Understanding depression

Sometimes when people are hungry, they will want to point out how hungry they are by declaring that they are "starving".

The human body could go up to a month without eating any food. It is not a healthy thing to do of course, but that is the fact of the human body. You would need water. No water for around ten days would be fatal. But the human body can go without food for around 30 days after all the stored fats, glucose, muscle mass and tissue have all become used...that is when your body will shut down. So when people claim that they are "starving" when they have gone a few hours without food is just a very exaggerated term.

People also use a term for when they feel down. That they are "depressed".

"That shop didn't have the ring in my size. It's well depressing".

"It's depressing watching them play football like that".

"It's so depressing that this place is going to close down".

These are all terms that I have heard people say today. Of course, they are all exaggerated. And it kind of annoyed me.  Should people be allowed to say they are depressed for such reasons? Is that not undermining what is a severe illness?

I am very ashamed to say that I do and have not treated mental health as seriously as I should have. I always used to think that when it came to mental health, something like depression for example, why would a person let that take over them? Surely the mindset could be strong enough to cope with such a silly thing? Surely if you were depressed, you could force yourself to get up and do something about it and live your life and become mentally stronger? And that this could make you a stronger person? After all, what if someone wasn't diagnosed with depression? They wouldn't know any better. So how could they not at least try to live their life to the fullest if they had no clue that their setbacks they suffer in their minds was actually an illness?

But if you don't understand it, then how can you make decisions about it? How can you judge it? And also, if you were depressed, but you weren't diagnosed as depressed-in other words if you hadn't been to the doctor-what happens then?

I don't understand it...Or do I understand it better than I think?

It is normal for everyone to feel down at some point. This is life. But if feeling down got in the way of actually doing everyday things in life-then this could be depression. And I have felt like that myself a lot of the times. I am sure that there are a lot of people who haven't been diagnosed with depression that have and are going through this right this very minute.

So far, it is still a bit of a taboo subject. People do not seem to be exploring this illness as much as they probably should be. It seems to be kind of pushed to the side. One example being the anti-depressants. It seems that they are just prescribed by doctors to "help cope" with depression but in my own personal opinion, I have to ask the question whether this is just a case of accepting things rather than getting to the root of the problem. Also with bipolar disorder-which is also known as manic depression (where your mood can gradually go from one extreme to the other and your behaviour may be impulsive and you would be very hyper and have little or no sleep), anti-depressants can actually be worse for you.

People often mistake feeling sadness is depression. This is not necessarily the case. Depression can be down swings in mood, emptiness, restlessness, being irritable and/or short tempered.

You kind of lose interest in pleasurable things.
Your behaviour can become very reckless.
You have problems concentrating.
Your body aches. You have no energy.

There are some very interesting facts about depression too. Depression rates for women are double than that of those in men but men have a higher suicide risk. As well as this, men apparently are more reluctant to admit that they are feeling like this. So could talking about it be very beneficial?

So how would someone put up with mood swings, sadness with no explanation and feelings of suicide and not wanting to face the world? Is there are an actual cure for all this? Apparently not. Anti-depressants have so many side effects that people actually feel worse for a long time before they actually supposedly start to feel better-that is what they say however in my opinion, it is just your body and mind getting used to them-not so long ago, someone was diagnosed with depression, was given anti-depressants and then that poor person committed suicide. So what does a person with depression do to beat this? Is it even possible to do so?

And what does all this do to a person who would know someone close to them who is suffering from depression? Whether it has been diagnosed or not? Not only is it difficult actually having depression, but it is also difficult dealing with a person who has depression. I very much now believe that depression could also be contagious. Imagine if you care for someone with depression? How would it make you feel if no matter what you did. no matter what you said or anything you could do for them just didn't matter? How would that make you feel?? It would make you feel really down. It would make you feel empty. It would make you feel like there is no point.

Maybe I will continue this on another blog post. I don't know, But right now, I believe that depression MUST come from somewhere. Whether it be something very obvious that had recently happened to you or whether it is an underlying sadness from something that could have happened to you in the past but has affected you and is still affecting you because you never dealt with it and are still having trouble coming to terms with it. Maybe it is that long ago that you have even forgotten what it is. It is at the back of your mind, hidden away under a million other thoughts you have had since then.

Maybe getting to the root of the problem and dealing with it is the key.

From the research that I have done, for anyone that is suffering from depression, get help. Talk to someone. Statistics say that talking to someone helps. On a good day, make the decision to get help BEFORE you have a bad day. Because it is not just yourself that is hurting.

 It is the people that care about you who are suffering too.