Depression is a Side-Effect of Anxiety
This is a theory that I've been working out for some time now. Someone's probably thought of it before, but I believe that depression isn't always a stand-alone deal. I think that it usually starts with anxiety. I suppose there are the cases where there is a true chemical imbalance in the brain that causes chronic depression, but I think that most cases (and most other things - obsessive-compulsive disorder, perfectionism, procrastination, bi-polar disorder, etc.) are the direct result of an anxiety that affects how we view our surroundings and keeps us in a box governed by irrational rules.
I base it largely on my own experiences, and as I try and flesh out the theory, I watch other peoples' reactions to their situations, ask questions, and apply them accordingly. Sometimes it takes a little working around, but I have found that most of their problems are similar to my own.
Growing Up Depressed
When I was growing up, I was a very quiet student/artist. I didn't spend time outside at the basketball courts and football fields. To be honest, I was terrified of them. I don't know why, but I didn't like meeting the new people and dealing with any sort of confrontation. This is mostly from about 10 years old and on, if I remember correctly. I remember playing soccer when I was between 7 and 10, but that ended, and I never went back. I played football when I was 15, and I received a serious injury to my knee that didn't allow me to participate for a while. Instead of going back once I was better, I quit, and stuck to skateboarding - a sport that I loved, because it had "no rules" and you didn't have to "depend on anyone else" to have fun. There was no goal, really.
I remember coming home when I was about 15 or so, and feeling overwhelmed about the events of school many times. I would wonder why I couldn't get a girlfriend, or why someone would make fun of me, or why I didn't anything back (you always think of the good shit to say back to someone after the fact). I heard about depression, and I thought, "that's me!" But it wasn't true. I had anxiety, and that was leaving me frozen solid during interactions with my classmates.
It's Easy to Point the Finger at Depression, Hard to Pinpoint Anxiety
It's easy to think, "I'm depressed, nobody likes me. I can't do anything right. I'm ugly, fat, and don't have the nice clothes that everyone else does." Some of this might be true, but for the most part, it's the perception that it's true that can leave you feeling down. This is the anxiety. This is what you somehow incorporated into your thinking. Just because every single person doesn't like you doesn't mean that you are no good. In my case, I didn't care if the "lower class" liked me - I wanted to be liked by the upper echelons of the student body. I wanted the nice car, the best looking girls in the school, and have the most friends. I have no idea how it happened, given my upbringing, but for whatever reason, I felt that I had to have all that.
And how was I going to have any of it without any money? My parents really coudn't afford to get me all the name-brand stuff, and that was fine. I understand now that it's a very big undertaking to get only the finest for your children. The point is, there was no way I could compete with that class of kids, because I was nowhere near their level of confidence. I couldn't move around like they did. (Something just popped into my head: A post about Anxiety and Religion! It has bearing on what I went throught, but not totally relevant to this post, so I'll do it later)
My standards were too high for what I was able to attain in reality. As I ponder this, I realize that what I mostly wanted were the girls in the upper crust, not the guys. There were a few guys that were alright, but most of them were dicks, and they're the ones that had the designer clothes, the fast cars, and the best-looking girls in the school. I didn't care about the nice clothes, the cars, or being an asshole - but all I could see was that the girls were on top of it. See, my confidence was low, so my anxiety was high, and the result was depression. Anxiety and depression usually move along in a snowball effect, too!
Why Couldn't I Have Just Boosted My Confidence?
Why couldn't I just have boosted my confidence somehow? I have no idea. I think it might have been a strict mom and a never-present dad, although it sucks that I have to lay the blame on them. With anxiety, it isn't your fault, but it's up to you to change it. That's the unfairness of it all. If you don't make a conscious effort to change, then you will get the exact same results as you always have. I knew no other way - I thought people were supposed to be cool, no matter what. What I found was they weren't: everyone has their own agenda, and I had no clue how to handle that, so I receded into a shell. That made me depressed, and all of my anxiety lay on the fact that I didn't know how to deal with people effectively. I always felt like a puppet. Pulled and manipulated to make the puppeteer happy, and make the audience laugh.
Anxiety and Alcohol
Here's a return to a familiar subject on this blog: Alcohol! I'm sort of happy that I never discovered the joy of alcohol while I was in high school - I probably wouldn't have finished, and I'm almost positive I would have seen a lot more jail time than I have already. I think that a person like me that has so much anxiety and rigid rule structure in my mind would have went off the proverbial chain back when I was younger. But, there's a part of me that wishes I did find it. Although I wouldn't have done as well in school, probably, I could have figured out some things that would help me in the future - talking to people, being more independent, fighting (more), maybe, I dunno.
Lucky me, I got to find alcohol a lot later in life, and a lot of you have read my "Anxiety and Alcohol" post. Again, alcoholism is a side-effect of anxiety, in my opinion (and my opinion is right!). If you're confident in yourself in any social situation, when you get drunk, things seem out of place.
I Still Get Depressed
It's tough to get over anxiety, and that's the main reason I still have spells of depression. My anxiety tells me that I'm going to be laughed at for my clothes, or my car, or something. It makes me want to stay inside, and that fosters that sickly-sweet feeling of depression. It's actually the reason that I write this blog! Writing here gives me a chance to get all of the shit off my shoulders and focus on something, instead of wondering what I'm going to do all day, and if I'm good enough to do it. This is my anti-anxiety medicine. This, making music, going to school, and writing rhymes. I hope to extend my anti-anxiety medicine to going to the gym soon. lol.
This is a theory that I've been working out for some time now. Someone's probably thought of it before, but I believe that depression isn't always a stand-alone deal. I think that it usually starts with anxiety. I suppose there are the cases where there is a true chemical imbalance in the brain that causes chronic depression, but I think that most cases (and most other things - obsessive-compulsive disorder, perfectionism, procrastination, bi-polar disorder, etc.) are the direct result of an anxiety that affects how we view our surroundings and keeps us in a box governed by irrational rules.
I base it largely on my own experiences, and as I try and flesh out the theory, I watch other peoples' reactions to their situations, ask questions, and apply them accordingly. Sometimes it takes a little working around, but I have found that most of their problems are similar to my own.
Growing Up Depressed
When I was growing up, I was a very quiet student/artist. I didn't spend time outside at the basketball courts and football fields. To be honest, I was terrified of them. I don't know why, but I didn't like meeting the new people and dealing with any sort of confrontation. This is mostly from about 10 years old and on, if I remember correctly. I remember playing soccer when I was between 7 and 10, but that ended, and I never went back. I played football when I was 15, and I received a serious injury to my knee that didn't allow me to participate for a while. Instead of going back once I was better, I quit, and stuck to skateboarding - a sport that I loved, because it had "no rules" and you didn't have to "depend on anyone else" to have fun. There was no goal, really.
I remember coming home when I was about 15 or so, and feeling overwhelmed about the events of school many times. I would wonder why I couldn't get a girlfriend, or why someone would make fun of me, or why I didn't anything back (you always think of the good shit to say back to someone after the fact). I heard about depression, and I thought, "that's me!" But it wasn't true. I had anxiety, and that was leaving me frozen solid during interactions with my classmates.
It's Easy to Point the Finger at Depression, Hard to Pinpoint Anxiety
It's easy to think, "I'm depressed, nobody likes me. I can't do anything right. I'm ugly, fat, and don't have the nice clothes that everyone else does." Some of this might be true, but for the most part, it's the perception that it's true that can leave you feeling down. This is the anxiety. This is what you somehow incorporated into your thinking. Just because every single person doesn't like you doesn't mean that you are no good. In my case, I didn't care if the "lower class" liked me - I wanted to be liked by the upper echelons of the student body. I wanted the nice car, the best looking girls in the school, and have the most friends. I have no idea how it happened, given my upbringing, but for whatever reason, I felt that I had to have all that.
And how was I going to have any of it without any money? My parents really coudn't afford to get me all the name-brand stuff, and that was fine. I understand now that it's a very big undertaking to get only the finest for your children. The point is, there was no way I could compete with that class of kids, because I was nowhere near their level of confidence. I couldn't move around like they did. (Something just popped into my head: A post about Anxiety and Religion! It has bearing on what I went throught, but not totally relevant to this post, so I'll do it later)
My standards were too high for what I was able to attain in reality. As I ponder this, I realize that what I mostly wanted were the girls in the upper crust, not the guys. There were a few guys that were alright, but most of them were dicks, and they're the ones that had the designer clothes, the fast cars, and the best-looking girls in the school. I didn't care about the nice clothes, the cars, or being an asshole - but all I could see was that the girls were on top of it. See, my confidence was low, so my anxiety was high, and the result was depression. Anxiety and depression usually move along in a snowball effect, too!
Why Couldn't I Have Just Boosted My Confidence?
Why couldn't I just have boosted my confidence somehow? I have no idea. I think it might have been a strict mom and a never-present dad, although it sucks that I have to lay the blame on them. With anxiety, it isn't your fault, but it's up to you to change it. That's the unfairness of it all. If you don't make a conscious effort to change, then you will get the exact same results as you always have. I knew no other way - I thought people were supposed to be cool, no matter what. What I found was they weren't: everyone has their own agenda, and I had no clue how to handle that, so I receded into a shell. That made me depressed, and all of my anxiety lay on the fact that I didn't know how to deal with people effectively. I always felt like a puppet. Pulled and manipulated to make the puppeteer happy, and make the audience laugh.
Anxiety and Alcohol
Here's a return to a familiar subject on this blog: Alcohol! I'm sort of happy that I never discovered the joy of alcohol while I was in high school - I probably wouldn't have finished, and I'm almost positive I would have seen a lot more jail time than I have already. I think that a person like me that has so much anxiety and rigid rule structure in my mind would have went off the proverbial chain back when I was younger. But, there's a part of me that wishes I did find it. Although I wouldn't have done as well in school, probably, I could have figured out some things that would help me in the future - talking to people, being more independent, fighting (more), maybe, I dunno.
Lucky me, I got to find alcohol a lot later in life, and a lot of you have read my "Anxiety and Alcohol" post. Again, alcoholism is a side-effect of anxiety, in my opinion (and my opinion is right!). If you're confident in yourself in any social situation, when you get drunk, things seem out of place.
I Still Get Depressed
It's tough to get over anxiety, and that's the main reason I still have spells of depression. My anxiety tells me that I'm going to be laughed at for my clothes, or my car, or something. It makes me want to stay inside, and that fosters that sickly-sweet feeling of depression. It's actually the reason that I write this blog! Writing here gives me a chance to get all of the shit off my shoulders and focus on something, instead of wondering what I'm going to do all day, and if I'm good enough to do it. This is my anti-anxiety medicine. This, making music, going to school, and writing rhymes. I hope to extend my anti-anxiety medicine to going to the gym soon. lol.
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