Think I"m depressed

[Kathleen2260]

I don't know what is wrong with me- it comes and goes. One day I could be fine, perfectly happy and content, laughing and joking with my guy and my friends and then like today I 'm just so down. I've been on the verge of tears since yesterday for no apparent reason. All week I've been sort of quiet, don' t want to be around people. I just want to be left alone. I should be really happy, my boyfriend proposed to me and wants to get married this summer. This from the guy who seemed afraid of marriage and it took forever for him to want to get engaged. So I should be thrilled. Also I'm in good health, my family is well, I just bought a new car on Monday (had my old car for the last eight years so buying a new one is exciting!) I've been at my job for the last five years and it is decent. My sister is getting married this summer as well so there is a lot to be happy about.

 

The only thing I know that has bothered me is that my grandma passed away last summer and I miss her. Sometimes I really really miss her and cry but most of the time I feel I've accepted the loss. I just don't understand my feelings. for once everything in my life is going right and yet I'm so irritable and angry lately. Last night my fiance's best friend came over to visit (he's my friend too) and I just wanted to kick him out- everything he did just annoyed me. He left his trash and pop can lying on the floor and didn't want to watch the movie I was watching. Just little things and I just had to get away because his attitude bothered me so much. Also I dont' want my fiance to be anywhere near me, I can have a normal conversation with him and I'm fine, even happy to be around me, but he will ask "are you mad at me?" because I am being withdrawn and quiet and I get so mad and just tell him to go away. Last night he came to tell me good night and laid there and hugged and it felt so good but I just started crying. I didn't want to be around him.

 

I'm sleeping fine, my appetite is normal, I still talk to my friends and am excited about planning a wedding. But the smallest things annoy me or make me sad. I work for a social service agency and lately (two days in a row, after talking to our clients I've gone into the bathroom and just cried. Because I feel so bad for them. Today at work, my older coworkers (in their 50's) were talking about planning their funerals and how they want to be buried and what songs they want at funerals and I just couldnt' take it. I just kept thinking about my grandma and her funeral and how we played Sarah Mclauglin's "I will remember you" and it was so fitting because my grandma had Azltheimers and only barely remembered who we were once in awhile. I don't know what is wrong with me! I just feel so down and don't want to be around anyone. Yet I have all these things I should be happy about.

[KittenMoon]

How long has this been going on? Have you noticed any pattern?

 

Could this be a menstrual thing? Sounds very much like severe PMS to me.

 

For example, I have two times a month I get into my worst depressions- a week to a few days before my period, and the last couple days of and just after the end of my period. So I know that at least at some level it's hormonally driven.

 

Pay attention to WHEN, in addition to WHAT, triggers these feelings.

[PYT]

Could be pms or a combination of things. There could be an underlying cause too that you have never known about. What caused my anxiety and depression etc was the way I thought about things. I learned about the ten common thinking errors people make (and I made most of them:( ) and through the cbt exercises I learned how to counter and eventually start to eliominate them and I have felt so much better ever since. I still get down sometimes but never as far or for as long though.