Fatigue and Depression

How can I love my nieces so much, yet feel relief that they have gone home? I am exhausted. I feel physically sick and I am so tired. It is not a sleepy tired, but a feeling like my whole body can hardly move. I'm shuffling my feet an just sitting here staring off into space: wasted.

Fatigue and exhaustion are a huge part of my depressive symptoms. I can be up, really up if I have to be; like with my nieces, but the cost is huge. As soon as the occasion for which I need to be strong, up and projecting a happy me is over I feel almost like I am going to collapse.

I was severely depressed (as part of this MDE) for the two years before I left work. I worked as a facilitator/teacher/program development specialist for a large corporation. My job was high paced, challenging and full of social contact via courses, classes, management training, management of a training team etc.

I would cry all the way to work, stand at the crosswalk thinking intensely about stepping in front of the oncoming bus, visualize myself hanging myself in the handicapped washroom; and then step into my work building and be "on", bright, happy, outgoing, welcoming, caring, kind etc, etc. towards every single person I met.

When I left for the night I could barely open the door to leave the building. I was that exhausted. I would get in my car and speed as fast as I could, praying my car would lose control and I would die. I would get home and hit my head over and over and over. I was so angry with myself for being unable to extricate myself from a job that, while I was that depressed, was literally going to kill me.

I still have the same patterns. I cannot help but make myself into the "happy" person I believe others need me to be when I am around them. The trouble is it takes so much energy to be that person that when I leave the scenario/person to go home I want to throw up I feel so tired.

I think what I do is called a "reactive mood". From what I understand it, and the fatigue, are markers of a subtype of depression called "Atypical Depression", along with other symptoms I have like eating more and gaining weight when depressed (vs. the person who stops eating when depressed) and wanting to sleep much more.

Fatigue was the reason I sought help from my family doctor. It is always the first thing that happens when a depressive episode sets in; and that, and a decrease in eating are the first things to go when the MDE begins to wane.

Despite my medications lifting my mood enough for me to manage a bit better, the side effects of the medicines are keeping me fatigued. I also am still having huge problems with mood lability and the "reactive mood--->fatigue" cycle.

My nieces are so beautiful and soul enhancing, but I made the right decision to not have children. You would not believe how much I love and adore my nieces. However, if I had to take care of children 24/7 I am certain I would die of exhaustion. I also made the decision to not have children because my family has multiple people in it who have bipolar disorder, or major depression, or anxiety/panic problems. I seem to be a mixture of all three and I just could not bear passing these on to another human being.

I am certainly not saying people with mental illnesses should not have children. I marvel at the love and attention many of my friends with these illnesses are able to provide their kids. I am just saying for me, I could not manage that responsibility, no matter how much I loved my kids. I can barely take care of myself much of the time.