You're strong

These last couple of weeks I have been feeling more down than I had for the last couple of months. Some of the 'biggest' symptoms of depression that had disappeared with medication, such as suicidal thoughts and constant crying, started coming back again.

Yesterday my psychiatrist readjusted my doses of medication and hopefully I will experience a change soon. (I know there are different points of view about medication, I am currently taking meds. I will expand on the topic of medication on a later post)

What I’m trying to say is: don’t give up if at some points of your recovery you feel down, because that

will most certainly happen. But it doesn’t mean you are weak, it is what happens to everyone and it is important that you know that you are not alone in that. You have to constantly make the choice of not giving up, and that is what defines your strength.

It doesn’t matter if at times you feel down or weak because it does not mean that you ARE weak, it is only your mind trying to trick you into thinking otherwise. You have to be stronger and smarter and pick to not give up, pick recovery over and over again.

What I am also trying to say is that you should not be afraid to go and ask for help if you need it. If you feel like you need to talk to someone about it, then do it, either to someone you trust and if you think that some symptoms have reappeared, don’t be scared to say it. Sometimes, different types of therapies or medications work differently for different people and your therapist might consider that a change could be appropriate.

You might be scared about people thinking that you are weak because once you have started recovery you think that you technically should go from feeling ok to feeling better and shouldn’t have any moments when you feel down. I understand that you might not want to tell people close to you, I have this problem too. I don't want them to worry, I want them to think I'm fine. But if they care about you, they want to know how you feel and probably if you told them you feel down they could help you feel a least a little bit better by making you feel understood. Because having to pretend is exhausting, I know.

If, however, you don’t want to tell your family, at least tell your therapist.

However, I encourage you to tell someone in your entourage as well and DEFINITELY your therapist. It is normal, it happens to everyone, and you will recover once again from it.

Don’t give up, hold on. You are not alone.