My confession, something that I admitted to myself today while visiting family for Easter....
95% of the time I spend with my family makes me depressed.
It's not like my family is bad, they're all very good, loving individuals. I don't have the greatest history with my father, but he always means well; my mother is a saint; and my brother, sister and their significant others are the pleasantly loud, jovial, life loving kind of people. I used to be like that to an extant (theough still the quietest of the bunch).
I had a hell of a lot of bad happen to me in my early twenties that affected who I've grown into (ie: a more reserved, internal person), but none of it came from within the family. I can freely admit that I struggled through extreme depression, but for the most part I'd like to think that I've overcome it (with the occasional slip), but I feel like there's something, some dynamic that causes all of that to come rushing back to me when I'm visiting family. I think my brother is the only one whom I can visit with and not really feel that way. And it isn't always feeling depressed, but also feeling uncomfertable and restricted, like I become physically incapable of slacking off and joining in on jokes and unreserved laughter, like my brain forces me to be the sad, quiet, straight man in a Three Stooges skit. I try to pass it off as simply being tired, or even that I'm fighting a headache (I come from a long line of migraine sufferers). I'm really not sure what it is, but I hate it. I kind of wonder if its that maybe i go through my days subconsiously holding off depression, and being around family is a "safe place" where the troops in my brain can take a break, but i couldnt say if thats really the case...Has anyone else ever felt like this?
in my 
