What do you say when...?

What do you say when people give you "advice" for the depression, and it leaves you feeling more alone than if they had just kept their mouths shut?

I love my pastors (it's a team-led church, and 3 of the 4 pastors have been deeply involved in walking through this thing with me). They're trying, they really are. They each have enough junk in their own backgrounds that they recognize the gravity of some of the challenges I face. But their advice just isn't helping much. I'm feeling more and more alone in all of this.

One of the pastors is also our worship leader, and he's been encouraging me in my efforts to learn to play the guitar. I'm getting there. But now when I'm struggling with a really intense "depressive storm", his advice is "sing your way out." I know where he's coming from--he's faced this junk himself. When the darkness starts to move in, he drops into worship and stays there to get himself out of it. He says, "you stick it out, and eventually it passes, and then you win." But that feels like saying to a woman being beat by her husband, "stick it out, eventually he'll stop, and that means you win." Is there really no hope of truly being free of this junk? Will it ever go away?

I've faced deep depression before, 20 years ago in college. It was horrible. I was in psychotherapy for all of my college years, and on meds for over a year. I hated it. The meds didn't help at all--they may as well have been sugar pills. I couldn't focus, I couldn't concentrate, I have huge gaps in my memories of those years (and no, I was not taking illegal drugs or drinking--I was a goody-two-shoes). I do NOT want to take meds again. But this thing has hit me again, and I'm really struggling to hang on.

I've been meeting with two of my pastors for the last several months. That's helped some, in that we've worked through some of the trauma from my past. I was really about to fall off the deep end before I finally asked for help at church. I'm getting more involved with our small groups (2 different ones), my husband is very supportive of me and helping in whatever ways he knows how, I'm trying to build some new friendships (we moved to this town nearly 2 years ago, and it's been a struggle to make friends because of my schedule).

Overall, my life looks like everything should be so great! My kids are smart, happy, and healthy, my husband is attentive and loving, I'm physically healthy, our finances are in decent shape though of course there's always room for improvement. Why am I so miserable??? I look at all the good things around me, and I feel so guilty that there's anything wrong with me. I think I've finally moved past the obsession with suicidal thoughts, but the pain is still nearly unbearable at times. It seems there's no solution. Another pastor says, "You just have to trust God. Stand firm where you are--it's not your fault that you're not healed yet because you're not God, and only God is the healer." I get that. I'm not the healer. But do you tell someone with a broken leg, "Just trust God more--He'll heal you when He's ready!"?

I refuse to go on meds again. My children are still young, and I don't want to miss out on so much of these years with them from being drugged out (that's the effect those meds have on me, rather than providing relief from the depression). The meetings with my pastors feel like they're running into a dead end, with no more strategies to pursue. We already eat healthy, and I get plenty of physical activity from keeping up with my kids. I'm involved at church, and trying to reach out to people, but I feel like such a burden to everyone around me. I hate myself. I hate this pain. I hate the exhaustion. I hate what happened to me as a kid. I hate the dysfunction in my extended family that makes them feel like such strangers when I'm with them (and I work with two of them in our family company, so it's a constant battle). I'm so tired.

Is the best advice really just, "Stick it out"???

Thank you...I have started taking some supplements (fish oil, st. john's wort, vit d). Some days it's better, and I conscientiously make the choice to embrace those days when they happen (in college I would talk myself back into the depression because I had so accepted "depression" as my identity, you know?). But then there are days like today when I feel like there's a really heavy weight just lying on top of me. I could hardly move today. During worship at church today, just a little, harmless phrase in a song...broke my heart. I wanted to fall apart crying, but I was alone with the kids at that point. (I made DH late getting ready for church this morning because I took so long, so he hung back at the house to finish getting ready while I took the kids on to church.) Plus, I hardly ever-ever-ever cry, especially from that deep, dark pain inside. In college, I went for years without shedding a single tear, despite the deep depression and all the counseling. As I've started facing again all the junk from my past these last few months, I've only cried twice, and both of those times was only a tear or two. Inside, I feel like I'm so broken and messed up and even insane, but I just can't seem to cry about it.

Both of my parents were mentally ill when I was a kid (my mom, who was severely dissociated, has mostly recovered with treatment; but my dad, who is not diagnosed but is in the BPD/narcissistic/sociopath camp, is still crazy). And my step-dad was a complete sociopath. He abused my sisters and me, and had my mom so brainwashed that even though she saw much of what he did, she had no clue there was anything wrong with it. Most of it was completely out in the open in our household, but we were never allowed to talk about it outside. I picked up so much dysfunctional junk from my family! I hardly even know what "healthy" looks like. It's purely God's intervention that my husband is such an amazing husband and awesome father. I beat myself up for dwelling on this so much, and that's how I got through the past 20 years--I just buried it and pretended I was completely normal. But it came to the surface last year, and I had just about given up on life at the end of last year when I reached out to my pastor for one last try at getting help and getting better instead of pretending all the time. I think the pretending was easier...but I so want to be real, the real me. It just hurts sooo much!!

Thank you...I'm trying to find time to sit and watch the video when the kids aren't around so much. I've had a couple of good days in a row, so trying to get some things done and spend time with the kids while I have the energy for it.