I have some questions about depression and how to deal with someone who suffers from it. My mother suffers from serious depression. When I was a child I remember my mother being sick a lot. She always seemed to have a headache, or "just not feel well". And I never realized, until I was in my 20's that she was suffering from depression. About 10 yrs ago she was hospitalized and went through ECT treatments. She has been on multiple meds and she goes through good times, and bad. I spent the week with her on vacation. A part of me feels so sorry for her and a part of me wants to shake her and say "snap out of it". I know that you can't just "snap out of it". It is SO incredibly hard to watch this caring, sweet woman who has a wonderful family, a beautiful new town home near the beach, a husband of 45 plus years, and yet she is so unhappy. It breaks my heart. I feel sadness, and at the same time anger and frustration. She cries about her life. She has zero self-esteem. She thinks she is a failure. And there is nothing we (me and my family) can say that can change her thoughts. She has never had good, positive self-esteem. She sees a therapist, but it doesn't seem to help. She doesn't sleep all day, or not shower, or cry all the time-although I think if no one knew, that is what she would do.

Here are my questions. I know some of you here have mentioned depressed relatives, and if you are not comfortable discussing your personal relationships you can PM me or email me at jmariet70@comcast.net.

Do you feel depression is created by having low self-esteem, feelings of failure, etc. OR is the depression creating these ideas/feelings?

Have you seen or heard of any successful treatments/meds for depression?

Do you think that someone who is 67 yrs old can turn around and make major changes when it comes to depression?

How do you deal with your own feelings when it comes to loving someone with depression?

I get angry and short with her when she complains non-stop and won't listen to any suggestions. I feel very insensitive sometimes. Do you feel yourself getting this way and how do you deal with it?

My mom is a great person but has alienated so many family and friends because she can be a real downer. I don't want to end up being one more person who keeps their distance because she is like this but it is so incredibly hard sometimes. My sister, who happened to go with me on vacation, has zero tolerance and at times was nasty to my mom. I tried to stay neutral but it was hard. Because part of me felt the same way my sister did and part of me wanted to lash out at my sister for being so mean.

I dealt with some depression of my own when I went through my divorce. I took Zoloft for a year, decided I didn't want to be unhappy anymore, and picked myself up by the boot straps and moved on. I know it's not that easy for my mom and it is so sad for me to realize that every day is a struggle for her. I want her to experience true happiness, for once in her life.

I'd also like to ask you all to pray for her. I know that you are all a very caring, kind group and I don't normally like to air deep issues like this but I feel safe and comfortable posting this here.

Thanks for listening.

Jill

(I saw the post while we were on vacation, and didn't want to shortchange the answers--sorry I'm getting to this so late.)

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Do you feel depression is created by having low self-esteem, feelings of failure, etc. OR is the depression creating these ideas/feelings?

Chicken, meet egg. Egg, chicken. In my case, it's a vicious cycle. It's a whirlpool that sucks me down. I believe that my worst episode (10 years ago now) was a perfect storm of events--I didn't like my job, I was relentlessly harrassed by a co-worker who thought I stole her man, my boyfriend was a jerk, I was far away from home, I had no one to talk to about my loneliness, and it is DARK in Minnesota in the winter. All of those contributed to the onset of depression, which magnified everything terrible in my life and paralyzed me with doubt. So I figured if I was stupid enough to have a terrible job, co-workers who hated me, a jerk boyfriend, was lonely, and had CHOSEN to move, it was my fault anyway. See the cycle?

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Have you seen or heard of any successful treatments/meds for depression?

A few drugs made me functional, but not "better." Denise's rant about 13 hours a day? Makes me laugh, because I AM that sleeper. My best success has come from cognitive therapy--it's been over a year of it now. People get physical therapy for broken body parts, and I get mental therapy for my less-than-helpful mindworks.

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Do you think that someone who is 67 yrs old can turn around and make major changes when it comes to depression?

I think it depends on the person and his or her motivation, abilities, and resources.

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I get angry and short with her when she complains non-stop and won't listen to any suggestions. I feel very insensitive sometimes. Do you feel yourself getting this way and how do you deal with it?

After therapy, I can "see" where some of my thought processes come from when I'm around mom & dad. They're good people who love me. But I do tell them, from time to time, "Dad, that's not helpful, and if I consider that, I'll feel worse" or "Mom, it's not something I can control, so I'm not going to worry about it. You worrying about it isn't helping me, either."
The boyfriend used to look at me while I was in a tailspin and tell me that I was wrong--and if I didn't believe him (that I was pretty, or smart, or worthy of affection), I was telling him he was wrong. I hadn't thought of it that way previously.

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I want her to experience true happiness, for once in her life.

Have you expressed this to her? Something like, "Mom, I know you're hurting. I want you to be happy, and I am willing to help you because I love you." It might sound hokey, but a true expression of unconditional love sure feels good to someone who finds themself unworthy of love.

And Denise is right. I did say depression is selfish. It is. Everything IS about the depressed person, because the pain inside makes it so tremendously hard to focus on anything outside. It's not deliberately selfish, but it did do wonders for me to have pointed out how it was affecting people around me and to put some focus outward.

I bet your mom loves it when you all come to visit, because it allows her to focus outside herself for a short while. You should not and cannot be her sole outside focus, though--that's an unfair burden to place on anyone. But I hope you'll take a minute to acknowledge what an understanding, loving daughter you're being and give yourself a lot of credit for that.

Lots of good input so far.

I'll just add that your gp should have some resoures available locally.

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Originally posted by GoingSkiing:
I know that she had ECT maybe 8 or 10 years ago... and I think that she thought that it helped. It isn't a therapy out of the dark ages or lobotomy or something. It has a bad reputation, but I think that it does help some people.

I just saw a story on MSN this week about ECT actually being quite an effective treatment for depression but it has such a poor history that many doctors will not even bring it up with patients as a possible treatment option.

PS... a friend of mine just had this book published.

Writing Through the Darkness: Easing Your Depression With Paper and Pen

I know that she had ECT maybe 8 or 10 years ago... and I think that she thought that it helped. It isn't a therapy out of the dark ages or lobotomy or something. It has a bad reputation, but I think that it does help some people.

I haven't read the book... but I've been to a couple of workshops with her and she is good at leading them...

I dealt with some depression of my own when I went through my divorce. I took Zoloft for a year, decided I didn't want to be unhappy anymore, and picked myself up by the boot straps and moved on

I think that is different than you described your mom… You and I went thru the same kind of depression… I think one therapist referred to it as “situational”. We got thru a situation or time period and get depressed… but eventually the situation resolves itself or we move on we are no longer depressed.

Maybe a financial analogy might be that a person gets laid off and has a really rough year or two financially, but then gets a new job and recovers. That is different from a life time of grinding poverty that is not so easy to recover from.

My dh has the lifetime kind… although he goes thru better periods and worse periods…

Do you feel depression is created by having low self-esteem, feelings of failure, etc. OR is the depression creating these ideas/feelings?

No… but for some people it might be a chicken and egg kind of thing. I wouldn’t say that my depression was caused by low self esteem… my was caused by a really sucky situation. I wouldn’t even say that my dh has low self esteem… I think that every person is different. I think that maybe it is possible to have low self esteem… and not be depressed. And visa versa to be depressed… but not necessarily have terrible image or esteem issues.

Have you seen or heard of any successful treatments/meds for depression?

My dh has done well with a cocktail of drugs and talk therapy. I think that he needs both the drugs and the counseling. He had to try several kinds of drugs and combinations and dosages and that was really stressful… The drugs help… and in his case the therapy helps him actually TAKE the drugs as prescribed. When he doesn’t do the talk therapy… he can get some wacky ideas of his own about which drugs are working and the dosages and such… which makes things much worse.

Also, one bad thing is that my dh doesn’t always follow his therapist’s suggestion of ways to be proactive (like exercise, eating better, etc.) Sometimes I get frustrated because he could be doing more to help himself… but doesn’t… but that kind of sums up the disease… if he COULD do more… he would… but he can’t.

How do you deal with your own feelings when it comes to loving someone with depression?
I get angry and short with her when she complains non-stop and won't listen to any suggestions. I feel very insensitive sometimes. Do you feel yourself getting this way and how do you deal with it?

Absolutely. Diana posted something to me once that really helped. Depression is a really selfish disease. I thought that summed it up pretty well. Of course, when I was having a conversation with dh and I said that… he got VERY offended at being called “selfish”. But it is kind of true, that his world often revolves around him… and his thoughts and feelings… and in the case of my dh his tiredness… and his problems and worries.

In the case of my dh… when he is doing really well… his worst depression thing is that he just sleeps a LOT. When he is doing well… he sleeps 11 hours on weekdays and 12-13+ hours on weekends. When he is doing well… he isn’t as self centered… but still spends a LOT of time in bed (which bugs the crap out of me). When he is not doing well, he pretty much goes to work… and is in bed the rest of the time… and is very obsessed with his own thoughts and feelings. And during a time when he was at his worst, I REALLY worried that he was going to become non-functional and might get laid off. He pulled it together to make it to work most days… and I think that doing that TOTALLY exhausted him… and they got the best of him… and we, at home, got the leftovers… and he would fall apart really bad at home… because he could, and it was safe to do so. But fortunately, I’ve only seen him this bad for one year, out of the 22 years I’ve known him. A friend told me that is unusual, and that it is more common for a person to relapse more often than that.

I do the best I can to deal with it by taking care of myself. And realistically ANY person I’m going to be married to is going to have problems and habits or personality traits that would just bug the crap out of me… so to a certain extent, I can accept it as part of the normal give and take of a relationship. I have things that I do that bug the crap out of him (I know, hard to believe, isn’t it?)

Sometimes I set about changing him or curing him… but realistically that ain’t going to happen. I can communicate with him… and I can remind him to keep his therapist appointments… and I can get him to communicate with me. For example, just him saying to me, “I’m getting up at 9:30...” really helps a lot.

But honestly, I sometimes want to take a box of alarm clocks and throw them at his head once at a time and scream, “Get the *%$#* up already, you’ve been in bed for 15 hours now… how the hell can you still be tired??? What the *#%$* is wrong with you?!?!?!?! Snap out of it and GET UP!!!!”. I know that is sort of irrational… but I think that it is very normal to be frustrated and angry sometimes. Once in a while… like a couple of times a year… I lose it and scream at him (without the cussing or the box of alarm clocks).

But mostly, I take care of ME… and have done the best job that I can do to learn to deal with stress in a HEALTHY way (since we don’t need two of us coping in a dysfunctional way). And I do the best job I can to keep MY self esteem up and not take the times when he is a little too self centered personally.

I'd also like to ask you all to pray for her. I know that you are all a very caring, kind group and I don't normally like to air deep issues like this but I feel safe and comfortable posting this here.

Will do… and will throw in some prayer for you and your family, too… as it is hard on the whole family.

It sounds like your mom has been through a lot in attempting to "cure" her depression. She should be commended and applauded for that. I am guessing that if she has been married for 45 years, she went through her treatments in the 50's...and that was the cure all for depression and any other ailment in women at that time ECT ---electro-conductive therapy. Try sticking your finger in a light socket, and see what happens, imagine volts higher than that pulsating through your brain, and they thought that would cure anything...I fail to see it, but that's me.

Anyway, I have lived with chronic long term clinical depression for over 25 years, I am 56.
This is what is sounds as if your mother has. It is an imbalance in your brain of the horomones and chemicals that help us live. It is, as you said, not something that you can "snap out of", and applause to you for realizing that. The meds she takes most likely help balance out those horomones, seratonin, etc in her brain and allow for functioning in her daily life. But yes, you are going to get break throughs where she will feel depressed, can she help it, some what, but not totally. Some of it, you just have to live through and use skills to pull yourself through.
Now in answer to your questions, remember I'm not a doc, just a person who has depression, and doing the best I can:

quote:

Do you feel depression is created by having low self-esteem, feelings of failure, etc. OR is the depression creating these ideas/feelings? To me some depression, as in your divorce etc , are caused by low self esteem, events that happen in our lives. But what you are talking about with your mom is a brain disorder, and isn't the same. Depression and your feelings can cause you to feel "less than" others, because you really can't explain what's happening with you, if you don't understand it yourself. Docs typically will prescribe the same meds for people with long term depression and event depression, the difference is the length of time you are on them.

Have you seen or heard of any successful treatments/meds for depression? Your mother is functioning, right? She is dressing herself, feeding herself, interacting with people, has raised two children that you spoke of, has a 45 year marriage, has she not been successful in life? I think her treatment would be called successful. What don't you think is successful? What kind of success do you want for her? Not to be sad? Me, too. There's a lot of meds and treatments out there, if she is unhappy with her life, she needs to investigate them. But to my thinking, hey, she is a very successful woman.

Do you think that someone who is 67 yrs old can turn around and make major changes when it comes to depression? Does she think she needs to make changes? Or do you want her to? Just like with our weight, you can't make someone want something for themselves. I hope I don't sound mean here, but as I said, she sounds pretty successful in life right now...but it is hard to love someone like a mother, and watch them hurt. We have to just love them for what and where they are, like we do with our own children, like they did for us.

How do you deal with your own feelings when it comes to loving someone with depression? My father, was (is) suffering from depression for most of his life, I believe. Do I love him less, no, I love him more for working through it, on bad days and being a great dad on good days. Sure, I get impatient with him, cross, etc., but then I don't think that is any different than any other adult child. I realize that these are MY feelings, and I own them. He might be very happy and satisfied with his life, and if he is, YIPEE, if not, well, I'll do what I can to help him. But you might want to look at where those feelings are coming from and what is causing them....you or her?

I get angry and short with her when she complains non-stop and won't listen to any suggestions. I feel very insensitive sometimes. Do you feel yourself getting this way and how do you deal with it?

Own your feelings. You can't fix it. You just can't. And that is a hard thing to understand, depression can't be fixed by anyone, especially if it's a chemical imbalance. You continue to suggest, knowing and understanding that she may not do a thing you said. You are going to be bitter, own those feelings. You might be very angry , but those are your feelings. When that happens; walk away and gather yourself together. Do you love her, I'd say a BIG yes to that one, otherwise you wouldn't have shared it with us. Then you might want to think about just letting her be, unless it gets worse with age, and then suggest that maybe a visit to the doc is in order. But otherwise, all you can do is love her, help her as she will accept, and then work on your own feelings. You are being a great daughter. Not many would share what you have shared and go on a vacation with someone who has a clinical disease, and then still love that person.

Please do yourself one more favor, check out depression on the NAMI site. It's the national association for the mentally ill and their families. They have some very sound information and help lines there. You might find some more things to help you walk with your mother.

Good luck!

Cathy J

Big hugs to you Jill. I don't have any first hand family experience but I did do work while in college for the NIMH. My understand is that clinical depression is caused by a neurochemical imbalance so I think that the depression causes the feelings of low self-esteem, feelings of failure, etc...

Are their support groups in your area for family members dealing with a loved one with depression?

Oh, Jill, I'm so sorry. I have not had anyone that close to me suffer for a long time. Have had good friends and myself but treatment was effective for us. I think it's super hard to deal with when the treatment isn't working for your loved one and for me at least, the whole idea that I've had to cope with in the last year or so with helping parents with their health issues is a whole new world that I never imagined could be so hard, awkward and sometimes nearly impossible to deal with.

I will say I have a pretty close friend that is in her 60's and she has been on and off the antidepressants the entire 15+ years I've known her. The last time she was off was pretty awful and I just kept trying to assure her that it was OK to take the meds. If she had diabetes, she'd take meds. The clinical depression wasn't any different. She really held out for a looooong time and I was far away so I'm sure it would've been much harder if we'd been spending more time together. She has been so much better and I really think she can see it this time. She still talks about wishing she didn't have to take them. They really 'flatten' her moods. She's not so down but she's also not as up as she would be normally. It seems to me that it is not so extreme this time and they seem to have the meds ironed out.

Hang in there. Try to remember you can't change her behavior, only your reaction to it. Try not to be hard on yourself when you get frustrated. My Dad has some pretty bad hearing loss and it gets frustrating and I am always surprised by how angry I feel. It's totally not his fault but that doesn't lessen my frustration and that sometimes comes out angry. Poor guy...I always wondered what my Mom's 'problem' was with his hearing. Now I know!

Hugs!

Peg