Today is Dr. day. I have to wait three months to see my Dr. and now I will have a short period of time in which to try to explain how not being severely depressed is not enough. Clinicians seem to think if I can take a shower, comb my hair, get dressed, smear on a little makeup and show up on time I must be okay.  I am much better than I was in April, when I felt suicidal.  Part of my brain was thinking up painless non-intrusive ways to kill me and the other part was saying “Bad idea!  We need more meds.”  I am much better than I was a few weeks ago, when I was getting things done, but walking around in psychic pain all the time, but it is not enough.  There is a huge space between feeling suicidal, entirely cut off, entirely unnecessary and wanting, really wanting to live. I fully appreciate not being in pain but I am so very tired of that huge gray space where I exist but never really get to live.  I exist and provide service to others and I exist and provide service to others-because I do not know how to give up and I do not know how to stay down long enough to die.  The best I can do is find some way to create an adrenaline rush and I have pretty much run out of energy for that, unless I become hypomanic….

Perhaps I can tell the Dr. I am not dead, but I’m not alive.  I can get things done, but I can’t see what I’ve done and I never believe I’ve done enough.  I am a work machine, and I have always been a work machine.  Decades ago I wrote a poem called Imitation “She’s a perfect imitation of a real person, she does her job. Then she turns herself off and goes home alone.” The only difference is now I work at home much of the time.  I could go to a party next Saturday night; part of me wants to go the other part is starting to feel ambivalent and a little sick already, so I avoid thinking about it.  That’s good, that will assure that I am completely unprepared, that I have not made the necessary plans.
The wonderful little aluminum trailer I was going to fix up has been sitting in the yard for over a year now. It’s now a wonderful little aluminum storeroom. I don’t have enough life in me to get started on it. 

I think of Halloween and what a pain it is to put up decorations.  It might however be nice to get in a good disguise and behave really badly…. I think of Christmas and what a pain in the butt it is to put up decorations, go shopping where there are lots of people, go any place where there are lots of people and watch all the cheer and not have access to a bit of it. I do it for the kids, for the neighbors, for my clients, for friends but I can’t do it for myself.  I want to feel what other people feel, I want to stop watching myself all the time.
           I read and I study – to escape ANHEDONIA.  I felt alive and connected once, for a week or so, over 20 years ago.  That’s the only way I know it can happen.  That time the meds were just right and I don’t remember exactly what happened.  Ultimately because of severe hypertensive reactions I had to quit taking that class of medication. I don’t even care if I have hypertensive reactions anymore.  I will try anything or anything again.
I always go to the doctor with my ‘papers’, new meds, new studies, or mood charts.  I’m taking a little lithium to protect and rehabilitate my brain.  I’m taking a little Metformin to protect my brain (I have the study someplace).  The Wellbutrin keeps me moving and producing.  The Buspar keeps me from having so much anxiety I can’t focus or breathe. The levothyroxine should help it all work.  5000u Vitamin D, lots of fish oil, melatonin, therapy, you should’ve seen me before I had all this stuff!!  Can you imagine a severely depressed person who can’t stop moving around but can’t focus or concentrate, who is always afraid “something bad” is about to happen, who is on the edge of a panic attack and trying hard to breathe, who is also trying desperately to look like they are okay-for 40+ years?  That was me.  So of course it’s better, incredibly better – but not good.  From a song, “It’s all very nice, but not very good”.  Later. Diane

When I begin to feel depressed I also begin to feel desperate and scattered. The last few weeks, I’ve been getting that way so I went to see an EFH (emotional freedom and healing) practitioner, in fact the founder of EFH. That was last Wednesday. I started getting better right away, I bought a bunch of cashmere sweaters and Argyle socks on eBay this week. Spending is a sign I’m getting better-perhaps too much better, but I am getting a lot done. That is the nature of bipolar illness, I’m down, I’m up, I’m rolling, or I’m not. As long as I don’t wander into the kind of “up” that gets me into trouble all will be fine.
I haven’t seen the emotional freedom healer for about six years and I can’t explain why. Last time the results were dramatic. After three healing sessions, I had the only nine-month period-far longer than I have ever had, of feeling good, social and productive.
I had been desperately depressed. I was afraid to lie down because I was afraid I couldn’t get back up. I was terrified I couldn’t take care of my dogs and they would be taken away. I was leaving a parking lot thinking about all this when on the bumper of the car in front of me I saw www.emotionalfreedom.com. Immediately I said to myself and probably out loud “that’s what I need!” A soon as I got home I got on the computer, found the phone number, made the call.

Two weeks ago I got on the computer found the phone number again and made the call. It can take two or three months to get to see my doctor, only a week to see Richard Ross. I guess I’m just a lucky puppymother.

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I made up stories, so I could feel safe. To my head, I said, “I am just like my father and he knows it. I am tough and mean and I could hurt someone. I am just like my father and he knows it. He knows if he hurts me I will do something just as bad to him. Therefore he respects me and is careful around me. My father likes me because I am just like him. I am safe. My father treats me better than the other people in the house because I am just like him. He is a little bit afraid of me and I like that.” Perhaps not in those exact words, but certainly in those exact thoughts, I tried to make myself feel safe. Of course that didn’t make everything all better. When I got a haircut he said I looked so bad, I couldn’t go any place with him anymore. That is one of the two or three most painful things anyone has ever said to me. I was nervous and I stuttered on a regular basis. Dad teased me about it on a regular basis.

Dad was in a tough spot, seven kids to take care of, money problems, time lost drinking, painful hangovers, and fights with mom over drinking, money, lost time and painful hangovers. No doubt, he also acquired some traumatic brain injury from the dramatic single vehicle ‘accidents ‘he had, totaling two pickup trucks. He had a big scar that went all the way up his forehead and into his hairline and another one from his lip down his chin.

When I was a kid I could see the black cloud over my father’s head. At the time I didn’t know that was depression, but I did know that was when he was most abusive. I understand dad felt bad, most of the time. He couldn’t get away from us, so he tried to make us get away from him. I think I was particularly sensitive. I decided early, by eight years old, I would not let what he said hurt me anymore. The best way to do that seemed to remain neutral to all commentary from him. If he said I looked bad it had no meaning . If he said I looked good it had no meaning. If he liked my report card it had no meaning. If didn’t like my report card it wouldn’t have had any meaning. And that is how I consciously started shutting down my emotions. I started being able to make everything into nothing. It is much easier to turn them off than it is to turn them back on.
Has anyone had a similar experience? How did you deal with it?

 It was, not at all nice, to be seven years old at my house.

My father had to deal with a bipolar disorder and alcoholism.  No doubt this was overwhelming, with a wife and seven kids to take care of.  He probably did an excellent job under the circumstances, but sometimes the best you can do isn’t good. 

 Of course my mother had an alcoholic bipolar husband and seven kids to take care of.  I have no idea how she did it.  Perhaps it was her God connection, but even that couldn’t make things good for any of us.

I had an alcoholic bipolar father and an entirely overwhelmed preoccupied mother, to deal with, as well as the belief that I was supposed to take care of everyone.  I have no idea where that came from.  I did the best I could under the circumstances.  I wish I had been raised by wolves.

I had acquired vast amounts of the ingredients necessary to manifests a significant set of difficulties, including alcoholism, anxiety disorder, panic attacks and bipolar disorder  very early.  That is I was, both genetically and situationally by virtue of constant stress set up to fail at being mentally or emotionally stable.  I imagine, from the same place I got all this, I probably also got incredible strength and resilience, pit bull toughness, appreciable intelligence and a potpourri of skills and talents.  Bottom line, I would not do any of it over, not a day, an hour or an event-nothing.  Everything is nothing.

So, where it comes from, this anhedonia, is no different than were a beautiful trained singing voice comes from, a combination of inherited potential, exposure to favorable circumstances for development and years of training.

If you experience anhedonia, what do you think it came from?   

Anhedonic babies grow up. I go to sleep thinking and I wake up thinking and all day thoughts drop and swirl through my mind like snowflakes, the only difference, some of them are the same over and over. When I woke up this morning the anhedonic children were in my mind. I started to think, to remember, to link.
Do you ever recall being scared by something just because you couldn’t clearly define what it was-some shadow in the dark-some errie noise? Then there are the more subtle forms of alert, confusion, worry, bewilderment, anxiety… all because you are thrown off base, can’t quite get a grasp on what is happening, what you’re seeing, what you’re hearing-the ‘why’ of the moment. For me it’s like this all day long every day every month every year decade after decade. Everyone around me is acting and reacting in ways I don’t understand, don’t have access to, can only imitate-and I do imitate quite well, well enough to fool everyone except my self. To keep from being ‘found out’, I keep all but a few people at a distance.

Christmas doesn’t really mean anything to me except candy canes and bright lights and endless demands on my very limited energy to make things nice for someone else. I watch this thing called joy, merriment, good will toward all and I have no idea what’s going on. Easter doesn’t really mean any thing to me except jellybeans and Easter bunnies. I’ve always liked the jellybeans, but that bunny, he’s always looked rather ridiculous. I don’t understand why people celebrate birthdays or anniversaries. I do not understand what party in general is about or social or Memorial or funeral and the list goes on. I don’t know why anyone gets excited when a baby is born or would want to have anything in particular to do with one.
The thing that makes this anhedonic state rather sticky, much more confusing, something a psychologist could have fun with for years-are all the stories I have made up and incidents and experiences to which I have attributed value to explain to myself how I got this way, why Everything is Nothing.
Tomorrow-or some time soon I will say more-in this 12 part essay on my personal anhedonic experience.

• Making up stories…
• in vivo adrenalin shootups!…
• No dreams, goals, aspirations… 
• how nothing becomes nothing good…
• “I don’t care”
• the value of anger… 
• one saving grace…
• the hug, the touch, other confusing things… 
• furfaced angels for anhedonia…
• Bipolar connection?…
• sex or not…
• creating reasons to live…
• and other STUFF.

Running across this just made me extremely sad. Imagine…
Document title
Characteristics of depressed preschoolers with and without anhedonia: Evidence for a melancholic depressive subtype in young children
Auteur(s) / Author(s)
LUBY Joan L. (1) ; MRAKOTSKY Christine (1) ; HEFFELFINGER Amy (1) ; BROWN Kathy (1) ; SPITZNAGEL Edward (1) ;
Affiliation(s) du ou des auteurs / Author(s) Affiliation(s)
(1) Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine, St Louis MO 63110, ETATS-UNIS

Résumé / Abstract
Objective: This study investigated whether a melancholic subtype similar to that established in depressed adults can be identified in depressed preschool children. Method: A final group total of 156 preschool children between the ages of 3.0 and 5.6 years and their caregivers underwent a comprehensive psychiatric assessment that included a structured psychiatric interview modified for young children. The clinical characteristics of four study groups (N=156) were compared: depressed preschoolers with anhedonia, depressed preschoolers without anhedonia (hedonic), a psychiatric comparison g.oup with DSM-IV attention deficit hyper-activity disorder and/or oppositional defiant disorder, and a healthy comparison group. Results: Fifty-four depressed preschoolers were identified, and 57% of this depressed group was anhedonic, a symptom deemed to be highly developmentally and clinically significant when arising in the preschool period. The anhedonic depressed subgroup identified was characterized by greater depression severity, alterations in stress cortisol reactivity, increased family history of major depressive disorder, and increased frequency of psychomotor retardation as well as other melancholic symptoms, such as a lack of brightening in response to joyful events. Conclusions: The clinical characteristics of this depressed subgroup are consistent with those described in melancholic depressed adults and suggest that a melancholic depressed subtype can be manifest in children as young as age 3.
Revue / Journal Title
The American journal of psychiatry ISSN 0002-953X CODEN AJPSAO
Source / Source
2004, vol. 161, no11, pp. 1998-2004 [7 page(s) (article)] (32 ref.)
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=16268209… All the little children, just like I used to be, without a chance of feeling good-ever. I’m so depressed I have to go to bed now.

Check it out…

http://www.mental-health-matters.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=159

The Loss of Joy: Anhedonia            Written by Richard O’Connor, PhD

“Less dramatic than anhedonia but a much more pervasive problem is a condition that doesn’t even have a clinical name; it’s the gradual withdrawal into isolation and indifference that can mark the beginning of depression. Robertson Davies called this condition acedia; it’s akin to the deadly sin of sloth. But it’s not merely laziness, it’s a gradual closing down of the world.”

Definition:

The term “ANHEDONIA” refers to the loss of capacity to experience pleasure or the inability to gain pleasure from normally pleasurable experiences.

1. I used to enjoy good food but no longer do. ……

2. My emotions feel numb and I cannot respond to happy events. ……

3. Feelings of sadness can easily overwhelm me. ……

4. Other people now seem to be much happier than I am. ……

5. I have great difficulty trying to get going in the morning. ……

6. I have lost interest in activities that used to give me pleasure. ……

7. I cannot think of anything that can make me feel happy. ……

8. I cannot give or receive affection as well as I used to. ……

9. I feel that God is very far away and not interested in me. ……

10. I no longer want to socialize with people. ……

11. I avoid going to church, club or other social activities. ……

12. I used to derive a lot of pleasure in hobbies or creative activities,

but no longer do. ……

13. Even when I accomplish something significant, I cannot enjoy it. ……

14. Most of what is happening in my life bores me. ……

15. The worst time of the day for me is the morning, or after I have taken a nap. ……

Total the score given to each question.                                                                 TOTAL ……

0 to 10: Your score is very low and reflects no anhedonia.Scoring and interpretation: Total the score given to each question. The highest score is 45.

11 to 15: Your score is still low, but there might be some mild, temporary

anhedonia in some areas of your life.

16 to 20: Your score is beginning to show some mild anhedonia that might

be more enduring in some areas of your life.

21 to 25: You are showing some moderate signs of anhedonia – if it is not

temporary you may need some help.
I got an A!

Sometimes I wonder if it’s all about being afraid of feeling good.  I’ve been away for a few days, a few days of trying to have a good time and a few days of trying to get back on track.  I need to overcome some of my reluctance to let anyone in the house hear, what I’m saying, after all they could go online and read it all, but probably wouldn’t.  Some of the turmoil I experience and fast mood swings, accompanied by entirely divergent states of mind are probably much more revealing and interesting ‘fresh’, before I have had the opportunity to try to explain them to myself and adjust them.

I took a friend on a mini vacation to the coast for his birthday.  I found a delightful place to stay called Wild spring, charming cabins set in a forest on a hill above Port Orford, on the Oregon coast. It was an absolutely ideal atmosphere by nearly any standard; rich sumptuous eclectic decor a big bed like a cloud with a thick down comforter, two fat soft upholstered chairs nearly the size of loveseats, candles everywhere, a high A-frame ceiling, lightly embroidered transparent fabric covering the lower half of the Windows only- not to interfere with the view of sunlight streaking down through the forest and in the corner, a small crystal chandelier, the list goes on.  Just out the door to the right a stone lined walking labyrinth had been constructed.  A two-minute walk through the forest and past the main lodge, we enjoyed a huge deep jacuzzi with a wonderful ocean view (which you can’t see in the dark, LOL).  I find I’m enjoying it much more thinking about it than I did when I was there. 

I have to wonder if I enjoyed it as much as anyone would.  I have to wonder if I would be okay if I lived there.  Then I have to come back to reality.  It might be okay to not be able to feel happy, if it didn’t feel like such a huge weight.  I feel like I’m disappointing the whole world, and that’s ridiculous, but I don’t know how to stop feeling that way.

Sometimes I see little glimpses of how I might be afraid to feel good.  It makes it hard to talk, that thought makes me cry a little, like right now.  If I felt good, disappointment, the slide into pain would be longer, the crash harder, the damage more.  Or is that just my rationalization for being stuck in “Everything is nothing”.  However, everything is not nothing, in addition to nothing, all those negative emotions exist and I’m certainly privilege to their full experience.

Many years ago, when I was first in a recovery, from alcoholism, I was involved in a program where everyone was responsible for helping others, as they had been helped.  That was supposed to be one of the keys to feeling well and staying sober.  Under any circumstances, I have always been a great ‘others helper’ and I took the opportunity to help others night and day.  The point of course was to stay sober and I did that.  I followed all the directions to the best of my ability, over and over, but I didn’t feel any better.  Whenever I would try to express some of my distress to other ‘program people’, looking for some kind of direction or help, I would always get the same answer. “Work with a newcomer.”  “Get out of yourself.”  So I worked with newcomers, dozens of them, for years.  As soon as they felt better, I couldn’t relate to them anymore, they had moved on to a different world and I was left behind to find another newcomer with whom to empathize and commiserate.  I stayed sober so I could feel the pain, mine and everyone else’s, with nothing with which to balance it or anesthetize it. After 11 years I became imminently suicidal. I went and got the anti-depressants that were unacceptable in “the program”. The whole thing still makes me feel confused.

I recall having an interview with a psychiatrist at one time.  He asked me if I felt confused.  The question was too confusing for me.  After some time, I said.  “I don’t know.”  I’ll bet he wrote very confused, and he certainly would’ve been correct.  Having everyone around me, appear to be experiencing pleasures and comforts I can’t touch, is a very confusing.

          A couple years ago I started writing a book on mental illness, my mental illness.
Because I have been somewhat disturbed for as long as I can remember, I started way back.
I’ve taken a few excerpts that reveal states of mind, that I now know as anhedonia. 
It was clearly well developed by the time I was 16 years old.  A number of instances stood out starkly
by virtue of their emptiness in relation to the experiences others were having.  How confusing and unrewarding it must be to be close to me.

       On my 16th birthday Jerry gave me a beautiful diamond engagement ring.  I accepted it.  I liked it but I couldn’t ‘feel’ it, there was no emotion with it.

          He was crying and I could see his pain, but I could only feel a tiny bit of it, just enough to make tears run down my face.  I wanted to give him an explanation.  I looked hard inside myself to find one.  It was almost like staring at a blank wall.  I couldn’t even feel confused, just tired out on the inside-some kind of dull ache.  “Please,” I said, “it’s not about you it’s something wrong with me that I can’t explain.” 

        Other people had feelings, lots of them.  I could see them flash across their faces, they expressed awe, appreciated the beauty around them and talked about their relationships, their connection to other people. Even in the emotionally impoverished environment in which I existed, I could see I was different.  I had anger, fear and pain. 

        I have worked for decades on the anger and fear and pain.  I have overcome much, only to find this nothingness, that this is what I have to look forward to.