What is a major depression?
Since it is so
common, depression has long been known as the common cold of mental
health conditions. If only depressive disorder were as short-lived and
conveniently managed as a cold. At its worst, it is a lot more like a
serious bout of the flu than a cold: You will not want to eat, you lose
weight, you simply cannot sleep, you are feeling tired, and you also
could not keep your mind on anything besides how lousy you feel. In
severe depression, you may feel numb as opposed to miserable. You can
work only with great effort, or you may not be able to work at all. You
do not care about the people you used to love and the things you used to
love to do.
In contrast to the flu, however, which in most healthy people lasts only
a couple of weeks, depressive disorders can last months and quite often
years.
And frequently, unlike the flu, it might not disappear completely if not
treated. Untreated depression raises the likelihood that the sufferer
will have another depressive episode. If you have had one bout of
depression, you have a 50 percent likelihood of having another. After
two bouts, you have a 70 percent likelihood of having another. After
three, there is a 90 percent chance you will have a fourth episode of
depression. Finally, people suffering from major depression are at
serious risk of committing suicide.
What is the difference between major depression and normal sadness or
grief?
The loss of a job, the failure to attain an important goal, the end of a
relationship, or the death of a loved one can all lead to intensely
painful yet normal feelings of sadness and grief. The early symptoms of
intense grief often resemble some of the symptoms of depressive illness.
It is not uncommon for someone who has just lost an important
relationship to feel sad or empty, cry easily, have
trouble sleeping, and lose his appetite.
Depressive illness can and frequently does develop, however, from what
began as a normal grief reaction. A clue that depressive illness may
have taken over is the persistence or worsening of symptoms. Another
clue is a growing impairment in a person's ability to function.
In addition, the appearance of other symptoms suggests that grief may
have developed into depressive illness. Depressive illness will lead to
a decrease in self-esteem. A depressed person will become pervasively
self-critical. Instead of having difficulty falling asleep, the person
with depressive illness will have trouble staying asleep. She may begin
to wake up early in the morning and be unable to get back to sleep. She
will start to have problems thinking clearly, remembering, and
concentrating.
Sadness and grief respond to the concern and caring of friends and the
passage of time. But in depressive illness, the concern shown by family
and friends may not help at all. Family members usually find themselves
at a loss as to how to help someone with depressive illness. After a
while, in fact, family and friends will begin to feel frustrated and
irritated. No matter what they say or do, the person with depressive
illness stays stuck in a gloomy, pessimistic mood.
Sadness and grief clear up in a reasonable period of time, and then a
person gets back to normal. Some forms of depression do improve
temporarily if things go well, but this is usually short-lived. And
although depressive illness can improve over time by itself, it usually
takes longer to do so than does normal sadness or grief.
In summary, if a depressed mood is hanging on for months, is disrupting
your functioning, and is associated with the symptoms mentioned here and
in chapter 3, you should seek a professional consultation.
