Depression and Exercise

Saw a post from someone railing against another person who suggested physical activity as an alternative to drugs as a cure for depression. They railed against that and compared it to telling asthma sufferers not to use a rescue inhaler and telling diabetics not to take insulin.

First, for some types of diabetes, watching one's diet and losing weight can lessen or even eliminate the need for insulin or other medical interventions. That is not true for all, by any means, but it is true for some. I am asthmatic and have found that regular aerobic exercise can improve my lung function and reduce my need for medication.

There is no doubt that severe and prolonged depression may require medical intervention. When it does, there is no shame in taking the medication needed to relieve one’s problem. There is also no doubt that physical activity is a mood elevator and can ease mild to moderate depression. The Mayo Clinic says, “Any physical activity that gets you off the couch and moving can help improve your mood.”

Some folks would reply that it is easy to talk about something when you don't suffer from it. I have suffered from depression though, and still have some mild depression. In my late 20s, I went through a very stressful period. I don’t want to get into the gory details, but will say I left a secure job for another job, which fell apart on me, taking all my savings and leaving me in debt. I found a new job, but less secure and not enough to easily cover my bills. I fell in love with someone who ultimately decided she cared for me, but didn’t love me, at least not that way.

I questioned myself very hard, and found I hated myself. I tried alcohol, mostly beer, but it didn’t really help, and I’m not inclined towards alcoholism. I tried pot, and it seemed to help for a while. The high would take the edge off the depression. I never smoked a lot – maybe the equivalent of a joint a day, when I came home from work.

After a while, I found that when I came off the high, the depression came back worse than before. I never before and never since felt the profound sense of self hatred, and self loathing that I did as I came off some of my highs. I remember lying on my bed, literally writhing in emotional agony, feeling a self hatred that I can’t even describe.

Any aspect of my being, I hated. I’ve always been fairly bright, if nerdy, and not at all athletic. I even questioned my own intelligence. Most people, when dealing with someone not too bright, will treat them kindly. I wondered if I was an intellectual imbecile who was merely being humored by the people around him. There was nothing about myself that I found of value. I even thought about how I might commit suicide – taking a car at very high speed and running flat into a concrete light pole or overpass support, with no one else around to be hurt.

I stopped smoking pot. I decided that the aftermath was so very much worse than the high was good, that it wasn’t worth it. I decided that I really was moderately bright – standardized test scores are not merely trying to be kind, and are quite impersonal. I decided that I needed to look at my life and see what I could change that would improve my self-image.

I was slightly over-weight – not grossly, but some, and very out of shape. I hated my body and my body image. I started doing sit-ups and push-ups every day in the evening before I ate dinner. I would not allow myself to eat dinner until I had done them. I started with very few, and for the first few weeks, even those were often uncomfortable. For the record, I still do sit-ups every night before I eat dinner, and it is many years later. I have only missed a very few nights from illness or injury in that time.

Eventually I got into racquetball and later running to improve my physical condition further. I reached the point, before injuring my foot, of being able to run over 9 miles without stopping. I had to quit for several years to let my foot heal and am now back to running 3 miles.

Exercise was a big part of helping me out of my depression. That is not to say it would work as well for everyone, and some folks might need medication to help them out of their depression. But everyone can get some benefit from such exercise, and to rudely dismiss exercise makes no more sense than to dismiss medication for those who cannot be fully helped without it.