Was looking for some people who understood this illness. It is no fun.

Is there loneliness in blogging about depression? Yes, if you only consider being face to face with someone as being “with” someone and not being lonely. I have to say that since I’ve developed a network of friends on the internet over the years via mental disorder mailing lists (such as Walkers.org), I would be a heck of a lot lonelier had I never made online contact with these people. I would have virtually no friends if not for the friends I’ve made online. I realize this doesn’t make for a very good impression of my character. That’s okay. (Didn’t I just mention that we are not judgemental of those like us? Why do I do that to myself??)
The friends I’ve made online know more about me than my own family members. I’ve friends online I’ve had for over fifteen years…. that’s a heck of a lot more time I’ve ever been able to keep a friendship with someone in “real life”. My real life is online.
Which brings me to a great site for writing, if you want to do more than blog… you can find my profile page here: http://www.webook.com/member/anitalite (anitalite ;-)_ is my pen name there). If you care to check out what I’ve written there. It’s an amazing community of very cool people who, most of which are, uh… like us… Great artists usually have some sort of mental thing going on, don’t they? lol
So sorry this is so long again!!
http://anitalite.blogspot.com/

I took your advise and started blogging. This is new to me so I hope that anyone who decides to check it out will be as understanding as you are. =)
Thank you for the suggestion and for saying (in a comment reply above) that you think publishing an unedited blog is a good thing. I believe it is therapeutic to do so. If I went back and edited my blog posts (all two of them so far, lol) I would probably be reduced to saving them as drafts and they’d never be seen by anyone but me. We are our own worst critics and that stands so true for me!

Thank you again for your site. You’re on my link list, as are a few others whose blogs I appreciate and respect as much as yours.

Hopefully one of these days I’ll learn how to say what I mean without over explaining everything. (grin)

That is a paradox I can really identify with. When I first began blogging about depression, it was on a free blog host somewhere (in fact, I have a few of those ‘depression blogs’ all over the internet…). I told myself it was simply a way to ‘get the demons out of my mind and into print’. One of those blogs was private, but the others were wide open for anyone to read. I just never told close friends and family about them.
And then I wondered if I was going to get any comments, but I never did (although the stats on the blogs told me people were reading them). But the depressed frame of mind I was in when I wrote those blogs meant that I probably would have reacted badly to almost any comment made in any case, so probably just as well…

But then my partner found one of those blogs (he’s a bit of a ‘detective’ when it comes to searching the internet) and he was horrified by what he found there. His question was “Why didn’t you tell me you were feeling like this?”
And my answer was, “And tell me, what would you have been able to do about it anyway?”
To which he replied “Well…. something…..anyhow….” And then tailed off…
As you can guess, it caused all kinds of stress…

But back to your point (sorry). Personally, if I read a blog and someone is putting into words just how bad they are feeling, I do comment. I don’t know if it helps; I just have to do it. I just can’t leave the blog without at least letting the person know that, although I cannot be inside their head, I am trying to understand. But I’ll admit, that is just my way of doing things and goodness knows whether or not it’s the right way to do it.
The down side of this is that when I am busy (which is most of the time), I tend to leave visiting these particular blogs until last, because I know I will get involved and not get my work done otherwise… (yes, I know that’s selfish, and I guess I am, but I do try to be honest).

As to publishing unedited posts, I think that’s good and I wish I could just warble on here some times, but the pedantic part of me won’t let me do this. Reading someone’s thoughts when they are at the depths of their particular depression would certainly help some of those who claim to be studying in order to help people who are suffering from depression, as many of them could certainly do with a reality check.

I won’t come out with any cliches about hoping you are feeling better since writing that comment. Although your comment on my post about recession, depression and suicide told me you were not at the complete depths of despair and I really hope that’s true.

Just to say thanks so much for commenting here and giving me more food for thought.