My dad hid his depression. I won’t hide mine
I&#x27;ve been a long time reader of this great news site which gives me a joy to read everyday but today is the only time I have felt compelled to comment on a post.<p>A few years back I had been bottling up a lot of issues and negative thoughts that had just manifested in my head over time and got worse and worse. I couldn&#x27;t think straight, everything was an effort I literally felt like I was going to feel this way forever. I never considered self-harm and said to myself that I couldn&#x27;t live with feeling this way day in and day out. I had somewhat of a breakdown (I was around 25 years of age living out of home with my partner) and had to take a week off work. I made the call and ended up getting an appointment with a psychologist later that week.<p>I was convinced I was screwed even after half a dozen appointments - mainly because I was too scared and embarrassed to say what was really bugging me out of fear of judgement by my psychologist (I know, it&#x27;s their job).  I felt like absolute garbage day in and day out and felt sorry for myself and feeling like I deserved better, I let it keep building up and building up and despite going to these appointments I kept shying away from explaining what thoughts and memories were upsetting me. One day I walked into an appointment and I was usually composed and pretty chirpy, this time I just sat down and bawled my eyes out and realized enough was enough. I explained all the negative thoughts that had been bugging me and that was the start of turning things around. I extensively credit my psychologist for helping me get my issues together and helping me finally get on the path to learning how to deal with these issues and overcome them.<p>I thought I was really depressed, when I really had severe anxiety and not much in terms of what constituted for &#x27;depression&#x27; - I know the two can go hand in hand and one can be labelled as the other and so on. I kept at it and over the course of about 30 appointments over several years I was taught strategies on how to deal with negative thoughts, anxiety and so forth. I was in a job I didn&#x27;t like one bit, living out of home with little money and whilst I was beginning to get on top of my anxiety issues which were dragging me down so heavily I knew I had to move on professionally.<p>I reduced my work load to part time, started studying Computer Science at University (my old job was non IT) which I have absolutely loved from the very beginning and am about two thirds through my degree. I was lucky enough to get some part time work as a developer with someone I know who needed a bit of help which I still do today. Since starting this new job I have felt like compared to the position I was into a year prior literally nothing could of gone better for me. I look back at myself two years ago in a job I really did not enjoy with constant severe anxiety looming over me everyday to the point where I didn&#x27;t even have the courage to catch up with some of my closest friends. It dictated my life but I said enough was enough and I wasn&#x27;t going to let it control me anymore.<p>It&#x27;s taken me a lot of practice and persistence to be able to control the flood of negative thoughts that come to me daily and I still on the odd day struggle pretty bad. Like I mentioned above I haven&#x27;t even finished my degree yet but am working as a part time programmer which I could not be more happy about as it is giving me great experience however I&#x27;m incredibly tough on myself to be as valuable to my employer as possible. Programming is something that from what I have discovered, experience plays a major part in how well you can do it - I currently have very little experience but put expectations on myself that I should be able to work as fast and have code as excellent and at a the same level of quality as my co-worker who has more years experience than me. It&#x27;s an area where my anxiety tries to find a way in to get to me to drag me down and something that I have to consistently need to keep on-top of but at the end of the day I&#x27;m glad that I am finally doing something I am truly passionate about.<p>The main reason I have written this is because I want to encourage people who are feeling down for an extended period of time to seek help. You may not see it at the time, and I didn&#x27;t believe me - but you can feel better. It scares me to think of where I would be had I not of walked into my psychologists office a few years back. It&#x27;s the hardest thing I had ever done but it was the best thing I have ever done.<p>I maybe rambled on a bit too much but just wanted to share.<p>Thanks.