firecat: damiel from wings of desire tasting blood on his fingers. text "i has a flavor!" (Default)
firecat (attention machine in need of calibration) ([personal profile] firecat) wrote2013-04-11 09:34 pm

depression tips

The other day I was picking on posts that have unhelpful-to-me tips for handling depression. In this post I'll mention a helpful-to-me depression aid, and ask for some advice.

Helpful-to-me thing: http://boggletheowl.tumblr.com/
This is a depression support blog where a cartoon owl offers a lot of encouragement and a little bit of advice. Some of the people writing in say upsetting things and sometimes Boggle is a bit too sweet. But I find the high encouragement to advice ratio helpful. (When you're depressed, what are some helpful things for you?)

Advice request:
I used to e-socialize a lot via mailing lists. These days it seems all the topical activity that used to occur in mailing lists has moved to Facebook. I check Facebook once or twice a day. But I've noticed that I usually end up feeling worse afterward. Part of it is that people post so much bad news. And OK, I do belong to some groups there where the whole purpose is to post bad news. But it's not just those groups that make me feel bad. I guess I could just quit reading FB, or limit myself to reading only a few people I have no other way to connect with. But it would be nice if there were a less drastic option or some way to approach FB that doesn't get me all riled up. (Does this happen to you?)
sasha_feather: Bright green grass (green grass)

[personal profile] sasha_feather 2013-04-12 03:41 pm (UTC)(link)
Maybe add some people and groups to FB that post funny and/or uplifting things? I like it when people post pictures of their pets and kids. I subscribe to people who post funny memes and videos and I've added WisCon folks recently. I am judicious about using the hide feature or having it show me "only important" updates from certain folks. FB can be stressful though for sure--it certainly does rile me up sometimes.
sasha_feather: dog looking over a valley (dog and landscape)

[personal profile] sasha_feather 2013-04-13 08:48 pm (UTC)(link)
It is not so much a New-Year's Resolution for me, but a montly resolution, not to get into fights on Facebook. Partly because I have so many connections there with widely divergent beliefs than me.