‘i Hate Life’: What To Do If Nothing Makes You Happy
Do you find that nothing makes you happy anymore? Maybe you’ve stopped doing things you used to enjoy, can’t get out of bed in the morning, or feel hopeless or lost about your future.
Whether these feelings are transient or a sign of a deeper underlying problem, it’s important not to let them fester. What might start out as situational depression could turn into something long-lasting.
If you are finding that nothing makes you happy and wondering what to do about it, below are some ideas to help you pull yourself out of the state you are finding yourself in.
Alcohol Tobacco And Other Drugs
The misuse and abuse of alcohol, tobacco, illicit drugs, and prescription medications affect the health and well-being of millions of Americans. SAMHSAs 2020 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reports that approximately 19.3 million people aged 18 or older had a substance use disorder in the past year.
Seeing A Doctor About Depression
Big changes in your life, like bereavement, losing a job, or even having a baby, can cause symptoms of depression. You’re also more likely to experience depression if you have a family history of depression. However, it’s also possible to become depressed without there being an obvious reason.
You can learn more about depression causes here.
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How To Find Purpose When Living With Depression
When you live with depression, it can feel as though everything is working against you.
Not only can you feel unmotivated, hopeless, or self-critical, you might not be able to concentrate long enough to focus on what you want to accomplish.
But depression doesnt have to be permanent. There are ways to get back on track by reconnecting to those things that bring you fulfillment.
These tips may help you find your purpose again, even if you live with depression.
What Should I Do If I Have Symptoms Of Postpartum Depression
- Your baby blues dont go away after 2 weeks
- Symptoms of depression get more and more intense
- Symptoms of depression begin within 1 year of delivery and last more than 2 weeks
- It is difficult to work or get things done at home
- You cannot care for yourself or your baby
- You have thoughts about hurting yourself or your baby
Ask your partner or a loved one to call for you if necessary. Your doctor, nurse, or midwife can ask you questions to test for depression. They can also refer you to a mental health professional for help and treatment.
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How To Overcome Depression And Feel Like Yourself Again
Depression is a common, but severe mental health condition that can make it difficult for you to feel happy, content, or motivated on any given day. Causes for depression include a wide range of factors such as stress, a family history of depression, or changes in hormones or brain chemistry. However, having the tools and information to overcome depression can empower you to take back your life and maintain good overall health for years to come.
Here are seven ways to overcome depression so you can start feeling better and get back to being the best version of yourself:
Note before getting started: Above all, the best advice is to consult a medical professional if you need help.
It’s Ok To Have Emotions
For a long time, I suppressed uncomfortable emotions like sadness, thinking that would mean the depression would go away.
But it turns out when we suppress one emotion, we also suppress our ability to feel all other emotions, like joy.
It meant that for a long time I’d avoid things that moved me deeply â like music â in case they made me too emotional.
Now I know emotions exist to tell us important things about ourselves and the situation we’re in, for example, what we need, what we value, what we love.
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Looking After Someone With Depression
It’s not just the person with depression who’s affected by their illness. The people close to them are also affected.
If you’re caring for someone with depression, your relationship with them and family life in general can become strained. You may feel at a loss as to what to do. Finding a support group and talking to others in a similar situation might help.
If you’re having relationship or marriage difficulties, it might help to contact a relationship counsellor who can talk things through with you and your partner.
Men are less likely to ask for help than women and are also more likely to turn to alcohol or drugs when depressed.
What Should I Ask My Healthcare Provider
If you have SAD, ask your provider:
- What treatment is best for me?
- How can I prevent depressive episodes?
- Will light therapy work?
- Should I take an antidepressant?
- When should I start treatment?
- How long should my treatment continue?
- What can I eat to improve my symptoms?
- What else can I do to feel better?
A note from Cleveland Clinic
Seasonal affective disorder is a type of depression that happens every year during a specific season, usually winter. Symptoms can include a lack of energy and feelings of hopelessness. Fortunately, theres treatment for seasonal depression. Talk to your healthcare provider. Theyre there to help.
Last reviewed by a Cleveland Clinic medical professional on 04/10/2022.
References
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Symptoms And Causes Of Depression
Symptoms of depression can be very different from person to person. However, as a general rule, if you are depressed you feel hopeless, sad and lacking interest in things that used to make you feel happy.
Depression symptoms are bad enough to interfere with work, social life and family life, and can persist for weeks or months.
Doctors describe depression in one of three ways, depending on how serious it is:
- mild depression it has some impact on daily life
- moderate depression it has a significant impact on your daily life
- severe depression this makes it nearly impossible to get through your life day to day
A few people with severe depression may have symptoms of psychotic depression.
Below is a list of depression symptoms it’s unlikely that one person would have all of them.
Get Ahead Of Relapse: Identify Early Warning Signs
These are different for everyone.
Mine are extreme tiredness, avoidance, cancelling plans, isolating, and letting self-care slip â not eating properly, not being able to shower because I can’t move, not being able to leave the house.
It’s helpful to tell people I trust what my signs are â it increases the chances of getting help sooner if others observe a change in my behaviour before I do.
I can even plan ahead and be specific about how I’d like to be told about this, for example a text message, a chat over coffee, a message iced on a cake .
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Be Patient With Yourself
Living with depression is depressing. Its hard. Enjoying life seems impossible, so thats why its important to give yourself space, time, and be patient.
Things wont improve overnight, but with a constant effort to better yourself, you can and you will.
From my own experience, most weeks, even days are still rollercoasters. Filled with emotions and anxieties, yet I continue to plug away at enjoying the life I have, one small moment at a time.
One of the most important things about depression, though, is knowing you are not alone and that it is okay to not be okay.
So many people have told me, why cant you just be happy? or just think better thoughts and of course that is the goal, but its easier said than done.
I try and that is all we can ever do try our best and remind ourselves that we are enough and deserve an awesome life.
How do you enjoy your life? What brings a smile to your face?
Improving Motivation And Thinking
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Life Events And Depression
Research suggests that continuing difficulties, such as long-term unemployment, living in an abusive or uncaring relationship, long-term isolation or loneliness or prolonged exposure to stress at work can increase the risk of depression.
Significant adverse life events, such as losing a job, going through a separation or divorce, or being diagnosed with a serious illness, may also trigger depression, particularly among people who are already at risk because of genetic, developmental or other personal factors.
Why Does Loss Of Appetite And Tiredness Often Occur Together
Loss of appetite and tiredness, or fatigue, often go hand-in-hand and are symptoms of several health conditions. For example, having the flu can make you lethargic, nauseous, and develop a loss of appetite.
Health conditions associated with appetite loss and tiredness include:
- Chronic pain, such as that caused by surgery, fibromyalgia, and nerve damage
- Premenstrual syndrome
- Eating disorders including bulimia and anorexia nervosa
- Mental health disorders including depression and bipolar disorder
- Stress and grief
Appetite loss and tiredness are also side effects of many medications, including sleeping pills, opioids, and antibiotics.
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Know When It’s The Depressed Mind And When It’s You
On the 17th day in hospital I wrote in my notebook: “I think the sad thing is you lose a sense of dignity for yourself.”
The depressed mind a) can’t do the things it knows are good for itself, b) will beat itself up over this failure, c) appreciates the irony of these two things on a good day.
Sometimes now I pause and ask myself, “Is this the depression?” because it helps to know who’s talking and who’s in charge.
Talking to a psychologist, reading about helpful strategies, exploring digital mental health treatment such as Mindspot â this all helps too.
Life After Depression: How To Thrive What Helps What Gets In The Way
Depression keeps itself alive with an intense, overwhelming sense of hopelessness. This hopelessness kills the motivation to reach into the world for support, something that is already fragile because of the stigma that is so often attached to mental illness.
New research, published in the journal Psychiatry Research, offers a reason for hope. There is life after depression a strong, healthy, happy life and the research has found the factors that will help to make this possible and those that will get in the way.
In a study involving more than 2,500 people who had experienced a major depressive disorder at some time in their lives, researchers found that about two in five people were able to fully recover and experience full mental health. The researchers defined full mental health as:
- experiencing happiness or life satisfaction almost every day for the last month
- a full year without depression, anxiety, suicidal thoughts or substance abuse and
- positive social and psychological well-being.
The research revealed important findings about what helped, what hindered and what had no bearing at all on the likelihood of thriving after depression.
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Educate Yourself And Become Your Own Advocate
You are your best advocate and responsible for your recovery, so arm yourself with information, Claude says. He recommends consulting Doctor Google, but with a grain of salt and always consult a medical professional before trying different strategies to manage your symptoms. Theres no cure, and theres no magic bullet to treat depression, he says.
It may also help to be prepared to encounter stigma, but dont let it defeat you, says Lukasik.
After I was diagnosed, I expected compassion and understanding, but more often than not, I was told to snap out of it or be more grateful for what I had, he says. At first he absorbed this negativity, feeling misunderstood and shunned, but he overcame it by going public. Writing about it, forming a website for lawyers with depression, and producing a short documentary gave me a voice to speak up about what depression really is, he says.
Setting Your Sights Higher
Studies have shown that a sense of accomplishment is an important element in developing positive well-being over time as it has more value than completing tasks with no personal value
Restarting life after recovering from mood disorders such as depression can also involve revisiting what you want to accomplish academically or in your personal relationships, or even in your career. Striving to progress may start with small goals such as updating your resume, applying for jobs that are considerate of your wellbeing, or reapplying for colleges, or re-submitting your essays.
Research finds that completing tasks that are of personal value and achieving goals that allows you to progress in life involves instilling positive emotions such as hope into our lives which can be a large influence on our perspective of life.
While setting your sights higher it is important to remember to be mindful of your pace and set goals that are realistic and achievable.
Restarting your life after depression will not happen overnight, it is not a one-time investment rather recovery from depression is a long-term investment into yourself. Putting effort into areas and milestones mentioned above can help smoothen the transition from living life passively to engaging and flourishing.
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Making Changes And Ditching Habits
Here, we are talking about lifestyle changes such as changes in diets that are nutritious and sustaining. New research has found connection between mood and food, citing that mediterranean diets tend to be connected to better mental well being as compared to western diets.
Ditching habits such as smoking, drinking, and other forms of substance will also be part of ones journey into living a thriving life. Active efforts to maintain optimal sleep hygiene will also help improve mood while poor sleep is found to have an immense negative impact on wellbeing.
Confidence When Piecing Life Back Together
Depression can take a sledgehammer to our confidence. It can make us feel useless and hopeless to the extent that we dont see any value in our life. As we start to piece life back together, low self-confidence often remains.
Re-building our self-confidence takes time, patience, self-kindness, and support.
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Develop A Solid Daily Routine
Depression can make you feel helpless, or lacking any control over your life and the direction in which its going. Incorporating structure in your life and developing daily routines can help you regain a sense of control and optimism in your ability to steer your life in the direction you choose. Having a daily routine also helps you stay busy and gives your mind less time to dwell on worries or losses.
It may help to map out your daily activities in a planner or a notebook, with times listed next to each activity. Writing down the time you plan to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner, the time you plan on being at the gym, and the times you plan to do activities that you enjoy can give your life more structure. It makes it easier to follow through on your planned activities even when depression makes you feel that all you want to do is stay home.
At the end of every day, it is also helpful to take some time to reflect on how each activity affected your mood, using a scale of 1 to 10. Maintaining this practice can help you identify which activities are routinely positive and which may be possibly contributing to feelings of depression. You can use this insight to change up your routine or lifestyle and improve your mental health.
Dont Care About Anything Enjoy Life Again
Have you ever felt that everything you do has lost all its substance? Like I dont care about anything, because theres no enjoyment or pleasure in doing it?
A surprising number of us feel this way. Whether your experience is depression-related or rooted in something else, theres a name for it: anhedonia. And the exercise below can help you beat it right away.
Its worth taking a look at what anhedonia is, how it happens to you, and a foolproof way to help you enjoy things you used to love again!
If you feel like you arent enjoying life anymore, and want to talk to someone about it, there are people here for you. You can chat anonymously on Supportiv, 24/7, with people who know how anhedonia feels.
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