New York – Buffalo Depression Project

Putting Pen to Paper: Writers on Depression

That terrible mood of depression, whether it’s any good or not, is what is known as The Artist’s Reward. Ernest Hemmingway

Others imply that they know what it is like to be depressed because they have gone through a divorce, lost a job, or broken up with someone. But these experiences carry with them feelings. Depression, instead, is flat, hollow, and unendurable. It is also tiresome. People cannot abide being around you when you are depressed. They might think that they ought to, and they might even try, but you know, and they know that you are tedious beyond belief: you are irritable and paranoid and humorless and lifeless and critical and demanding, and no reassurance is ever enough. You’re frightened, and you’re frightening, and you’re “not at all like yourself but will be soon,” but you know you won’t. Kay Redfield Jamison, Night Falls Fast

That’s the thing about depression: A human being can survive almost anything, as long as she sees the end in sight. But depression is so insidious, and it compounds daily, that it’s impossible to ever see the end. Elizabeth Wurtzel, Prozac Nation: Young and Depressed in America

In depression . . . faith in deliverance, in ultimate restoration, is absent. The pain is unrelenting, and what makes the condition intolerable is the foreknowledge that no remedy will come – – not in a day, an hour, a month, or a minute . . . It is hopelessness even more than pain that crushes the soul. William Styron, Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness

They flank me-Depression on my left, loneliness on my right. They don’t need to show their badges. I know these guys very well. …then they frisk me. They empty my pockets of any joy I had been carrying there. Depression even confiscates my identity; but he always does that. Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

Continue Reading Article

The Depression Journey: Walking the Rocky Trail with a Therapist

A friend recommended me to the man who would become my therapist for the next twenty years. Jerry was a psychology professor at Buffalo State College. From the Bronx, he has a beautiful, salty sense of humor. Not only was he brilliant, but he was also warm and engaging. I felt at home, and we quickly bonded.

Is therapy effective?

A recent article in The New York Times explored whether therapy, based on the most current research, really works. What the studies show, and this has been both my experience and hundreds of others I’ve been privileged to meet over the years who struggle, is that it’s the combination of a good therapist and antidepressant medication that is the most effective treatment. In my case, I have been on Cymbalta (an antidepressant) and Lamictal (a mood stabilizer) for the past fifteen years. The meds quieted the physical symptoms enough so that I could benefit from my therapy with Jerry. Without the medications, I found that my time with Jerry was not as effective because his insights could not penetrate the hard shell of the physical side of depression that my brain was generating.

Some have told me I was lucky to find a therapist as good as Jerry. Others have said that they’ve had therapists who have been real duds or ineffective. As The Times article points out, it’s not always the educational background that matters (Jerry had a Ph.D., but many other therapists have M.S.W.), but, interestingly, if a patient emotionally bonds with a therapist. Bonding and its relationship to the efficacy of the therapy was challenging to measure in all the studies reviewed for the piece. The article reviewed some research that suggests how therapists react to the negativity of a patient that matters. For example, while this was not the case with Jerry and me, many patients can and do blame their therapists for they find the therapy not helping. Sometimes, they outright say this to them. If a therapist responds with empathy rather than being defensive, that is the key.

Continue Reading Article

Can Creativity Help You Heal Depression?

Dr. Carrie Barron is a board-certified psychiatrist on the Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons clinical faculty who also has a private practice in New York City.

She has published in peer-reviewed journals, won several academic awards, and presented original works related to creativity and self-expression at national meetings of the American Psychoanalytic Association.

Along with her husband, Alton Barron, M.D., a hand and shoulder surgeon, she co-authored the book The Creativity Cure: How to Build Happiness with Your Own Two Hands.

Dan:

Why is depression such a problem in our culture?

Carrie:

I think the stress level has increased enormously because we have so much to do, and we’re on twenty-four hours a day. So I think because of technology, which offers us so many great things but gives us much to do. I think that’s part of it. I also believe, especially for children, we’re in a striving, ambitious, productive time mentality – for children and adults. We need to play, we need to hang out, we need to have spontaneous time. I think spontaneous thought does a lot for alleviating depression and anxiety.

Dan:

We have so many different words in our culture for unpleasant experiences. We might say things like, “I’m sad,” “I’m burnt-out,” “I’m stressed out,” or “I’m depressed.” But what is the difference in your mind, as a clinician, between sadness, say, and depression?

Continue Reading Article