Recently, I unearthed a new relative from about 150 years ago. It was about 15 minutes from when I discovered them (in a baptismal record) until I had the outlines of their life, and then discovered their death (and cause of death). And it was like someone was taken away from me.

I realized that I feel this way *all* the time when I'm researching, or even reading results. I feel loss when I look at all the death.

So much of the genealogy is, find the birthdate, maybe a baptism, if you're lucky there's a US high school photo. Then there's a spouse - boy I wish marriage records were easier to find. And then there's kids. And then it's always a death. And really, only about 1/3 of people in my family got married and had kids - a lot of single folks running around. So to me, it's like I'm constantly learning about family death.

And I find that depressing.

So how do you stop from becoming depressed when you're doing your genealogy research?