I’ve known Laura Becker ever since we met in college years ago (too many years—I don’t like to count them). Marriage and a baby didn’t change her much, although they had given her new things to talk about. But Laura is the kind of person who feels comfortable talking about anything, which sometimes makes me nervous. I never know what she’s going to say next.

Also, Laura believes in mild physical exertion (i.e. healthful walks in the park).

“Good afternoon, Reese!” she said, appearing in my doorway with her baby (Marybeth) in a stroller. “Ready for a walk?”

“Does it matter if I’m ready?” I asked. One time, I had refused to get out of my bed when Laura had decided to walk with me. She had pulled the blankets off, bundled me into my clothes, and taken me outside, without being even slightly mean about it. And, just as she had said, I had felt better—although at first I’d wanted to strangle her.

“I’m willing to wait,” Laura said.

I didn’t have to keep her waiting for very long, but was soon ready to leave my little house with appropriate footgear on my feet and a bottle of water in one hand. Laura was adjusting her ponytail, eyeing her reflection in my kitchen window.

“Are you ready?”

“Yeah.” I didn’t sound enthused, because I wasn’t. Some days I really hate leaving my house.

Undeterred, Laura started walking, trundling Marybeth down the sidewalk ahead of her.

“How was your morning?”

It took a little prodding on her part, but I told her what I’d been doing: how Bailey had woken me up at an insanely early hour, how I’d tidied my house and worked on my budget (a little bit), and how I was beginning to run out of groceries. Laura listened to all this with apparent interest.

Then she told me about Marybeth. This always takes some time, because, in Laura’s mind, everything Marybeth does is worthy of discussion and praise. Much to Laura’s delight, Marybeth was apparently starting to gurgle the semblances of words.

When we reached the park, Laura stopped the stroller and went around it to peer at Marybeth. She gurgled at Marybeth. Marybeth gurgled back.

“See! She said mama,” Laura said proudly.

I hadn’t heard anything like that, but I decided not to mention that failure on my part. After all, sometimes I think I know what Bailey is saying, and Bailey is my cat.

I knew Laura wished I would find a man and settle down and have babies—“so we can relate more,” she’d said once—but that didn’t look too likely at the moment.

My boyfriend, Zach, and I hadn’t made many commitments of any kind. We’d only been kinda-dating for a few months, and he was gone a lot on business trips. All the time, really. I found his rushed emails to me endearing, but… not nearly enough.

I sighed.

“Reese? Are you OK?” Laura asked, glancing up from her darling baby.

I shrugged. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

There was no reason to tell her the truth—not today, at least—that seeing her and her baby made me feel confused and uncertain. (What the heck was I doing with my life?) I wished we could jump back five years, when we’d both been younger and unattached and able to do anything we wanted (we thought).

I wished she’d leave Marybeth at home sometimes, so I could at least pretend. I was beginning to realize that the very sight of Marybeth could trigger something—a sadness?—I didn’t even understand.

I blinked, grinding the palm of my hand against my weary eyes. I was still tired. That was it. I was just tired.

Laura gave me a quick half-hug. Maybe she understood.

“Come on, precious,” she said. “It’s a beautiful afternoon. Let’s enjoy it.”

We started walking again.

Experimentation is one of the keys to my mental health.

I’ve known this for eight or nine years now, in fact ever since I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

One of the biggest problems with any illness is working out cause and effect. There is so much noise going in everyday life that it’s near impossible to separate these things out.

Take medications as an example.  Bipolar is notoriously difficult to treat; it can take several years of trial and error to find a combination that offers a reasonable result. It requires experimentation. If this is formalized in some way there is a much better chance of success.

What used to happen? Once a month I’d visit my doctor and each time the conversation went like this:

“How have you been over the last month?”
“Pretty bad”.
“What in particular was pretty bad?”
“I can’t really remember.”
“How is the new medicine going?”
“I don’t know. It’s hard to tell.”

If you’ve had similar conversations then you’ll know how frustrating they are – for everyone. If only we had a checklist of what works and what doesn’t handed out to us on a silver platter, life would be so much easier*. But the realization that this was never going to be the case opened up the door for me to a way of dealing with my condition proactively: experimentation. Instead of merely telling myself, “Don’t do this or that,” I sought to answer the question, “What will this achieve?”

* Shameless plug: I developed the Optimism apps to help with this specific problem. :)

A couple of years ago I stumbled across Think Try Learn, a website that has been a big help in my goal of living a more fruitful and less stressful life. Dubbed as The Experimenter’s Journal, Edison is the perfect resource for people who adopt the simple idea that “all life is an experiment” and it’s up to us to think, try, learn.

With over 400 experiments and more than 600 users to date, Edison has evolved to become a community of experimenters who have given the TTL method a try and are willing to share the lessons they’ve gained over the course of exploring unchartered territory. Whether it’s learning a new sport, starting a weight loss plan, or growing a plant – all these experiences are documented at Edison.

In my case, there are many and varied things that I’ve found out about myself through experimenting – some of them related to mental health, others unrelated.

• I am intolerant of some foods beyond a threshold. If I binge on one of them I have a big mood swing a couple of days later.
• I am more productive when I select my work tasks randomly by rolling dice.
• I took photos of my food for a week to shame myself into losing weight. (I put on weight.)
• I experience better moods when I sit on an exercise ball for work, than when I sit in a normal office chair.
• My skin reacts to latex dish washing gloves, which isn’t immediately obvious for some time after washing up.

I documented the last 4 of these on Edison, with some feedback and encouragement from others.

As you can see from my own experience, an experiment need not be a grand one to be beneficial, especially when it comes to one’s health. Even the simple discovery that eating sweets makes you stay awake long into the night, or that a certain brand of detergent causes you to break into a rash, is something that you would appreciate knowing. However small a piece of information may seem, if it brings some ease to your day to day living then it‘s worth the effort that you put into finding it.

Saturday morning began, as many of my mornings do, with Bailey breaking into my bedroom and frolicking all over my bed. I love cats. I love Bailey. The problem is, sometimes I forget why. I think cats should be able to wait for their breakfast until I’m ready to face the day. Bailey thinks I exist to bring her food whenever she wants it, no matter how I’m feeling, no matter how much sleep I did or didn’t get.

Bailey wanted breakfast. She padded across my quilt, looking for my face to lick. It’s funny how cats look light and graceful until they’re tromping all over you. Stupid cats.

I dragged my blankets over my head. I didn’t want to see what time it was. Bailey meowed insistently several times, coldly disregarding my groans of hapless protest.

I decided to play dead. Lay very, very still and hoped she would go away. No luck.

I opened one eye. 6:07 AM. Ridiculously early. Insanely early. I vaguely remembered crawling to bed at 2:45 AM. Three of hours of sleep? Good grief.

I clamped my eyes shut, but when I tried to fall asleep again, all sorts of thoughts came crowding into my brain. How could I function on three hours of sleep? I had so much to do. For one thing, it was Saturday, my cleaning day. Between the two of us, Bailey and I had managed to clutter the house to no end throughout the week. I didn’t think I’d washed dishes for… a while. Ugh.

I needed to go shopping as well—or could I leave that until Sunday? (Did I have milk? Eggs? Vegetables of any kind? Was I likely to contract scurvy?) And I probably needed to think about money. Contrary to my halfhearted belief, it did not accumulate when I left it to its own devices.

My friend, Laura, had threatened to come over some time in the afternoon, which meant that the house needed to be presentable by then. I needed to be presentable. Laura worried about me. Said I spent too much time by myself, just me and my plants and my cat. I hated worrying her, but there was no way I could act as persistently perky as her.

Of course, as soon as I started thinking about all that, I could feel myself getting tense, so tense my heart started to race. There was no way I was ever falling asleep again. Better to get up, grin, and bear it. With this early start, I was sure to have all manner of success.

In theory.

I lurched to sit up, blinking blearily at the wall. OK. Just swing your legs out of bed. You can do it.

Nope. I flopped back down. This wasn’t going to work.

Bailey thrust her head into my face. She was a beautiful tabby, long-furred, green-eyed, her coat a patchwork of brown, gold, and black. Now that I was clearly awake, she was very pleased with herself.

“Meow?”

I groaned.

“Meow?”

She started licking my face. The cat always wins.

It took forever, but at last I got up. I wobbled to the kitchen, put on the kettle, and filled the little cat dish with food. Bailey rejoiced. I scowled at her.

I found some Earl Grey tea and soaked a sachet in hot water. The smell of bergamot filled the air. It was such a cozy smell that I could feel myself relaxing, despite myself. Caffeine sometimes turns out to be a mistake later in the day, but I tell myself that I need it in the morning.

Surveying the dispiriting heap of dishes in the sink, I started to make plans. Breakfast first, then the dishes (all of them!), then shopping, then money… maybe. Then Laura would insist on taking me to the park for fresh air. We both knew sunlight and exercise was good for me.

Bailey pounced at my ankles.

“Sorry, love,” I said. “You may have won this round, but you’re going to have to wait for lunch.”

–
Reese is a fictional character who agreed to share her story on this blog. This was the first installment.

A couple of weeks ago I took my daughter to a Gloria Jeans coffee shop for a drink. When we were at the counter I noticed an “RU OK Day” flyer, and said to her that a friend of mine is involved in running the initiative. We took a copy and read it while waiting for our drinks.

We chatted about other things for while and then I asked her if she was okay? She said “No. I’m not.” We then discussed her problems for an hour and a half. It was one of the most valuable conversations we’d had in her 11 years.

The next day I had one of the worst days I’d had in a long time, with a couple of pieces of upsetting news. In the evening my daughter asked me, genuinely, “Are you okay, Dad?”, which started another really good conversation.

Since then we’ve asked each other a few more times, more than casually, as to how the other is doing.

“Are you OK?” is just 3 short words. But how often do we ask those around us how they are, not expecting more than a perfunctory “yeah” or “no problem”? What if you knew the person’s response would be “No. I’m not OK.”? It would be tempting to not even ask. But just as I experienced, it can be a catalyst for a good conversation and helping someone just when they need it.

R U OK? Day aims to raise awareness on the importance of meaningful conversations and connections. It is a national day of action in Australia – and now spreading overseas – held every September 15. It emphasizes the need for positive encouragement among family members, friends and colleagues. By asking each other “Are you OK?” you initiate a conversation that may prevent small problems from becoming heavy burdens.

While this year 2011’s R U OK? Day was only the third, the campaign has generated a lot of support and awareness across the country. Well-known celebrities like Hugh Jackman, Naomi Watts, Simon Baker, and others have put their support behind the movement. Stories have been told and retold about how individuals, seemingly fine on the outside but suffering from severe stress in reality, broke down and clung to that listening ear when simply asked, “Are you OK?”

They say even the little things in life can make a big difference. You don’t need to wait until September 15, or live in Australia, to ask “R U OK?”

There is a useful website called BluePages by the Centre for Mental Health Research at the Australian National University. The site isn’t pretty, but the content is very helpful.

The Centre for Mental Health Research has ranked the best treatments for depression according to the depth and quality of evidence supporting them. It is updated regularly as new research is published.

Here is a summary:

Medical

Antidepressants and Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) are both ranked highly with strong scientific evidence for their effectiveness. A relatively new treatment called Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation has so far only shown small benefits that disappear after a couple of weeks.

Psychological

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy ranks highest with strong evidence for being very effective. CBT focuses on helping the individual learn and use new thinking skills to modify negative emotions, beliefs and behaviors.

Interpersonal Psychotherapy, Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Bibliotherapy are all on the next tier. They are supported by scientific evidence as being effective, but the evidence is not as strong.

Studies have found that supportive counselling, in which problems are discussed and the counsellor provides emotional support, is not effective.

Lifestyle & Alternative

Exercise, Light Therapy and St John’s Wort are ranked on the second tier as useful treatments, with good evidence but not as strong as for, say, CBT.

On the third tier there is a large group of other promising treatments with less evidence in support. It includes Acupuncture, Alcohol Avoidance, Massage Therapy, Relaxation Therapy, Vitamins and Yoga.

Many different things are touted as the best treatments for depression, but that doesn’t mean they’re effective. The BluePages is a good place for a quick check on such claims.