{"id":1547,"date":"2016-03-10T09:21:21","date_gmt":"2016-03-10T09:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/?p=1547"},"modified":"2016-03-10T09:21:21","modified_gmt":"2016-03-10T09:21:21","slug":"the-coldest-winter-ever-my-battle-with-depression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/the-coldest-winter-ever-my-battle-with-depression\/","title":{"rendered":"The Coldest Winter Ever: My Battle With Depression"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"2014-08-20<\/a><\/p>\n

Author: Ashley E.<\/p>\n

Winter was always one of my favorite seasons until last year. \u00a0Last winter things had gotten so bad for me that I found myself sitting in front of a therapist hoping she could help me put my life back together. I had been dealing with depression on and off for the past 2 years but it was starting to take a heavy toll on me and prayers and pep talks with friends weren\u2019t helping me cope anymore.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In those two years I experienced a failed relationship, the news of an unexpected health problem, losing my job, and moving to a new unfamiliar state without a plan. \u00a0A few months into my move I found myself broke, behind on bills and on the verge of having my car repossessed. I just couldn\u2019t figure out how I lost so much control over my life in such a short period of time. If you could rewind my life back three years prior things seemed to be going pretty good for me. I had a second degree under my belt and I was working a job in my field making decent money and just living a normal life for the most part. That was my reality check on how easily your circumstances can change and how your world can get flipped upside down in the blink of an eye.<\/p>\n

Every single day for almost a year I would wake up with the thoughts of my problems on my mind and I would carry those thoughts with me throughout the entire day. I felt like I was losing my mind because the thoughts were never ending and they were starting to have an effect on my health. It got to a point where I looked forward to going to sleep because it was the only time I had peace of mind from my problems. I always considered myself to be a strong individual but having to deal with all of those problems at one time caused me to reach my breaking point. \u00a0I felt like I was failing at life and for the first time I felt inadequate and unimportant. It\u2019s crazy how when it seems like everything is going wrong in your life you forget about everything that is going right and you forget about all of your accomplishments and talents. It really hit me that I needed to seek help when my thoughts started becoming suicidal. The thought of going to sleep and not waking up was becoming a reoccurring thought in my mind.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Going to counseling turned out to be really helpful for me. It wasn\u2019t a quick fix to my problems but my therapist was able to help me re-frame my thoughts and give me a new perspective on my situation. \u00a0There is still a lot of stigma associated with depression and mental illness and a lot of people don\u2019t see them as major health problems. It\u2019s ironic because our mind is what keeps our entire body in check but we tend to neglect it the most.<\/p>\n

I wrote this post because I wanted to share my experience with anyone that might be dealing with depression in hopes that it might let someone out there know they are not alone and that it\u2019s okay to get help. My mom has suffered from clinical depression for years and I always disregarded her situation as something that she can simply control but once it affected me I realized it wasn\u2019t something you could snap out of so easily.<\/p>\n

As I continue on my journey to self-love and building a better relationship with myself, I\u2019m constantly making sure my mind, body, and spirit are in tune. A lot of times we give so much of ourselves to other people without taking time out for us. It\u2019s okay to be selfish with your time to take care of yourself and it\u2019s okay to reach out for help when you feel like you\u2019re sinking. \u00a0Life can get heavy and behind those smiles most of us wear daily we are dealing with internal issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author: Ashley E. Winter was always one of my favorite seasons until last year. \u00a0Last winter things had gotten so bad for me that I found myself sitting in front of a therapist hoping she could help me put my life back together. I had been dealing with depression on and off for the past … Continue reading “The Coldest Winter Ever: My Battle With Depression”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1548,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[188,327,328],"class_list":["post-1547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-personal-confessions","tag-depression","tag-mental-health","tag-mental-health-awareness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thedoublescoop2.com\/dev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}