When I was first diagnosed with this disorder, I was asked if I had ever felt depressed. I had. Oh, I had. From the summer before 8th grade, until right before my panic got bad sophomore year, I went through various stages of depression.
My doctor told me that this is common because anxiety and depression work in the same part of the brain. A normal person has balanced levels of both. They get nervous when they have a big presentation, they get depressed after a bad break-up. What is wrong with me and other people suffering from depression and anxiety is that those levels are not balanced naturally like everyone else. Or at least that is my understanding of it. I'm not a doctor.
I go through weeks of bad panic and anxiety but then I won't be anxious anymore. I'll say that I'm better when I'm not. It just flipped. I'm just depressed now instead of crazy. Depression can make people crazy but not in the same ways.
For example, I missed a test yesterday. If I was a normal person, I'd just be pissed at myself. But because of me being me, I thought this was the end of the world and I was suicidal for a good portion of the day. Now, today, I look at this and think "What? Are you insane? You wanted to kill yourself because of a test? Not Cool." But that's just the way my brain works. It's always drama with me. Which I guess is the reason I want to write films, but not dramatic ones, funny ones that people can watch and be rid of all the drama in their life.
But when I'm in a depression stage, nothing can make me happy. I watch comedies trying to feel better, but usually I think of some reason why they are sad. Once I was feeling lonely and sad while I was at school so I decided to watch the classic comedy "Stripes". I laughed but then I got sad that this is a movie I used to watch with my dad all the time when I was a little girl and now I'm not a little girl. And blah blah blah life is always moving forward and not backward and it makes us sad to notice that we are growing older towards our inevitable death.
Yeah, I get dramatic.
So the point of this post is that sometimes people with bad depression get bad anxiety, and sometimes people with bad anxiety get bad depression. Because its really the same thing.
My doctor told me that this is common because anxiety and depression work in the same part of the brain. A normal person has balanced levels of both. They get nervous when they have a big presentation, they get depressed after a bad break-up. What is wrong with me and other people suffering from depression and anxiety is that those levels are not balanced naturally like everyone else. Or at least that is my understanding of it. I'm not a doctor.
I go through weeks of bad panic and anxiety but then I won't be anxious anymore. I'll say that I'm better when I'm not. It just flipped. I'm just depressed now instead of crazy. Depression can make people crazy but not in the same ways.
For example, I missed a test yesterday. If I was a normal person, I'd just be pissed at myself. But because of me being me, I thought this was the end of the world and I was suicidal for a good portion of the day. Now, today, I look at this and think "What? Are you insane? You wanted to kill yourself because of a test? Not Cool." But that's just the way my brain works. It's always drama with me. Which I guess is the reason I want to write films, but not dramatic ones, funny ones that people can watch and be rid of all the drama in their life.
But when I'm in a depression stage, nothing can make me happy. I watch comedies trying to feel better, but usually I think of some reason why they are sad. Once I was feeling lonely and sad while I was at school so I decided to watch the classic comedy "Stripes". I laughed but then I got sad that this is a movie I used to watch with my dad all the time when I was a little girl and now I'm not a little girl. And blah blah blah life is always moving forward and not backward and it makes us sad to notice that we are growing older towards our inevitable death.
Yeah, I get dramatic.
So the point of this post is that sometimes people with bad depression get bad anxiety, and sometimes people with bad anxiety get bad depression. Because its really the same thing.
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