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The Survival Guide to Coping with Depression
When depression hits it can feel like a tsunami that you can’t survive. Since I can remember I have struggled with major depressive episodes from feeling completely hopeless, lonely or borderline suicidal.
When I was seven years old I stood in the middle of a street waiting for a car to hit me. I remember thinking that my family didn’t want me and that they wouldn’t even notice if I was gone. A car came and screeched its brakes a foot away from my tiny body.
As a mother I reflect on these moments of my life and feel so much sadness and compassion for the child in me. She had to overcome so much just to simply survive.
In the last ten years I have been reframing my life and my mindset to healing from trauma and coping with bouts of depression when I do feel less than and lose hope.
An old high school friend reached out to me the other day and shared vulnerably how she struggles with anxiety and depression. She asked me how I have coped with it personally. I shared some simple tips that helped and still help me manage my days of depression when they do come.
Here is my survival guide to coping with depression:
- Get air. — Seriously. This may sound cliché but honestly it has been a mood changer even for a few minutes. Go outside and take a few…
