Posted by dj on June 21, 2000, at 10:37:09
In reply to Re: Moves Moods Away from Sadness and Pain, posted by dj on June 21, 2000, at 10:30:11
This is a description of the initial Disengaging Depression workshop, written by one of the facilitators:
DISENGAGING DEPRESSION
. . . Joann Peterson
Disengaging Depression, now a one year old workshop, is exciting --challenging beliefs and providing surprises for leaders and participants. The inaugural workshop had been accepted for a 'masters' level research project at UBC, and we thought there would be few surprises in the participants' responses to the questionnaires. We were stunned to discover that many of the twenty plus participants who signed up for the depression workshop would distance themselves from most of the questions related to symptoms and problems associated with depression!
The graduate student was frantic (her grade depended on a valid research design); we, then, brought the results out into the group for discussion. Was everyone there only to learn about depression and how it affected others?
In the halting, then progressively energized responsive dialogue that followed and continued to permeate much of the workshop, we discovered an immense amount of stigma attached to depression. So much fear, morality (good and bad judgements) and self criticism was attached to the diagnosis and symptoms that people would rather disclaim their pain and distress than acknowledge them directly, even though the research was handled in an anonymous manner.
I was intrigued with this reaction to a "mental health diagnosis" that is claimed to be responsible for significant pervasive emotional distress for people living, relating and working in today's fast paced world. At the end of the discussion, people volunteered to re-take the research questionnaire, and the results were manifestly different. However, we had launched that first workshop with an honesty and understanding that set the tone for the sequential workshops.
Then, we discovered that many people in both workshops had been "depressed" since early childhood, growing up with a profound experience of emptiness, helplessness, desolation and isolation. Such "anaclitic depression" usually began with actual problems in attachment, with real or emotional abandonment and a lack of stimulation that is often coupled with a. Usually beginning very early in life, it is different from a depression that emerges later in life in reaction to patterns of relating and engaging life. Identifying the differences was both reassuring and important for many.
We leaders proposed that depression is simplistically used as a noun, a "thing" or "object" and as a labelling diagnosis. As leaders, Linda Nicholls, Judy Lemon and I define depression as a process, an activity in which depression is used as a style of SELF- EXPRESSION and SOLUTION.
Questions asked: "What are my symptoms describing about me and my contact with people and the world? What is my depression serving in my life? What would I be doing if I weren't depressed?" In answering these questions, people struggled with issues of blame, victimhood, personal responsibility, abandoned boundaries, loss of faith and intimate contact, isolation and depression as a means of creating meaning. The groups struggled, pushed away and then gradually reclaimed the idea that in their depressing, they became so self focused that the impact upon others was primarily unrecognized. With this recognition, the topic of suicide was explored with pain, guilt, shame and, yes, excitement as old beliefs were challenged.
In the midst of all this, we moved and breathed. But as the workshop moved forward, we directly addressed breath, body and movement. Judy Lemon taught people some beginning ideas about Thought Field Therapy and soon the room was engaged with people tapping trigger points to shift areas of energetic impaction. This recently developed field of psychological intervention is very useful for people struggling with anxiety and depression.
Fun and music accompanied moving meditations; breath, voice and sound filled the air, and people began to reinhabit bodies that had been frozen in despair. Creativity reemerged with poignant poetry, clay work and many other forms of expression.
In the sharing and contact, we reemerged into life, reconnected and with more clarity about the role we had shaped to manifest depression in our lives. We learned so much in these first workshops. Participants still continue to contact us with very positive feedback about the impressive effects of workshop on their lives. .
Joann Peterson M.S.W.,A.C.S.W.,Dip.C. is Education Director of PD Seminars, leader and co-leader of a number of workshops, including "Disengaging Depression", Anger, Boundaries & Safety", "Clinical Interventions", "Effective Boundaries", "Mirroring", "Separation & Loss"
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thread:37856
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