So I'm back. Anxiety is strangely back too.

[Varjo]

Well, I haven't commented here in many months. Since my anxiety just started to fade in the background and I stopped thinking about it, everything was fine basically, felt as if I was returning more to the person I was before. Now a couple of days ago I went out to have some coffee with a friend, after I came home I just went online and everything was normal until I started to feel a slight withdrawal from the caffeine (actually it was caffeine that seemed to cause my anxiety in the first place as well as stress) and then I started to feel paranoid. I went to sleep, and woke up the next day even more anxious, I felt really sick actually. Went to see the school nurse and it turned out I had a fever so I figured my anxiety was due to that too. I spend the other day resting. Then the next day I find out my sister is experiencing anxiety and panic attacks too, as well as weird waves of depression, this stresses me out more as I start to think about how genetic this probably is (considering my mother who has many mental issues and my grandmother who suffered depression to the point of suicide) and I start to freak that I'll never be able to get rid of this feeling. Which, of course, makes me more anxious.

So I get more and more anxious, and just try to shake it off. A friend invites me out that night and I go along, I start to feel very depressed (unnaturally depressed) as I'm out with her but she convinces me to have a few drinks so I feel better, then for a while I feel back to myself. I go sleep mostly fine.

I wake up today and I'm feeling very depressed and strangely anxious again. My anxiety no longer has the same symptoms as it did when it first started (As in my heart rate seems to stay normal and I'm not as restless and shakey) but instead I just feel very unreal and unpleasant about everything around me. It's very bothering and I'm feeling those waves of depression again. I'm really upset now. Considering that this month I had many good things planned that I was looking forward to, now I feel that if I keep feeling this way it'll get ruined again.

I just wanted to share this with everyone and hope I get some support and feedback. Anyone else experienced these feelings returning? And how do you fight the depression?

[Literophile]

Fighting depression is no easy task. When I tell people how I did it, I make it sound easy, but it took years and lots of practice in getting myself out of the deep, dark hole of depression. I slid back in, I pulled myself back out, and went in and out for years. But the way I pulled myself is I recognized that I was depressed, and I told myself not to be. Whenever I felt that way, I would do anything I could to fight back--if someone invited me to do something, I did it, and I forced myself to smile. I didn't force myself to be happy; that's too much to ask a lot of the time. But by forcing myself to smile, I activated the neurons in my brain that tell me I am happy. It was basically a form of neurofeedback, but without all the money.

You can do it. And yes, it comes and goes, but when you learn to pull yourself back out again, it becomes easier and easier. If you need more help, go to neurofeedback. I believe in you!