I am currently learning more about depressive disorders in response to having people in my life who suffer with depression. This has also stemmed from my BTEC course which requires an in depth knowledge of the topic to create a response that can help educate others on the condition. I hope to learn about other people's stories and experiences with depression and gain knowledge on what is important to raise awareness on, relating to depression.
I am interested in learning:
What message do you think is most important to inform others on regarding depression? Do you have experiences with therapy? What sort, and has it been helpful? Do you have any experiences with drugs like anti-depressants, and have they been useful? Do you have any coping mechanisms that make it easier to live with the condition? What's your opinion on self-diagnosis? How should people without the condition approach it, and is it important for them to have an awareness of depression?
Thank you so, so much to anyone who takes the time to answer to this, it's very appreciated
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GreenBannanaBulldog
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The most important message to be conveyed regarding Depression, is that Depression is a multi-factorial mental illness that needs to be treated medically, and not just ignored or left untreated. There are different types of depression and depression is also frequently associated with various other mental illnesses, amongst which Anxiety is the most common. So Anxiety & Depression are closely linked and associated with each other. Being multi-factorial, there are several factors that can either cause or contribute to Depression. The most common type or diagnosis for the illness is MDD - Major Depressive Disorder. There is a clear cut difference between normal grief and Depression. So Doctors use the term Clinical Depression to distinguish it from grief. When the term Depression is used to denote the medical illness, it always means Clinical Depression.
There are 2 major treatment approaches which are Medication and Psychotherapy. Mild to moderate depression may respond to psychotherapy, whereas moderate to severe forms require either medicines or both medicines and psychotherapy. Therefore one needs to get treated by a Psychiatrist and Clinical Psychologist depending on the type & intensity of the illness. The 3rd treatment approach, neuro- stimulation, is reserved for severe to extremely severe depression or for treatment resistant depression. By neurostimulation i mean rTMS, TDCS, ECT..... etc
So depression needs to diagnosed only by the professionals mentioned above and self diagnosis is strictly not advisable. However after someone gets to know they are Clinically Depressed, it is very important to educate themselves about the illness by reading self help books and interacting with Peers.
According to WHO statistics, MDD is now the no. 1 cause of disability (mental & physical) amongst all medical illnesses. 30% of people suffering from Depression, suffer from the type called Treatment Resistant Depression.
My case is treatment resistant depression and so my response to medication and psychotherapy has been poor. I have not tried neurostimulation for various reasons that are specific to my case.
As Depression is very difficult to understand for the lay man, close family members also need to be educated and counselled, in order to ably support the patient.
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