the rix mix

"Dysthymia, sometimes referred to as chronic depression, is a less severe form of depression but the depression symptoms linger for a long period of time, perhaps years. Those who suffer from dysthymia are usually able to function adequately, but seem consistently unhappy.

It is common for a person with dysthymia to also experience major depression at the same time - swinging into a major depressive episode and then back to a more mild state of dysthymia. This is called double depression."

I have two friends who suffer from depression. One is bipolar, with an unrelated, debilitating physical condition, post-polio syndrome. The other friend is more like myself; he'll enter long "down" stretches that sometimes turn into major depressions. I'm in touch with my PPS friend online almost daily. She receives a lot of basic needs practical help where she lives, has some family around (tho not day-to-day) but she's also a writer & crafts artist. The only "interventions" I ever try to do with her happen if I suspect she's headed into a manic phrase; the symptoms are when she's finding too many online "bargains" for her jewelry-making supplies. I have no doubt they are good deals, but she has to budget for people food & cat food, too. The other friend I've known much longer, speak with less often, but he got a fabulous new digital camera last year, & I check to make sure he's using it & posting new photos. Scenery becomes unavoidably dreary this time of year, the starkness of winter that most visual artists enjoy in December loses its appeal as January & February grind on, & by now, judging from his recent shots, he's getting antsy for some spring colors on the local vegetation & women.

I've been struggling through a couple of horrid weeks. Turned down several WFMU late night fill ins because they discombulate me mentally & physically, & the last time I did one without feeling good about it, it took four days to recover & I caught a cold, too. The most recent would've had me traveling in last week's storm. Stormy night radio can be fun, with the weather service machine in the studio clacking out yards of alerts, very newsroom-like. But from the moment one leaves home one is already anxious about the return trip. I would've contracted pneumonia on top of the pestiferous bug that's already going around & somehow gotten in here. I was going to bed so early I missed both Boston Legal & Shark during a sweeps week. I was so down that receiving a much-desired CD of Charles Ives Americana music failed to stir me. I dozed off, snoozed through a drunken barn dance & an orchestral imitation of fireworks, & didn't wake up until the chorus was triumphantly singing a hymn of thanksgiving at the end.