Are depressed people more realistic?

[thesummerqueen]

What happens if you're an optimistic realist?

I don't think I suffer any delusions about my control over my situation, and I don't suffer from an inflated sense of self-worth, no matter how much I joke about it. I get sad every day over situations that happen the world over, and angry over suffering that's needless because of greed or religion, but it doesn't stop me from thinking that the problems can and will be solved (even if 'eventually').

But having gone through a year or so of depression and knowing what that was like, and being back to my normal irrepressible self, I don't think in terms of wishing situations away, but that no matter how bad something is realistically, there's always some sort of way back up. I guess I consider myself a cheerful pragmatist.

I never went through therapy, so I don't know what therapists tell their patients in order to get them to better function.