Depression worse in evening?

Posted by LyndaMM @lyndamm, Jul 22, 2016

I have Major Depression, recurrent. I take Prozac for my depression, I've tried several others but Prozac works best for me. I also take Effexor, low dose, to help cope with the hot flashes and other side effects of the drug I'm on to try to prevent a return of breast cancer. Recently I have found that my depression gets worse in the evening, I hate to see the evening come aound. Does anyone else experience this and if so how do you cope? Right now my depression is a little worse but I think it's due to having had open heart surgery 7 weeks ago.

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Mental Health Support Group.

Lynda, I'd like to bring a few members into the conversation @kareniowa @nhaegele @liz223 @dawn_giacabazi @wolfer1975 who have written about depressaion, as well as @crhp194 and @thankful who haven't written about depression and anxiety as well as managing heart issues.

You may also be interested in joining this discussion https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/i-have-been-on-so-many-anti-depressants-over-the-past-35/

@lyndamm, how do you help yourself face the dread of the evening coming around?

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I can tell you what I do every evening to reduce my depression or anxiety. I self medicate and that, along with my many meds, has been a lifesaver.

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Hi Lynda,
Would love to share information on biofeedback. Here is a great link.

http://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/biofeedback/home/ovc-20169724

The training I received involved several electical monitoring devices. They taught me how to contral my breathing, heart rate, muscles, body temp. Then we made a recording of one of my training sessions for the difficult times and need a reminder on how to do it.

Most insurance companies cover this therapy. You can receive biofeedback training in physical therapy clinics, medical centers and hospitals.

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Sorry, I can't help with this because I dread getting up in the morning. It is my time to procrastinate. The longer I stay the worse it gets. Eventually I get up. I am retired now so I don't have a set time to get up unless I have something scheduled for the day. What I have found helpful is setting my alarm for 10 minutes before I want to get up and allow myself to hit the snooze button only once. When it does off again I throw my legs over the side of the bed and get up. It works for me.

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@colleenyoung

Lynda, I'd like to bring a few members into the conversation @kareniowa @nhaegele @liz223 @dawn_giacabazi @wolfer1975 who have written about depressaion, as well as @crhp194 and @thankful who haven't written about depression and anxiety as well as managing heart issues.

You may also be interested in joining this discussion https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/i-have-been-on-so-many-anti-depressants-over-the-past-35/

@lyndamm, how do you help yourself face the dread of the evening coming around?

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Before the surgery I tried to stay busy in the evening. Now by evening I'm so tired and hurting that I haven't found anything that helps. I have always read a lot so I'm trying to read in the evening. In the past I used to cross stitch but I just haven't felt like doing that in months.

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@callalily74

I can tell you what I do every evening to reduce my depression or anxiety. I self medicate and that, along with my many meds, has been a lifesaver.

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How do you self medicate? What do you use to self medicate?

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@dawn_giacabazi

Hi Lynda,
Would love to share information on biofeedback. Here is a great link.

http://www.mayoclinic.org/tests-procedures/biofeedback/home/ovc-20169724

The training I received involved several electical monitoring devices. They taught me how to contral my breathing, heart rate, muscles, body temp. Then we made a recording of one of my training sessions for the difficult times and need a reminder on how to do it.

Most insurance companies cover this therapy. You can receive biofeedback training in physical therapy clinics, medical centers and hospitals.

Jump to this post

Thank you, Dawn. I have heard of using biofeedback for anxiety, I have never seen it used for depression. I would love to try it, however, I live in a very small town and we have very limited medical facilities. How often did you have to go to the training, I get all my medical care in a large town over the mountains but it is anywhere from 1 1/2 hours To 2 hours travel time one way. I will look into this and see if anywhere near here offers biofeedback. Again, thank you .

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I totally understand, for years I got up at 5 am to get to work on time and since my retirement I sleep later. Before the heart surgery, I made myself get up by 8am but now I'm sleeping till 9:30 am and later. I will work on that after I feel a little better.

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@colleenyoung

Lynda, I'd like to bring a few members into the conversation @kareniowa @nhaegele @liz223 @dawn_giacabazi @wolfer1975 who have written about depressaion, as well as @crhp194 and @thankful who haven't written about depression and anxiety as well as managing heart issues.

You may also be interested in joining this discussion https://connect.mayoclinic.org/discussion/i-have-been-on-so-many-anti-depressants-over-the-past-35/

@lyndamm, how do you help yourself face the dread of the evening coming around?

Jump to this post

Right now I haven't found anything that works. I've always read a lot in the past and I'm trying to do that again. Before the heart surgery I tried to stay busy in the evening, but now by the evening I am so tired and hurt so much that I am just sitting in my recliner.

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@callalily74

I can tell you what I do every evening to reduce my depression or anxiety. I self medicate and that, along with my many meds, has been a lifesaver.

Jump to this post

Do you mean you self meditate? I did mediation many years ago and maybe that's an idea to try again. I think I'll try that for the next week and see if that helps. Thank you for your suggestion.

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