I've gone back and forth on what exactly is my diagnosis. To be honest, I've never truly had a doctor independently diagnose me. I've always come to them and said, I have depression. A lot of the diagnosis is self assessment anyway. It really makes mental healthcare confusing.
I suppose in most cases, people present fairly clearly as having depression, or schizophrenia, or bipolar disorder, or obsessive-compulsive disorder, or anxiety, or alcoholism. But when you have multiple things going on and a variety of symptoms, everything gets a little murky.
I know that I often exhibit signs of depression as well as anxiety, although probably with fewer occurrences of anxiety. I spent some time reading definitions in Wikipedia and WebMD about these, but haven't felt all too satisfied with how everything is categorized. Even reading technical definitions of what is categorized as a "depressive episode" is a bit triggering.
I need to stop here and correct something that I've been writing for some time. I've been referring to "depressive episodes" for quite some time, here, here, and here, for example, but I've had the technical definition wrong. For me, what I've been calling depressive episodes, I'm going to start referring to as depressive breakdowns. For me, it's any time where I have debilitating feelings of worthlessness types of feelings which prevent me from being the person I want to be. Sometimes these events can affect me for half an hour and then I can recover (but that's rare and I think some of those times are the start of anxiety attacks, with some crying to relieve the buildup of stress). But sometimes these events affect me for an evening or a whole day or several days.
Here's the actual definition of a depressive episode, courtesy of WebMD:
An episode of depression involves feeling sad or blue, or getting no pleasure from life, plus at least five or more of these additional symptoms most of the day -- nearly every day -- for two weeks or longer:
- Loss of energy
- Feelings of guilt, hopelessness, or worthlessness
- Loss of interest or enjoyment from things that were once pleasurable
- Difficulty concentrating
- Low energy
- Feeling physically or mentally sluggish or restless and agitated
- Increased need for sleep or inability to sleep (insomnia)
- Change in appetite causing weight loss or gain
- Thoughts of death or suicide or attempting suicide
My therapist pulled out the DSM definition yesterday so we could discuss it together. I certainly present many of these signs when I'm feeling depressed, and some often, but I don't really meet that time criteria
regularly. So I suppose I don't really have chronic major depression. But maybe chronic depression (without the major) is more correct? That doesn't seem to be a true scientific term.
It's probably another discussion I should have with my psychiatrist.
Regardless, whether or not I have major depression or minor depression or some anxiety, a lot of the treatment is the same. It makes sense for me to be on an anti-depressant and to have some anti-anxiety medication for when it's needed, and it makes sense to be seeing a therapist regularly to work on cognitive behavioral therapy because that's been shown to help with both depression and anxiety, and it makes sense to be practicing mindfulness and exercising because again they help with both.
So does the exact diagnosis matter? No, but I do apologize for messing up the verbiage I use sometimes. I will try to start referring to depressive episodes correctly and will start to use my own non-scientific terms perhaps.
Today I ran for just under a mile with my littlest running buddy, TK. He started kindergarten but only goes every other day (for 2.5 days of each week), so he is home today.
We also prepped apples together and there is some applesauce cooking in the crockpot. (As much as it looks like he is about to cut off his fingers here, there were no casualties. And at least it's a special kid knife that's not nearly as sharp as our regular ones).
and after school.
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