I am a failure, then, I guess.
I became very depressed after years of working with kids who were severely abused, abusing drugs and/or dying from a chronic illness. I was stalked, dumped, and had extremely unhealthy friendships. Also during this time frame, I completed my master's degree with a 3.8, created a name for myself in the community in my field, and changed lives of these kids in a positive manner. I joined a gym, lost 95 lbs (healthily), and got rid of toxic people in my life. And I cried myself to sleep every night, had a brain full of negative self-talk, and nightmares that made it almost impossible to sleep. I started medication, and I don't care what others think of using that as a tool. My med never changed the way I do my job or how motivated I am. It made the negative self-talk easier to deal with and slowed down a lot of my thought processes so that I could focus on what was important. I still cry, I still have nightmares... just not as much. And I still kick ass at what I do.
What bothers me as much as being referred to as a "loser", is the loose definition of depression in the OP. In my training, I was taught that chemicals in the brain affect mood and mood affects the chemicals. So how is it exactly that anyone who is depressed is not "chemically depressed"? I've never even heard of this diagnosis and I've been in the field almost 10 years. Clinical depression, yes. I've never met someone who was truly clinically depressed who was successfully able to just "decide" that they aren't going to be depressed anymore. But I've met gamblers, alcoholics and drug users that decided they weren't going to engage in their addiction... and don't. It's so frustrating that I have difficulty in actually forming response that makes as much sense as I'd like it to. But blanket statements, especially about human beings, human nature, and mental illness never hold up 100%.
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Try telling someone with bipolar disorder to just "buck up" or "relax" and see how useful that little bit of advice is.
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I did have to laugh at this because the three most common responses I've experienced to this type of "therapy" are: "what the F*** do you know about how I feel?!", tears and suicidal statements, and chairs flying... at my head, the window and a door, during a family session.
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And little tippler, depression is hugely different than bipolar disorder. It's entirely incorrect to simply group them together.
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Both are already grouped together in the DSM. 296.xx family of mood disorders. Bipolar disorder (depending on the subtype) requires certain amount/frequency of major depressive episodes.