Depression, Burn Out and Writing Code

Re:Depression, Burn Out and Writing Code by pjscott on Saturday May 28, 2011 @04:11PM (#2595111)

The really high-level meta-advice here is to introspect and notice patterns. What circumstances and mental states lead to feeling bad? What methods have shown themselves effective for producing desired changes in feelings and behavior? Noticing this sort of thing can be very useful. It's certainly helped me.

In other words, we can do science to ourselves.

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Re:Depression, Burn Out and Writing Code by X-Istence on Saturday May 28, 2011 @04:40PM (#2595172)

I don't feel bad, I don't feel down, instead what I feel is like I can't concentrate on any single one task unless I take a downer (alcohol in this case) to slow my brain down and let me think of one single task at a time.

The thing that has helped me, as stated before, is alcohol. It allows me to concentrate and just get code down. Now do I think that is good for me and or my body? No. I would rather have my full brain capacity to work just as hard, I want to be able to focus on one task.

That is why I was asking if other people had found the same, and what they were doing about it, or how they were solving the problem.

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Re:Depression, Burn Out and Writing Code by mattdeboard on Saturday May 28, 2011 @06:39PM (#2595371)

I was similar until I got a prescription for Adderall. That worked for me. Not saying it works for everyone but treating my "overactive brain" with Adderall has changed my life, 100% for the better.

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Re:Depression, Burn Out and Writing Code by joshuacc on Sunday May 29, 2011 @06:17PM (#2597759)

This is a really common symptom of adult ADD/ADHD. I highly recommend the book Driven to Distraction. It helped me make sense of a lot of aspects of my life that I just couldn't understand before.

http://www.amazon.com/Driven-Distraction-Recognizing-Attenti...

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