Well I am in an odd situation.

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I am not suicidal at the moment, but only because I am fighting it with everything I have left. I mean if I am to feel this empty for the rest of my life what's the point? I know there are people who care about me, and I do not want to hurt them...but its frusterating that there is no real relief for how I feel. Though I have no plans to act on anything at this point I do have thoughts about how I might end it..its annoying and clutters my mind when I would rather think about something more useful.

I tried talking about this with my counseler, but I could not seem to word it the right way....its just kind of freaking me out a bit, because I have it under enough control not to do anything at the moment. But if I keep feeling this way and don't do much about it I am afraid I might have a really bad day and be unable to fight the urge. But what do I do? I don't want to let it escalate and end up succeeding, attempting and then missing class due to involintary commitment and I don't want to start failing or missing class because of how I feel. I don't even know why my main concern is missing class, but I do know this concern is getting in the way of me deciding what I should do about these suicidal thoughts other then consantly fight them out of my head all the time.

Sorry to hear you are thinking of suicide. Please don't clutter your mind with this--you are worth a lot more than a few random negative thoughts. Seriously. Everybody reaches a point sometimes when they can't handle things alone. Lean on somebody. This is a very stressful time of the year for students. Find a family menber who will let you coast a little or take a few "personal days from stuff."

Sweetleaf,

Pekkla and Keira gave good advice and I agree. I am sorry you are in such a bad state. I wonder if there are any peer advisors or regular advisors at your college who could find you some sort of support group. When I was in college I was assigned an older student mentor who also became my friend who really helped me.

Also maybe if you don't know how to word it to your counselor you could say it just like you said it here. It made perfect sense in my opinion anyway. If they still don't understand, maybe you could ask them if, since this is really important, they could bring in another counselor in the office and you could try to explain it to them with your regular counselor present. I know that sounds like a weird solution but the more people who hear your explanation the more likely it's gonna get understood.

Also I can't tell if your counselor is an academic advisor-type person or a therapist-type person, but if they're not a therapist maybe you could ask them about going to one?

In the meantime Keira's yoga suggestion sounds really good! That or anything else really diverting and relaxing that you can think of to do. Or maybe working on a project, maybe an art project or something involving cooking, will give you a feeling that there's something for you to work toward.

You shouldn't have to endure hellishness. I feel like a drug-pusher when I suggest this but I do cause I think it can really be lifesaving: have you seen a doctor or psychiatrist about taking antidepressants? They do not solve everything but they can improve things significantly.

Hmm. Doesn't your college have some kind of health-care plan for all its students? Where you maybe have a certain number of visits free? That was you could talk to a general practitioner and they could prescribe you something maybe?

About Prozac, yeah, I did not react well to that either. Maybe if you are able to see a doctor you could specifically tell them that Prozac caused anxiety and maybe they know of another one that does not or they would prescribe anti-anxiety medicine in addition to an antidepressant.

Ah I see. Well I'm really sorry you're in this situation and I hope the Medicaid works out soon. I wish I had better advice.

Here is a reputable-looking not-too-long scientific editorial article about how to raise serotonin levels without drugs:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2077351/

Basically it names four ways:

1. Inducing positive thoughts patterns in oneself (this seems obvious, but it's saying that when test subjects were exposed to positive stimuli, it measurably raised their serotonin levels). SO I know this one might be hard but maybe if you try to expose yourself to more positive things (pleasant music/books/reading material/artwork) and avoid negative things whenever possible, that could help.

2. Exposure to bright light. It also mentions that serotonin is highest during the light part of the light-dark cycle (i.e. the day), so I guess this is why you (anyone) should try to sleep at night rather than keep odd hours.

3. Exercise (this is mentioned a lot I know and I know how hard it can be do to when you're depressed, but maybe you could get a jump rope or something kind of fun and use it. Not sure if you are living in a dorm or what but I don't think your roommates would find it too weird, and if they do, so what? You could also jump rope outside and ignore anyone who might be walking past - people see interesting stuff all the time)

4. Diet. I am not sure if this is saying it could make a significant change, but it says that things like milk and chickpeas contain high levels of tryptophan, which increases serotonin.

Anyway I am really sorry you are feeling bad and I hope the Medicaid works out soon so you can see a psychiatrist.