In love with sadness?

No one that I have spoken to this has understood it.

I have been suffering from mental illness for more than 12 years. I have been in therapy for the past 6.

Have you ever heard the term "I'm in love with my sadness?"

I think I am in love with my sadness. When I am happy, and realize I am enjoying myself or am in a good mood, I search for reasons to be unhappy. Just this past week I was with my friends and was having a great time, when I realized I was having fun, I instantly thought of negative things and was depressed.

Does this make sense to anyone? It's like when I am happy, it doesn't feel right. I am almost comforted by being sad.

I've suffered with Depression most of my life and I know what you're saying about worrying about being 'in love with sadness'! Negative thoughts are otherwise known as 'stinking thinking' and you need to train yourself to be aware of them and as soon as one enters your head think things like; 'STOP!' or 'Get out!'...over and over..keep doing this and you'll actually feel happy! When you REALLY have a craving for sadness, rent a tear-jerker video or two, or listen to some really sad music and have a good cry...another method is to write a 'no-send-letter'...just write down how you're feeling or to whom you feel sad about and then read it and tear it up and throw it away! I've heard somewhere that each negative thought is repeated in your head more than 200 times..so negative thinking is quite dangerous..but it is a behavior that can be changed. I was in rehab once for Severe Depression and was told that most people have some form of Mild Depression which comes and goes and is controllable..sometimes people have Moderate Depression which is a bit harder to get rid of...and CAN escalate into Severe Depression which, if left untreated, can escalate into MANIC Depression! Depression is a disease and can escalate..MANIC Depression is when you start hallucinating and hearing voices! I was pretty scared when I found out how close I was to it! I had gotten severely depressed after my father died...I was on Serzone for 2 years and haven't taken any medication since. I've recently been going through alot of stressful ordeals and am nearly ready to seek help again (medication) but I don't have health coverage and I'm debating on waiting this out..although, as I said, depression CAN escalate! Insomnia is one of the symptoms (I've been up all night!) and it's the one that personally, I hate the most! I was raised by an alcoholic mother with a Borderline Personality Disorder...she took great joy in making my (and my father's) life into a living hell. She was physically beaten (until bloody) as a child and she used to say; 'At least I don't hit you!'...whatever. Anyway, look into your inner child and find out who hurt you so deeply that you feel like you could be in love with sadness! Someone did. You have to FORGIVE whoever did that...I've forgiven my mother for 75% of her cruelty...but my holding on to the 25% is only hurting me and and helping further my Depression. It's a very difficult battle..but it CAN be won! Lastly, here's a story (analogy) that I heard in rehab: Depression is like this: You're walking down a street and you see a deep hole...you fall in; you climb out after much struggle...the next time you walk down that street you walk around the hole...the next time; you walk down a different street! That's what YOU have to do...walk down a different street! (So do I! LOL!) Anyway, good luck and God Bless! It cheered me up just being able to maybe help someone else! P.S. Two more things I learned in rehab: "The Pity Pot" is when you sit there and feel sorry for yourself...DON'T DO IT! and also "The Broken Record"...when you keep repeating the same sad story or event over and over and over and over. These are pitfalls (holes) that must be avoided.) Now if I could only heed my own advice!

I like the advice that helpmeimconfused wrote. I can identify with all this talk about depression. For me, as a child of an alcoholic I did not think I deserved much success or any success. I also came to believe that I was responsible for everything especially for making everyone happy.

I've suffered from depression and anxiety for many years. For me it is my thinking that gets me in trouble. I need to stop myself often to make a gratitude list and to pat myself on the back for every little bit of effort I make toward positive goals. I compare myself to myself (my old self) not to other people. For me to just get out of bed is a victory. To get all my clothes on and go out the door to work is another great victory. People like me often never get a change to be loose in the world--to have a job, to go on vacations, to have hobbies, etc. I try to cut down my need to be perfect. I try to do an average job. I know that most of life is just showing up. My friends told me to just suit up and show up--I have had much personal and professional success by doing just that. Other people say, "Just do it."

Good Luck,
Jim S

not quite the same but part of the reason I haven't tried to get professional help is kinda cause depression is what is familiar to me I guess :/ Dno if thats even relevant and I know its not usefull but just thought I'd mention it as it seems a kinda more mild form of the same maybe?

I didnt know anybody else did this!!
I thought it was just me. I dont mean to sound rude to any of you but i am so pleased!
Thankyou so much for posting this topic it has been of great comfort to know im not alone.

wow, someone happy that others aren't :p

But yeah, It's nice 2 hear from others!

wow. i agree with whoever said that its a comfort to know that other people are going through this too. i have suffered depression for years, adn when i was 15 i overdosed and nearly died. i didn't even have any of the problems that you guys are talking about. my parents didn't ever abuse me. it was clear that they loved me. and to this day it still is. most of it's just in my genes, which really SUCKS because that means that its more than likely to come up over and over again in my life. it started off with just being a mild depression, but still hard to live with. then it spirreled out of control and i, too, was very close to becoming manic. my uncle, a former manic and a man who spent months in rehab and had shock therapy, died due to it.

anyways, obviously an enormous amount of things have changed for me. i switched schools, got into more hobbies, started exploring more things in general. but for some reason, i can't seem to let myself be happy. i'll be happy for 2 minutes and it will seem like the best 2 minutes of my life. adn then when i realize how happy i am, i start thinking about all the awful stuff that has happened to me. i think about what i did every day. about being in the hospital and having to be watched every minute. my therapist has been telling me forever that i need to think happily. like when i'm thinking "ugh i'm gonna have an awful time at this party", i'm supposed to think more along the lines of "this party will be fun! there will be new people to meet and blahblahblah." it sounds easy. but it's not. and it's something i'm been struggling for years to do.

i know a lot of this probably sounds really stupid, but i just wanted to say how glad i am that there are people who DO understand. my friends tell me they understnad. but i know they don't. so, i stopped telling them things. and then it got to the point where i couldn't let myself get close to people, because i had realized that the closer you are to people, the more power they hold over you. and, for me, that hasn't ever been a good thing.

even though i've been pretty negative in this thing, i just wnat to say that you can get through whatever you want so long as you believe in yourself and don't beat yourself up over things. don't let stupid things get to you. don't let people take advantage of you. take pride in yourself and what you do. i don't do this myself, but i'm trying to learn to. don't ever give up the way so many of us have tried. and whenever you think that nobody understands, just know that even though no one you KNOW understands, there is hope, and there are people out there who understand.

welll, that's like me...i guess
Im pessimistic,...negative...and I can't get outta taht style of thinking
and...I love sadness...I think sadness is soo o soo beautiful...
a good and bad feeling at the same time, it gets confusing sometmies
but still, i love it...i dont think i will be normal if i was happy...sadness makes me feel normal..its wat im used to..its wat i lived with..its me

srry about the rant.

I understand it. I think you start being comfortable with it. To be happy is to be healthy. And if you are healthy and then have a problem, you have to explain it. When you are ill, it's the illness that causes most big problems, so small problems don't matter as much. When I was depressed, I didn't like the idea of getting treatment and to this day, I never uttered a word to any professional about it. My mom knew a tiny bit about it (but only general "i'm not very happy" stuff). My girlfriend knew the details, but she was pretty messed up too (we broke up and don't talk to each other anymore, probably best, for both of us).
But once I was truely happy, after the depression was gone, it felt amazing. Things actually made me happy again. I was actually happy MOST of the time, instead of being sad MOST of the time. I actually had times where I could watch TV and actually watch the show. With depression, I could never sit down and watch a show, I could not turn off the horrible thoughts. They were ALWAYS in the back of my mind, no matter how happy I seemed.