Treatment doesn't work - can I actually GET better?

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I've had at least a low level of depression pretty much my whole life. In recent years it's been diagnosed as major depression, and I've tried a bunch of medications -Cipralex, Paxil, Effexor, Wellbutrin - none has made a difference. I've had some side effects, but that's it.

Been to about a dozen different therapists and that didn't help much either. Most of them don't even bother to look at my issues from my perspective, so how can they expect to help? I've had maybe 2 or 3 therapists who actually tried to understand me, and they were great to talk to, but I don't think they actually made me any better. Just made me feel understood, for what that's worth.

Went to a screening interview to get into a study and get free medication. (I can't afford to pay for drugs right now). I don't qualify because they're looking for a specific type of patient, but the screener seemed particularly concerned for me. Apparently my everyday day-to-day mentality that I've dealt with for the past 5 years sounds like crisis to her. I'm better today than I was at my worst, bu apparently that's still pretty bad. She wants me to go into the ER so I can jump the waiting list and get some sort of treatment, but at this point it doesn't seem worth the bother. I'm worried about building up a record of psychiatric treatment that could bite me in the butt later - to work in Asia, or to get health insurance if I move to the US. If I thought the treatment would hlp, I wouldn't worry about those consequences, but given my past failure to improve, it's worth considering.

Went to a naturopath. She thinks I should stop eating gluten - I get digestive problems if I eat too much bread and there are psychological effects from gluten too. But I tested negative for celiac disease. I tried being 90%-wheat-free for about 6 weeks. I don't think I was better - if anything just more apathetic. I couldn't eat bread so I'd just go home at 9 pm and go straight to bed. Empty.

I've read that celiac disease and possibly gluten intolerance can lead to depression. Someone suggested that if your intestinal villi are all wrecked you have trouble absorbing antidepressants. Maybe that's the case. I don't know.

I think that making a concerted effort to eliminate all gluten from your diet will make a difference. Gluten is not found only in bread, but lots of other things. I used to suffer from major depression, but now only get depressed about specific things. I have been working on eliminating all gluten from my life, and have seen improvements. I have also been eliminating dairy, and refined sugar, with even better results. I am a lot calmer, and not as prone to catastrophic thinking. Please don't be discouraged, and continue your quest to feel better. You deserve not only to survive, but thrive.

First of all, having the right therapist is key. If you have somebody you don't like, it's NOT going to work.
You have work your heart out and reveal EVERYTHING about your life before you make much process. Remember, it also gets worse before it gets better.
You have to have a bit of hope. Remember the expression "If you think you can't, you can't"

Suggestions:

1. Moderate exercise: eg Walk at a fairly brisk pace for 30 minutes every day.

2. A book on cognitive therapy: eg 'Feeling good: the new mood therapy' by David Burns.

3. When you are OK to pay for it, seeing a specialist depression psychiatrist. I had been on almost every antidepressant without much improvement (and getting side-effects). But now my mood had been much better by taking a combination of antidepressant and mood stabilizer.

All the best with it..

Can you actually get better? YES!

There are probably many treatment options that have not been offered to you, due to lack of knowledge about them or because they are controversial...
For example (this may sound a little crazy) but have you ever considered ECT? It has been proven to help people with major depression who are either at high risk for suicide or have exhausted a lot of other treatments.
Not many doctors will offer it to a patient as an option, unless the patient brings it up in conversation for themselves, and still many doctors are very resistant to discuss it, let alone perform it. It might take a while to find a willing doctor to perform this on you (if you ever do decide to have it).
Like anything, it has side effects, some of them quite distressing (like memory loss, normally short term), but has it's benefits. A benefit of ECT is that apparently, it offers near instant relief for major depression.

I know a lot of people wont consider this but if you have near to no other options, then it might be something to think about.

have you tried the full range of alternative treatments. fishoil evening primrose b vitamins 5 htp taurine tyrosine selenium topical lavender oil
homeopathy chinese herbs nuerofeedback?

Shiatsu
Acupuncture
Fish oil
Supplements
Vitamin B6
Vitamin B12 shots
Naturopathy
Homeopathy
Chinese herbs

I walk between 1-4 hours a day. It's helpful to get me thinking about story ideas, but at the same time it also gets me thinking about my miserable biography and half the time I'm crying halfway through the walk anyway. I find the gym is more helpful, but if don't go for a few days it actually makes me more miserable. Knowing the outcome of "withdrawal", and given that it's very difficult for me to get to classes - either I sleep in too late or I'm working during the night sessions, plus when I work full time it's very very difficult to keep up a routine in addition to my night classes and still have time to come home and cook my own dinner or clean my apartment. So.... I don't end up going often.

I've tried cognitive behavioral therapy and it was mostly useless - I understand the logic of changing my thinking but that doesn't mean I don't think that way. Any time someone approaches my depression logically I look at it as a argument I need to beat them at. Because they cannot possibly win whenit comes to knowing myself.

I've seen psychiatrists - they're actually free in Canada, but psychologists cost money. I've seen 6 psychiatrists and 6 psychologists and the MD psychiatrists were by far the most incompetent. Basically they just wanted to write you a prescription or give you some logical argument for why you're depressed (or argue with you about whether you actually are depressed or whether you "get weepy sometimes" - as the first doc I went to, who actually had a chance of helping me in my early days, so callously said to me). Psychiatrists are not trained to understand personalities, they are trained to diagnose diseases. I'm sure there are some great psychiatrists out there, but they are in the minority. The majority of them don't have the social skills to understand the world outside of their own perspective, so they just see illness as a problem that can be fixed by medication. I had one doc who gave me an antidepressant that did nothing but make me sleep 12 hours+ a night - so to counteract the side effect he gave me Adderall (stimulant). Let me tell you, Adderall sure helped my depression (8 hours at a time, anyway), but the antidepressant did nothing - so why give me a second drug to compensate for the side effects of the first one that doesn't work anyway?

Yes, I have heard that ECT is coming back in vogue. I'd definitely consider it if I was that suicidal, but where I am I don't feel like the side effects (loss of memory, etc) are worth the risk. I'm not suicidal - I mean, I have those thoughts, but I also have sort of a contract with myself that I have to achieve certain things in life before I could ever consider such a thing (I know, not the best way of dealing with that, but it will keep me around for a few more decades at least). Plus, I'm too paranoid about the side effects of a failed attempt - brain damage, liver damage, nerve damage, etc etc to actually do something. I'm a total chicken - I can't even cut myself - so I'm not concerned about that... more like I will kill myself slowly with various forms of physical neglect.

you still havent tried the amino acids and evening primrose oil. that some stubborn depression

have you tried the full range of alternative treatments. fishoil evening primrose b vitamins 5 htp taurine tyrosine selenium topical lavender oil
homeopathy chinese herbs nuerofeedback?

have you tried proces oriented therapy? have you tried meditation

It's worth looking at programs on websites and audiovisual material:
There's the Depression Recovery Program at wwwDOTclinical-depressionDOTcoDOTukSLASHprogramDOThtml

Also, Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (MBSR) is another therapy for depression/anxiety etc. There are books by Dr Jon Kabat-Zinn. The best is Full Catastrophe Living.