Depression Days

Posts Tagged ‘anxiety’

When I was 7 I had my tonsils removed and a couple of days later I started haemoraging (no idea how to spell that).  The doctor was called and by the time he arrived at our house I had lost so much blood I had collapsed unconscious.  I was rushed to hospital and given a blood transfusion and without that transfusion I probably wouldn’t be alive today.

I have always wanted to donate blood to give back to someone else that amazing gift that someone gave me.  But there’s a problem…….  I suffer from haemophobia – I faint when I see blood and have done since I was a kid.

In 1996 I had a partial hydaditifor molar pregnancy and a D&C operation that wasn’t done correctly.  As a result I ended up losing a lot of blood and clotting quite a bit and was again taken to hospital.  I had to have another operation and they found I had an infection in my uterus and was lucky they caught it on time.  I was put on IV antibiotics and given a blood plasma transfusion.

A few years ago I had a hysterectomy and following the surgery I had a large bleed.  I could barely walk to the toilet and back without collapsing and that wasn’t very far in a hospital room.  My haemoglobin levels were half what they should be and I was given a blood transfusion.

I have certainly received my share of blood from some amazing people and donating blood is something that I really passionately want to do.  I just want to give back that gift of life that these people selflessly gave to me.

Last night I had an appointment to give blood.  I has taken me over 20 years to build up the courage to actually go and give blood and I was feeling really good about doing it.  I got to the blood donation place, I had to fill out a thousand questions and then had to have an interview with a nurse.  The nurse decided that they would not take my blood because of my blood phobia – they didn’t want to risk me fainting.

I was so unbelievably upset.  I feel so pathetic that I can’t even give blood!

I knew there was a good possibility that I might faint and I was willing to take that risk just so I can give someone a great gift.  Does it really matter so much if I faint when the blood taken could save someone’s life.  Me fainting is a small price to pay to be able to save a life!

As I’m working through many issues in my life and my blood phobia is one of those issues.  There is so much more to me giving blood than just giving blood.  This was a big step for me and one that I’d hoped would be a step toward me working through some of my issues.  It was just so much more than just giving blood.

I feel like such a failure right now.  It seems that everything I do or try to do I fail at. 

That’s exactly how I feel right now, like I’m stuck in this deep dark hole and I just can’t seem to pull myself out of it.

When I first started this website a few years ago I did so because it was a topic that I knew about.  I suffered Depression and so I wanted to share what I knew.

However, I never really liked this website, it just seemed to give the usual details about depression that everyone with depression already knows anywhere.  The same sort of information you can find on a thousand other websites online.

I almost let this domain expire and just let the website go altogether but I decided not to.

I have made a change to the site – not a very obvious one, but one that I felt I needed to make.  You see, I promoted some depression products as a way of monetizing the website, even though I hadn’t used them myself and had no idea how good they were.  So I’ve removed them, especially now that I believe all self help stuff is just CRAP!

The only one I’ve used and found does help a little is the Mindsoothe, although now I’m on prescribed medication I don’t use Mindsoothe anymore.

SELF HELP CRAP!

Now if you are here to find the answers and find something that will snap you out of your depression, then you may want to leave.  Because I am not promising to find any answers – hell, I’m still looking for them myself.  But I will tell you what I have learned along he way.

I have done all the self help stuff.  I have read heaps of self help books, I have done Yoga, I’ve done Pilates and I’ve attended courses on depression and anxiety.

Did they help????

Nope – not at all.

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Depression affects most people at one or more times in their lives.  This fact leads some to question if depression is really an illness.  Yes is the answer to that question, especially if we are talking about clinical depression.  Over 12 percent of residents of the United States will more than likely suffer from clinical depression.  While some may only become depressed one time in their entire lifetime, others will have many episodes of depression.  Half of the people who suffer depression once in their lifetime will suffer at least a second time.  The second time leads to a threat of a third episode of depression.

This very real illness involves the emotional, physical and mental faculties of the depressed person.  This is not just a passing feeling of sadness that you can will away whenever you wish.  There are signs and symptoms and there is proper treatment.  When not immediately and properly handled, the condition may become worse.  Just as any disease, depression will vary from person to person. Read the rest of this entry »

There are millions of people in America suffer from depression. There are also millions of America suffer from some form or another of anxiety. Usually the two disorders coexist.  There are between 60 and 70% of all those millions that suffer from both anxiety and depression.

At least half of the people that are diagnosed with anxiety also suffer from depression. These two overlap so often that more and more psychologists and scientists see these two as aspects of the same illness.

Let face it there are many people who feel sad at one point or another in their lives. A loss of a job, death in the family or various other disappointments will cause a lot of the symptoms of depression. At the same time, most people experience the above at some point of their life when stressful situations are brought to life. These are normal feelings to a certain point. Read the rest of this entry »