If life is like a box of chocolates why do I feel like Lucy in the candy factory?

It’s hard to say what the exact causes of depression are. Is it biological, genetic or environmental? I tend to think it’s all of the above. They’re just in different percentages/ratios in us.

A good friend of mine named Tom once told me of a childhood friend who had a pretty good life up until he came upon a car accident shortly after it happened. It wasn’t anyone he knew and he wasn’t involved in anyway, but just the image of the horribly mangled and deceased people in the cars triggered a major depression for him. Who knows if maybe this was just the tipping point for what he was already genetically predisposed towards or if it was a natural reaction for him when confronted by a gruesome reminder of his (our) mortality?

A year or so later Tom went through a very stressful time in his career. The administration at the university where he taught was at odds with him and tried to get him out but couldn’t as he had tenure and a good attorney. Nevertheless he also ended up being diagnosed with depression. Tom certainly had a large amount of stress to deal with but did it cause his depression or was it a matter of his brain’s chemistry being off?

Why do some soldiers crack on the battlefield while others don’t? It seems to me that it’s kind of the same in our everyday life. Some people are overwhelmed by what happens in their life, others don’t seem bothered at all, and yet others seem to thrive on chaos.

Years ago at a seminar I had the pleasure of meeting a man who’d lived through the holocaust. He was a Dutchman named Jack Schwartz. Jack found himself in a concentration camp where his Nazi captors made life a living hell for everyone. Despite the utter hopelessness of trying to escape and most probably the certainty of execution for being caught trying, Jack continued to align himself with others in his barracks who constantly planned their escape.

When they heard the German’s jackboots on the wooden walkway in front of their building they literally did not know if they would be pulled from the group and killed. It seemed to be a random occurrence; some prisoners would be taken away never to be seen again, while others would be left alone. Some in the barracks completely fell apart, while others fought, conspired and strove to live through the horror.

This is real hope and real bravery. This is real life.

Before you say you could never do that - ask yourself if you really think anyone who’s gone through such horror thought they could live through it? I’m sure they didn’t. Who could really think and believe in the face of sudden & seemingly random death that they would have the ability (and luck) to keep going?

In the face of hopelessness, feeling helpless and overwhelmed can you make the decision to go on? Despite our own personal ‘jackboots’ outside our door we must make the conscious decision to work towards our freedom, to allow ourselves to hope. Believe in yourself. You will make it.

My own black dog started during the dissolution of my first marriage. I was devastated at the loss of my kids. My children were always number one in my life. The idea that I wouldn’t be able to see them everyday was very painful. That pain continues to this day. My relationship with my children has forever been colored by divorce.

It seems that most of my black dog came in response to life events - loss of love, divorce, death of close friends by suicide and cancer, job burnout, parents and Alzheimer’s, aging and death, loss of love again, etc. BUT, I can’t say it’s cause was completely environmental. My mom was never officially diagnosed with depression but I’m convinced she had it too.

Mom would spend a lot of time withdrawn from life. She stopped driving, didn’t go out with her friends as much and started staying in bed most of the day. She was eventually prescribed an anti-depressant by her family doctor.

From my own experience I think some people are more susceptible to depression. I’ve always been pretty sensitive. It’s not a choice I’d make on my own. I’d much rather be thicker skinned and not be bothered at all by what others do but that’s not the way I was born. Sensitivity does help me be more creative - so it does have an upside especially since I’m an artist, but it also makes me more open to depression - so it has a big downside. Kind of strange that the very thing which helps me make art also helps the black dog which stops me from making art. Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor?!

I think knowledge is power. If we have some idea of the triggers that start us towards depression then maybe we can head it off. We can’t do a lot to change the way we were born but we can use the tools I talk about on this site to get better. In my case one of the things I do is to watch how I react to what others say and do. If someone says something that hurts, I try to unravel it a bit and make sure it’s not the black dog coloring my perception.

So what do you think caused your depression? What have you found makes it better?

This entry was posted on Friday, September 28th, 2007 at 8:19 am and is filed under causes.