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Perhaps not a small question, but I'm curious if folks here have dealt with depression/anxiety and if so, how have they turned it around or alleviated symptoms?
Looking mostly for success stories.
Disclaimer: I still struggle with depression and anxiety, very much a work in progress.
Me from two years ago would absolutely hate this answer, but therapy. I found a really good therapist focusing on CBT and exposure therapy, who made sure to explicitly affirm he's working within my values (e.g. I told him there's a certain level of stoicism I refuse to sacrifice in the name of healthy communication, and that it is important to me as a man that I project a feeling of security toward my loved ones. Once he understood this was a value thing, not an anxiety thing, he enthusiastically embraced it and adjusted his treatment accordingly).
Sure, most of the stuff he works woth me on is fairly basic and readily available for free online. There are dozens of self-help CBT programs, complete with literature and worksheets. But for me, a therapist offers two things self-study can't:
a good therapist calls you on your shit and keeps you honest in a way that is almost impossible to do on your own. We're so good at lying and rationalizing to ourselves that you really do need an impartial outside party who is both able to recognize when you're doing it and willing to bluntly call you out.
meeting regularly with a therapist is good for accountability and consistency in the same way a personal trainer is. It's a lot harder for me to break a public commitment to another person than a private commitment to myself. As I slowly build up my good habits, I've been tapering off my meetings, but the extra accountability was super helpful, especially during those early stages where I had no good habits and little motivation to build them.
If you're not able/willing to start therapy at the moment, my best advice would be that inaction and isolation are the ultimate enemies. The best way to deal with anxiety is to run headlong at whatever is causing it, preferably accompanied by trusted friends, over and over again until it doesn't scare you anymore. In my case, my depression is mostly downstream of the maladaptive coping mechanisms I've developed to deal with the anxiety, so this is also the best way for me to deal with depression. I've never had any luck with the pharmaceutical options I've tried (all zoloft did was make my dick stop working while I was on it), but your mileage may vary.
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