life help: i feel like i have been depressed for years…i want to bring sunshine back into my life but i don’t know how. - Help.com

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Everywhere I turn everyones recommending excersize - so keep yourself busy by working out. Or take an interest in healthy things like food, sleeping and hygiene. May sound silly but it can be good for you to work out your own recipes or try out other peoples (healthy food)
Take care with your sleep-make sure your getting enough and research ways to make your nights sleep more fulfilling.
Then figure out healthier more natural ways to be clean!

Can make a difference to your mood. I know its not the cure but its a start in the right direction.

I don’t know if this will help much or not. I’m not generally depressed, but for the past couple weeks I’ve been very upset which put me in a depressive mood. I never wanted to get out of bed, I’d stopped eating, I’d sleep at least 14+ hours.

When I go outside though, even for a short ammount of time, I feel 10x better. Also, taking a shower during the morning or afternoon when it’s still light out helps quite a bit. I’ve also heard that exercise helps.

http://www.myhomeremedies.com/topic.c…

I’ve been feeling the same way since I had a nervous breakdown 4 years ago. My sister-in-law gave me some good advice. My Dad died 2 years ago and I feel guilty that I wasn’t there by his side when he died. My sister-in-law told me to try and get up every day, look at my Dad’s picture and say, “I’m gonna make you proud today Dad.” Since then, every day I find more and more purpose in my days and am setting goals and taking a step each day (however small) to make my life better and turn myself around and start living again.

So, maybe there is someone you really love that you would like to make proud of you. I know now that I have started a positive effort here - I will ultimately make MYSELF proud of me :)

Very good advice green. :)

I love the advice I’ve seen here!

I have been battling depression for almost 10 years. While I for the longest time felt it was because I had low self esteem, eventually after getting married, becoming successful, and having a really great family and group of friends, I finally burnt out. I didn’t have any more fight in me. When I went to a doctor about it, he was REALLY helpful, asked me so many questions and eventually diagnosed me with major depression and said that he was shocked I’d gone this long before accepting medication. I was always afraid of becoming addicted to medication so I never went to a doctor.

I’ve been on antidepressants for 6 months and I wish I had gone on them YEARS ago. Realizing that my depression was not esteem related, it was a genuine chemical imbalance makes me feel a lot better about the fact that I feel like I lost the battle. But I didn’t. I sleep better, I’m much more patient, I’m happier, and I’m MUCH less stressed.