Depression

Depressed? If so, you are not alone. There is a growing epidemic of depression. Everyone can get the blues, but it becomes depression when the blues are severe or stay too long. Being tired, waking early in the morning and unable to get back to sleep, not enjoying activities that used to be fun, and feeling down for extended periods can be part of depression.

If you, or anyone you know, is feeling so bad that they are thinking of committing suicide, then it is essential to get treatment. This is not to suggest that anyone should delay treatment until they are suicidal. Mostly, treatment involves medications and talk therapy.

In general, antidepressant medications, such as Prozac, increase the available amount of serotonin in the brain. In depression, the brain produces low levels of serotonin, a chemical that some nerve cells in the brain produce to communicate with other nerve cells.

Talk therapy today is very successful, and often as good or better than medications. Combining talk and drugs works even better. The two talk therapies with the most data to support them are interpersonal therapy and Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). CBT was developed by Dr. Aaron Beck and rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) by Dr. Albert Ellis. CBT and REBT are similar. Both methods essentially are based on the idea that an adverse event triggers automatic negative thoughts. The thoughts result in depressed or anxious feelings. The activating event and the negative thoughts can be written down and examined. Then the negative thoughts can be countered with a more true, fair or useful interpretation of the events. An example of how CBT works was given in the previous post. CBT has also been popularized by Dr. David Burns and by Dr. Martin Seligman. Dr. Seligman started from an interest in learned helplessness and optimism.

For more on this topic see the following posting: More on depression.