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Welcome to the grown up world. Time to grow up since you're no longer a baby, nor in the nest. Maybe you are trying to do too much for where you are in your life.
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I would say its more of a hormone imbalance rather then chemical.
When you put your body through lots of stress, be it physical or emotional, your adrenals will stop functioning properly. This then causes the thyroid to slow down as well.
Cholesterol levels will then go out of whack, because it is used by the body to fix what is wrong.
My sil is going through all of this.
She is finally off the drugs, and is working to heal her adrenals and thyroid naturally.
We all need little pick me ups on occasion. Often we are so busy taking care of others and our other obligations, we neglect ourselves. Take the time to care for yourself, you dont have to spend much.
Try a little early morning sun with a nice cuppa.
Give yourself a nice hand soak and hand massage.
Better yet invite a friend over and pamper each other!
Take 15 minutes every day doing something completely selfish Dance, take a bubble bath, whatever makes you smile.
Give yourself a splurge allowance every week, only use it on something for YOU! Could be $5 or $500, mine is more like $5, and Gelato makes me happy
Take a Adult Edu class on something you have always wanted to learn; pottery, modern dance, Thai cooking, whatever!
to all of you who are feeling down or overwhelmed, and one more
for good measure.
When life just gets overwhelming, I look at it like a pie. Rather than tackle the whole pie at once, I find if I break it into "slices" and concentrate on taking care of one slice at a time it is much less daunting than trying to tackle the whole pie in one sitting. The sense of accomplishment from tackling that one slice makes me feel so much better than beating myself up because I didn't take care of the whole pie. When that fails, sometimes I just resort to Winnie the Poohisms, for example, "Don't underestimate the value of Doing Nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can't hear, and not bothering" - Piglet from Pooh's Little Instruction Book. Sometimes you just need to be a human being, not a human doing...
oh man, oh man, oh man, is this bringing back memories and tears. i have battled SERIOUS depression on and off for years, serious like suicide planning. when i was in nursing school full time, holding a full time job, and had a 2 year old and 3 year old and trying to have a spotless house and i couldn't do it all......it was a recipe for disaster. first of all, know you are not alone, also know that not reaching out or talking about it creates more isolation. i have found out that people want to help and now i know i have many, many people i can call at a moments notice if i need to. reaching out to people does not mean whining constantly about how pitiful you are, it is explaining you need help at that moment. realize the house doesn't have to be perfect, or even very clean. i found a plaque that says, "my house is clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy'. you don't have to vacuum every day, or dust every day, (or i've found out, EVER!). kids don't have to be clean, in fact, i think they mostly shouldn't be clean. i think a dirty kid is a kid who has been out playing, falling and playing. there is a difference between clean and filthy. talk to your doctor and don't sugarcoat how you are feeling. sometimes just a little bit of a medication makes a huge difference and remember just because you need it now, does not mean you will need it always. look for ways to make your life easier. for example, we have 4 cats, their food is in a big tupperware container in the basement. it holds a 12 pound bag and i only have to fill it every couple weeks. i don't have the stress of having to feed 4 bowls of food 2 times a day. our dogs are on the same type of feeding. my 3 dogs have their food in a large horse tub. they self regulate their feeding, i don't have to worry about cleaning my horses stalls cuz i don't keep them in stalls. a lot of life is how much work you make for yourself. if there are specific things that are overwhelming you or stressing you, post them. there are a lot of creative people out here. two things it took a lot for me to work on were 1) asking for help. from the time we are toddlers we work really hard at being independent. adulthood is knowing when you are over your head and need help. 2)idle hands are not the devil's workshop. when i was in therapy one of my "homework" assignments was to do nothing for 15 minutes a day. wow was that hard. i saw the yard which could be mowed, the dust, the dirty car which should be washed. the horses which should be ridden/brushed, the laundry which should be done, the dishes which should be done...(are you seeing all the "should's" here?) the word "should" needs to be removed from your dictionary. "should" puts stress on you, puts pressure on you. amazingly, when i got done with the 15 minutes of doing nothing, all my shoulds were the same, they had not multiplied by a 100! hmmmm, did that mean that life really wouldn't get away from me if i took 15 or 30 or 180 minutes off? what an intriguing thought. (it is a good thing this is the rambling post, isn't it?) one last thing, i made it a point to go to sleep on good thoughts. the worse i felt my day was the harder i tried to find good things in my life to be thankful for. i'd say to myself "tough day, find 7 good things". the first couple are always easy, billy, franny, c.c., (i always lump them together), then family and friends who care about me. thats 2, i am thankful i have a warm, safe place to sleep,3. i am thankful i have enough to eat, 4. i am thankful it was sunny today, 5. (as i remember how the sunshine felt on my face). i am thankful i could hear the birds singing,6. i am thankful my beautiful little neice gave me the world's best hug. i believe the worse you feel your day is the more you need to be thankful for. i think i helps to go to sleep with good comforting thoughts in your head, not "special victims unit" type thoughts. one last thing (i promise!). take "a bad day" out of your dictionary. when you start out your day, if something happens and you think "i'm having a bad day', BAM, you will have a bad day. try to be more specific in how you feel. when one of me best friends died, and i had to pick out his casket, and clothes. it wasn't a bad day. it was a sad day, and a difficult day, but not a bad day. when i have a tough night at work, it is busy, or i was frustrated because of something, but that doesn't give credence to a bad day. don't be so willing to give your whole day over to "bad". anyway, that's years of therapy , boiled down into a little pep talk. just last week i was thinking how glad i was that i hadn't killed myself. that i was very happy with my life and how much i was enjoying life now. keep talking to us. a lot of us have been there.
bonnie
ps, come-on over to my house, we'll snag baby-bear (clearly the best pony in the world) and hook'em up to his snazzy red and black pony cart and go two-tracking thru the woods of northern michigan. it's awfully hard to be down when you're giggling!
Dance, take a bubble bath, whatever makes you smile.
bonnie 
