Advice Girl: How to Deal with Sadness

Wednesdays are now advice day at Magpie Girl. Got a question? Need some tips? Email me: moi @ magpie-girl dot com.

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The other day Kristen at Halfway to Normal and I were having a little on-line chat about sadness. Where does it come from? What does it mean? And what do you do with it once it’s got you?

Kristen was talking specifically about that free-floating kind of sadness that descends upon you sans apparent cause. You know the kind, right? Here’s what we came up with so far:

Hormonal Sadness
Well the first obvious culprit is hormones. Hormonal shifts often cause seemingly random bouts of sadness. One of my best friends told me about this article once that said whatever emotion you are experiencing when you are ‘hormonal’ is probably something that you haven’t been able to adequately address in the past month. When your body chemistry starts shifting into high-gear, that emotion (sorrow, anger, regret, etc) can’t hide out anymore. So in some ways, that hormonally triggered sadness could be helping you out by knocking on your window and saying “Hey! Look at me please!”

We womenfolk have come to expect some moodiness before or during our period. But hormone flux can catch you at other times too. I know my moods (and migraines) are also bad at ovulation (about mid-way through your cycle.) And, when I was breast feeding I would get to feeling a little post-partumish whenever the baby went through a growth spurt and started nursing more, or while we were weaning.

There are some mood enhancing things you can do to help with hormonally-induced sadness. Mild exercise stirs up the endorphins, which help with both pain and sorrow. Calcium, Vitmain D and Vitamin B6 can help too. I make sure my dose is topped up the week prior to my period/ovulating. Ask your doctor, naturopath, or nutritionist for ideas and create a plan to support yourself.

Empathic Sadness
Another kind of sadness is what I tend to think of as empathic sadness – that is, sadness that isn’t mine, but is indicative of something that is going in some connected corner of the universe. What I’m talking about is a kind of ‘sixth sense’ that something difficult is about to go down. This can be a frightening experience; because of course you experience a sense of foreboding.

If you are highly sensitive in this way, it is possible to write yourself a script which helps you see this as a super power rather than as a disability. For instance, now that I’ve learnt to recognize empathic sadness, I use it as a kind of prep time. Just last week I had a terrible random bout of sadness. That night, I made a matchbox shrine using various symbols and items that at the time appeared quite random. Two days later I got a call that a friend had been diagnosed with uterine cancer. Every single object in the matchbox shrine related back to her experience. I packaged up the shrine and sent it off to her right away.

If you’re experiencing sadness that doesn’t feel like yours, fall back on the basics. Free write. Collage. Make lists of words, colors, images. Then sit back and see what the Universe is telling you. If the sadness feels too burdensome, try creating a symbolic place for it until its cause is ready to reveal itself. (This works when you need a break from sadness that ‘belongs’ to you too.) A ritual for this can be as simple as writing the word “sadness” on a piece of paper and putting it in a pretty bowl while asking God or the Universe to hold on to it for you for awhile . This kind of symbolic gesture can provide you with a bit of solace and relief.

Pervasive Sadness
Pervasive sadness that will not lift, or grief or sorrow that does not ebb with time may be a more serious condition. Depression is very common, and can be treated with therapy, medication, even dietary changes. The problem is, how do you know if you are just a little blue or downright depressed? There are assessment tools on line like this article or this test. But of course, the best thing is to see a doctor or therapist for professional assessment.

Over the years I’ve experienced all three of these kinds of sadness. In fact, sometimes I feel like assessing and managing my sadness is a pretty big part-time job. There are days when I wish I could just be happy-go-lucky and float around on the top layer of life — like the stars of the Disney channel, you know? But most of the time I can recognize my bouts of sadness as part of the package of living a life observed. Recently, when I was feeling overly burdened by illness and sadness combined, I asked my ever-ebullient soulsister Leonie if she EVER got sad. She said something quite wise:

What do you think? Can we embrace that? I say we give it a try.

What do you do when you are hit with a bout of sadness? What are your tips and techniques for riding the waves?

Tagged as: ask magpie girl, Sadness/Depression, Soulcare