I’ve been dealing with depression (and anxiety) for well over 5 years now. I’ve tried so many different medications and treatments with no apparent success. Inevitably, in the course of the treatment, the doctor will ask if I’m starting to feel better to see if it’s worth continuing the treatment, up the dose, or swap to something else. And… I never know what to say. If it’s not going to get dramatically better all of a sudden, I don’t really know how to recognize any incremental progress if it’s happening at all and without being able to do that, I might be passing on treatments that could have helped if I gave it more time.
So if you’ve been in this situation, how did you recognize progress? To the extent that you can put it into words, what did it feel like to slowly get better as you were treated?
It’s like boiling a frog in water or weight change over time. You don’t notice it until one day it hits you. It like, faded away but you didn’t notice because you’re so used to it. So you relish it and enjoy it until it inevitably comes back. It’s like a roller coaster but slow and shitty. Gotta have the rain to appreciate the sunshine as they say.