To Me, when feeling depressed.

  Letter to me, when I'm feeling depressed:

Dear Grumpy Sweetie-Pie,

I know you feel yucky, but I want to remind you that it's okay to feel this way sometimes. Hey, remember when you felt like this for months? Yeah, that wasn't fun. You don't go through that kind of depression now. Just a day or two of hiding under the covers, or a few days of blah, glass is almost empty type of blues. If it's worse than that, sleep, call your therapist, and wait. But the first thing to do, is to take an extra half of a Zoloft, and two Excedrin. Really, the chemicals from being depressed are much worse for you than those.

If you're hiding under the covers, and you don't want to change that, then hey, go with it. Lay there, sleep, eat, cry, whatever. Within an hour or a few hours, you will have a thought of something you'd rather do than lay there. That's when you start feeling better. Get up and start doing whatever it is you thought of.

If you don't want to lay around, then try these things: Read a fiction book, preferably a mystery. Have Pat go get you a couple at the library. Eat something very yummy, preferably with ice cream. Enjoy it. Smile, make yummy sounds, etc. You Deserve Yumminess. Get some of your Sark books out. Say a prayer of thanks. Say a prayer of asking for help. Call Jesse. Don't do what you're 'supposed' to be doing...there's a good chance you're depression is from being overwhelmed with a project or the number of things you 'need' to do. Don't do those right now. Work on your photos, write, make something cool, organize, move stuff, clean your desk, whatever sounds fun.

If you can...shower, dress and go out. Pier One and/or the bookstore always cheer you up. If you can't do that, then put on your baseball cap and ragged jeans and go out anyway. Or just go out in the yard. Look in the shed. Feed the birds. Go see the kids next door.

If you're functioning fairly well, but just very blah/bluesy, go to the bookstore and read, take your laptop with you or to Panera's. Spend a dollar on a bagel, drink water, and they'll be happy to have you. Nah, they're happy to see me even if I just get water. lol. Try to make yourself go to work, no matter what. You can come home if you don't feel better within an hour. Remember all the times you go and within a few minutes, you're involved helping somebody else, and feeling better.

Remember, if you're going to be depressed, do it right. Make sure people who see you know you're depressed. Slouch, walk with your head down. Walk slow, shuffle feet a little if you can do it without tripping, none of this ADHD bouncy stuff...that just ain't right. Don't smile, no matter what. Not even at babies. Okay, that's impossible, go ahead and smile at babies, but don't expect the depression to hang on very long if you're out smiling at babies!