Is having clinical depression for ten years abnormal?

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I suffer from clinical depression, specifically dysthymia, and it's plagued me for a little over ten years now. I can still get up and move around (Though some days it takes me longer than necessary to do so) but I never experience full pleasure in doing things. If I play a video game or watch something or listen to music or read something, I still have negative thoughts going on in my head. It can get to where I'll lose my interest in things and just lie around until I go to bed. I can go to a water park and swim around but I'll look at the girls in swimsuits going around and feel sad that I don't have someone like them being my friend or my girlfriend. If I eat at a restaurant, I'll feel lonely and wish I had someone to eat with me instead of enjoying the meal I have. If I have to wait for something for an extended period of time, I'll feel detached from the world around me. This especially happens if I go to a music show alone or to a movie by myself.

I just wonder if it's abnormal I've felt this way for so long? I haven't really gotten accustomed to being by myself or see it as solitude, I just feel sick and malfunctioning.

hello, Marknis. I've had pervasive depressive disorder since childhood, so you're not the only one with long term depression.

But I think that really, any kind of depression could be classified as being technically abnormal. In the U.S. it's like 7% of people that suffer from depression. So that's not average, or normal, right there. Then if you looked at only people out of that group who had chronic depression, the percentage would be even less.

I wish you well.

Thanks, plainjain.

I think there is a genetic component to depression because members of my mother's side of the family have it. I was also born prematurely so that could've played a role in it.

I've suffered from chronic depression since I hit puberty. At least, I remember it that far back. I wasn't exactly Little Mister Sunshine even before that. There are cycles, where it's fairly moderate and bearable for a while, then it will plunge into a suicidal abyss, sometimes precipitated by some sudden upset in my personal life. The last couple of years I've been taking Turmeric, and that seems to keep it from plunging into the darkness so frequently. But basically, it's been a permanent chronic condition for the past 45 years.

I've been moderately depressed starting from about age 10 to 18. At 18, I had my first psychotic episode, and I spiralled into a deep clinical depression for 7 years straight. It suddenly ended when I was 25-26. I still do get depressed from time to time, with flare ups of psychosis, but it lasts for no more than 2 days at a time.

It seems like even other depressed people can take their focus off themselves by exercising and engaging in hobbies but I am apparently immune to this. Whenever I was exercising at the gym, I couldn't stop thinking about how no girls were expressing interest in me and how it felt like I was putting off looking for a girlfriend while other guys were doing what they wanted to do. Whenever I would try to learn a new song on my guitar, I wondered why I struggled to learn while one of my co-workers was playing in a band.

well then pursue the girl, and write your own song.

Stay strong!

Pursue? How so?

Well I was referring to how you said you felt like you were putting off getting a girlfriend. Putting it off in what way? What would you do if you didn't put it off, maybe? Pursue in the way you felt you were not doing.

I feel like if I don't think about looking for a girlfriend, I have given up. I've been told I obsess about it and to turn my focus to something else but it sounds like they are telling me to give up when they say it.

I've been depressed off and on all my 29 years and anti-depressed for the last 10 as of the July that just ended. It's normal; I have friends and acquaintances who have also been on antidepressants for 10 years, sometimes more.

https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/01/ ... r-therapy/
An article on the best way to treat depression.

It isn't unusual for people to take prescription drugs to help them stay in relationships, despite the side effects.

I've taken celexa for the last few years of my life. It's the only antidepressant I've taken that hasn't caused any apparent side effects but it doesn't erase the bad thoughts I am plagued with.

I don't expect a relationship to cure the depression but I'd atleast feel happier than I do now.

________________________________________________________________________________________

half of marriages end in divorce.

relationships could end at any time for any reason. it could be your fault, the other party's fault, or nobody's fault.

an article claimed that a man was married to two women at the same time for several years. and neither suspected anything til the dry cleaning got mixed up. one of the women was a clinical psychologist.

so if someone with as much skill as a clinical psychologist, for a long time. several years. with a lot of intensity as a husband/wife relationship. did not know better, then how am i supposed to know better, with less skill, time, and intensity?

answer: i do not know better.

in the past numerous times i made the mistake of choosing to trust the wrong precious lil "person". and sometimes the punishment was beyond imagination.'


quite frankly, with the exception of Wrong Planet, online forums, facebook. and counseling.

quite frankly about ready to get rid of all social interactions right now. to say nothing of romantic ones

Why would it be an abnormal thing, some people live their lives as best they can manage under a ceaseless cloud of depressive boil and froth no matter how hard they work to handle it, having the tentacles of autism meddling and poking through that just adds another almighty conundrum fluttering away to have to contend with, it don't help I'll leave it at that.

No, it's not abnormal at all -- I had it for many years as well. Sometimes I think I might still be considered clinically depressed because I am a recluse and don't like to go out and socialize, but I realize it is my choice to do so because most people are very annoying to me in general and I have no use for their vapid conversations. I am always searching for some higher meaning and a more "complete" way of connecting and communicating with others that I think I will always be disappointed in social relationships with them and never truly be happy.

In terms of your depression, have you had a full blood panel done lately to check all your vitals as well as your vitamin/nutrient levels? What is your general diet like?