Lost-Connections-Uncovering-Depressio...

Re: Tips for the depressed

#153

Post by afiori »

allendoerfer wrote: post #21
pmoriarty wrote: post #15

Things that help me when I feel depressed: - Listening to upbeat, energetic music and avoiding depressing music, which tends to make me feel worse - Walking outside on a clear, sunny day - Eating my favorite food - Playing a good game to get my mind off whatever it is that I'm obsessing about - If I am able to concentrate, reading something by a favorite author, listening to a good podcast, or watching a non-depressi…

When you are actually depressed and not just feel a bit down, those things seem unreachable.

my uninformed opinion on this is that there are countless way to suggest the same thing and maybe one will resonate with you. this would become a motivation to offer earnest advice and be prepared that likely you will not be that magic person.

in this sense advices like "just do X" are useless, while advices like the one above are not.

for sure serious depression is very unlikely to be treated that way, but for every case of clinical depression there are many less critical ones.

Re: Tips for the depressed

#154

Post by jlangemeier »

MegaButts wrote: post #144
jlangemeier wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ehhhhhhh... And google swings... and it misses... There are two somewhat competing studies involved in what you linked. The original meta-analysis is stating that "[a]ll antidepressants were more efficacious than placebo in adults with major depressive disorder." And if you dig into that study, the level of effectiveness varies, but is consistently above a placebo. The other, states that the original meta-analysis mi…

I agree with everything you said, and was merely pointing out the evidence is far from overwhelming (or even conclusive, in my opinion). If we're going to talk about making dangerous statements, mentioning that antidepressants are effective while ignoring the fact they increase suicide for some people seems a lot more reckless to me. Of course, you don't know if they will do that until after you are already taking th…

I really like the article you linked; I also found it interesting at the end of it:

  "It is absurd to use drugs for depression that increase the risk of suicide and homicide when we know that cognitive behavioural therapy can halve the risk of suicide in patients who have been admitted after a suicide attempt and when psychotherapy does not increase the risk of murder."
And I think it really speaks to the need to have professionals that aren't just throwing folks on drugs and sending them off. A whole form approach to mental health is needed, where a combination of various forms of therapy may be the best way to help an individual; since pretty much every study can agree that the efficacy essentially comes down to the individual level.

For my ADHD, anxiety, and depression I don't take anything (currently), but I do regularly see a therapist with whom I work through issues I'm having and how to combat them, as well as how to reinforce my successes. This isn't to say that at specific times I haven't tried different pharmacology to combat one or all of these issues; but at this time, the most effective thing __for_me__ has been basic therapy.

This isn't to say that what has worked for me will work for others, but at its most basic, finding a professional that is willing to really dig into what's going on is extremely important, as they will be able to work with the individual to figure out not only what's going on, but even what the goals are and whether they are even achievable goals (elimination of symptoms, management, setting new normal habits, etc. etc. etc).

And that's why I get frustrated with fluff journalism around much deeper studies, they can convince people that an entire system and industry is a bunch of quacks that shouldn't be taken seriously; is the person that's doing self-study going to dig into what it means for a study to show bias or the effect size or the sample size; or whether it's a direct study or a meta-analysis; or what the type of statistical analysis was used (were they using teeming or densification methods for gaps in data, was it a regression analysis, if so was it linear, bilinear, quadratic, etc); I could keep going on... or are they going to just read a couple of journalism pieces and call it a day.

This isn't to say I don't love medium-science (not hard, not soft) journalism; I love Quanta and the pieces they put out about science and math concepts, but if I want to dig deeper I will look up the pub or pre-pub information from the details they're covering; I would hope that someone that's doing self-study would do the same with medium-science medical journalism, but I can't ever guarantee that.

Re: Tips for the depressed

#155

Post by starpilot »

throwddd wrote: post #116

As Tianeptine wasn't mentioned: it did help me, took it for 7 months (Coaxil, 3x12mg/day), no side effects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tianeptine

There's a dead comment mentioning it's addictive potential. This is no joke, there's /r/QuittingTianeptine. There used to be a subreddit for sourcing tianeptine (closed down I think) and the desperation in some of the posts was scary.

Re: Tips for the depressed

#156

Post by derekp7 »

ThrowawayP wrote: post #86
derekp7 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For that matter, is there a link between depression and feeling overwhelmed with tasks all the time? Does one cause the other, is it a two way feedback loop, or is there sometimes a separate common cause?

> " For that matter, is there a link between depression and feeling overwhelmed with tasks all the time? " If you're talking about work tasks, that seems more likely to be from occupational burnout. Here's a comparison chart that might be helpful: https://mdedge-files-live.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/files/s...

I'm talking about both work tasks, and personal. Surprisingly I can get through assigned work tasks typically without issue. It is the tasks that I set out for myself that I have a problem with. Which fits in with why I'm primarily in a systems administration / engineering role -- I can pull on my decades of experience to solve tasks readily, however whenever I have to do a programming / design related task (which I can be fairly good at), I can't pull that off consistently. I can only do that if it is an area I'm not familiar enough with, where I can trick myself into thinking that it isn't that big of a project. But if I end up going down the wrong path and have to start over, then I fall apart and can't even think about working on it anymore. Or if I get a basic system developed (MVP), I find it difficult to work on improvements because the list of things I can do is never ending.

For my non-work related projects (open source software, home system builds, woodworking, 3D modeling) I wish I could hire a project manager to oversee my work on them. (would that be a variation of hiring a life coach?)

Re: Tips for the depressed

#157

Post by steveklabnik »

PeterStuer wrote: post #106

How do you report things on HN? This may be the wildest inaccurate information I have ever seen pass here. I have suffered depression, and nearly all of the points mentioned in the article except for some trivialities are completely of the mark.

> How do you report things on HN?

Users with enough karma can click "flag," or you can email hn@ycombinator.com

Re: Tips for the depressed

#158

Post by dillondoyle »

ditonal wrote: post #19

I largely agree with all the advice here. I dropped out of college due to depression, then I torched my tech career with a manic episode that led me straight from a FAANG SWE job to an involuntary psych ward patient for a month, which was followed by a half year brutal depression. I’ve done a lot of research and I think psychiatry is pseudoscience and antidepressants are largely placebo. I’m really on the mindfulness…

This is dangerous. Sure criticize for-profit pharma but it will cause harm to tell others who are struggling to ignore the huge of amount of research on different pharmacological treatments that are over and over again proven to be more effective than placebo.

The meds I'm on have no profit built in. It's like $8 for 90 day supply. The research shows it's so effective that it even lifts mood/energy/sociability for non-diagnosed mood disorder patients (without giving away too much personal detail it was originally an effective treatment for something unrelated to mental health).

If anything these 'change your attitude' or 'tips' kind of articles get under my skin a bit. For many changing habits can be helpful, especially CBT with professional guidance, but for many actual major depressive disorder patients no amount of habit or behavior changes will have meaningful effect without actual medicine.

Re: Tips for the depressed

#160

Post by Jare »

uoaei wrote: post #125
Jare wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And every step is the first since the last one.

That sounds inspirational but it just comes across as daunting/insurmountable to those who haven't gotten used to the idea of taking that first step.

I meant it as factual rather than inspirational. It is daunting for sure, but every person in this journey will find out about it as soon as they take that first step. And most people around will not understand, and will not be able to help and support appropriately without that understanding.
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