I’ve written about emotional abuse in my boyhood and a family history of depression as big contributors to my own illness, but recently I’ve spent more time reconnecting with the things that went right all those years ago rather than dwelling only on what went wrong. The positive side is simply the love that has […]
Archives for 2019
Living with a Depressed Partner
Several readers have asked about the best ways to respond to warning signs and symptoms of depression in their partners. The illness tends to separate two people in many ways, so the question always arises: What can I, the well partner, do when the symptoms start to push us apart? I think the first thing […]
Overcoming Resistance
Writing is a way of reclaiming my mind from depression, but there is a darker side to it called resistance. I won’t call it writer’s block because the same thing stands in the way of any purposeful activity or major life commitment, including the process of recovering from depression. It usually begins only after I […]
Recovery Is More Than Remission of Symptoms
A lot of people think of recovery from depression as an unending process of managing the symptoms. But I have always hoped that recovery is more than remission of symptoms. Before imagining full recovery, however, there’s the enormous task of getting the most crippling effects of depression under control. I don’t mean ending them altogether, […]
Beyond Depression to Guiding Values
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy reminds me of the tense time I spent learning how to drive a car. Venturing onto a two-lane highway, I fixed my mind on the big worry – how to get where I wanted to go without crashing into anything along the way. The most important thing was to stay in […]
Before ACT – Doing Depression Right
When I started learning about Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), the idea that I was doing depression rather than having it as an illness didn’t make a lot of sense to me. I could understand that avoiding painful situations could worsen depression and that I often acted in self-defeating ways. But weren’t those the effects […]
