Tag Archives: Depression

It’s Not Me. It’s You, Part 2

Posted on December 15, 2025 by Christy Barongan

Eleven years ago I wrote my first blog post about anger. That was a tough one to write about because I felt so ashamed of my anger. That I had it at all. That I couldn’t control it. That it didn’t make any sense. And I was angry that when I tried to get support, whatever people said wasn’t helpful.

I didn’t say specifically in the post what my friends said, but since the same thing is happening right now, I’m guessing it was something like, stop being angry. You’re making me uncomfortable. Go over there somewhere so I don’t have to feel it.

I’m not one to attack someone. But if you attack me by telling me something like I don’t know what I’m talking about because I’m just a psychologist and you’re a physician, you should start running now.

Because this is what my dad told me when I became a psychologist. Stuff like, because you’re just a sorry ass psychologist instead of an M.D., you can’t even afford a Mercedes Benz. Because that’s what’s important in life.

He has Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), Bipolar Disorder, trauma, and Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). Ironically, the TBI is because he was trying to save his Mercedes Benz when it was rolling down a hill backwards and he jumped in to hit the brakes.

These conditions are all examples of Autism. Or Neurodiversity. Or as I like to call it, good ol’ neurospiciness.

Neurospicy people become very easily dysregulated and have a very difficult time knowing what to do to self-soothe. Because they have no idea what they are feeling or what’s triggering them.

Recently I’ve been told 3 times by 3 different physicians that I don’t know what I’m talking about because I am a psychologist and not an M.D. At least that’s how I heard it. But it’s certainly possible that it was something like that and I got triggered and then became dysregulated. Because it was traumatic, hearing that over and over again.

Anyhoo, it inspired me to look up stats on ChatGPT related to clinical psychologists and physicians. Did you know that the percentage of people who say they want to be M.D.s and succeed in doing so is only 6%? So physicians are also neurospicy, but on the opposite end of the spectrum, toward the brilliant end.

Being brilliant is technically “abnormal” too, based on statistical infrequency. But since we value brilliance, we don’t call it a disorder. Disorders are just for things that people do that we don’t like.

It can all get kind of political, really. So I prefer not to pathologize anyone. I tell my clients that we are all just human beings, being imperfect, feeling all the feelings on the spectrum of humanity, doing the best we can trying to figure out how to do this very hard thing called life.

I couldn’t find an equivalent stat for licensed clinical psychologists, but the closest one was that only 7% of the people who apply to research-based clinical psychology Ph.D. programs are accepted. However, you still have to defend your dissertation and pass the licensure exam. So 5%, maybe? Also neurospicy individuals.

People with NPD like my dad are too ashamed to admit to any vulnerable feelings, especially hurt and shame, so they project them onto other people. It’s not me! It’s you! And then they get angry and want to beat it out of you.

When one of my brothers was learning his multiplication tables, my dad was inexplicably enraged that our younger brother, who later turned out to be a genius (also neurospicy), could learn them faster than he could. So my dad told my multiplication-deficient brother that if he didn’t learn them by the time he got home, he would be in trouble. Because there’s nothing like the fear of punishment to enhance someone’s capacity to learn.

Not surprisingly, he couldn’t learn them in the next few hours. So my dad yelled at him, which I could only hear from the other room, but it was enough to make me cry and remember to this day. Then he took him into the bedroom and beat him, which was far worse than whatever I could hear.

When we were young adults, my dad was reflecting on this incident, perhaps out of guilt, and his excuse was that he was afraid that our brother might have a mental disability. Because when our mom was pregnant, she and 2 other female residents in medicine got the measles or something, and the 2 other mothers had children with cognitive disabilities.

Decades later, my dad tells me in a rare conversation of vulnerability and honesty that he was teased for being stupid and “retarded” because he couldn’t read. Which was because he had dyslexia, but that term probably didn’t exist back then. His dad beat him and screamed at him so loudly that all of the neighbors could here it because in the Philippines they don’t have windows.

My therapist thinks that he thought if it were his genes that made my brother have difficulty learning, that would make it his fault. I never really understood why couples argue about whose side of the family this “problem” comes from. It’s not like you get to choose your genes. Or your family, for that matter.

When you don’t want to identify with the aggressor, you think, I’m just never going to get angry. I’m going to be this semi-human stoic superhero! So instead, their anger goes underground. Their drill sergeant and inner critic tell them to “toughen up,” “pull yourself up by your bootstraps,” and carry on, as mentioned in the blog post written by a previous client.

Women also have to suppress their anger because it’s frowned upon in women. Just look at what happened to Elphaba. So instead you try to be a people pleaser and blame yourself for everything. Which is ideal for narcissists.

I think it would be much better if we empowered each other by telling people what they’re good at rather than making people feel bad for not being what you want them to be. But it takes more effort to empower than it does to judge.

But trying not to get angry doesn’t work. You may say you don’t feel it, but it’s coming out, anyway, in ways that you don’t even know about. That’s the kind of denial in passivity. Your anger is hidden from you, but you feel very hurt and undeserving.

I had 3 men angry at me yesterday. The first one actually thanked me when I explained to him that I would rather him tell me that he’s hurt so that I could apologize right away. I told him that anger and hurt go together. That often people prefer to identify with one but not the other, so the other one goes underground. So in reality, we’re hurt and angry at the same time. So he and I are good.

But I was so paranoid after he told me that I hurt him that I sent a flurry of texts, checking to see if I offended anyone, apologizing to everyone just in case.

My partner blamed me for repeating what he said because that’s not what he meant to say and I should have known what he meant before he took 20 minutes to explain it and why are we still talking about this! I’m just going to leave.

So I was like, well, OK, but…can I give you your Christmas gifts since we may never see each other again?

But he called to check on me tonight. So that’s something. He has ADHD so he’s neurospicy.

With my brother, I initiated the conversation because of the aforementioned paranoia. I apologized for being passive-aggressive and saying mean things that he doesn’t deserve to hear. I’m just going to own up to my anger and be honest so that I stop making snide comments.

It turns out he was waaaaayyyy angrier at me and has been holding a grudge against me for something that happened over 4 years ago. Because I didn’t know he wanted me to help him put my kitchen table together. Because he didn’t ask me to. I should have known without him having to say it. I was just weaponizing my incompetence to waste his time, which I clearly thought was less valuable than mine. So APOLOGY NOT ACCEPTED!

Whoa!

Please, people, if you’re feeling hurt or angry, just tell the person. You’re not benefiting anyone by trying not to feel. If he had just said, come help me so that I can show you how to read instructions for furniture that comes from China that are on one page with no words, and the parts come in bags that don’t correspond to the numbers, and the “instructions” are arrows, I would have said, good idea!

By the way, I found this out right before I had to lead a meditation. I was honest about it and said hey, I’m dysregulated and I may cry, but I’m glad we’re meditating together.

Then I got my massage, but it was essentially a therapy session, because I had to pull myself together somehow since I was about to see my partner, my brother, and his wife. I wanted to give her a good tip for just listening and giving me a hug because it was essentially a therapy session with a light massage for self-soothing and connection. Which was exactly what I needed in that moment.

But then, when she tried to run my card, for the fifth time in the past month, some hacker associated with Al-Qaeda had tried to use both my cards that day. If you have an Apple credit card, they will automatically reject even the smallest suspicious activity and change your number on the spot. So I used that card.

But for the other one, I had to call my credit card company again and have them re-issue a credit card again. But you can’t call them back from the number from which they called you. You have to pull out your credit card, look at the back, and call the number for U.S. cardholders. And they ask you really stupid questions about stuff that shows up on their side but not yours and ask you if you can see it, even though they just told you that you can’t. As well as things like, did you make a purchase a week an a half ago for $6 using Apple Pay? And then they say, OK we’ll send this out to you in a few days, so I hope you have another card or money in your account!

I did this credit card thing prior to getting ready for our dinner party. Because I was crying and hysterical, my partner asked me if I was sure I wanted to do this. My drill sergeant was like, yes, you do! You have to make this work! So at first I said yes. And then I thought, no. I don’t have to do this if I don’t want to. I can do whatever I want. So I called them to say I wasn’t up to it and to apologize.

Then I talked to my sister-in-law, since my brother was obviously furious with me, and I told her I had to cancel dinner. I was so upset I couldn’t do it for them. I had grand plans of using fancy china. I had put my Christmas decorations up. I was going to move my space heater to wherever they were sitting because the last time they were at my house they were cold. Because I’m always sweating since everything is triggering my fight/flight response. My partner had already been cooking for over an hour. And because they asked him to prepare a meal rather than hosting us, for weeks he had been planning out the meal, trying to make it just right, and trying to pick something they would like.

I hadn’t even gotten through the list of all the horrible things that had happened to me that day so far. But she thought this was a good time to tell me that I’m out of control, too loud, and too argumentative. And that I should seek psychiatric help. And go back on the meds that made me get surgery for GERD, throw up on the court, give up tennis, sing horribly, and wreck my vocal cords.

She’s a pediatrician. My brother, too. I asked her some differential diagnosis questions about mania, and she admitted that she didn’t know the criteria. But she still knows better than I do about what I need.

Apparently, they had been talking to my best friend behind my back and they all decided that this is what’s best for me. Because over Thanksgiving, when I got into an argument with my brother because he told me I didn’t know what I was talking about because I was a psychologist. And I hadn’t talked to my best friend in over 2 weeks. So none of them had any idea about the horrible things that had happened before this horrible day, because they don’t bother to check on me, even though they were obviously concerned. Unless this counted as their check-in.

I was blindsided and confused. Had they been holding on to their feelings about the argument since Thanksgiving? Is that why she had to tell me at that very moment, no matter how poorly timed it was? Was my apology to my brother interpreted as anger and argumentativeness? Was that the last straw? Had their plan been to come over and ambush me during dinner?

That added the most horrible thing to my list of horrible things that day.

By then, I was so dysregulated that my partner was confused by what they could have said to make me so upset. Seeing me in that state caused him to became dysregulated. Because it reminded him of what it was like when his family argued and he just wanted to make it all stop. So we argued for several painful hours, unable to connect and enjoy each other’s company, no matter how hard we tried. And even though we hadn’t seen each other for weeks and he is leaving for home to celebrate the holidays with his family tomorrow.

And I never even got to eat dinner.

Still, I advocated for myself on the phone. I addressed every issue that she brought up one by one. I told her that I checked in with every person to ask them if they were bothered by my behavior, and they said no, it didn’t bother them. They think I’m great. I told her I’ll talk to my therapist, and if she thinks I should talk to my psychiatrist, I will. I have an appointment with her this week.

But she said that wasn’t good enough. Because I guess they’re the ones who were bothered by my behavior. She trusts the psychiatrist who we share, who is an M.D., and has known me for about 4 years and sees me every 6 months, more than she trusts my therapist, who is a clinical psychologist that I have seen routinely for the past 26 years.

Neither of them are in therapy because they don’t have any problems. She even went out of her way to tell me they have a good marriage. Which was also confusing, since I had know idea what that had to do with me needing to see a psychiatrist.

Those are 2 of the 3 physicians I referenced earlier.

The other interaction with a physician happened during a gathering that was specifically organized so that all my friends in Roanoke could see me. I did something similar with him that I did with my brother over Thanksgiving. I gave him evidence that he’s neurodivergent on the brilliant end after an impromptu question to ChatGPT about how many people who start off pre-med graduate pre-med. Because even though I didn’t know the answer, I know from 19 years of working in a counseling center that the answer is, not many. ChatGPT said 16%. And I said it in the exact same way–loudly, in an argumentative manner, and angrily. Because he said dismissively, you psychologists think everyone is neurodivergent.

I also told him that our current administration and the majority of Americans are clearly not neurodivergent, based on the current laws and lawsuits.

His reaction was to tell me that everyone loved me and he wanted to give me a big kiss. Which was also confusing and disorienting, but not dysregulating. I also texted his wife the next day, who had hosted the party for me, to ask her if I was out of line. Because even being really happy to see your friends can be dysregulating. She said not at all. I love your energy. You’re so smart and I learn so much from listening to you. And I love having someone to scream at the TV with me during a UVA game.

To “support me,” my best friend and partner told me not to be mad that they’re mad that I’m mad because they really care about me. To me, that sounded a lot more like supporting them.

So after a whole day of crying yesterday because nobody wanted to listen to me or believe me, and everyone projected their anger onto me–except my friend who thanked me for the insight–I decided to take a self-care day today, talk to my therapist, and take a break by distancing myself from my stress, like my family suggested. And they are the only stress I am dealing with at the moment.

Oh wait. The other stressor is that I can’t sleep. Which is activating my fight or flight response. So I am running on adrenaline. So I’m actually looking forward to talking to my psychiatrist now.

Serendipitously, at this very moment, I’m listening to a continuing education presentation on when psychologists should make referrals, which is very basic and boring (except for the slide on new meds). She just said that when someone isn’t sleeping, they’re in crisis.

And I’m writing a blog post about it. Because that’s what I did in that last anger post and I said it helped. And I guess this one is helping, too, by giving me something else to focus on. Because taking deep dives into something is also a form of self-soothing for someone who is obsessive-compulsive (also neurospicy).

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Guess What? I’m Neurodivergent!

Posted on October 26, 2025 by Christy Barongan

I see a lot of women diagnosed with ADHD in adulthood because they had managed to compensate and succeed with considerable effort, despite having the disorder. It took a while for adults with ADHD to be noticed at all, since the stereotype of ADHD is the boy who can’t sit still in his seat and runs to the window when an ambulance passes by. But it’s even more difficult to diagnose in women because they usually don’t have the hyperactive symptoms that lead to recklessness, impulsivity, and sensation-seeking.

Now in the literature the same phenomenon is happening with people on the autism spectrum. In fact, Autism, ADHD, and Bipolar Disorder are all a part of a larger category called neurodivergence. If that word calls to mind the movie or novel Divergent, it’s actually kind of fitting. People who were different in some way were isolated and seen as a potential danger or threat to society. Not so different from what many people think now.

What’s strange, though, is that many of these women who show traits of being on the spectrum want to be formally diagnosed with Autism. I would explain to them that it wouldn’t really benefit them now because they are adults, and they no longer get accommodations, IEP’s, early intervention programs, and other resources that neurodivergent children can take advantage of. But after reading Divergent Mind, now I do. They wanted to know that their experiences are a known entity with a label and that other people share their sensitivities.

Because I have so many of these clients, I decided to read the book Divergent Mind. And it literally blew my mind. Like, I could feel the neurons in my brain firing, making connections between bits of information I have gathered throughout my life. It was like the equivalent of runner’s high, but a kind of intellectual high that you get when you have a Eureka moment. Or like Neo in the Matrix when he could finally read the code.

Nerenberg describes neurodivergence as simply cognitive differences rather than mental disorders. And there are lots of characteristics of neurodivergence that aren’t considered abnormal but make it difficult for people to navigate the world, nonetheless. Often they are diagnosed with depression or anxiety, because living in a neurotypical world sucks the life out of them. Or they are in a constant hypervigilant state.

The geniuses I went to high school with (you know who you are) are also neurodivergent. But since it’s not a bad thing to be brilliant, no one includes them in this category.

I kind of figured my whole family was neurodivergent, because half of them have bipolar disorder and the other half have anxiety. Some of them have both. I have known for some time that I am a highly sensitive person (HSP) because I read The Highly Sensitive Person decades ago.

In particular, I have mirror synesthesia. I can’t watch horror films because when someone’s arm gets cut off with a chainsaw, it hurts my arm. And I don’t like reading or watching anything that depicts the Holocaust in great detail, because their pain overwhelms me.

I also have a sensory processing disorder (SPD). My brother once told me I had supersonic smell. I don’t like the tickers on ESPN because I get distracted by them and stop watching the game. I don’t like hugs. I’m constantly adjusting the volume on the TV because music makes it louder.

I have insensitivities in proprioception, which means I have difficulty judging my body in space. Consequently, I have bruises all over my arms and legs and have no idea where they came from. Or perhaps because of my sensitivities I don’t have enough bandwidth to calculate my dimensions in space.

I have the same problem with interoception, which is why hunger and depression feel the same to me. And anxiety and having to pee feel the same. I tighten all my muscles when I’m concentrating even if those muscles aren’t needed when I’m playing a song with one finger on Duolingo.

None of these things are necessarily disorders. In fact, Nerenberg refers to them as potential superpowers—IF someone can learn what their sensitives are and learn how to self-sooth when they feel overwhelmed.

Medication and therapy can be helpful, but another possible resource that I didn’t know about is occupational therapy (OT). An occupational therapist can help you identify what your sensitivities are and develop specific coping strategies so that you don’t become overwhelmed and shut down, melt down, or stay in fight/flight/freeze.

After I found this out, I told all of my clients about this resource. Even clients who have stopped seeing me, perhaps because I couldn’t help them with their sensitivities. And I have to say, because I now recognize what my clients’ sensitivities are, or at least recognize that they become dysregulated because of some sensitivity, I feel like the knowledge itself has also become a superpower.

As a result, the mindfulness book that I told you I was going to write is going to specifically address people on the spectrum. Because mindfulness is about being more aware of what’s going on inside you and around you. While everyone can benefit from mindfulness, perhaps people who are on the spectrum who don’t want medication and/or therapy can read this book and learn how to develop tools on their own that can help them thrive.

So stay tuned! Reserve your copy today!

Just kidding. It’s going to take a while.

But definitely check out Divergent Mind!

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It’s Time

Posted on August 11, 2022 by Christy Barongan

So I had been on a pretty steady writing roll at the beginning of the year, publishing about a post a week, when something unfortunate happened. My psychiatrist thought that my antidepressant wasn’t working so she recommended that I taper off of it. She thought the problem was that I have PTSD and should do some trauma-based therapy instead.

My therapist didn’t think it was a good idea to taper off my meds while depressed without adding anything, and she did not think trauma-based therapy would be helpful at this time. I completely agreed with her. I’m not used to having my providers be on different pages. She and my previous psychiatrist used to work closely together and often gave each other updates. I try to do what my doctors tell me to do but I was at a loss as to how to do so in this case. So I listened to my psychiatrist about the meds and went down on my dose, and I listened to my therapist about the therapy and did not start trauma-based treatment.

Guess what happened? My therapist was right about both things. She has known me for over 20 years, whereas my psychiatrist has known me less than a year. My therapist also has more than 40 years of clinical experience, and my psychiatrist is at the beginning of her career. So really I should have just listened to my therapist from the get go. I don’t really know why I didn’t. It was a costly error in judgment because I got severely depressed and anxious a few weeks after lowering my meds.

In a previous post, 50 Shades of Blue, I talked about how there are a lot of different flavors of depression. When my psychiatrist thought my meds weren’t controlling my depression in March I was still highly functional and I didn’t think it was that bad, relatively speaking. Maybe a light to medium blue. At the lowest point of this depressive episode in April I would describe it as an inky blue-black. Things got better for a little while in June but then by July my depression was more of a cold grayish blue.

What really sucks about going off of your meds is that simply going back up on them doesn’t correct the problem. Sort of like how it takes months to lose weight but just a few weeks to gain it all back. So for the past 5 months I have led a fairly marginal existence, mainly saving up my energy for my clients and working on self-care. I would try to get a little exercise, some sunlight, meditate and pray, eat, see my family. I even started playing pickleball, because it’s easier on my body than tennis, and I could have some social interaction, since I don’t have friends here yet. But I could not get myself to write. Could not blog, write in my journal, or even jot down writing ideas in my Notes app.

But here’s the good news. A week and a half ago I suddenly decided that it was time to write my book, and I knew this meant I was finally getting better. If you’ve been with me since the birth of my blog, which was almost 9 years ago, you know that the purpose of this whole endeavor was to get me to write a book. And now that this goal feels like my destiny again I finally feel alive, fully like myself again. I write in my journal. I read books on writing books. I jot down lots of ideas for posts and chapters. I’m blogging at this very moment. There are interesting ideas in my brain other than worrying about my lack of funds and when I’m going to start my new job. I feel joy and excitement rather than feeling empty and dead inside. I finally feel awake.

I’m sharing this with all of you because if it weren’t for you, dear readers, I would have never been ready to write my book. I would have never known whether or not what I had to say was interesting or funny or meaningful or relatable. I wouldn’t have felt the joy of having someone tell me that sometimes they feel the exact same way and it gave them comfort to know that they’re not alone. I wouldn’t have received the encouragement to write the book that many of you have given me. I’m going to continue to rely on you for support as I go through this process. In fact, in next post I’m going to ask you a favor, so I hope you’ll participate.

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I Haven’t Moved Yet and Other Updates

Posted on June 1, 2021 by Christy Barongan

It’s June and a lot has happened since my last post. Inquiring minds want to know.

First, after another semester in COVID, surgery #1, and obsessing about all of the things I have to do for the move, I am finally feeling better! While I was going through all this, I knew it was bad. But I guess you can’t fully realize all of the things you had to do to survive while you are in the process of surviving. It’s only when you look back that you realize you’re stronger than you think.

The other thing about depression is that when you’re in it you think, was there a time I wasn’t depressed? My boyfriend was always trying to get me to go outside to get sunlight, but I was too tired. But then I began to doubt myself. Did I like sunlight at some point? Maybe I’m just making excuses. But I vaguely remember playing tennis. And watching my team play tennis. And I remember thinking it was fun.

But then when you’re not depressed you think, did I really just crash on the couch after work every day in a comatose state? Did I really have that little energy? Wow. Thank goodness that’s over with.

The other update is that last week was my last week of work. 19 years. That’s longer than any relationship I’ve had. But I always knew I’d be better at work than marriage. I still have to pack my office and transfer files, but I’ve said my good-byes to clients and colleagues. We had a nice get-together during a work retreat last week. That was the first time I had seen most of my colleagues in over a year. In a way, I’m glad I’m leaving during Covid. I wouldn’t have wanted a bunch of people coming up to me saying good-bye. I may seem sociable, but I’m really not.

My next update is that I am able to do a lot more stuff now. Like

  • play tennis again–it’s starting to come back to me
  • ride my bike–managed not to crash
  • see the Star–with a short hike uphill after playing tennis to boot
  • rollerblade–not very smart but it did inspire this haiku

As I laced my last

rollerblade I remembered

I’m too old to fall.

I didn’t fall. But hopefully I won’t try to do it again.

Most of the time these things were done without coughing, and I’ve only thrown up a couple of times. I’m getting a little less rusty and out of shape, but I’m still getting old. My body can’t do what it used to do. And there’s nothing that can fix that. So, I’m trying to focus on being grateful that I can be active at all. And I’m putting that self-care commitment I made in my last post into action. I spend a lot of time resting, icing, stretching, massaging, and doing yoga. All things I didn’t do before because I thought they were a waste of time. Hence the neglect of my body.

Which brings me to my next update. I had to take a bunch of tests to see if I needed surgery for my GERD, and one of them was a pH test. You have to get this tube inserted through your nose and down your esophagus and wear this big monitor where you had to indicate if you were eating, sleeping, or taking a pill. For 24 hours. But I still went outside for a walk, as indicated in the Rocky-like picture below.

The cutoff score for high acidity was 14, and I had a score of 80! My surgeon said it’s the highest score she’s ever seen! So I’ve been bragging that I have the worst GERD ever. I know I said I wasn’t going to be competitive about health stuff anymore but that one is just too good.

Plus it makes me feel vindicated. When I was watching my team play a few months ago, I noticed how quiet it was. No one was coughing. Why am I the only one? I was worried that when I moved to Knoxville no one would play with me because they’d probably think I had Covid. But now that I’m having surgery, maybe things can get even better. Maybe I’ll be cough-free by the time I meet people to play with. Maybe they’ll want to be my friend.

Thanks to all of you who prayed for me last time. If you think of me on June 18, feel free to send some healing vibes my way. This time I’ll have to spend the night for observation, which makes me a little nervous. I haven’t stayed overnight in the hospital since I was 5.

This brings me to my final update. I haven’t moved yet. In retrospect, I should have said in that initial post that I am moving months from now. Probably in August. Ever since I wrote that, people keep coming up to me saying, what are you doing here? I thought you moved. I don’t think they’re disappointed or anything, but I just want the rest of you to know, in case you see me in the near future.

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Déjà Vu

Posted on April 7, 2020 by Christy Barongan

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At the end of 2013, my youngest brother R. stopped taking his antidepressants. My mom, who is a doctor, was giving him samples, and she told him that he needed to find a doctor to prescribe them. Because it’s the legal thing to do. Not wanting to have depression on his record, and coming off 5 years of steady employment, he decided to go off of them instead. I begged him not to, but he was afraid to be dependent on them in the advent of an apocalypse and wanted to prepare himself.

Three months later he was depressed. And, as I’ve mentioned based on my own folly, every time you have another depressive episode, it’s harder to recover. My psychiatrist described it as breaking your leg in the same place over and over. Still, he did not go to the doctor until his depression and anxiety were so bad that he could not make it to work. His job was very generous, allowing him to cut back his hours to as little as he needed and keep his job. But ultimately the shame and guilt of not being able to go overwhelmed him and he quit.

After a few months of unemployment, my brother moved back home with my parents. My dad, who had been depressed for 4 years, went straight to a manic episode and was blowing through his retirement money. And my mom’s retirement money. And she could do nothing to stop him. So he took on the impossible job of trying to figure out how we could stop them. But the situation was so bad that, instead of helping them, he had a heart attack. At the age of 40. And since they were in no mental state to care for him, he moved in with me. And still lives with me.

It has been a rough 3 and a half years, but in the past year R. has been feeling much better. He is able to go to make it in work, has friends, a church community, extracurricular activities. He’s the happiest he’s been in a long time. But it was a 6 year journey–a high price to pay for going off his meds.

Last winter my other brother M., who also struggles with depression, stopped taking his medication. Because he didn’t want to have to see his doctor for his yearly follow up. And he didn’t want to be dependent on the meds. In case there was an apocalypse. And he got depressed right a way.

A few days ago in our sibling Zoom meeting, M, confessed that he had stopped taking his meds and recently restarted them. He was feeling anxious, having chest pains, shortness of breath. He couldn’t eat, couldn’t think clearly. He was afraid of losing his job. He was a loser, a failure. He worried about homelessness.

It was déjà vu.

We did everything we could to talk him into going to his doctor to discuss getting back on meds. And to rule out the possibility of a heart attack. Like R. did when he was depressed and anxious, M. makes excuses because he doesn’t see how dire his situation is. Doesn’t seem to remember anything that happened to R. Doesn’t recognize that history is repeating itself.

I’ve been trying to convince him to come stay with me until he gets better. Yes, there is a travel ban, but I consider the possibility of him committing suicide or having a heart attack essential travel. I feel as anxious as I did when my younger brother was about to be released from the hospital and would be in may parents’ care for recovery. Which meant certain death.

It’s strange to be in this catch-22: trying to convince my brother of something that will save his life, knowing that it will once again probably cause me to become anxious and depressed. This is the first time in a very long that I feel mostly relaxed. I’d like to enjoy it for as long as I can. But I don’t think he can get better in isolation. And he is also at risk for a heart attack. And he’s bipolar and could become manic.

Is every family like this? One mental health crisis after another? Will there ever be a time when things can be “normal”? Just for a little while? Just so I can catch my breath?

R. thinks it could be a good thing for all of us if M. comes. He will have someone to talk to. They can exercise together. R. can take him to church, introduce him to his friends. Maybe one day he and M. can get a place of their own, which is their dream. M. would be closer to his kids. I could have my space again but have them close by.

I hope he’s right.

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How to Tell if You’re Lazy

Posted on April 25, 2019 by Christy Barongan

lazy cat

I have clients tell me that they’re lazy all the time. Even though they are all high achieving, perfectionistic, over-scheduled students who work more hours in a day than I do. And I work a pretty full day myself. Why is that, you may ask? That doesn’t make any sense. Because that’s how mental illness is; it doesn’t make any sense.

Usually when people beat themselves up for being lazy it’s a telltale sign that they’re probably depressed. A better word for laziness would be something like fatigue. When people are depressed they have no energy, no motivation. Nothing is enjoyable. Getting out of bed is too much effort. But it can’t be depression. That’s just an excuse. I don’t have real problems. I’m just being lazy.

Sometimes being paralyzed with fear can feel like laziness. Because fight or flight aren’t the only possibilities in the face of fear. Sometimes you freeze, like a deer in headlights. This is usually what happens when students have a paper due the next day but they have been staring at a blank screen on their computer for hours without typing a single word.

We do need a certain amount of anxiety to be motivated to do anything, but it doesn’t take much to go from the kind of anxiety that motivates you to the kind of anxiety that paralyzes you. Especially when you try to motivate yourself by saying you suck, you’re disappointing everyone, you’re going to flunk out of school and end up homeless. Not exactly a pep talk. And yet, this is the kind of stuff we say to ourselves all the time.

The ironic thing is, when I was looking for a meme on laziness, I discovered that people who really are lazy don’t feel bad about it. They’re out there looking for hacks to make the most out of their laziness–trying to figure out how to make it seem like they do yoga, or what comfortable clothes they can buy to lounge around in. There’s no shame about it at all. In fact, many of the memes are about wearing their laziness on their shirts like a badge of honor. Literally. Like this one:

laziness.jpg

And this one:

Not productive

In case you were too lazy to read the whole blog post, I’ll summarize it for you.

Here are 5 signs that you are not really lazy:

  1. Your therapist tells you that you are depressed.
  2. Your therapist tells you that you are anxious.
  3. You think you’re a loser and a terrible person.
  4. You worry about homelessness.
  5. You feel a strong affinity to deer in headlights.

And here are signs that you might actually be lazy:

  1. You’re a cat.
  2. You own one of those t-shirts.
  3. You have a Pinterest board about hacks for lazy people.
  4. You don’t read them because you’re too lazy.
  5. Being lazy doesn’t really bother you.

And if you were too lazy to read those signs, then here is the one-sentence moral of this story:

If you’re beating yourself up about being lazy, then you probably aren’t.

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50 Shades of Blue

Posted on April 10, 2019 by Christy Barongan

shades of blue

When I was in grad school, clinical depression was described as this discrete period that occurred in episodes with a clear beginning and ending. It was even called the common cold of mental illness. Like you would know when you had caught it, and then you’d get better and be in remission. If you had a genetic predisposition, you could be at risk of recurring depressive episodes, potentially for life.

You could also have this more chronic but less severe form of depression called dysthymia. Sometimes you could be unfortunate enough to have dysthymia and major depression at the same time. Double depression, it was called. As though you could have carefully measured doses of depression, and double depression has 2 cups of symptoms instead of 1. Which is strange, because you can’t have double of any other mental disorder.

Now that I’m a practicing psychologist, I know that the diagnostic categories are not as neat and clean as they were made out to be. As a person who has been depressed for most of my life, I can say that major depression feels distinct, but it is not always clear when I am depression-free vs having dysthymia. There are times when I didn’t think I was depressed in the moment, but when I look back, it’s clear that I was.

Often we tell clients who are on meds that they can begin tapering off once they are in a period of stability. Over the summer, perhaps. Or some time after they have gotten settled in their new job. Maybe the problem for me is that there is never a period of stability. Never some time when there isn’t some family crisis. When there isn’t some problem that I’m dealing with. If anything, I would say there have been episodes of stability that have broken up the more chronic feeling of being depressed.

I don’t to want give the impression that I’m always miserable, because I’m not. Like I said, sometimes I don’t even realize I’m depressed. Sometimes it only lasts a few hours or a few days. And it doesn’t feel the same every time. So at least there’s some variety to it.

Every now and then I get upset about how unfair it all seems. The depression. The anxiety. The family craziness. The stress that comes with thinking I need to save the world. But life isn’t fair, right? And I am blessed and fortunate in other ways. If I had to choose my suffering, at this point I’d choose mental illness, because at least it’s familiar to me. I know what to expect. I know how to manage it.

And the meds do help. So does therapy, self-care, mindfulness, and self-compassion. I think depression has made me wiser. It has made me a better therapist. I’ve learned to accept the ebbs and flows of my mood, and of life in general, without beating myself as much, because I’m doing the best that I can.

This week is finals week. We are all willing ourselves to make it to the break, exhausted from the semester. Despite taking my meds, talking to my therapist, and practicing self-care, mindfulness, and self-compassion, I’ve still had bad days. But I’m determined to get that Perfect Attendance award, so I’ve made it to work when I’m supposed to be here.

Today I would call my mood cornflower. Which is a pretty shade of blue.

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Falling Apart

Posted on January 2, 2019 by Christy Barongan

I learned something about myself in 2018. I learned that I am not a superhero. I can’t do it all.

I mean, I knew that. I knew that I had reached my limit and I was going to fall apart, but I had kept it all together for so long, you know? I figured it was like knitting some complicated dress pattern. Or winning a tennis match after driving 10 hours and being injured. Just another crazy challenge that I could push myself through. But this time I met my match.

The past two and a half years have been tough for my brother and me. This was not intended to be a long-term living arrangement. I decided to get a new place at my therapist’s suggestion. It would at least give us more personal space–literally a wall between us–which was one small thing I could control.

And it is nice, the new place. But it caused 6 months of additional stress before I could benefit from it. Selling my old place. Moving out and running out of storage space. (How could I get so much stuff into 1000 sq feet?) Staying in a really expensive apartment for several weeks. Not knowing when I was going to have my new place. Changing my address multiple times. Trying to fit all my stuff in my new place. Which should have been easier with double the square footage, but for some reason it wasn’t.

The other thing I took on this year is that online therapy job, in anticipation of the added expense of buying a new place. Even though I can barely see all the clients in my primary job. Plus, it’s really hard to make a connection with someone who you don’t get to interact with face to face. So much of what heals in therapy is what happens when you literally sit with someone, being fully present to their pain, rather than the words themselves. In online therapy, all you have is words.

Plus, you know when someone doesn’t like you, because you get multiple emails telling you the person is transferring. They can even write a terrible review about you. Or file a complaint. And then you have to have a video conference with an expert who specializes in helping you be a less sucky online therapist. Fortunately, the last 2 things didn’t happen. But I did have people transfer. And thank goodness, because what was I thinking, taking all those new people?

Last semester had been particularly stressful at my primary job because one of my colleagues had to be out for the beginning of the term, so things filled up a few weeks earlier than usual. I usually fall apart some time around Thanksgiving, no matter how hard I try to practice self-care, but usually I can bounce back after a mental health day. So when I first fell apart, not surprising. After the second day, I started panicking a little. After the 3rd day, I knew I was in trouble.

I ended up taking an extended leave, and it’s the best thing I’ve done for myself in a long time. I probably should have done it 10 years ago but didn’t because it felt like admitting defeat. An extreme version of retiring from a match. So I just sucked it up, even though I knew I wasn’t doing a great job.

This time I had no choice, because unlike in previous depressive episodes, I couldn’t think. I felt like I had a concussion. I couldn’t remember words, and had a hard time even having a conversation. If I had to make a decision, I would get overwhelmed. Even reading made me anxious, because it activated my brain. I knew there was no way I was going to be able to handle my job, so I accepted defeat.

Having this time to focus solely on self-care (and moving) made me realize how long I had been operating under duress. Some of it was beyond my control, but some of it I put on myself. I push myself relentlessly. I’ve gotten a lot better since practicing self-compassion, but my Drill Sergeant is still active, bossing me around every chance it gets. I was only able to stand up to it because it felt like life or death.

Today is my first day back, and I’m glad I’m the only person here so that I can just catch up on the things I have put on the back burner for the past 6 weeks. I’m feeling pretty good but I still don’t know how much stress I can tolerate, so I’m hoping I can slowly ease my way into the crazy schedule that awaits me.

But I have to do things differently. So this year, my New Year’s Resolution is to let go of as much as possible. Moving has taught me that. A lot of what I had been holding onto went into the trash or to Goodwill. I even gave up plants that I’ve had for over 20 years, because the idea of carrying them up 3 flights of stairs to the one bedroom apartment that my brother and I were going to share didn’t seem worth the effort. When you have to carry all of your belongings around with you, you to learn to let go of material possessions pretty quickly.

I’m going to let go in other ways, too. No more captaining multiple teams because they desperately need another captain. I’m cutting back on the number of people I try to save that are not a part of my job. I’m going to stop beating myself up about working out, sleeping abnormally, and being unlike other people in general. Any thought that causes me distress I will put aside. I will only do what I have to do, because that will still be plenty.

This year, rather than choosing some challenge that pushes me to the limit, I’m going to choose me.

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Living With It

Posted on January 3, 2018 by Christy Barongan

Bob

I am excited to start the year with a guest post from a friend I have known for 29 years. We met during our second year of college in a philosophy course and, though we probably didn’t know it at the time, connected in part because of our struggles with depression. It’s a rare gift to be able to see what the journey to self-acceptance looks like over the life span. For me, reading it was a reminder that wisdom is born out of suffering and self-compassion.

***

I remember wandering around my neighborhood with tears streaming down my face. It was a sunny day in Austin, Texas, but to me everything was hopeless, sadness was all around, and the future promised only pain. My Dad picked me up in his car, clearly worried, and not long afterwards I was hospitalized with depression.

That hospitalization when I was fifteen was a long time coming. When I was seven years old and my parents were getting divorced, I pulled so much of my hair out that I had to wear a hat to cover up the bald spot. When I was eleven, I starved myself for months and had to be hospitalized and treated for anorexia.

I’m nearly fifty years old now, and for most of my life I’ve lived with depression and anxiety. It comes and goes. I’ve contemplated suicide too many times to count. I’ve spent days, weeks and months wishing I were not alive, crying when I thought no one would notice, and feeling like I was crazy.  

I’ve tried various strategies – ignore it, fight it, drink or smoke it away. I’ve taken all kinds of pills, and I’ve seen psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, and counselors.

I’ve read books about depression, spirituality, self-help, mindfulness and positive psychology. I’ve quit some jobs, taken other jobs, and moved several times, at least partly influenced by depressive feelings.

Through all of this suffering, I like to believe I’ve learned a few things worth sharing. Here are my “Top 3” insights regarding living with depression – because everyone loves lists right?   

  1. Depression makes you believe a lot of things that aren’t true. A psychiatrist told me this, after I complained to him that I was a lazy, worthless bastard, and a burden to everyone I knew. He was right and I was wrong. Don’t believe the things depression tells you about yourself. No matter what you may have done or what you think your faults are, you deserve love from both yourself and others..
  2. Don’t give up. Even if the future seems bleak and promises nothing but pain, hang in there because things will get better. Even if you don’t think it will help, see that new doc or try that new technique, whether it’s yoga, exercise, diet, meditation or medication. Your depression may not completely go away, but finding a way to manage it is essential. And it’s a lifelong process. You never know where that breakthrough might come from – and sometimes a smile from a stranger is enough to get through the day.
  3. You’re not alone. The hardest part of depression for me has always been the loneliness. I feel like no one loves me or cares about me, and connection with other people is impossible. Now I know that is the depression talking, because it’s an illness that robs us of joy and love. We are never alone, no matter how lonely we may feel. Chances are at least one person in your life truly loves you, and even in the rare case where you are truly isolated, please know that many of us have been where you are, and have felt what you feel.  

None of these 3 insights are especially original, but that’s okay. I actually find it comforting that what I’ve learned from my experience of depression reflects what others have learned as well.

Maybe this is a fourth insight, or a corollary to #3 above, but it’s love that’s gotten me through. Love from family and friends who cared enough to help me when I’ve been down. Sometimes I’ve needed a lot of love, patience and support, when I wasn’t in a position to provide anything in return.

Your depressed mind may tell you that you don’t deserve love or help, that people don’t want to be bothered, and you’re not worth it. That’s not true. Reach out, ask for help. Tell someone how you feel.  

Your closest and most trusted friends are the ones who will hold you when you’re a basket case, tell you they love you, and never judge you. Those friends are keepers. Not everyone is equipped to provide this kind of support, but you might be surprised what other people have gone through, and how willing they are to help.

Sometimes I still feel like that teenager wandering around in the middle of the day and crying his eyes out. I feel fear and dread and sadness, without any apparent reason.  

But I know now this pain is universal, a drop in the enormous bucket of pain that the universe dishes up every day. It’s the pain that we have in common, and seeing that is what can unite us, and make love and joy possible.

Charles G. lives in the Upper Midwest with his family. He works in marketing, likes to travel, and gets by with a little help from his friends.

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Accepting Love

Posted on December 15, 2017 by Christy Barongan

I always find reading previous journal entries enlightening. Here’s an excerpt from 7 years ago about my struggle to be “normal”:

There’s always this doubt that I’m doing things right. Like if I’m passing for a normal human being. I have to learn what normal people do from observation and piece it all together. Like maybe the way someone feels when they have a learning disability in a non-disabled world. You kind of don’t want to have to point out to people that you don’t get it so you pretend that you do.

A clear precursor to Normal in Training.

I mentioned in my last post that I’ve been reading journals from way back. Once I got past the entries about Rick Springfield and started having real relationships, it was difficult to read some of them with compassion because I was so frickin’ crazy. I know I still struggle with accepting love, but back then I was downright out of touch with reality.

In one entry, a friend of mine would repeatedly call me in the middle of the night to tell me that he loved me. Granted, he was drunk every time, but based on my experience in working with college students, it is when a person is drunk that they often reveal their deep, dark secrets. I have an eating disorder. I think about suicide. I’m in love with you.

My response in my journal was, I wonder what he means by that? I’m going to have to ask him next time. As I read this, I was like, what the hell is wrong with you? Are you delusional?! Is it not obvious what someone means when they tell you they love you? And then the next line was, why doesn’t anyone like me? Which was even more maddening to read. No wonder my ex boyfriends would tell me that nothing was ever enough.

I get it now, though. I couldn’t take in anything good. I didn’t believe I was lovable, and there was nothing that anyone could say to convince me otherwise.

I have been depressed for the past few weeks because, even though I did a much better job of saying no and conserving my psychological energy, eventually my work load was beyond what I am capable of carrying. Because I have such good friends, many of them recognized the signs (not being social, turning down tennis) and checked on me, invited me to dinner, sent me food. Because they know me well enough to know that I never have food.

It was difficult for me to accept their love. I have the same reaction to love as I do to pain. I can feel myself tightening up, trying to brace myself against it. It’s the craziest thing. But since I was practicing mindfulness, I did what I do when I realize I’m trying not to experience pain–I let myself feel it. Consent to it. I imagined giving the love space, letting it move within me and around me, and to express itself in whatever way it wanted to. I told myself that it was OK to let them love me.

I often tell clients that receiving love is not selfish. It is a gift, and refusing it hurts the person who is giving it. That it is more generous to accept it with gratitude than to tell the person that you don’t deserve it and list all of the reasons why. I actually told a client this yesterday.

I also told a friend that this is what I’ve been trying to do to make myself feel better, so now he reminds me that I have great friends who love me, and that I need to let them. Which pisses me off. Because even though it’s good advice–my advice–I still don’t like to be told what to do. He knows about this flaw, as well as all of my other flaws, but he loves me, anyway. I’m trying to let myself believe that, at least.

And you know what? It really did help. So I’m going to add it to my list of strategies of what to do when I’m depressed–to let people love me.

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