Image credit: Ylanite Koppens

I was born to write. Unfortunately, I was also born to be depressed.

Keeping a traditional journal is one way to get your thoughts and feelings out of your head so you can take a more objective look at them. But writing long-form, even if it’s a rules-free method such as free association or a “vomit draft,” in which you write down whatever comes to mind without censoring it, takes time, energy, and commitment.

I don’t know about you, but I suck at commitments, and when I’m depressed, I have neither the energy nor the desire to do anything. Combine that with my self-imposed, anal “rules” surrounding Time and it’s no wonder I’ve never been successful at keeping a journal! LOL

Fortunately, there are other ways to track your moods. But first, let’s take a look at why you would want to.

THE CASE FOR MOOD TRACKING

It’s true that our moods can change seemingly without cause or explanation. And while we can’t predict when or to what extent our neurotransmitters might go haywire, mood tracking can be an important part of your mental wellness plan. I’ve done it at various points in my life and have found it quite useful.

There are a couple of ways to track your moods. The quickest way is to rate your mood on a scale of, say, one to ten. A more in-depth way to do it is to write about what happens during your day and include as many things as you can think of that might be relevant and useful.

If you consistently keep a journal or otherwise write about your thoughts and feelings, you will be able to identify the factors that impact your mental health, such as expectations put on you either at work or at home (or by you), biology, relationship issues, medication use, and others.

On the other hand, if you simply rate your mood using a number scale, you fail to get any useful information. You miss all the juicy stuff, the tidbits of your day that can help explain why you feel the way you do. Sure, you’ll be able to see your moods go up and down, but what good is that if you can’t be sure what led up to them?

BENEFITS OF MOOD TRACKING

Here are some of the benefits of tracking your mood:

• You can figure out exactly which factors affect your mood the most. You may already be aware that exercising lifts your mood more than anything else, or that listening to music while you tidy up your home might put you in a good mood (it does for me). Wouldn’t it be great if you could also tie more subtle things to mood changes? Perhaps watching a certain kind of TV show (like true crime) keeps you on edge, or maybe your mood is highly dependent on how much sleep you get. Or you might discover that your sugar habit gives you a high, which ultimately leads to a real downer of a crash. Maybe the shorter days and colder weather of the winter months bring you down. If you are female, your mood might be tied to your menstrual cycle.
• It can help get you the proper diagnosis. The complex nature of mental disorders and their often-overlapping symptoms can make diagnosis difficult. In fact, according to Hillside Counseling in Atlanta, the three most commonly misdiagnosed conditions are ADHD, Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), and Bipolar Disorder. When I first started seeing a psychiatrist, in 2001, she diagnosed me as Bipolar, Type II. I never did agree with that, but every subsequent psychiatrist I saw would accept that diagnosis without question instead of doing their own evaluation. It wasn’t until I found the inimitable Dr. Nelson, fourteen years later, that a comprehensive intake and evaluation took place. I was, finally, correctly diagnosed with MDD and an effective course of treatment was begun.
• It allows you to see patterns and triggers. No longer do your moods just seem to appear out of nowhere and catch you completely off-guard. With mood tracking, you can get a better picture of when and why your mood changes. Every change in mood is precipitated by some event, whether we realize it or not at the time. By identifying the things that happen right before your mood changes, you’ll be able to see the bigger picture. This could help you avoid possible disruptions in your mood and allow you to consider seeking support once you notice your mood starting to change.
• You will learn how timing affects your mood. You know how they say, “timing is everything?” Well, sometimes they’re right. If you start keeping track of your moods, you may discover that certain times of the day, week, month, or year trigger a mood change, such as an anniversary of a loss. Or you may find that you’re obnoxiously crabby on Sunday nights because you hate the idea of going back to work or school on Monday.

YOU HAVE OPTIONS

The good news is that there are more ways to track your mood than by writing a long, rambling journal entry, replete with shorthand and abbreviations that may not make any sense to you two days later. Here are some of the tools you can use.

From your desktop:

1. Moodscope is what I’ve been using off and on for six years. The concept is quite simple: It uses a deck of 20 cards, each one representing a certain feeling. Every card allows you to select the intensity of the feeling. You can flip it from top to bottom or from front to back to rate that feeling on a scale of 0 (very slightly or not at all) to 3 (extremely). NOTE: This is not just a tool to rate depression; rather, it contains both positive and negative feelings, such as Proud, Afraid, Interested, Hostile, and many more. It puts your total score (on a scale of 0% to 100%) on a graph so you can see how it goes up and down. What makes this desktop-only app so appealing to me is that you can write a short note to yourself about what’s going on in your life, which you can recall at any time. The free version is fairly comprehensive; 2 paid versions offer more insights. I highly recommend it.
2. The Black Dog Institute’s daily mood chart.
3. This chart, created by a doctor at Harvard’s Mood Clinic.
4. Bipolar individuals, in particular, might benefit from using this paper chart.
5. Dr. Richard O’Connor has some really good things to say on the website Undoing Depression that are clear and understandable. Read what he has to say, and then decide if you want to do a Mood Journal. (His method is simpler than some of the others I mention in this post.)
6. Simplenote, a desktop and mobile app, is also excellent. It is a remarkably simple and straightforward note-taking app for those who want to write things down “freestyle.” It doesn’t have any bells and whistles, so don’t expect to be able to stylize your text with italics, bold, and the like. It is distraction-free, which can be very useful if you’re like me and get distracted easily. You can add tags to each entry for easy searching.

On your mobile device:

1. MindDoc – I have done a preliminary check-in with this app. It gives you an assessment after 14 days of using (I haven’t gotten to that point yet). It provides mood tracking, mental health screening, a depression and anxiety journal, and much more. It can also be used for eating disorder issues and keeping track of your stress level. Psychology lessons, mindfulness exercises, and meditations are based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. You get a lot more with the paid version, but the free version is a good place to start.
2. Daylio – This app, which calls itself a “micro-diary”, seems to do a lot of things. You can track fitness goals, mental health, food consumption, even gratitude. You can also add notes and keep an old-school diary, if you wish, as well as create goals. Daylio backs up onto Google Drive.
3. Mood Patterns – This is a mood tracker/diary, which you can use it as many times a day as you want. It states that it is “not the simplest mood tracker” due to its many features, and they’re right. I’ve tried this one, and it does do quite a bit, even on the free version. For $1.99/month, you can get much more detailed information. It’s definitely worth the small price if you’re looking for a reliable way to track every facet of your feelings. NOTE: If you do try it, don’t forget to use the menu bars on the top left for some good stuff.

WHY NOT TRY IT?

As you can see, there are many options for mood tracking and many different tools to choose from. Know that tracking your moods requires you to pay more attention to your thoughts and feelings than you usually do, so it will be uncomfortable. You might feel like giving up after just a few days. But I recommend trying it for a couple of weeks before you do. And hey, if you don’t like the first one you try, try another one for a couple of weeks. And if none of them tickles your fancy, grab a pen and a piece of paper and create one that works for you!

I have printed out my graph from the Moodscope desktop app in the past and shown it to my therapist. If you’re feeling unstable, it’s a good visual way to help her see what you’re going through on a daily basis. This can be eye-opening, not only for your therapist, but for you as well.

It’s hard to work on yourself if you have no idea what you’re feeling or why you’re feeling that way. Tracking your mood can really help you and your therapist identify causal relationships and build strategies for becoming more stable.

Thanks for reading, and as always, Keep it Real out there! 🙂

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