The Surprising Lessons Depression Taught Me
Cross-posted with permission of Jessica Kirkpatrick (Women In Astronomy).
Today's guest post is by Nicole Cabrera
Salazar. Nicole is an NSF Graduate Research Fellow at Georgia State
University. She plans to pursue a career in science communication and outreach
focusing on equity in STEM.
Back in December I opened up about taking a break
from writing my dissertation to focus on my mental health. As
scary as it was to walk away from research, it turned out to be the right
choice for me. Here, I highlight the lessons I learned during this difficult
time.
1. Depression Lies
If you’ve never experienced depression, it can be hard to understand
what it feels like. The best way I can describe it is that my brain was
constantly lying to me. The very things that would have helped me overcome the
depression were the things my brain was telling me to avoid. I withdrew from
everyone around me, even though just a short phone call with my family would
have made me feel better. I stayed in my apartment for days, when a brief walk
outside would have lifted my spirits. My brain also said that I would never
feel better. The hardest part was gathering the energy to actively fight those
lies so I could start the process of getting better.
2. It Won’t Last Forever…
A friend of mine who had gone through periods of anxiety and depression
told me that all of this would eventually pass. She told me about her own
struggles during her final PhD year and could relate to all the feelings I was
having. The only difference between her and I was that she was past it, and
that moment would come for me, too. She encouraged me to convince myself of it,
even though it felt like a lie.
3. ... But it Does Take Time
One of the most important pieces of advice I got during my depression
was that I needed to learn two things: patience and gratitude. When I was
depressed, it was challenging to come up with things to be grateful for (more
on that later), but learning patience seemed downright impossible. I had told
my advisor I’d be back in three weeks. Eight months later, I’m still not “back
to normal.” But the moment I started thinking of overcoming depression as a
process - a journey rather than a one-time accomplishment - I stopped
suffering.
4. A Break May Not Be Visibly Productive, and That’s OK
I felt guilty taking time off because, not being physically ill, I
didn’t feel that I “deserved” to stop working. At first I felt like I had to do
something useful with that time, like completing projects I had neglected while
I was doing research. Instead it turned out to be a period of apparent
inactivity, but immense personal growth. I learned how to be kind to myself,
how to have a growth mindset,
how to ask for help. None of these lessons are tangible, yet they helped me get
to a place where I can see my dissertation for what it really is: a hoop to
jump through on my way to better things, rather than a Big Scary Monster that
can cause me physical harm.
5. The Side Effects Can be Worse Than the Condition
One of the reasons I ended up taking so much time off is that getting on
the correct type and dosage of medication is a lot more complicated than it
seems. It takes about 4-6 weeks for a typical SSRI to cause a noticeable
effect, so until that happens it’s impossible to tell if the medication is
actually working. And even if it does work, the side-effects can be so bad that
you might prefer being depressed or anxious. One of the medications I took gave
me restless leg syndrome, which happens to fewer than 1% of patients. This was a
full 8 weeks after I had asked for time off, and afterward I had to start all
over with a new medication.
6. Relationships Get Stronger
There was nothing easy about dealing with anxiety and depression. The
past few months have been among some of the most dark and difficult of my life.
When I was finally able to reach out to my friends and family (thank you,
medication!), it was in a moment of total vulnerability. I had to ask for their
help. I had to open up about how awful I felt. I had to try to explain
depression to people who had never experienced it before, and it was
exhausting. But somehow, these honest and deep conversations we shared helped
us grow closer, in a way that I don’t believe is possible when everything is
fine. I want to be clear, I definitely would not recommend being depressed as a
shortcut to developing relationships! But I do see now that out of all that
darkness, something tremendously valuable emerged.
7. Gratitude Is A Powerful Ally
As I mentioned before, a dear friend of mine encouraged me to learn
gratitude throughout this process. It seemed kind of futile, but I tried it
anyway because I figured it couldn’t hurt. Before bed I would think about
everything I could be grateful for, including the ability to take a break from
grad school, which is not an option for everyone. I know it sounds kind of
hokey, but the point of practicing gratefulness is that the story we focus on
is the one that comes true. I could fight depression by forcing my brain to
focus on the good aspects of my life, even though I wasn’t feeling very
grateful. Depression may be one of the most important moments to apply the
“fake it till you make it” mentality.
8. Meditation Is Key
Okay, here’s where I may lose a lot of you. Trust me when I say that I
was the most skeptical about this one, and now that I’ve tried it I have to say
it truly works (and the literature backs
this up). Meditation is one of four clinically proven ways to fight
depression, along with medication, exercise, and therapy. On its own it is
fairly effective, but when coupled with the other three methods it can be life
changing. It was for me.
I’m not talking about sitting cross-legged in an incense-filled room and
ridding your mind of all thoughts (although that may work for some people).
Meditation is really about becoming more mindful of your thoughts so you can
actively engage them and counter the negative ones. Since a spiral of imposter
thoughts is what got me here in the first place, practicing mindfulness through
meditation has turned out to be the most effective tool in overcoming my
anxiety. I had to learn that meditation is a practice, which means
you won’t initially be good at it. I got very easily distracted at first, but
with time I’ve learned to focus. The Calm app was
extremely helpful because it talks you through meditation exercises, so you
don’t have to rely on willpower alone.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I want to stress that depression is an illness, one of the most common
in the U.S. (in fact, it has recently been
shown to be a systemic disease). While I have listed some ways to
help fight depression, there’s no bootstrapping your way out of it, or “sucking
it up” until it goes away. You have to treat depression just like you would a
broken bone - taking it seriously and getting help from a doctor so that it
heals properly.
Sometimes psychotherapy, or exercise, or meditation
don’t help by themselves and antidepressants are necessary. Sometimes
depression can come in waves, and you have to fight through it each time it
comes back around. Depression manifests itself differently in everyone, even
though there are some common experiences. What worked for me may not work for
others, and that’s okay. As Jane McGonigal
discusses in her TED talk, the key to fighting the bad guy is to
build your endurance, surround yourself with allies, and reach out for help
when you need it.
Hi....Even from a very early age, I knew I didn't want to miss out on anything life had to offer just because it might be considered dangerous.Read more-Best Cure For Depression
ReplyDelete