This is the first time I've ever seen dysthymia explained so well. Link to whole article below.
For much of my childhood and young adulthood, I suffered from depression. Although I did have some periods of major depression, the bulk of the time my depression was a type called dysthymia.
Photo: Storm Cloud Over Moscow
Dysthymia is a low-grade form of depression that lasts at least two years, with symptom free periods lasting no longer than two months...
...Although dysthymia is not as disabling and the symptoms are not as severe as,major depression, it can still destroy a life, by making the person a shadow of what they could be. The best way I can think of to compare major depression with dysthymia is that major depression is like a thunderstorm in your brain or psyche.
Photo: Rainy Day
Devastating, but of a short duration. Dysthymia is like a steady rain under a perpetually gray sky. While the thunderstorm may be more devastating, imagine living with a gray, rainy day in your brain all day, every day...
by Deborah Gray
Monday, January 05, 2009
No one knows what it's like unless they've lived it. Looking back on my life is squinting at the past and not being able to see anything... I said for years that I didn't remember any of my childhood. This is why. I hope that people who say Don't Live In The Past find a way not to judge what they cannot know.
7 comments:
Your blog just gets better and better.
XX
Theory of Art
I don't know if a person can experience both major depression and dysthymia but I can say with absolute certainty that even though I have generally experienced the thunderstorms, there was a two year period where I felt exactly as you describe and it was horrible. Part of it is awful because it is so invisible to everyone else and easy to doubt that it's out of your control to shake it off. It feels constantly like you should be able to, but you can't.
Like not being able to get water out of your ear after swimming.
I'm so sorry you've spent your life feeling this way.
You've got the perfect description there. Like you, I've probably had it since childhood, getting more severe during adolescence. It does cripple more effectively than a thunderstorm, with my straight 'A's steadily falling over the years till I barely managed to graduate from University last year. Now I've got pills and am waiting for CBT, hoping I can somehow catch up to those friends who have raced off into the horizon on their fantastic lives. I desperately want to shake it off so I can still make something of myself.
Sorry, that was bit of an essay, but I had this overwhelming urge to share!
yes, it seems like forever and there really isn't a cure, is there? Not for sure. If you take drugs are you still you?
-Aeron
http://aeronswalk.blogspot.com/
@Angelina: Yes, a person can experience both major depression, and dysthymia. Dysthymia cook you in low flames, major depression on high flames. On its best days feels like hell.
i like this blog keep working and posting the article regularly....
Smith ALan
dysthymia... is the feeling of not belonging, losing our identity. you look at the mirror and you just feel that you are not the person in the mirror.the constant upset mood and flat feeling is always there, 24/7. and life just goes on and on with no end.
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