Depression: what you need to know about

Depression is defined as the mental state of low mood and distaste to activity; it affects a person's behavior with himself and others, thoughts, feelings, sense of wellbeing self-esteem.

When someone suffers from depression, it reflects shadows of sadness, difficulty in thinking, insomnia concentration and a decrease in appetite, without forgetting that people experiencing depression may have feelings of rejection, hopelessness, dark ideas and even suicidal thoughts. Here are major things you need to know about depression.

          

It is not the usual sadness

Sadness –as you have already experienced- is a natural part of being human, an ordinary reaction to painful situations. All of us have already felt sadness at some point in our lives. Depression, on the other hand, is a physical disease with many more signs than an unhappy mood (the combination of symptoms called a syndrome)

Depression is a real illness that physicians believe is led to by several causes inducing imbalances in certain chemicals within the human brain called neurotransmitters. These neurotransmitters play an important role in keeping stable your mood as well as maintaining your nervous system functional.

Depression varies from an individual to another

A lot of people see depression as white and black; it is either you are depressed or not, however, psychiatrics consider it as a “spectrum” as the symptoms are multiple and differ in intensity, thus depression isn't a one size fits all diagnosis, the condition has many faces, from atypical depression to seasonal affective disorder. This is why it must be diagnosed by certified psychiatric fulfilling the criteria in DSM-5.

There are several factors leading to depression

 

The exact causes of depression aren't completely enlightened, but for now the best explanation for it is that depression probably caused by a combination of factors, including genetic tendency towards the condition and some environmental factors which can act as triggers like drug abuse, stress, sexual abuse and so on.

Depression does NOT Define you or your personality

If you suffered from pneumonia, you would never say: “I am an infected lung.” likewise, if you suffer from depression, it is a treatable condition that must be considered as a temporary circumstance, not your permanent livelihood.

Another stigma that worsens the situation, treatment for depression is received by many people as a proof for their craziness and a weakness of who they are. When someone has a toothache, he sees a dentist without any fear of how people will perceive him. But when someone suffers from the symptoms of depression, frequently he thinks “something is wrong with me as a human being” and often feels guilty.

This twisted thinking is partially due to the depression itself but also due to the overall understanding and perception of mental diseases or behavioral problems as different from other health issues, we can easily image a broken leg or a decayed teeth but not a problem within the nervous system, there reality is, they are not different.

Untreated depression is the most frequent cause of Suicide

The appropriate diagnosis and treatment of each case of depression is very crucial when it comes to fighting back suicide. Eighty to ninety percent of those who commit suicide worldwide are suffering from some sort of mental disease. And, most of these people have depression that is undiagnosed, untreated, or undertreated.

Depression is treatable

As we mention above, you don’t need to suffer if you have depression. With the proper diagnosis, there are several effective treatment options available, mainly medications and psychotherapy. Additionally, each year there are new treatments being developed all the time that are proving to be effective in cases where other treatments have failed. There is nothing to be ashamed of when it comes to depression, just like any other disease, seeking help doesn’t make you a bad person, but a careful one for his own life and the wellbeing of his surroundings.