How do you know if your depressed? What really is depresion?

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Is depression a long term thing that hangs around forever or can it be somewhat short term aswell? It seems I get very sad almost every night. I feel like I always fail. I suck at school, I am failing, my parents say I most likely can't graduate high school. They say I could just take life classes and give up trying to graduate because of my many learning disablitys. I am a bad driver too. Worse then the normal teen learning to drive. I am training a service dog for myself because thats what I want to do when I grow up. My dog is 7 months old and when she screws up and I don't know how to fix it, I cry and stay sad all day. Tonight she barked uncontrolably at a kid on the street and I couldn't stop her. I went to my room and cried.

I love going to school on week days but on week ends when I don't have any plans I get sad. I feel awful in a bad mood all day and all night until school on monday. When I come home from school, most days as soon as I get home I am sad again because of school work that I suck at and I don't like my class mates. Its not like I have a bad home life or any thing. I live in a prety big house with 4 dogs and my large family that I love very much. I just get really sad and as much as I want to play outside and stuff I can't shake this sad feeling.

Could this be depression? Or just the loneliness that can come with having no friends and being an Aspie?

Sounds like depression to me...and it can last a long time, I've struggled with it ever since I can remember though it wasn't till I was 15 I learned it was depression before I just thought I was lazy and bad at things or whatever. Though I didn't really have a good school or home environment for the most part.

But for me even when things are going ok, I still cannot typically shake the depressed feelings. Also loneliness and lack of friends can contribute to depression.

How can I get these awful feelings to go away? Will I have this for the rest of my life because Im an Aspie who never makes friends or as any fun?

I think it is possible....however I don't really know how to make it happen, I haven't been able to make mine go away. If you want friends you could try and make some, though I know that can be much easier said than done. Also do you mean you do things you enjoy and simply don't find them fun.......or you generally don't do a lot of things for fun? if its the latter maybe you could try and figure out what things are fun for you and do them more often.

Do you get along well with your family? I mean if you have a good relationship with your family and are happy with where you live therapy might help.....its not really as effective if your situation sucks and is continuing to suck though as in order to really recover you need a positive/supportive environment.

How long have you felt this way?

I have felt this way on and off for 2 years. Lately I just havn't had a good hard laugh or fun with a friend or things like that. I have 2 friends that are severly autisic and I love spending time with them but they can be hard to talk to being they don't talk well themselves.

if you are happy during the school day, you probably don't have depression. depression must be present most of the time for two weeks straight. depression symptoms include sleep and appetite problems, feelings of worthlessness and guilt, low energy, sadness, irritability, and perhaps suicidal thoughts.

sounds like you are very stressed by your situation. having a loving family as you do helps you deal with stress. meditation or listening to relaxation recordings can be helpful, too. exercise is a powerful mood lifter and stress buster.

i am not a dog expert, but at the obedience course we took our puppy to, they said to ignore bad behavior and reward positive behavior. exposing your dog to lots of people and giving him/her a treat when he sits quietly around them might eventually cure the barking problem.

if you are depressed, you might ask your doctor for an antidepressant medicine. if i were asking for myself, i'd ask for one like wellbutrin that doesn't interfere with sexual functioning. i was on prozac for a while and my sex life will never be the same again.

I don't want my mom to know because she will take me to the doctor. They are evil! I hate them! Last time I went it took 4 nurses, my mom and my step dad to hold me down so they could draw my blood.

I've been depressed for at least 38 years. I remember threatening to jump of a building when I was about 7 or 8 y.o. And there have been jobs I've had where I'd carry a scalpel in a plastic box, in case my stress and depression got too bad for me. I still get depressed at 45 yo.

And I believe I know both the cause and the cure. I'll share it with you on the understanding that what I'm about to type applies to me. It might also apply to you, but it might not. It will be something to consider as part of your overall search for your place.

I saw a documentary on depression a few years ago. They showed how all social animals have hierarchy. And how the further that an animal gets from the alpha position, the less control they have over their own rights or fate, the more common it is for even animals to exhibit signs of depression. This is the view I've come to believe as it concerns myself.

When I was about 7yo, my parents separated. My mother and us kids left the city and relocated to the Outback (mid 1970s). Not a great situation. As an Aspie, and a new kid at school, I became the official school victim to the official school bullies. Any friends I had were more or less because they were also outsiders, and probably just because they were family of friends of my siblings. Always picked second-to-last for sports, never invited to popular events, parties, etc.

Criticised by just about everyone. Called a 'Jinx' by my step-father (a violent alcoholic), kids at school didn't like me, teachers didn't know what to do with me (so mostly excluded me). Got into religion. Wouldn't you know it, apparently I'm a sinner and all my righteousness is as filthy rags. Actually, there was one priest who liked me. I wonder if he ever did go to jail.

Employment. Hell on earth. By the time I got there, I had no self confidence. So I became a walking self-fulfilling prophesy. And my self esteem got lower, if that's possible.

One bright note. I got married and we had kids.

Just after we married, 10 years ago, we relocated to where we live now. Shame I wasn't thinking of employment at the time. Turns out that we now live in the highest un-employment district of the highest un-employment state in Australia. And me without a degree or a trade. Oh well...

So after a lifetime of abuse and head shots to my self esteem, and living in the worst place I can, in a rural area with no public transport and few options for higher study... well, I'm still depressed.

So, part A is the 'WHY' of it.
.......................................

Part B: The Cure:

It goes back to that documentary. It's easy for me to see how dis-empowered I've become. I don't know how to dig myself out of this hole. I can see that even though people might superficially like me (I am a nice guy), it's unlikely any of them will be coming round to drink beer and watch football (or however people hang out). There's every chance I could be unemployed and unfulfilled until I retire in a couple of decades. In short, I'm 'bottom of the pack'.

The cure is to reverse the trend. To build 'muscle'. To become assertive (not arrogantly aggressive).

Indeed, I've just discovered the term “Self Actualised”, that I'm really excited about. There's a wonderful article called 'Common Characteristics of the Most Successful People' (just google: “regaining freedom abraham maslow common characteristics”), that I'm finding useful, and which, if I can implement them, may just kill the depression and give me my life back. I've typed out the points, (in a folder and read often) and agree with most of them. They are a good basis (for me) to continue researching and to build a plan of action around.

Will they be your answer? No idea, but they are worth considering, and might open your eyes to a path you might have been previously unaware of.

Think of hand shakes. There are three main positions. Hand over = dominant. Hand under = submissive. Hand side-on = equal. The aim is to no longer take the submissive position, nor to waste time trying to maintain a dominant position. Walk your own path in strength and confidence.

Good luck.

DoniiMann, thank you for your courage in telling your life story and including the part about the priest. The more people acknowledge this kind of abuse, the more reform will come along.

Now, on the subject of self-actualization, I don't know. It's almost like too much heaven and not enough earth. When I was into academic philosophy in my mid 20s, it was good, but I didn't have the connections I wished for. When I was religious from ages 14-15, that worked better for connections, but the whole thing was too rigid and doctrinaire and made me suspicious of myself.

Actually, one of the best recent things was working on the H1N1 swine flu pandemic on wikipedia in 2009. So, I worked at a department store pre-Christmas slightly above minimum wage and then did my really important work on my off time. Most people on wikipedia seem mainly interested in the formality of the writing itself, honest to gosh, they do. I was one of the very few people willing to take the time to read through, for example, transcripts of WHO press conferences, so yeah, I think I did some good work.

its when you say you're sad and the doctors like hmmm i think he's depressed, here's some meds

Can be either one. Dysthymia is long-term, low-level depression; it hangs around for months or years. Major depressive episodes can last weeks to months. But if you can shake it in a few days, that's in the normal range and not something to worry about, especially for a teen in a stressful situation. Everybody is sad sometimes; depression is what happens when "sad" or "emotionless" sticks and starts to impair your functioning. If you're depressed, you sleep and eat too much or too little; you move slowly or in a purposeless, agitated way; you lose problem-solving skills and you start to see everything as hopeless and impossible. If it gets bad enough, you might not be able to get out of bed; but plenty of people with depression, especially dysthymia, can drag themselves to work and school and even pretend that everything's okay to reassure their friends and family.

It's possible. You describe being sad most days, most of the day; and if that were me, I'd be talking to a psychologist. I have recurrent major depression, and that would make me start thinking I might be getting into another episode and need to head it off before it gets worse.

Since you're not suicidal and you haven't lost the ability to care for yourself and you're still going to school, this isn't a "call 911" style emergency, but it's also something you shouldn't ignore. I have no idea if you have depression or not, but you seem to be struggling, and that's reason enough to ask for help. In your case, I think having some reasonable plans for the future would be encouraging to you. Autistic people are often very anxious when they can't predict what's going to happen next; if you are uncertain about your future and you have this tendency, it's probably starting to wear on you. Plus, you have your parents telling you to basically give up on your education, and you're trying to train your own service dog--not a project to undertake lightly. You're under a lot of stress. Whether you're depressed or not, you could probably use somebody to talk to.

Kaelynn, I compliment you on your project of working to train a service dog. About seven years ago, I got to hear the author of Planet of the Blind speak, with big parts of his book about his relationship with his seeing-eye dog (a yellow lab!). From his book, I got the idea that it's about 50-50. About half of dogs trained as service animals, because of the dog's disposition or personality, don't work out as a service animal and instead becomes someone's pet which is okay, too. Doesn't mean there aren't good and better methods of training, which you certainly can learn and get better at just like any skilled practitioner, and without falling into the trap of perfectionism, which is sometimes my problem. And I suspect dogs are more logical and straight forward than people!

You might also be able to meet colleagues in local service animal raiser associations. And sometimes friendships spring and dance from being colleagues, sometimes it might not. And I find the zen theory of light-touching and undertrying in the broaching of friendship possibilities and in reciprocating to the overtures of others in a series of medium steps (easier said than done, at least for me).

And school can be gamed out. For example, I love the idea of pre-studying. Pre-studying is cheating, just an entirely legal form of cheating! For example, a college student can leaf through an anthropology textbook the day before class, and that little casual bit of ten to fifteen minutes is like a movie preview which has a surprising amount of carry through. A person can also observe and figure out whether their learning style is more heavily visual, auditory, or kinesthetic, and their higher energy times of the day. For example, I'm a morning lark even though I wake up relatively late. After stretching and a little bit of waking up, I have my most energy for the first couple of hours after I wake up. And I also learned, whereas I can really struggle with chemistry and physics, I do well in biology and geology I think because these are more 'narrative' classes. Anyway, I think the people here at WP myself possibly included can potentially really help you a lot with school. I mean, we have a lot of skills and resources represented.

[quote="DoniiMann"][/quote]

Thank you for your story!

I think what you are talking about, to me, relates to mindfulness. Be mindful of your body language, be mindful of what it is caused by (anxiety, etc.), then have the courage to go your own way and not be controlled by these things.

As for me, I have depression quite a bit, and although I know it has a lot to do with things going on in my life I know it also is genetic. For one I have a gene mutation called MTHFR. I am not sure how this works exactly but I know it makes it difficult to make some of those mood boosting neurotransmitters I need.

Something else that might help me is a better diet, like the raw food diet. But such a change is too big to do at all once so I try to just eat healthier and set realistic goals. I also do yoga at school, and I am trying to make more time to do Tai Chi because that has done me well. I hope this helps.

No, I do not believe you're depressed. For if you were, you would feel hopeless and use that term to describe yourself, call yourself all sorts of nasty things like "loser," think thoughts of self-harm, and tell yourself that life is not worth living. You would also have trouble sleeping.

More likely you're feeling frustrated and, as you wrote, sad because you're not doing well in school, are not getting along with your classmates, and are still learning to be a good dog trainer. In short, you have reached a plateau and, like a car stuck in mud, are spinning your wheels instead of moving forward.

Can your parents or your school provide you a tutor? Even kids in regular schools get (private) tutors, sometimes even at the local public library. If you have brothers and sisters, have you asked them for help?

What could you do for you and your classmates to get along?

As to boring weekends, what would you like to do on the weekend?

And if you are menstruating, has anybody mentioned that hormones (certain chemicals created by the brain and body) can make you feel yucky and out of sorts several days before your period?

To me, it does sound like depression. Going on for two years, feeling sad and sometimes very sad most of the time except for school. Yes, that does sound like depression.

I struggle with depression, too. I have not yet taken antidepressants, but I am much more open to them than I used to be.

What I have read, it is hit and miss (because everyone's biochem tends to be a little different), trial and error in a respectful sense anyway. And thus there is no need to draw blood.

It typically takes takes a month to tell whether an antidepressant will work or not. And it's also sometimes important to step down from an antidepressant in phases even if the medication doesn't seem to be working.

And what one of the people above recommended about diet and yoga or other exercise, that also is trial and error. Helps some people but not others. But, and this is key, one thing or even several things may not work, but then something else does work and makes a big difference.

One thing the right antidepressant might give you is more energy to light-touch social events, take medium risks and not be devastated if they don't work out. I really think we do young people a disservice making school the end-all and be-all of all things social, of putting all their social eggs in one basket so to speak. School social interaction is usually about hierarchy and superficiality, sometimes it's not, but a lot of the time it really is.

My guess is that your parents thought resceduling would make it even worse, they got trapped and lacked the self-talk skills to disengage. Clearly lousy, and I'm sorry this happened to you.

Your mom or step dad might welcome a conversation on this, relatively brief so that you kind of let them off the hook. And there are some very practical things to be done if you get something like an infection where you need to draw blood, like finding the person in the clinic best at drawing blood, giving you the option of a smaller gauge needle with a little bleb of anesthesia first, etc.

And again, for antidepressants, no blood work is necessary, because it's all trial and error anyway! Need to have a doctor willing to tinker with the medication and/or doctor shop as necessary, as I've read and heard, that's basically the fact of the matter.