Depression or Anxiety?

[Tinyflame]

This is a stupid question, but how do you tell which Is which? :confused:

When I was a child, I could easily identify anxiety, because I was a basically 'happy' kid. But depression (or anxiety?) leaves one exhausted and even apathy re SI is recognized as a depressive symptom. Or is it possible to become depressed from too much anxiety, or does anxiety itself leave one heart-broken?

I recall with the SI attempt(s), in retrospect, I'm not sure if it was anxiety (no-way-out-and-"it's-fill in the fear(s)"-coming), that eventually led to depression (no way out)?

How do you recognize and tease out which symptom is caused by what?

Thank you for any thoughts or experiences.

 

[ladee]

I understand the question. May I ask 'why', the question?
Hugs to you Junebug.

 

[Kubash16]

So for me, probably different for everyone, this is how I am able to tell:

Anxiety: I feel restless and jittery like I’m overloaded on caffeine. My thoughts race and I can’t focus on any one thing for very long. I also worry. To an extreme. Oh and I can’t sleep, decent insomnia.

Depression: I’m really not worried about anything but I just don’t care. I flat out don’t care about anything except sleeping (a ton) and then SI comes in and such. Though, to be fair I’ve had attempts in the height of anxiety.

When either of those peak? I binge like no ones business, can’t read a paragraph for shit, and I’m highly impulsive.

 

[Friday]

My super basic rule of thumb
Anxiety = Up (& Out)
Depression = Down (& In)

Depression is a brand spanking new thing for me, so it’s been really shocking how familiar things... jag in suddenly new and different directions. :wtf::banghead: I HATE it. Seriously hate it. I don’t know how to work around it, much less work with it.

Case in point... Fear.

(Fear) Anxiety >>> Jolt of fear / Or slower rising fear <<< The dominos click over very very fast, as a 1001 possibilities suddenly race through my mind; my heart rate speeds up, breath shallows, icewater in my veins, vision narrows, muscles start twitching ready to act... and there are only 2 possibilities from here... I kick into rage (which is easy to sort; coil it up tight for later, or unleash it now) OR I kick into that calm cool place where suddenly everything flows together without thinking; no fear, no rage, no regret, no remorse.

(Fear) Depression >>> Dread - slow, sinking, paralyzing, stupifying dread <<< It’s this horrible bloody f*cking quicksand that SUCKS all my energy, and my awareness, and my ability to think/assess respond/react, right out the damn window. It’s alarmingly similar to being hit really hard in the head, with the entire world going blurry, and muscles going to jelly, as the entire of everything just becomes this horrible bloody f*cking emotion, and before you know it you’re finding yourself on the floor god only knows how long later staring at nothing. Helpless. The f*cking personification of helpless. What follows is despair, and numbness. Not the cold/hard or calm/cool of emotions set aside for bigger problems needing sorting, but the motherf*cking wrongness of numb. Blurred instead of clarified, heavy instead of swift, exhausted instead of alert. No energy instead of too much energy. Sinking inside myself instead of exploding outwards. It’s a useless goddamn response. And. I. Hate. It.

Come to find :banghead::banghead::banghead:Everything I was familiar and practiced with kicking up? Can also plunge down. Fear is just one example of far too many things. Depression can f*ck right off and die screaming. It warps and twists things in the most useless nonsensical ways.

 

[Innordinate]

I agree with the above two. Anxiety tends to be too much energy with nowhere to go and depression is no energy.

I don't think I become depressed directly from too much anxiety. Indirectly, for sure!

I think the limits or bubble I've created for myself to avoid anxiety causes me to become depressed.

I think if I have too much anxiety for too long that when it finally releases I'm so exhausted I don't have energy to be productive which also causes me to become depressed.

 

[grit]

to me:
Anxiety is there is a butterfly or mosquito in the room but I cannot see it and looking for it.
Depression is I am chained to the floor and cannot move or think or feel my leg.

 

[ladee]

Mine have been 'blended' for so long, I can't tell them apart. Sorry, no help from me.

 

[Tinyflame]

Thank you everyone.

May I ask 'why', the question?

I guess @ladee , because of your statement below; Idk what's blended. Also, I never was good at understanding about emotions. I figure I can't adress/ stop/ preclude what I can't even name. For example, there are meds for either/ both (though I react badly to most meds- my whole family did). For a while now it occurred to me, Idk if I'm even categorizing what I'm living accurately. :confused:

Mine have been 'blended' for so long, I can't tell them apart.

Anxiety = Up (& Out)
Depression = Down (& In)

This is helpful @Friday . Except I am rarely 'out', whether it be either. Keep it hidden.

Anxiety >>> Jolt of fear / Or slower rising fear <<< The dominos click over very very fast, as a 1001 possibilities suddenly race through my mind; my heart rate speeds up, breath shallows, icewater in my veins, vision narrows, muscles start twitching ready to act... and there are only 2 possibilities from here... I kick into rage (which is easy to sort; coil it up tight for later, or unleash it now) OR I kick into that calm cool place where suddenly everything flows together without thinking; no fear, no rage, no regret, no remorse.

For me anxiety is more like I am going to explode- not in rage, usually, just physically/ literally. My head, and 'self'. And I never feel calm. Except in some crises.

Depression >>> Dread - slow, sinking, paralyzing, stupifying dread <<< It’s this horrible bloody f*cking quicksand that SUCKS all my energy, and my awareness, and my ability to think/assess respond/react, right out the damn window. It’s alarmingly similar to being hit really hard in the head, with the entire world going blurry, and muscles going to jelly, as the entire of everything just becomes this horrible bloody f*cking emotion, and before you know it you’re finding yourself on the floor god only knows how long later staring at nothing. Helpless. The f*cking personification of helpless.

This is where I am confused ^^. I experience this with anxiety, paralysis, helplessness, despair.

I can only describe my definition of depression being how I've felt/ feel with grief and loss. Where every effort is an effort, plus the extreme sadness. Also like @grit describes, sometimes:

Depression is I am chained to the floor and cannot move or think

Yet, I do not really understand how despair, and as it relates to SI or loss, cannot be depression (also)? I can only compare it as:
Anxiety= "OMG what I fear will happen !" vs
Depression = "OMG what I fear will happen . "

Idk if there's a thing such as ~'functional depression' (like functional alcoholism), or simply all I know how to do (like comedians); or if anxiety runs the show.

I agree with the above two. Anxiety tends to be too much energy with nowhere to go and depression is no energy.

I pretty much relate to the entire post ^^. But, I also am physiologically (+/or neurologically) 'wired' for energy, even though I've felt depleted of it for years (sometimes understandably so, and possibly from what I've learned from a highly likely genetic condition). But then there's responsibility, so no energy or depression or not, much of my life/ jobs have had an absolute requirement for it. So I drag myself through it. Virtually each day I do not know how I will make it through. Not exaggerating, it's 'if' not 'it's difficult but I will'. But, then is that because too I am living in constant fear and anxiety that's burning up energy I need, or because I'm depressed and have less energy to begin with? Because the baseline is a heartbroken-ness feeling, but not without gratitude. I can't say at it's core it leaves me much. though. Though that is not what I'm projecting/ try not to allow to show. (And no, it wouldn't be appropriate or self-preserving to allow it to show, nor make me feel better- most places or people aren't safe enough for that.)

But then maybe too, when one is a child they are not thinking as existentially as when an adult? And so when I was 5, I still had great anxiety and fear but not depression?

I also wonder if unlike Freud's thought of depression is anger turned inward, that it is anxiety turned inward (for some)? Because something never said about anger (I think because it's so obvious), is that it's a secondary emotion- one that follows another. Whereas I can more often (not always, but at least even eventually), say/ think I am hurt, or I am afraid, etc, and that is why I felt angry. But even then, anger requires a component- that one believes they have a right being trampled, or a right greater than another. So it's not displacing it, when one really thinks/ believes, You owe me nothing, +/or also I owe You everything.

 

[Innordinate]

How about

anxiety= can feel anger and other emotions
depression= can't be bothered to feel at all

Very simpistic and overgeneralized I think but if I have anxiety a lot of times it turns into anger, sometimes sadness even. I can become hypervigilent.
With depression I can get triggered still but it won't lead to hypervigilence. I just don't care. Even if someone with a weapon walked through the door i just wouldn't care, as crazy and dangerous as that seems.

functional depression'

yep, definitely.

So I drag myself through it.

the word 'dragging' is a word i would associate with depression.

And you 'drag' yourself because of responsibility. If you had none, kind of a hard thing to imagine, then you probably wouldn't function at all with depression.

That's my take on it anyways.

Anxiety is also usually a control response. It's the feeling of not having control over or fearing not being prepared for something.

Depression doesn't have those controls or fears, I find, for present day- or relatively present day events, but the distant future.
Not sure if that makes sense so if you need I can try to clarify that.

 

[Tinyflame]

Thank you so much @Innordinate it is very helpful.

With depression I can get triggered still but it won't lead to hypervigilence. I just don't care. Even if someone with a weapon walked through the door i just wouldn't care, as crazy and dangerous as that seems.

I have rarely felt that, and when I did it was closer to nearly catatonic. But sometimes, with SI I have.

And you 'drag' yourself because of responsibility. If you had none, kind of a hard thing to imagine, then you probably wouldn't function at all with depression.

Yes and if I hadn't had the requirements I think I would have too. Or if I were entirely alone.

Anxiety is also usually a control response. It's the feeling of not having control over or fearing not being prepared for something.

^^Totally agree. My worst comes from the perception I very much know I cannot handle some things or more loss. That is my perception of course, but 'as is'. And then, no way out.

Depression doesn't have those controls or fears, I find, for present day- or relatively present day events, but the distant future.

Yes this is what I'm hearing. I'm not sure how it's different from extreme sadness, or if the functional depression is extreme sadness plus pushing through because of requirement?

And anxiety to me is dread. Like slow motion waiting for the axe to fall, like 'during' a car accident.

 

[grit]

Sometimes language is not enough for expressing what the body knows.

I think because you are here writing about it and utilizing a lot of brain/cognition, to me it sounds you have high anxiety versus deep depression. Your articulation seems like you are flying rather than paralyzed by the dark cloud of depression. But we are all different.

Listen to the body, ask the body, the answer may surprise you!

 

[Innordinate]

or if the functional depression is extreme sadness plus pushing through because of requirement

I have persistent depressive disorder - which I think some people call functioning depression.
I don't know if i would call it extreme sadness but I also don't know what regular sadness would be in comparison because I have persistant depressive disorder- my baseline for sadness is naturally lower than people without it. And my days of sadness are a lot more frequent than people without it.

When i 'get depressed' it's sometimes called double depression. I don't think there's a clinical term for it, but it mimics major depressive disorder. I would describe this as extreme sadness and it almost always involves SI. There is no functioning through that requirement or not.