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Depression is an illness
Feel down in the dumps, tired or lost vitality: we all have, at one time or another, went through a slump.
But depression is a disease which, if not detected, can ruin a life.
How not to get overwhelmed by the malaise and get out of the depression when it threatens us? How to detect depression in itself, and those around us?
Low-spirit, depression to know the difference
Low-spirit, everyone knows it, and we get rid of it pretty fast in general.
But depression is a disease.
Like any disease, it has symptoms, and should be treated medically.
Depression is one of the most common psychological disorders.
The risk of being infected during life is 10 to 25 % for women and 5 to 12% for men.
Low-spirit
We are not superheroes and moods are part of life.
It is normal from time to time, to suffer low morale: disseminated anxiety, profound fatigue, indefinable malaise, dark thoughts...
These symptoms, although unpleasant, are due to the hazards of life and can overcome them somehow.
Depression
What makes the difference with low-spirit is primarily the inclusion of symptoms over time.
The depressed has no longer taste for anything; he is unable to experience pleasure, to project into the future, even for a moment.
Another sign speaking: the malaise has repercussions on his social, professional and personal life.
If you feel down: your low-spirit persists over time, it prevents you from leading a normal social life and take care of your children, even taking a shower or getting dressed in the morning is for you hardship? This should alert you. Talk to someone close, and do not hesitate to seek advice from a doctor. Sometimes the simple act of expressing one’s unhappiness helps feeling better.
Depression with Apparent Cause
This is the most common and the least serious cases, since this type of depression called "exogenous" and reactive has a more limited suicide risk than other depressions.
Grief, unemployment, divorce, unhappy love, etc... can trigger trauma for someone who will struggle to overcome alone.
The environment does not always understand this reaction, and tends to blame the depressed instead of taking into account the suffering: "move up", "shake up", "stop crying"... This is the vicious circle of reproaches which are useless because the person actually suffers from a lack of self-esteem quite often.
If you are the victim of a moral or physical shock, you will easily establish yourself the relationship between the triggering event and your access to depression, and you will be able to recover quickly. Do not hesitate to consult: this type of depression can be well treated with an appropriate treatment with antidepressants.
Seasonal depression
This group also include seasonal depression.
In general, the rate of depression is higher in the months with less sunshine.
But seasonal depression mostly affects 35 years old women, for reasons still shrouded in mystery. It is linked to the entry into the winter, with the lack of sun.
Today, it can be treated with light therapy, which consists of sessions of exposure to artificial light.
Depression Without Apparent Cause
Called endogenous depressions, they are related to genetic, personal or family history.
They are generally more serious than exogenous depression because they occur without obvious cause or triggering event, and constitute a field of suicidal risk.
Heredity is a factor among others: a person with a parent who is (or was) depressed has 15 % of risk of becoming in turn, while those whose relatives are not depressed have only 2 to 3 % risk. Some of the depression types are:
Major depression called "melancholy"
Mood disturbance and slowing of intellectual and physical activity, with dark thoughts, a sense of anxiety and lack of forward looking.
It can arise without warning and lasts 6 to 12 months or more. But when the diagnosis is made, it can be treated in 85 % of cases.
Bipolar depression or manic depression
It is a chronic disease. The risk of suicide, risky behaviors, addictions, work and family disintegration, violence and crime make it serious.
It is characterized by alternating manic episodes, when we double the energy, the projects, when we are extrovert to the extreme, in addition to major depressive episodes, with inhibition, grief and envy to end it. (It is at this stage that the risk of suicide is greatest).
White depression
We talk about it more and more, it mostly affects women.
Everything seems fine, and yet a kind of numbness, loss of desire, prevents to fully enjoy life.
This is a real depression, except that the symptoms are barely noticeable. By fear of change, those who are victims have learned to live with their discomfort, which can mislead the entourage.
In fact, they live as anesthetized, absent, without positive or negative reaction (in contrast to melancholic depression, which gloom).
Therapy can be effective.
Detecting Depression in Oneself and Others
Depression is a serious disease for which an early diagnosis can avoid the most dramatic effect.
This is the doctor who, in 80 % of cases, is the responsible for detect it.
Here are the signs that should alert you and push you to consult, or to incite friends and family to consult.
Symptoms and signs
The characteristics of depressive disorders are both psychological and physical.
They often reach their maximum intensity late at night or early in the morning.
At the Forefront of Psychological Signs:
You are in a dark mood, with a tendency to cry often, you feel self depreciated and have lost motivation in your daily life. You have trouble concentrating, you plan ahead, and you suffer from anxiety.
The depressed individuals often have feelings of guilt and helplessness. Sometimes they panic. In about 15% of cases, there are also hallucinations or delusions.
Warning: These are often the same sensations as anxiety: state of internal tension, fear of imminent danger, indefinable malaise...
But if depression is often associated with anxiety, anxiety symptoms do not necessarily mean depression. And both can be treated differently!
Physically:
You are bulimic or the opposite, you cannot swallow a mouthful, you sleep poorly, you wake up till dawn or have insurmountable difficulties getting up in the morning, you feel idle and nothing, not even a prospect that would have delighted you previously, fails to give you a smile ...
Your face looks dull, your voice faint. You can also suffer from digestive disorders, headaches and various pains (especially in the joints or abdomen).
If these symptoms last for at least two weeks and affect your social and family relationships, you may be suffering from this type of depression. You should consult your doctor.
Helping a depressed
The closest are often responsible for engaging the patient to become aware of his condition and getting treatment.
Delicate task because one of the characteristics of depression is to be difficult to identify, especially when the patient complains primarily of physical disorders (somatic), therefore it is called the "masked depression".
It is useless to ask the person to show goodwill and take charge to recover.
Depression is a disease, like cancer or diabetes, of which we are not responsible.
These remarks will have no effect, except that further stigmatize the depressed person.
Be patient, understanding and listening, but firmly incite the person to consult a doctor because only a doctor can prescribe the appropriate treatment.
Depression Treatment
The discovery of antidepressants in the late 50s, marked a true therapeutic revolution in the world of neuropsychiatry.
They improve, in a couple of days, depressed mood and relieve mental distress. They are then prescribed in maintenance treatment for 3 to 12 months.
Treatment with antidepressants requires some precautions: alcohol use is not recommended, and possible side effects can range from drowsiness to libido disorders.
Unlike an anxiolytic, antidepressant is hardly addictive.
It simply requires a gradual discontinuation of the treatment.
Sometimes treatment under antidepressant requires hospitalization, a plan to secure the initiation of treatment and recovery speed.
You should know that some patients "respond" well to some molecules and not to others: it is the responsibility of your doctor to determine what drug suits you best.
Warning: In some cases, the first few days of treatment (with the removal of inhibitions) is a critical time for the appearance of suicidal impulses.
But if these medications are a valuable use, they are not enough. Like aspirin for headaches, it relieves a symptom, but doesn’t treat it.
To really end the depression, you have to understand why and how we got there. And that is only possible with psychoanalysis or psychotherapy. In general, therapy is also coupled with medication.
Caution: Every case is different, it is essential to consult a doctor before starting a course of antidepressants (unless only prescribed).
The consequences of poor treatment or dosage can be dramatic, so never try an antidepressant advised by someone without medical advice.
Are you Depressed?
You may experience a major depressive episode if you have at least five of the following symptoms (at least one of the first two listed below), almost every day for more than 2 weeks:
These symptoms...
In this case, we recommend you consult your physician
Better consult a psychiatrist than doing nothing, there is no shame in that, and it's not because you will be monitored that you're crazy!
Again, consider that depression is an illness, like the flu, and as such, it can be treated.
Get rid of the suicide taboo
All depressed do not commit suicide, and conversely, any suicide did not originate from a depression.
The important thing is to dare to speak and think without dramatizing.
Youth and Suicide
How to identify a young suicidal?
Some warning signs are:
To prevent this, it is essential not making suicide a taboo.
Contrary to popular belief, talking about suicide with a teenager who suffers does not encourage him to take action. It is, on the contrary, important to ask direct questions and insist that he speaks about his distress. Because he needs a listening ear, which does not judge him, and he will be extremely sensitive to the attention he receives, even if he denies it. So listen to your teen and hold dialogue with him, encourage him, if you feel he is wrong and he refuses to talk to you, to meet face to face the family doctor or to consult a psychiatrist.
If he has already made ??a suicide attempt, it is essential to ensure psychological support to help your teen make a return to normal.
Women in the First Line
One man out of 10, one woman out of 5 suffers from depression during their lifetime.
We're talking about a gender disease since women are two to three times more affected than men by this disease.
This frequency can be explained by both biological factors (sex hormones) but also environmental, social and emotional factors (family problems, more frequent exposure to widowhood...).
In comparison, the symptoms in women are more important:
Pain which women are able to express in words more easily than men, and that lead them to consult more often and spontaneously.
Finally, it should be noted that women go through many "at risk" steps during their lives. The week before menstruation (premenstrual syndrome) or after birth (baby blues), depressive syndromes during pregnancy (less known but still more frequent after childbirth), menopause, and may be particularly sensitive periods.
The elderly depression
This is still a taboo, as the old age scares in our society.
It is easier to talk about body aches than those of the soul, especially with regard to older people.
Yet, studies in industrialized countries draw a disturbing picture of the morale of the population over 65 years: it is the case of a depression rate of around 30%.
The difficulty is to detect it.
If we assume that a person at an advanced age easily speak of her death, it is much more difficult to be listening to her grief. However, this depression detection of elderly people can avoid violent suicide and often misunderstood by those around.
If you feel or you have in your entourage an elderly with symptoms below, it would be wise to seek medical advice:
10 Ideas to Stop Moping
When it does not go well, it is much more sensitive than usual.
Sometimes, simple things can help to regain control of his emotions and not slip completely into depression.
