Winhamn intro - D in process, WAW

[Winhamn]

"I was heavily depressed. I have a restricted license (meaning I can't just up and take the kids somewhere)."

Can you elaborate? I know it's painful, but the more details you can give us the better.

"I've come out of the depression and am seeking help from a variety of sources, including individual therapy and counseling."

Sounds like you're still in the depression funk. It's coming through in your posts. What positives are there in your life right now? Can you see any?

I have pretty massive mood swings at the moment, which I believe is totally normal. I tend to post here when I am feeling down.

There are times when I can see lots of positives, and am even excited and very optimistic about the idea of moving out.

(let me preface this by saying that over this same time period, my wife was watching a very close friend, her "brother", die of alcoholism. He slowly faded over the last 6 months and she spent a lot of time with him and his family)

Over the winter, I was, as I said, very depressed. I was very stressed out from being in charge of the kids (usually at least one and sometimes all three) for long periods of time over the weekends.

I was not sleeping well. I would stay up till 1130 or midnight most nights, and sometimes later. I was drinking a lot of coffee, up to 6 large cups on a regular basis, and drinking it well into the afternoon.

I started drinking beer fairly regularly, a typical weekend night drinking 1 or 2. I started eating poorly, in larger quantaties. I stopped going to the gym entirely. I lost muscle, put on bellyfat, and my energy plummeted.

I spent a lot of time laying on the couch being frustrated with the kids.

Frustrated is a good description of how I felt. I felt very alone and abandoned by my wife, I felt like she was choosing someone else over me, and I felt very uncared for. I am uncapable of lovingly expressing these feelings, so I relied on my typical coping mechanism of cold withdraw and distancing, isolating myself and pushing even further into this depression that largely stemmed from feeling isolated and trapped.

I'm addressing that issue through therapy. I am a survivor of child sexual assault, and I have a lot of flawed emotional "things" as a result of that. The process will be neither easy nor quick. But I am working on it.

As I said, I am very up and down at the moment. Certainly I am not free of depression, but there is significant improvement from where I was a month ago.