Day Three
Today I woke up feeling better for some reason. It occurred to me that I have a lot to be grateful for. This month marks the second year of my retirement from a job that caused me a lot of pain. I left that situation with a home that was paid for, a comfortable retirement, a wife who loves me and good health. That's so much more than i ever expected to have at this point in my life. I think I've put too much effort in feeling down and not enough into looking at all I have to be glad for. As I know from my past, things can always be worse. I don't have to make a job of looking at the dark side. I tend toward pessimism, and I know where that comes from. Today I don't want to give in to that part of my personality. Today I can celebrate all I have to be happy for.
Depression is a disease that I have to fight every day in order to stay on top of it. I have to treat it with drugs, but I also have to put some effort into not sliding into dark thoughts or wandering around in difficult memories. I can't do anything about the past except not let it overwhelm my present and future. I've been able to do this in the past, so I know that I can do it again. I know I can do it today.
I've always had a tendency to allow outside events and people direct my mood. Today I'm lucky to be living a life that's free of a lot of external strife and difficult people. I sometimes feel isolated, but I can see from this website that it's possible to connect with people who are only here to support each other. That's a new kind of thing for me. For years I worked in an environment where there was a lot of unhealthy competition and people who more often suspected each other's motives than willingly accepted them as friends or helpful colleagues. Now I'm free of that and I don't have to let it get me down anymore. I sometimes miss the opportunity to meet and work with people who have similar interests to my own, but I have to admit that my work life had very little of that by the time I retired. I'm alone but not lonely, which is a blessing in itself.
Today is the first day in weeks that I haven't felt like something was pushing down on me. This is a good thing and I think I can build on it.
Depression is a disease that I have to fight every day in order to stay on top of it. I have to treat it with drugs, but I also have to put some effort into not sliding into dark thoughts or wandering around in difficult memories. I can't do anything about the past except not let it overwhelm my present and future. I've been able to do this in the past, so I know that I can do it again. I know I can do it today.
I've always had a tendency to allow outside events and people direct my mood. Today I'm lucky to be living a life that's free of a lot of external strife and difficult people. I sometimes feel isolated, but I can see from this website that it's possible to connect with people who are only here to support each other. That's a new kind of thing for me. For years I worked in an environment where there was a lot of unhealthy competition and people who more often suspected each other's motives than willingly accepted them as friends or helpful colleagues. Now I'm free of that and I don't have to let it get me down anymore. I sometimes miss the opportunity to meet and work with people who have similar interests to my own, but I have to admit that my work life had very little of that by the time I retired. I'm alone but not lonely, which is a blessing in itself.
Today is the first day in weeks that I haven't felt like something was pushing down on me. This is a good thing and I think I can build on it.
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