Coping

I wonder if HSPs have an advantage in a crisis, as we are already very familiar with overwhelm. While that’s no guarantee that we are better equipped to deal with it, at least it’s not a new feeling. If we have learned to balance our sensitivities with a sense of perspective, perhaps we can rediscover sooner than others that our emotional reaction is not a measure of our capacity to cope.

Global pandemic really shouldn’t surprise anyone, as we have had a high level of rapid international travel for at least 70 years. What’s surprising is that it didn’t happen sooner. I don’t expect that to be a comfort, but I am ever-hopeful it will promote facing and planning for other future challenges (not holding my breath, though).

Hunkered Down

Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it

About those other things that have been going on with me lately? One of them is the weather. We just had a nasty heat wave, and I have Seasonal Affective Disorder.

A SAD State of Affairs

SAD, or, as it is officially (but inaccurately) known, Major Depression with Seasonal Pattern, is clinical depression in response to factors in the physical environment.

Winter SAD, which you may have heard of, results from insufficient exposure to light. It was first observed as a winter-related phenomenon, since sunlight is weaker, days are shorter, and clouds are more common during winter in many climates.

However, SAD can also be found year-round in people who work at night and sleep during the day, or even those who live in sunny places but spend very little time outdoors. That makes the name misleading, and the official diagnostic criteria just plain wrong in far too many cases.

Summer SAD, which you probably haven’t heard of, is major depression triggered by heat, usually in conjunction with humidity (I’m fine in the desert). It also is not necessarily seasonal, but can occur wherever someone is exposed to hot and humid summer-like conditions, whether natural or artificial.

I have both types of SAD.

Depression and Self-Hypnosis

Here are a couple of great links I stumbled across recently.

Cognitive Distortions: The Lies Depression Tells is an excellent article about how depression affects our inner dialogues.

Are you prepared to be Hypnotized… by yourself? is a great ‘self-hypnosis “how-to” for beginners.’ I experimented with self-hypnosis recordings that I made myself a year or two ago. My scripts centered on self-understanding and settling anxiety. The effects were so gradual and natural that I hardly noticed them at the time (which is typical of hypnosis results), but in retrospect I can see that’s when I started making breakthroughs in self-discovery. Hypnosis was also very helpful for physical feelings of intense anxiety that I was experiencing at the time.

While this is a nice article in many respects, don’t worry too much about the recommendations (daily practice, an hour at a time, and never in bed). I broke all those rules and it still worked for me. The most important thing is just to do it.

What You Don’t Know About Depression Can Kill You

In the wake of my post last week, The Black Hole of Depression, the Huffington Post obligingly published a highly relevant first-person account:

When You’re Depressed, You Can’t Pull Yourself Up by Your Bootstraps

Or as I put it, ” If the problem is that your brain doesn’t work correctly, can you think your way out of that… with your brain?”

Remember, you read it here first :)

A couple of points about the Huff Post column:

1). Not caring about anything as a symptom of depression. “Things that you used to enjoy no longer interest you” is a commonly listed symptom of depression, and was certainly true for the columnist above.

(If you are curious what this might look like, check out the Star Trek: Voyager episode “Extreme Risk” from the 5th season. Oddly, there was another episode during the same season in which yet another crew member grappled with depression. Note that violence therapy, which was presented as the recovery “bootstrap” in both episodes, is NOT a recommended treatment plan!)

Indifference does not occur in everyone with depression, however. It certainly should not be depended upon as an identifying indicator. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, there is no “before” to compare with for people who are chronically depressed (or at least, not one they remember). And some people experience extremes of emotions, rather than no emotions – I certainly did.

2). He felt “overwhelmed.” HSPs are familiar enough with that, for sure! And from his description of what was going on in his life, it seems like a reasonable reaction, right? But the important thing to note is not what he felt, but what it motivated him to do. It didn’t spur him to rethink or delegate, it immobilized him. That’s a perfect example of what I mentioned in Black Hole, about normal “negative” emotions not functioning the way they are supposed to when someone is depressed.

So does feeling too overwhelmed to function mean someone is depressed? Not necessarily. It could mean having unrealistic expectations of our own capacities because we’re HSPs and don’t know it (or men, and can’t admit it!). But if you stay that way, it’s a possibility to consider.