Do things ever really change?

Has anyone on this site had a mental health problem/bad experience/problems in their life and turned their life around in a profound way? To the extent that they look back on their past and not recognize themselves?

I have been trying to improve my life for a long time, and have made progress, but I have a long way left. It's almost as though, with every step I take forward my path to recovery becomes not shorter, but longer, and the more progress I make, the more problems are revealed. If anything, it's like I'm on a treadmill that speeds up when I do, so that no matter how fast I run the best I can manage is staying in the same place.

I don't want to go into a long, boring dissection of my issues, but I'm in need of inspiration. I've been fighting some problems for a while, and like I said, made some progress, but I'm tired, I'm weary, I feel like an old, old soldier who has been fighting in the same war for years with no end in sight and wants more than anything else to just lie down and go to sleep, get some rest. That isn't a euphemism for suicide, I'm at no risk of that, I just genuinely want some rest, but I know that life will just march on regardless and I'll get left behind again, so I have to keep going.

What I am looking for are some true stories of change, of happy endings. Not Hollywood, Fairy Tale happy endings, but happy endings for the real world, so that I can see that it can be done and there is hope for me. I don't want a miracle; I just want a little hope.

I am in the same place as you. I had bad luck most of my life. I have been trying to reconstruct my life for the past 8 yrs and things are getting better but no where near where I want them. All you can do is keep hope and faith and have your goals to work toward and cut the junk and useless things out of your life.

Hmm..

First time here I've ever mentioned this...

Well, I suffered from extreme depression and anxiety for a time... everything had gone to complete hell and I was mentally done. At one point that resulted in a suicide attempt that did not work... and it was an honest attempt... not "for show or attention"... I submerged myself under water with sixty pounds of weights on my chest, exhaled deeply, and tried to draw water into my lungs.

Stupid body. It fights like hell. Your throat closes off. Didn't happen. I will always remember the seconds spent underwater, seeing the lights shine through, waiting for them to dim... they didn't. I couldn't stay under.

So... afterwards I sought out the professional help I knew I needed if I was going to ever be in a better place. Somehow knowing more about my "illness" helped me.

I am good at dealing with things I understand. The more I understood myself and what id been going through, much of it due to physiological imbalances, the better I became.

I will always remember hitting the next to very bottom. The closest I could come to death without it happening. Some people survive a plane crash. I survived myself.

And I'm a better man now... but only after letting go and saying "please... help me"...

All the help I received has helped me be the healthier person I am today.