Treatment resistant depression help.

Suicide does NOT sound wonderful. Please consider the following five easy steps:
1. clean up your diet, eat more good food, less junk food.
2. reduce alcohol and tobacco use.
3. exercise, to include aerobics (walking), strength (weights, resistance) training & stretching if possible.
4. Have a reason to live - wake up with something to do every day. Boring is bad. There's much to do in this world! Volunteering makes me feel better.
5. Be kind to people, reduce or eliminate hate from your mind. Say something nice to a person once a day minimum.

Thanks for taking the time to respond, I am not considering suicide. I am just accepting that without taking poison in the form of anti-rejection medication I will just let nature takes its' course. Where I live Voluntary Assisted Dying is available and I qualify for all but one term, I must be diagnosed to die within 7 months. I watched my mother waste away and it had ongoing effects on me and my family, I do not want to go out without my dignity. Granted my mother refused a lung transplant something I wished I had done. I eat good food, I do not drink or use tobacco. I think really, really hard about walking and exercise but here lies my problem, I have no drive. I have an engineering workshop and a blacksmith shop and used to make knives pre-transplant, again no drive. My reason to get up each day is family my children and my wife. But each day I suffer a considerable amount of pain and take copious amounts of medication which are likely to lead to acute kidney disease. Since the transplant I have had a melanoma a common side effect of the anti-rejection medication. I feel like I have been down every single fork in the road, and each has reached a dead end. I do my best to be kind to people but as an ex-Prison Officer I do not respond well to unkind, inconsiderate people. But that is a whole topic just on its' own.

I have been blessed with cluster headaches for 25 years also known as suicide headaches. I have tried everything but lying in a dark room with no noise and enduring the pain is all I can do. Although it is claimed they are more painful than a migraine at least they can go away for years at a time. I never got them until I tried anti-depressants for the first time when my wife died. I believe the consistency of migraines would be worse.

Good luck with everything. It sounds like youre very grounded and thinks things through well, which should help you going forward

That sounds terrible. Any options to tweek the medication to moderate the intensity or frequency of the headaches?

@melbourneaussie69, hello, I just wanted to start by saying that I feel very sorry for all your health problems, it’s not easy to endure so much pain and suffering, your body and mind have taken a beating and feeling the way you do is definitely not an uncommon thing. It takes a lot of strength and courage to go through so much and it would be great if you felt better afterwards but alas our bodies and minds need their own time to heal, I believe that you have done the best you could do to get through this and it’s not your fault. The medications can often make things worse because some of us don’t respond to them easily and that makes it difficult to move forward, I also struggle with anxiety and depression from having lung cancer twice and although I’m truly grateful to survive this I still feel so bad, I also tried many things to help me but nothing ever worked out. The last antidepressant that I tried was also Mirtazapine and it was really awful, I gave it up after two months and it took forever to leave my system, I’m also using marijuana gummies and they give me some help with my sleep and mind set. I don’t think you’re suicidal, just tired and frustrated but try and stay strong and keep telling yourself that it’s going to get better over time, enjoy your loved ones and take it easy, good luck to you and best wishes, Frouke.

I really appreciate your response, you have nailed it regarding my mind set and the medications. We have both been down a similar path. I have started eradicating certain medications such as cholesterol, antacid, and any form of anti-depressant/psychotic medication just to give my liver a fighting chance. I to found mirtazapine awful and it was the worst one to get off. I have had to initiate medicinal cannabis against the advice of the lung transplant clinic as it was the only way I found solace and my mind could just rest. Here in Australia, it has been legalised for medicinal purposes for years, yet the stigma attached seems to cause resistance. Once again thank you for your inspiration and I am going to do just that let my mind heal and enjoy life. We have all been dying since the day we were born yet we worry when something happens to us, there is no purpose to worry about that which cannot be changed.

I don't want to jinx myself, but I have had threatened headaches a few times but have not had full cluster headaches for some time now.