/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.2891359]

/lit/, what do you do when you're utterly depressed?I don't mean like just feeling down. I mean feeling utterly discouraged, no longer having any ambition due to (at least in part) overwhelming discouragement, and feeling like every minute is a painful hour.

[Anonymous No.2891366]

I go to my therapist and make an effort to discover why that feeling occurs me. This action is often enough for me to get out of the bottom of the pit, even though I'm far from the top.

And believe me, I know what you mean.

[Anonymous No.2891365]

i see a therapist, bro.

[Anonymous No.2891368]

>>2891365
This. You don't want to end up like the guy in the photo.

[Anonymous No.2891380]

that guy has juciy balls
would suck

[Anonymous No.2891405]

I was that way once. Quit my job, slowly ran out of all my savings and eventually my car was repoed. The only thing that kept me from ending it was the fear that I'd mess it up and not lose my life but rather end up a paraplegic or worse.

Finally my mom offered to help me. She paid my bills while I took care of her during a hysterectomy. Helping someone else pulled me out of my funk enough to research depression. I found out it was one of the most common problems in the 1st world and is also the one that goes the most untreated. I learned more about what causes it and how to get help. For me the doctor gave me Zoloft and after a single bottle I was able to get my head straight enough that I've been Med and thoughts of suicide free for over 8 years now. I'm not saying this is an a typical story for everyone nor am I saying I've not had bad days. But I am saying I hope you get some help OP, cause it doesn't have to be like this.

[Anonymous No.2891408]

really, you guys think op should see a therapist? not op btw, just some faggot who also feels kinda depressed and never in the mood to read anything anymore

I used to read a lot, now i left college and I just don't feel like fucking doing anything, not to be an attention whore but I have started to ponder the pros and cons of suicide and honestly i don't really see myself living another 20 or 40 years (i'm 24 btw)
tl;dr therapist yes/no? kthx

Also to make this /lit/ related, the last book I read was Pride and Prejudice and I didn't like it, too much girl romance crap

[Anonymous No.2891413]

How can you maintain that outlook when there's so much empirical evidence to the contrary?

[Anonymous No.2891426]

>>2891405
>I found out it was one of the most common problems in the 1st world

why is that?

[Anonymous No.2891429]

Funny thing for me was prior to my depression I was a pretty happy dude. Then some shit started happening that began to take its toll. Women problems, religion problems, job stress, roommates who were freeloading ass hats. I saw the train coming and went to see a doc to get a recommendation for a therapist. He was like "yeah, we can send you to someone to talk about your faggy feelings but Drugs are best".

My family has some serious drug abuse problems so I didn't really like his suggestion and never got the prescription he wrote for me. The irony was it was a prescription for Zoloft which is what eventually helped me get out of the depression all those years later after my life had fallen apart. I was 26 when this all happened to me.

I got a great wife and two awesome sons now. Life is pretty good now.

[Anonymous No.2891442]

I usually listen to music and wait for the day to end.

[Anonymous No.2891443]

I read and write.

[Anonymous No.2891445]

Posting because I just left my PhD program in clinical psych, where I was researching chronic depression, because -- guess what -- I became depressed. Now I sit around all day on the computer, take drugs, don't pay the bills and will probably get evicted in within the next month.

Yeah, this shit sucks

[Anonymous No.2891448]

Music, jot in my journal until I find the source of the problem. try to change my mood manually.

[Anonymous No.2891450]

>>2891426

I'm no psychologist, but my suspicion is we aren't chased by any lions. All our stresses are pure crap (oh no my boss is on my ass. Oh no my friends think I'm a fag cause I am an adult who likes Pokimon. Oh no I haven't been successful enough and I'm 40.)

Its like Taylor Durdin said, we work to hard for things we don't need and endlessly pursue pleasure. My suspicion is our animal brains burn through our serotonin supply to fast and without any real dangers to keep us focused on what is important our chemical balance gets all out of wack. Again I'm no expert so this is just my own idiot conclusions. But my way of dealing with it has been to try no to be too extreme, emotionally. Not always happy not let stupid shit get to me. Because all those feels you have, that shit is chemicals in your brain burning away. I just don't thing the physiology of man kind is very well suited to modern life so we gotta try to "feel" more like our ancestors did when they had to farm/hunt all day and occasionally fend off predators or enemy armies.

[Anonymous No.2891461]

Bros.

I cannot communicate to you how much I needed to see this thread, in /lit/ of all places.

OP, I turned to books once my depression has gotten to the point it is now. in the last week I've read The Bell Jar, Notes From the Underground, Metamorphosis, and am about to work through Beyond Good and Evil. And let me tell you, OP, I could feel exactly why Sylvia Plath did what she did. The same thing you and I are contemplating.

Obviously these books aren't helping my mood or my situation, but I felt as though I could relate in some way to these pitiful stories. I'm going to get help soon. I'm scared to know what will happen if I don't. And I think you need to get up in the morning and call until you can get an appointment with a therapist. I will if you will.

[Anonymous No.2891467]

>>2891450
>Because all those feels you have, that shit is chemicals in your brain burning away.

Oh really thanks for making my depression worse.

I'd love to slit your throat.

[Anonymous No.2891473]

>>2891467

He's technically right, which is why medication works quite a bit, but it is by no means the comprehensive answer. Don't let him get to you.

[Anonymous No.2891479]

I go for a really long and hard run until the heaviness in my chest is gone or at least I'm too tired to care. It's temporary obviously and it doesn't always work, but I find that a lot of my depression is just caused by inactivity and/or lack of exercise.

[Anonymous No.2891498]

>>2891479

Agreed. When I had a free membership to the campus gym in college, I would go there and hit the machines for a while. Turn some metal on in my headphones and get the endorphins going. Occasionally, though, I just ended up sweaty and still dwelling on too much in my head. So do what works for you.

[Anonymous No.2891500]

>>2891467

Sorry man, my intention wasn't to make things worse. When I was depressed shit like what I said probably would have made things worse for me then too. So I should have been more careful.

What I mean is that when you are depressed you take everything personal. You think you are worthless. You think everything that goes wrong is just more proof of how incompetent you are. You think nobody cares because if they did they would say or do the right thing to take away the pain and numbness.

But that's just the depression taking. Its like you're caught in a gravity well and its damn near impossible to escape the slow decent to oblivion.

The last guy is right, drugs should never be a permanent solution. But they can be like a lifeline to pull you out of that black hole. Once out my recommendation is to learn to navigate without them. But the way our brain chemistry works its damn hard (if not impossible) to get out on your own steam once caught in the pull of depression. But please don't just listen to me. Find a doctor you trust and keep an open mind.

[Anonymous No.2891509]

im so emo im nemo

[Anonymous No.2891510]

>>2891500

Amen.

[Anonymous No.2891520]

Take freezing cold showers. It feels amazing and gives you mild euphoria afterwards. I can take up to 3 of these bad boys a day. I've never taken warm showers since I first started taking cold ones.

Go running. Long distance.

Now for /lit/ related

Whitman's Leaves of Grass
Anything by PG Wodehouse
Robert Walser
Tao Te Ching

But to be honest, if I'm really depressed I can't focus on reading. I can't do anything. So I either go running or go for a long walk. I can't do things but I can't stay put.

[Anonymous No.2891531]

I FUCKING ATE SOME ICE CREAM AND THE FUCKER GAVE ME A HEADACHE IN RETURN


WHAT THE FUCK IS WITH THIS SHIT THE WORLD IS EVIL

[Anonymous No.2891534]

>>2891531
kill it

well now its in ur stomach

cut open ur stomach and kill the fucker before your stomach does

[Anonymous No.2891538]

>>2891359

Do you think you're depressed or really depressed? Sometimes I feel like nothing is good in the world and that I want to die because nothing could possibly make it better and anything that even seems like it could is only fleeting and ultimately meaningless. But when I read descriptions in lit and in real life of what it feels like when people actually get to that point where they will end it all, I realize I don't have an inkling of what it actually means to be depressed.

Which makes me feel better. Posting here and on other sites, along with some mind altering substances from time to time makes me feel better, because even among all the trolls and bullshit, sometimes it feels good to say what you really want to to other people even if they don't care or respond,because really the only person you're hiding it from is yourself.

[Anonymous No.2891546]

I don't really feel depression anymore, but my motivation comes and goes without warning, which is getting annoying.
Just today I was biking (which I've been doing every day for the last two weeks, and enjoyed) when suddenly halfway through the route I was struck with complete boredom and apathy.
I pulled over to the side of the road and smoked a joint, then I just laid there and smoked and when I was done I couldn't bring myself to get up. Yesterday I loved nothing more than biking, and at that moment it became the most boring and pointless thing I could ever imagine doing.
This happens with all of my hobbies. I spent two years loving math with every part of my being, now it just bores me. I used to play piano religiously, but I haven't touched it in months. Sometimes I'll go through a month or two where I'll go through dozens of books, then I wont be able to touch them without being bored (last time this happened it lasted for several years). I really want to pick a hobby and stick with it, but my passion comes in waves and my interests are as variable as the seasons.
Anyone else know this feel?

[Anonymous No.2891553]

Depression?
Hm I think I am on a good way of getting depressed again. I was at university, majoring in IT and after a few years I hated it, got even depressend and asked myself what to do with life. Decided to write and read a lot in my free time to get over it. Still dropped out of university eventually. See that all kinds of jobs related to literature except maybe book store clerk or an apprenticeship at a library need you to have some kind of university degree.
Go for an application as a wohlesale salesman. Trading was always interesting to me. Still there is this nagging feeling, that this idea wasn't the best one.

On the other hand, I always thought I would be amazing, but now I am 26. Have a shitty apartement. Started an apprenticeship (that people can start with 16/17) and even though I like to write I have nothing published. Slowly but steadily those dreams of becoming a succesfull writer are fading and that hurts like hell.

[Anonymous No.2891566]

>>2891546
DAT FEEL!
With every fiber of my existence. I fucking do the same exact thing! That's what happened right before the last semester in college ended and with it my free gym membership. I went and didn't even finish my set. I stood in the shower in the locker room for what must have been ages and just could have melted in shame and complacency right down the drain with the hot water

[Anonymous No.2891567]

>>2891546
I certainly know that feel. Here are some things I have gotten into only to give up a few weeks later: Solving the Rubik's Cube, learning Japanese, drawing, playing guitar, playing the drums, Learning Chinese, studying sociology, studying mathematics, Learning Norwegian, martial arts, programming, reading philosophy, swimming, several trading card games, dancing, climbing and perhaps many more that I can't remember right now

Some people say that running/exercising helps, but when I go running i always feel that I can't run fast enough or that i have to little stamina, and then I feel like I'm never going to improve because it's been a long time since I started running and I always run the same distance before getting tired, i see no improvement at all, so I think oh well perhaps I'll never get better at this and I should just give up and admit defeat; and that feeling is the same when I try to draw something or sing or play a musical instrument.

In the end it's just like oh well, i've given up on a million things through all my life, perhaps i should give up on life itself

trying not to sound too much like an angsty teenager in here

[Anonymous No.2891572]

>>2891567
>>2891546

I get you guys.

I feel like no matter what I do I can't change.

I am lazy and a procrastinator and don't care about much, and every time something works out I feel like it's because I got lucky rather than for any other reason, and that I'll never truly follow through and achieve something to be proud of.

[Anonymous No.2891574]

>>2891572

Me again.

And I hope I don't sound retarded or full autist, but I truly believe I haven't changed as a person since I was like 6 years old...I feel pretty much exactly the same, I don't feel mature or anything (I'm 20 now), and I when I'm with adults or people my own age I feel like they are all so much more mature and competent than me and I'm just nervous and unsure of anything.

[Anonymous No.2891576]

>>2891567

But that's EXACTLY what it feels like. An angsty teenager in an adult's body! I recently have picked up reading again and lurking /lit/ and have been trying to stick with knot tying and rope work (fetishfag), but even then I'm like, fuck it. You know? I relate this very thing to Notes From the Underground. The Underground Man talks at length about the sense of hyper-consciousness and the resulting ennui and absolute inertia. One simply can do nothing more than sit with the arms folded and do nothing. When we all sit in our respective corners "morally rotting" on the inside, in complete inertia. Oh God this book made my heart hurt. As if it were the shape of a stake and it had been driven expertly into my chest cavity by the hands of some malignant ethereal jester...

[Anonymous No.2891579]

>>2891576

Sorry for the rant, btw.

[Anonymous No.2891591]

>>2891538
>. But when I read descriptions in lit and in real life of what it feels like when people actually get to that point where they will end it all

What does it truly feel like?

[Anonymous No.2891596]

>>2891591
How does it feel? To be on your own?

[Anonymous No.2891601]

>>2891567
>>2891572
>>2891576
Its not really like that for me. I do feel passionate, and I do work hard. Its just that my passion is short lived.
I spent the last year and a half studying math as a hobby, and I loved every moment of it. But in the last few months I simply haven't been able to bring myself to do it. When I quite being interested in my bike ride, its not that my passion or energy stopped (I actually felt more alive than I had all week, I wanted to run and scream for joy, I wanted to throw myself headfirst into a good movie (the only thing I've really been interested in lately is cinema and art) or go walking through an art gallery, I just didn't want to bike), its just that my interest in biking was, in a split second, destroyed and replaced by another interest.
I think I could really achieve a lot if I was able to stay interested in the same thing for long enough (when I was doing math I jumped about two years ahead of everyone else (I'm in highschool) effortlessly), its just that my interests come and go without any cause or reasoning.

[Anonymous No.2891602]

>>2891596
kill ur self faget

[Anonymous No.2891606]

>>2891601
Your issue is that you are simply burning yourself out.

try to focus on multiple passions instead of just one

[Anonymous No.2891612]

itt: /lit/ shows its colors and they are not pretty.

lay back and bask in the warm glow of existence.

http://youtu.be/4ZDxmE1nFos

[Anonymous No.2891619]

get drunk & write bad poems

[Anonymous No.2891622]

>>2891612

>dat Buckley

[Anonymous No.2891625]

This video cures depression

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUu2nqe-D30

[Anonymous No.2891631]

>The depression stayed with me for over a year; it was like an animal, a well-defined, spatially localizable thing. I would wake up, open my eyes, listen – Is it here or isn't? No sign of it. Perhaps it's asleep. Perhaps it will leave me alone today. Carefully, very carefully, I get out of bed. All is quiet. I go to the kitchen, start breakfast. Not a sound. TV – Good Morning America –, David What's-his-name, a guy I can't stand. I eat and watch the guests. Slowly the food fills my stomach and gives me strength. Now a quick excursion to the bathroom, and out for my morning walk – and here she is, my faithful depression: "Did you think you could leave without me?"
>—From his autobiography, Killing Time

Damn, Feyerabend, giving me them feels.

[Anonymous No.2891632]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6laGvKtPZYQ

this will really cure your depression or at least for the rest of the night

[Anonymous No.2891639]

>>2891408
Yes, see a therapist the fast as you can.

But be willing to change.

[Anonymous No.2891812]

>>2891632
>hi baby girl

laughed so hard
depression is gone

[Anonymous No.2891866]

Different Poster:

Any tips for a /Lit/erati who wants to go on Prozac. This probably sounds stupid, but I don't know what to say. If I go in all "hurr durr, everything sucks" They'll probably charge me a bunch of money to tell me what I already know or charge me a bunch of money to tell me they don't think I'm depressed.
If I go in all "I think I have depression" They'll probably be all "You self-diagnosed yourself?"

[Anonymous No.2891897]

>>2891866
>probably
>probably
>probably

That's a lot of probablys. Have you ever been to a psychologist/psychiatrist/neurologist for real?

Also, no medicine can cure depression, they can ease it like an analgesic ease the pain but doesn't heal your wound. You need personal change, if anything, change of mindset. You need to learn the causes of it, you need to figure out what is missing that makes you go on like that and, from there, start to fix the problem. You need to be willing to get out of the depression and that means to change.

Fuck the "probably", go there, be honest and see what they'll say to you. You might realize your problem is easier than you think, or that it comes from something you don't expect. You don't know yourself, we usually don't. We have superficial ideas about it, biased, misleading notions. That's something you have to keep in mind, because being depressed, not being able to cope with something is already a sign that your mind is confused, even if you feel you're not. You shouldn't self-diagnose for that very reason, you start to believe in things you don't know about yourself.

[Anonymous No.2891925]

>>2891897
Probably, Probably, Probably,
Yeah... hehe, Notice how I conjur nothing but scenarios where it goes wrong, and am anxious about the idea of going to the doctor to get diagnosed.
Yeah.. all that, probably part of the problem.

[Anonymous No.2891931]

>>2891925
Don't be afraid. There is a lot of prejudice towards it, but think that these men are professional that know several cases like yours. And they also know that each case is different. Ask yourself what would you change in your life and take the first answer, the one that is just obvious, the one that is just how you feel regardless of what is correct or incorrect, good or bad, and use it with that to get to the doctor.