grumble-not-a-rant

[lagilman]

Today, I am fighting off the urge to explain to people the difference between depression ("I'm feeling depressed about that,") and Depression, the clinical state. Confusing them does nobody any good - you can't "make someone feel better" when they have Depression.

On the other hand, scolding someone who is talking about depression for not using the proper terms of Depression doesn't do anyone any good, either. Because people DO get depressed for reasons that have nothing to do with the chemical causes of Depression, and they shouldn't be made to feel worse because someone else thinks only in terms of the clinical form and penalizes all others to the point of abusing a person who's already feeling bad.

Should there be different common terms for the clinical and non-clinical state? Possibly. Until then, can we at least read the context before we go off on someone for using the terms? Sometimes "I'm depressed" just means they're (justifiably) depressed. Not that they have Depression.

Eeyore thanks you.


(this grumble brought to you by somebody else's rant on Tumblr)

Comments

[jaylake.livejournal.com]

My therapist makes the distinction between clinical depression and situational depression. From childhood through my mid-20s, I experienced severe clinical depression, up to and including a suicide gesture that landed me in the hospital. This was largely biochemical, exacerbated by an early childhood parental divorce and early grade school sexual abuse.

These days with incurable cancer, I experience severe situational depression. This is not at all biochemical, as the causative issues are crystal clear, though one of the ongoing goals of my therapy process is to keep from channelizing the depression into something that could slide in chronic. (And yes, it's odd that I've had situational depression for years, which would seem by definition to be chronic.)

I am extremely clear on the difference. Not everyone around me is.

So, yes, this.

Re:

[paulliver.livejournal.com]

Situtation depression sounds like the logical result of being in a depressing situation. I hope that's not an illness now.

Re:

[jaylake.livejournal.com]

Well, it's certainly a diagnosis... ;)

[nick-kaufmann.livejournal.com]

I found the recent film Melancholia to be an excellent representation of the emotional state that accompanies clinical depression. If people want to know what that kind of existential depression feels like, the film is a good way to experience it.

Strangely enough, I also discovered a song recently with lyrics that seem to sum up clinical depression very well, "Cocoon" by Assemblage 23:

Even though I know it's only chemical,
these peaks and valleys are beginning to take their toll.
Trying to convince myself that all it takes is time,
but the most derisive voice I hear is mine.

It opens all the scars on me.
It leaves me shaken in my belief.
It takes my hand just to drag me down.
It makes a stranger in the crowd.

Give me isolation just for now,
I feel a hard rain coming down.
I promise that I will be back soon,
But for now I'll return to my cocoon.

There is thunder in the distance and the sky grows gray.
There is lighting in the clouds in search of prey.
It's not a matter of if as much as when,
the clouds will break and the rainfall will begin.

It opens all the scars on me.
It leaves me shaken in my belief.
It takes my hand just to drag me down.
It makes a stranger in the crowd.

Give me isolation just for now,
I feel a hard rain coming down.
I promise that I will be back soon,
but for now I'll return to my cocoon.

Cracks in the chrysalis spread out like tiny snakes
that hiss a litany of rumors and mistakes.
But I'm afraid their cause is fraught with futility.
There is nothing more that they can take from me.

It opens all the scars on me.
It leaves me shaken in my belief.
It takes my hand just to drag me down.
It makes a stranger in the crowd.

Give me isolation just for now,
I feel a hard rain coming down.
I promise that I will be back soon,
but for now I'll return to my cocoon.

[cailleuch.livejournal.com]

I understand exactly. I luckily have never been Depressed but two weeks in a burn unit in the hospital will depress anyone, even me.

[claireeddy.livejournal.com]

It may sound trite but I compartmentalize--I use the "I haz a sad" for those times when I am mightily struggling to make lemonade. I take the hugs and chocolate then.

The other times when the black monster that has visited me at points in my life barges in for a fight? I battle him alone...

[elsceetaria.livejournal.com]

I agree completely. I've had several points when I'm describing a character as displaying the symptoms of Depression, and my adviser will comment are you saying they display the symptoms of clinical depression/MDD. TO this, I try to revise so it is obvious that I believe the character displays traits readers may identify as the character having a clinical issue, or Depression. My thesis, after all, is on using YA speculative literature about mental illness as bibliotherapy. The clinical is of much greater interest to me.

Personally, depression and Depression tend to blend together thanks to a Heinz 57 mix of different mental illnesses. When I see it in others, I try to read the situation and be supportive regardless of whether or not I can ascertain which is going on. Telling someone to just pull themselves up by their bootstraps is offensive even if it is just depression. I'd rather just be their friend.

Overall, I do believe this is one of the points in which the English language has failed us in terms of ambiguity.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

seems that no one can tell the difference between Big D and little d these days, so I go with "not feeling up to speed" and "wallowing in a big murky rut of gloom and meh" ..

which brings to mind that old saying about the only difference between a rut and a grave is about 6 feet .. its gotta do with the depth.

[kateelliott.livejournal.com]

Yes, this. I've never been clinically depressed but I have struggled with situational depression. To be told that situational depression isn't "real enough" would be really .... depressing.

[difrancis.livejournal.com]

Yet. This.

[paulliver.livejournal.com]

I was in a depressing situation; I hid from it by watching DVDs of Buffy, Angel, Six Feet Under, and Dead Like Me.

Then I got out the situation and felt better.

[paulliver.livejournal.com]

Sometimes the world just sucks, and it is logical to be depressed about it. The problem is when depression is your default emotion.

[seachanges.livejournal.com]

Are you by chance talking about the post I reblogged? Because that was not how I interpreted it at all. :/

That said, I absolutely agree that we need more words to describe all the various types of depression out there. This one little word has so many different meanings, it's no wonder there's so much confusion and misinformation surrounding it.

My family? Thinks depression means the blues, and don't understand why I can't just get over it. I mean, everybody gets the blues from time to time, right? No reason I should spend so much time wallowing in it. That's just plain self-indulgent, not to mention unseemly.

I've also had people tell me that I should channel my depression into my writing, and transform it into some kind of creative force that will give my work more depth and meaning. Um, sorry, but no. When I'm depressed, I can't create, which is why my current novel remains unfinished.

Are there people who can? Yes. I've met them. This doesn't change the fact that I'm not one of them. But because we only have this one word--depression--I have a hard time getting those folks to understand that my particular flavor of depression doesn't work like that, and that insisting otherwise is actively harmful to me because it makes me feel even more worthless.

[lagilman]

It may have been your reblog that triggered it, - I had read the original comment as something I often agree with - that being aware of the crap in the world, and how much we create it ourselves, leads to depression. So having that comment taken out and shamed (and it was shaming) for "how dare you use that term that way" pissed me off, yes.