Distorted Thinking

Taking action when you have depression can quickly become the hardest thing known to man or beast. It's one thing to recognize when you have a problem and understand how it's affecting you and identify the means to change that problem into something that brings you good things instead of keeping you in a box of misery with more depression oozing down its sides. It is another thing entirely to try making those changes.

A few years ago, when I hit my absolute lowest, I did make several changes: for the first time since I was a teenager, I tried medication; I altered my diet by going Paleo (or as Paleo as I could afford); I opted for HIIT workouts, so that I would lose weight I was dragging around and gain strength and flexibility; I changed the nature of my relationship with some people I knew to be toxic. These changes were marvelous, and while they took time to impliment and time to see the results, I noticed.

Most of these lifestyle changes stuck well for a long time, but in the last few months, I've noticed how lax I have been with almost all of them. I worked hard to get off medication, and use a large daily dose of vitamin D to keep myself steady chemically. I also added a small dose of melatonin each night to help me feel drowsy and actually want to go to sleep, because insomnia plays a HUGE role in my depression. But I've become very lazy with the others, especially my workouts. As a result, I've gained back twenty pounds that I thought I had eliminated for good.

Here's the tricky part: I see this as failure. Instead of knowing I have changed myself before and can likely do it again, I see that I tried to get better and it didn't last, so it therefore did not work, period. That's dangerous. It leads to thoughts of having to start over, and "why should I try if I'm just going to screw up again", and "I'm not worth it if I'm going to fail". My therapist calls this "distorted thinking", and encourages me to take a moment when these come up and challenge the thought process. I've been doing this consistantly for over a year, and it's effective. It's just overwhelming at times to see how deeply that distorted thinking has woven into my life, knowing that at some point, I have to challenge all that has been warped. It's like relearning my entire life.

Today, I have at least three things that I want to accomplish: a good workout, a perosnal project, and possibly time to keep training my new dog to get over her fear of a bath. It's about 12:30pm now, so that gives me a little under 12 hours to go these things. Let's see how it goes!