Good work and nice to meet you! I too have experiences with a mood related disorder (BPD).
I have some mixed feelings about this post. On the one hand, I fully appreciate it when anyone speaks out about these kinds of struggles and puts those experiences out there for others who are nervous and feel like they are the only ones going through it. Better to talk about your depression than to let it fester and build into the anxiety of getting nowhere. I also want to congratulate you on having found a solution that works for you.
In fact, this is an impressive feat on your part. When we deal with depression we seek solutions to it, often times turning up empty. Many of the behaviors that are exhibited turn out to be coping mechanisms which in psychological research have been proven to help to a degree. For example, if you feel extreme pain in one part of your body you can lower the overall pain sensation by causing another part of your body to experience pain. In the case of extreme depression where some sufferers turn to cutting, this uses the same mechanism to offset psychological pain with the pain of being cut. That's not a recommendation for cutting AT ALL. I think in most cases pinching should work just as well as an alternative.
In a similar fashion, you independently discovered mindfulness meditation, which is a therapy that's been proven to work. Your therapist should know it as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT). I was always skeptical and confused about the concept of meditation until I learned mindfulness training in group therapy. I could never get past a sentiment like "try not to think." Luckily, it's way less complicated than that. What you end up doing is focusing on something, like biofeedback or a sensation and spend some time in a third-person point of view thinking about your own thoughts. Sensations, including depression, come and go and are then followed by further sensations. It's been an amazing technique for me to get through the hardest of times. Despite having found it independently, I recommend you mention CBT to your therapist if you can to make sure you have the full backing of what has been proven to work.
The downside to this post I inferred earlier is that along with your personal growth, there is this self-help semi-magical thinking process attached to how you came to find it. When you are the only data point to consider, it's impossible to know with certainty if the cause of your relief from depression is the technique you discovered or if it was some other cause such as human development, hormones, or a new diet. Don't let this criticism discourage you at all from working hard and searching for answers, I'm just advising that you maintain good skepticism and that you clarify that what worked for you will not necessarily work for everyone else.
I personally turn to The Twelve Virtues Of Rationality to inspire critical thinking and reason in everything I do. Thanks for the post! It was a good read.
Thanks for your reply! Just to note, I probably did not make this clear but I myself, did not see a therapist, I was only listing solutions that many of those who are diagnosed might have tried. My fault for bad wording on that but I do agree that it was some form of self-meditation that helped me. Outside variables such as diet, hormones, and development I know were not a factor. (Believe I looked into everything) Anyway to go along with the process and technique I used, it was a meditation I did where I kept asking myself in-depth questions or deep thoughts on the subject matter of why I am depressed. I learned that it's because of my fixed mindset that was causing my depression and since then I have become open minded and free from constraints on subjects. One example is that I was so opinionated and biased on a political issue(I won't name) and I've realized the other side of the spectrum and in doing that I realized the balance in everything and the benefits to being open to anything. I will do another post in the future about this. :) Thanks for reply again!