Help?

OverlordMikey at the PPMB posts this thread about how depressed he is and how he needs to get his mind off his depression.

As someone who is a depression sufferer, the best advice I can give you is simply not to follow the news, either on television, radio, or the internet. I stopped following the news and reading political blogs and now I feel about ten times better. Trust me, political thought is so polarized and so filtered you will not feel better after hearing any kind of news, even if it's the kind of news that benefits your party. (All you'll be thinking is "it sure took them long enough"!)

As for writing skills: the only way to really get better at writing is to write. And the best place to write is probably in writing fanfiction. Fans are generally supportive and willing to help you out. The only danger is that any critique applied by fans will range from laudatory to extremely laudatory. If you find yourself too satisfied with your writing - you ain't doing it right. On the other hand, you can't just perfect and perfect and perfect a story forever - at some point you just have to say, "fuck it" and throw it out there to swim or sink on its own.

If OverlordMikey snores, I would suggest a CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine. That machine changed my life. I stopped taking the depression medication and haven't needed it since. (Drug free for about three years now.) There's no guarantee that I won't need it again some day but for now, I'm all right. Long term oxygen deprivation makes your brain do strange things. A CPAP machine gives you the air that you need, but unless you have good insurance to pay for the testing it will be very hard to pay for out-of-pocket. (Insert rant here.)

Raskolnikov had good advice with Frank Capra movies. Comedies in general are also a good idea.

Oh yes - and if you feel that you're going to hurt yourself or hurt other people, seek help right away.