Can you be depressed but still enjoy things you like?

Hi, I have this question because I know some of the symptoms of depression is that you don't enjoy activities you once did, but I have this thing where lately I've been feeling extremely negative feelings, self loathing, zero self esteem, anxiety, you name it, not down enough to be unable to get out of bed or going to work, but bad enough to feel miserable most of the time especially in the afternoons-evenings, and suicidal thoughts are back, I'm also hallucinating in low degrees, however, I still enjoy activities I like, for instance my passion is live music, and I've been to many concerts this past week and I've enjoyed them especially if it's one of my favorite bands, I feel euphoric and happy, also when I'm with my close friends I manage to enjoy a good conversation and going out, the thing is that when the party is over I'm left alone with my thoughts then it all turns to sh*t. I told my pdoc that these experiences felt like an escape to me, but he said in this case this doesn't qualify as depression, even though my feelings aren't "normal" at all and I feel miserable, more like all over the place except happy or content or relaxed, then what could it be? He said it could be a depression related more to my personality disorder rather than a clinical one, so there are traits. I'm not a "text book" depressed, i fact I'm not a text book in any of my illnesses so they can go unnoticed sometimes. I still asked him to put me on antidepressants but he refused before I got an exam to check my levels of lithium in my blood.

SO, what do you think this could be? Miserable but still able to enjoy some things? Does this qualify as anything or am i just in a "normal mood", (which I doubt) when I really feel I'm on the lower side after having been high for a couple of moths? Any thoughts?

I don't know what it is, but if live music makes you feel good, get as much as you can!

I wonder if humming a favorite tune would help push away your negative feelings about yourself?

take care,

Have you already posted in the BPD forum? Sounds more like BPD than depression.

You have two options. Either you keep yourself occupied so that the bad thoughts don't come to you. Or you allow yourself to feel the bad emotions - fully and without withdrawing from them. Of course this is painful. Also ask yourself what this emotion wants to tell you. Then let it go. Imagine breathing it out or something. Act accordingly to what you have learned from the emotion.

I often do a "emotion meditation" when lying in bed. I concentrate on my emotions and feel them. I ask myself why i feel them, what they want to tell me. If i don't find an answer that is ok too. My subconscious will find the answer in time. Then i let the emotion go.

It is ok to sometimes feel bad. Society these days is so f*cked up, we think that feeling bad in itself is bad. Emotions have a reason. They want to tell us something.

Your emotions are not your enemy.

Do you think, by any chance, it is simply medication helping you out some, but not enough? Before medication, I did have the "classic" symptoms of depression. It was pretty severe. Once I got on medication that worked only partially, I had what you have. If I was occupied, I was ok. (Mostly, anyway. But being occupied exhausted me, and ultimately made the depression worse.) When I went home, all you-know-what broke loose. Now that I'm on medication that works better, I do not have that issue where I am either occupied or depressed, or where being occupied exhausts me to the point of not being able to function. (I am excluding hypomanic episodes from that spiel, of course.)

My point is, your symptoms pre-medication are, in my opinion, what defines your true diagnosis. Since I've gotten my medication straightened out, I've been increasingly stable. But what happened the minute I went off? Hypomania. And most times when I pull that stunt (deliberately stopping to experience hypomania), I crash, and BAD. So that goes to show that I do have some sort of problem that the medication is helping. I am NOT suggesting you tamper with meds - please don't - I'm just saying that we have to look at our pre-medication symptoms and compare them to our current symptoms in order to decipher first, what the problem is, and second, whether or not it's improving, and if there's anything else we can do to help.

Good luck to you.

I agree with gratteciel. Before meds, I had all the typical symptoms of depression. Couldn't get out of bed, couldn't shower, couldn't be bothered to do anything at all. Now it's different (keep in mind my meds are at a lower dosage than they should be). It's like I'm more capable of fighting the depression. I still feel and think all the things I used to, but I'm more capable of forcing myself out of bed, I'm usually able to shower, and sometimes I can even leave the house and go for a walk or something. This helps distract me, which in turn helps keep these thoughts and feelings at bay. It seems similar to what you describe. It might take me 2h to leave the couch, but eventually I manage, whereas a while back I didn't.

I agree with the others. Do your best to stay occupied with things you enjoy. It's not a perfect solution, but just to help you get by until you have your lithium levels checked.

Thanks for your replies.

Well, if I think about my life before meds, I remember feeling depressed as a teenager and I really didn't want to do anything, although it could've been mistaken by typical teenager attitude, but I just wanted to be in bed, I was forced to go to school but when I was 16 my grades dropped and all I had was instead of understanding from my parents they got really mad and treated me as just lazy, they should've seen that this was not typical of me. Then I was stable for a few years till I think I got hypomanic and made lots of impulsive desicions like studying a difficult major such as law even after I already had a degree just because I read somewhere it was profitable and also I thought the sky and some songs were giving me messages that I should go ahead and study and I'd manage because I was awesome and smart and I was capable of absolutely anything, to later crash and realized I couldn't keep up with doing a thousand things at a time when I was hypo. Somewhere along the way I lost my job and I really had trouble getting out of bed to go to class, couldn't focus or study, then got better, then hypo again, then I drank heavily and many other things, and sometimes didn't want to see anybody, although I only once got a sick leave for depression, cause I always felt I had to "man up" and "keep going" no matter how bad I felt, untill it was too late. But I was never diagnosed during those periods of time untill I crashed heavily and started to see professionals and got my meds. I'm sure they've helped me a lot, and that's why I have symptoms but not all of them cause the meds block them, also although I think I was hypo in december-january, I didn't do anything stupid cause I was aware that I had bipolar and I had to be careful when feeling too high. It's just that now I miss that feeling and being miserable but probably not severely miserable sucks, however if my meds help me at least enjoy my passions and function on a daily basis then they're doing heir job, so maybe I'm not depressed I'm just overly emotional or I would be fully depressed if I was out of meds. IDK, the feeling still sucks. I'd just hate not being able to enjoy music, music is part of my medicine.

Just a thought... well this weekend I felt fine cause I was surrounded by people, once I was left alone I started crying in the bathroom and got really low coming home, then this morning I woke up fine and up to this hour I've felt normal, not miserable and no self-loathing, just a bit irritable, and scared of not knowing how I'd feel the next couple of hours. Last week I thought about not going to the gym for a couple of weeks till I felt better cause the gym later makes me feel miserable too. Anyways, all these ups and downs, more downs than ups, could they be some sort of ultra rapid cycling? I have felt rather hypo and irritable sometimes these last few weeks and I had to take clonazepam to calm down, and I've felt really low, but now I don't have that feeling, but it can come back any minute. IDK if it's borderline or bipolar, I'm very puzzled. Is that how ultra rapid feels? Or could it be a mixed episode, or nothing? Sometimes the emotions are triggered by something, sometimes they aren't. I'm just new in this thing of tracking moods so IDK if I've felt like this before, I probably have. Yesterday I told my mom I didn't know if I was doing something cause I didn't know how I was gonna feel that day. Does this sound familiar to any of you? I can't deal with so many intensive emotions at the same time