Psybersquare: Depression

The Elusiveness of Gratitude

by Mark Sichel, LCSW

Gratitude is often elusive to depressed people. We sometimes become so focused on negativity that we have difficulty thinking about all the things for which we can be grateful. When we focus on our gratitude, however, we are able to give back to the world, and we feel better about ourselves. When people involve themselves in community service out of gratitude for what we have been given, we tend to lessen our focus on our depression.

When you are under a black cloud, and seeing the sky as partly cloudy and the glass as half-full, do you have difficulty remembering things for which you can be grateful?

The reason concentrating on all that we have to be grateful for is so helpful to people, and so important particularly for depressed people, is that gratitude can give us strength and fortitude to fight our way through depression. Gratitude is an integral component of a thought process that depressed people can use to reverse the tide of lethargy, hopelessness, and helplessness with which we are often burdened.

If you have trouble remembering all the things for which you can be grateful, go to the Gratitude Workshop on Psybersquare and complete the interactive exercise there. You'll have a print out of "Your Gratitude List" which you can keep handy for those dark hours when you need to focus on positives about life and yourself.

Psybersquare recently received a series of postings on the Ask the Expert Message Board from a member who was contending with terribly tragic life circumstances. She was having great difficulty functioning and coping with being a caregiver for her terminally ill husband. In our interchange of messages, she started to understand that she needed to focus on the gratitude she felt for having some time remaining with her husband. She learned to feel grateful for her ability to care for her husband, and grateful that she received the support and encouragement she needed to keep fighting from the members of our on-line community. After some time her depression lifted! She continued to feel sad, of course, as she watched her husband's health deteriorate, but she was able to function, coordinate her husband's medical care, and get support for herself.

I would like to share with all of you this member's most recent posting to the boards. If the member who wrote the post is reading this, I would like to express my gratitude to you for sending the letter and sharing it with other community members and me.

Hi mark,

Just wanted to get a quick note off to let you know that things in this house are ok....thank you for the support you have given me through all these long and hard days.... You have helped me turn every curve ball I have been thrown in to a home run! And I thank you for that....

Hubby still VERY sick, and I lost use of legs Friday night, but my cup is still half FULL and I am grateful for the things I have...our "vacation" has been days in the hospital for him and days overnight with friends for me, and our "dinners" out have been in the hospital cafeteria (not like the fried clams and lobster we had in mind last winter....), BUT I have had the GIFT of having dinners with hubby, and we have had time...lol.... lots of time together. Therefore, I am grateful for those things...

I am grateful for all that is posted here, grateful to read that I am not alone in this boat...our circumstances may be different, but emotional pain is the same for all of us...

Thank you for being here...all of you!