Can environment foster/eliminate depression?

I've been unable to stay in school for nearly three years now. I caved my first year, but still finished it. Family drama has left me unable to register for two years, and I finally returned this semester, only to both not afford housing and get squeezed off campus by the police because being a homeless student apparently made me a safety risk to other students. So I'm back home.

My ability to progress independently has hit 0 after a steady decline. I'm 20 years old, and all of my friends are either out of trade school, finishing up college in a year or so, or generally moving along in life well enough. I've tried to find a passion about anything, but it just isn't happening. I've managed to make a fair amount of acquaintances, even friends, online, but I can never seem to find the same sort of people IRL in my areas. Having interests that aren't particularly popular here makes it hard to find friends in the area; I've made one or two good acquaintances. When I do find people with some mutual interests, I don't really manage to fit their bill as an acceptable tagalong, so I'm never quite worthy to hang out with them, anyway.

Now when I do try to force myself to develop a skill, I always feel so old -- too old to be literally just starting. I know the alternative is to never be good at a thing, but its always demotivating to know I'll be in my thirties at best -- and probably at an age at which nobody would care/I'd still be a general nobody -- before I have any decent level of skill at anything. I feel like part of it is where I am, a middle of nowhere place that most anybody I know that's done anything with their lives has run away from and never come back.

And now, I've had an offer to get out, too. Not school again, but something else. I just don't know if the "me" independent of this place is man enough to deal with it. I don't honestly think I can change. I dunno what broke in my head, but I feel like somewhere along the line I fucked up and can't recover.

Yes, I reposted. Sorry for failing to bump the old one. I dunno if the workmail email was legit or not. I might go out on a limb with a throwaway.

Yes and no. Depression will always be with you but as you do different things and start to adapt you will feel more of a success than that of a failure.

So go for it. You are young, go and have fun..whatever that fun deep down in your mind is. Be selfish, you have earned it.

>>17529182
You're still 20, you're not like most of the 30-40 year old guys on here asking for advice, you literally what they don't have, time.
Get your shot together anon, take your medication, think of what you want to do with your life, go to college, get a degree on something, get a job with that degree, pay your college debt with the job, have your own place and stable income, start dating, meet some girl, fall in love, marry her, have kids, watch kids grow, have grandchildren, live out the rest of your golden years with your wife.
All of that could be you (or something similar, it doesn't have to be the get wife and kids route) in a few years, all it takes is trying, and from there, all it takes is succeeding, eazy.

>>17530658
I'm currently still trying to finish college and get my computer engineering degree, definitely.

As far as dating and all that jazz, I'm not sure I'm quite cut out for any sort of productive pairing up.

>>17529179
I think it can. But hey, I'm a depressed cunt who blames his upbringing, so I might be biased.

Either way, my parents had this upbringing style where failure was simply not tolerated. Bad grades, breaking their rules, not listening to them, it was all the end of the fucking world. Zero understanding, and zero tolerance. I had to argue like a politician with them, sometimes, just to get the sort of leeway that came naturally to other kids. It has turned me into a person who is irrationally afraid of making mistakes, which means I'm so stressed out in a learning environment that I don't learn a damn thing. I never finished my Masters, and now I'm supposed to be learning a trade, and I just can't do it. I can't. Every time I open the material, my intestines turn into knots and my ability to concentrate goes out of the fucking window.

And it's like that with everything. I've become so risk-averse that I barely have a life at all. And that's, in the end, what depresses me. Sure, I have a negative attitude and shitty habits. There might be something clinical going on, but it's never been so bad as with other depressed people.

But yet:

>Even now, I can bust ass through a 40, 50, 60 hour work week and do a better job than coworkers.

Same thing here. Sure, I don't enjoy doing it, but I'm perfectly capable. But the moment I have to do something for myself, I freeze. Education, entertainment, anything. I just don't do a goddamn thing.

I don't know how, Anon, but you have to fix this. I'm 30 years old by now. It's going to get better, but it's not going to go away on itself. You have to be hard on yourself, but in a different way. You're going to have to allow yourself some failure. You're going to have to come to grips with the fact that sometimes, things don't work out, and that's OK. That's not because of you. You have to learn to take risks, or you will not develop, like I haven't. And trust me, it's shit. You don't want that.

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>>17530820
>computer engineering

>>17530820
That's OK.
Life is made of steps, so take one step at a time, rushing things usually ends badly.