I'm awesomer than depression

Guys, I'm doing really well with depression. I pretty much have it locked up in a jail cell far away, and even though it can talk to me sometimes, it can't attack me.

I'm awesome!

It's a lot of work to keep depression under control, though. Emotional health is interconnected with everything else; by balancing my attention among my intellectual, spiritual, and physical health, I'm likelier to stay feeling good.

I've been very careful about what I eat, because I've noticed that junk definitely makes me feel worse, while non-junk makes me feel better.

I'm reading, practicing Spanish and otherwise keeping my college-educated brain limber and muscly.

I try to wear real-people clothes instead of pajamas all the time. It might sound silly, but dressing up like every day is a normal day helps me feel more normal.

I also set aside time every morning to study the scriptures (I'm so spir'chal, guys). 

I'm awesome. Go, self!

Depression is annoying.

Even when life is pretty dang awesome, depression kinda lurks in the corner. Sometimes it gets tired of being ignored, so it tries to convince you to feel bad for no real reason.

So you feel bad, because it told you to.

Obviously, this is pretty frustrating. I've never been particularly good at ignoring my feelings and pretending to feel a different way, which makes it hard to say, "Heck no depression, you're stupid. Go away." But I think I'm getting better at it. For me, finding positive ways to distract myself help me remember that I'm not unhappy, even though my body thinks I should be. Going on walks and reading and not eating brownies for breakfast are a good start. And I always cheer up when I watch the misadventures of the Bluth family. Seriously, watching Arrested Development should probably be considered an antidepressant. Although the FDA would have to include a warning on the box that you'll get addicted within five minutes of watching.

Pictures of our new apartment!

I figured you guys might like to see pictures of our new place, since I talked it up so much in Monday's post. Here you go!

This looks like a normal mirror, but it opens up to reveal...

... our kitchen!

Our oven is nestled in this little... alcove? Completely adorable.

The cabinets in our kitchen have windows!

We have a lot of these little clasp-lock things on the cabinets throughout the house.

I wish I had a legit old-timey key for our doors.

Here's our security system.

Our new place

We finally got out of the worst apartment ever and have moved into the awesomest apartment ever. Why it's awesome:

1. It has two bedrooms.
2. The kitchen is normal-sized, instead of closet-sized.
3. It's in the basement of a house, so it's cool. I've only had to use a fan once or twice (in our other place, the fan was always on).
4. WASHER AND DRYER OH MY GOSH
5. The apartment is furnished, so now we have so many places to put our stuff, we're running out of stuff to put in places.
6. It's an old house so it has a lot of weird, funny little details. Like doorknobs that have actual keyholes underneath them, and light fixtures that are at least 60 years old.
7. There are jillions of windows, so we don't feel like we're living in a basement.
8. We have a front yard... AND a backyard!
9. We actually like our new ward. (Sorry, old ward.)
10. We have a driveway to park in, instead of the street.