MSI Press Blog

  Excerpt from Depression Anonymous DEPRESSION AS A DRUG  All of us feel blue from time to time. After all, sadness, sorrow, and grief are natural reactions to the loss of persons and things that are important to us. Feeling sad, we withdraw into a cocoon to soothe ourselves and adjust to the change in our life. We withdraw to nurse the wound of the loss. Feeling the pain, we inwardly search for its meaning, looking for a way of making sense of it. In this grieving process, we slowly let go of all the energy we used to put into what was lost and come to accept the void in our lives. If we do not succumb to the temptation of bitterness, the accepted pain of sorrow opens our hearts to new life and to empathy for others.  But sometimes the loss can seem unbearable and the sorrow overwhelming. The sadness reaches to the core of our being and a black cloud envelops us. We cannot escape the darkness. Our bodies, minds, and spirits become possessed. We cannot sleep or eat normally,

  In March, Carl was diagnosed with advanced stage 4 (metastatic) cancer of unknown primary. In August, he died.  When we got the diagnosis, we had to choose a detour from our normal life. There was no way to move straight ahead with life as usual because, you see, there was this big obstacle, called cancer, straight ahead. So, the question was to detour to the left and choose a treatment option, hope, and focus on the living or detour to the right and let nature takes its course, choose to accept the situation at face value, letting nature take its course, and focus on the dying. To fight or to surrender? There was no logical superiority of either path, not knowing what lay behind the cancer tree and how long was the path for it  continued out of sight. We decided not through reasoning but through conditioned reaction to fight. That is what we had done all our adult lives, as we successfully navigated life for four children, two with rare birth defects, and three grandchildren, two wi

  Just released -- the hard cover version of the powerful Harnessing the Power of Grief  by Julie Potter. Other versions of this book include  paperback  and  Kindle . For more posts about  Harnessing the Power of Grief , including excerpts, click  HERE . For more posts about Julie Potter, click  HERE .

Sadness  Sometimes, living with chronic illness can make us feel deeply sad. It’s okay to occasionally fall apart. Cry if you need to. After a painful and unexpected episode of particularly bad health, I often found myself overcome by sadness and despair. I would be doing the dishes, making the bed, or watching a television commercial, and I’d start to weep. On top of everything else, I then felt stupid. But so what? No one besides you cares if you sob while you wash the dinner dishes! However, if sadness overwhelms you and you can rarely shake it off, you may be clinically depressed. Then you might consider consulting a therapist for counseling or antidepressant medications. Therapy and/or medication won’t ensure your happiness, but they may alleviate the oppressive quality of your sadness. While it’s natural to feel sad, try not to dwell on your despair longer than necessary. Only you know how long you need to focus on your sad feelings. But if you find yourself weeping

SADNESS, THE PAIN OF LIVING  Because we live in bodies which constantly change and interact with the world, we have feelings. We naturally have emotional reactions to what happens to us. Unpleasant experiences repulse us, moving us to withdraw to protect ourselves. Pleasant experiences energize us to seek more of what we desire. In our ever-changing world, we naturally feel joy as new life unfolds and sadness as the old and familiar passes away. Our sadness and sorrow are natural reactions that serve survival purposes. In fact, they are signs of intelligence. Animals live by their instincts, only in the present moment. Because we are conscious, we humans are aware of the passage of time, alert to loss and gain. We are aware of changes around us and their consequences on our wellbeing, and so we make adjustments. Hardwired into our brains is a built-in threat protection and safety-seeking system. In the experience of loss, sadness prepares us to let go of the past and prepare for