Caution: Lengthy postings from an old thread that I created back in 2003.
As we all know, depression is a major symptom of MLC. I thought I'd spend some time discussing the symptoms of depression so that others can actually have a bird's eye view of what MLC is comprised of. Maybe, after seeing the symptoms, people will understand a little better what their spouses are going through and realize that they aren't out there having the time of their lives. MLC is true emotional pain, a pain that can't be healed with a band aid or antiseptic, but can be healed with time, love, compassion, understanding, medication and therapy.
When most people hear the word depression, they automatically think of feelings of sadness or being blue/down in the dumps. But when the mental health professionals use the word, they are describing depressive illness. According to them it is a label for a collection of symptoms that can consist of persistent irritability, excessive guilt, shame, low self-esteem, difficulty experiencing pleasure, changes in sleep, appetite and weight. This is a very serious health concern as it affects a person's health, his relationships, and the ability to work efficiently, ability to concentrate and think clearly. It can even lead to death. People left untreated with depressive illness and other mood disorders have a greater incidence of upper respiratory infections than those without mood disorders. Did you know that women suffering from depressive illness have significantly lower hip-bone and spine density than non-depressed women? The depressed woman is at a greater risk for osteoporosis and hip fracture.
There are two groups of mood disorders: unipolar (or depressive) disorders and bipolar disorders. A person with unipolar suffers only with depression. A person with bipolar suffers ups and downs in mood, energy level, ability to think clearly, and need for sleep, among other symptoms. A person with bipolar can also have a mix of both depression and manic symptoms at the same time. The person can have racing thoughts and yet complain of being depressed. The mood of a person with mixed symptoms or mania is often irritable or explosive rather than euphoric.
The symptoms for Major Depression are: depressed mood, loss of interest in previously enjoyable activities, feelings of worthlessness or excessive guilt, loss of appetite, an increase in eating, especially carbohydrates and sweets, or weight loss/weight gain, trouble staying asleep, waking up early in the morning and being unable to get back to sleep, or oversleeping, restlessness or sluggishness (when feeling sluggish, the person may actually move and talk more slowly; the face will be much less expressive–as if the person is wearing a mask), fatigue and loss of energy, inability to clearly, concentrate, or make decisions and thoughts of death or suicide.
Then we have Masked Depression. The symptoms and behavioral problems listed have sometimes been referred to as masked depression. They are: chronic aches and pains, compulsive social activities: party going, dating, avoidance of being alone, workaholism, and thrill seeking. These are all behaviors designed to keep someone from feeling depressed. We have impulse-control problems: rage attacks,sexual compulsions, shoplifting and gambling. Repeated accidents and multiple surgeries for vague complaints.
According to Sigmund Freud's work and developed by his followers, depression is based on the childhood disappointment of wishes for parental affection and affirmation, and the child's failure to fix a parent's unhappiness. This then leads to: low self-esteem, guilt, and shame based on the belief developed in childhood that personal inadequacy is the reason why parents were not affectionate or were unhappy. A sense of emptiness and a search–doomed to failure–of someone or something to fill that emptiness. The person will also feel ashamed of his intense neediness. Rage regarding the unmet needs, directed at the image of the parent who has been internalized which will lead to unrealistic expectations, repeated disappointment in current relationships, and conflicts over expressing rage to important others.
There are many other psychiatric disorders that are often found together with mood disorders and they are: substance abuse, eating disorders, anxiety disorder and panic disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder. I'm not going to touch on these in this posting. They can be touched on later in this thread if people are interested in discussing them.
Now, please take a few minutes and think about your spouse. Have you seen any of these traits in him/her lately? If so, you are seeing depression at work. Your spouse doesn't hate you. The love that he/she has for you is still there, buried very deep beneath the childhood issues that he/she is currently facing head on. According to one source, he got relieved of tremendous amounts of hang-ups during his depression. He was relieved of his guilt. Once the issues are resolved, the fog disappears; the person will come out of the depression and will be a much better person, more settled and mature. There can be minor changes in his/her personality that you may or may not like, but that's what happens to the mlcer during his/her crisis.
I hope that this information will help you better understand what is happening to your spouses. Be a friend, don't place undue pressure on them during their crisis, show compassion and above all, be a good listener. They are in such emotional pain, a pain that we can't understand, unless we have been in a major depression ourselves.
BTW, one major point, be sure to protect yourselves financially during this time, as they will not care about financial issues, i.e., all they will care about is finding a "cure" for their emotional inner pain during their depression/crisis.
