Depression
What is Depression?
When we feel depressed it can be like a dark cloud has descended all around us. Feelings like sadness and hopelessness can feel ever present and there can even be a sense of shame that we feel this way.
However, sadness and hopelessness and other emotions, together which might be referred to as a low mood, characterize periods of our life from time to time. In the painting the deer is wounded by not just one arrow but many and the face is human. Withdepression it can feel as if we are hurting all over but on the inside and sometimes for a long time.
What is the cause of depression?
What causes you pain? It is a truly inexhaustible list. We all feel differently, react to events in our own way and though the experience of feeling emotional pain is universal, the things that cause us pain are highly individual. We might know the experience that is connected to this feeling of depression and we might not. Our childhood, our personality and our biochemical make up (the way our particular body works biologically and chemically) all contributes to the complexity of depression. The common denominator is that these feelings do not feel like they are going away and they persist to be a regular feature in your life
When to seek treatment for depression?
If you are experiencing low mood and a persistent sense of hopelessness
If you are sleeping more than normal and choosing to sleep as a way to avoid being awake or finding it hard to sleep
If you have lost interest in doing things you used to enjoy
If you are feeling tired and with low energy, putting off daily things you need to do
If you are neglecting daily hygiene or there has been a negative change in your eating habits.
If you are avoiding seeing people and making excuses not to be seen.
If you are having negative thoughts towards your self worth, feeling like a failure
If you are having thoughts of harming yourself or others.
If you can notice that your behaviour feels off, even if you cannot completely understand why.
The Role of Psychotherapy in the Treatment of Trauma
Depression can feel lonely and also isolating and being able to talk to someone is an important step to feeling less alone whilst trying to navigate something we might not understand. The complexity of depression involves a multitude of factorsand I will work alongside you using a range of evidence-based psychological treatments to help explore your depression. This is with a view to bringing relief and symptom reduction to you in your present day life.
Sometimes cultural attitudes to depression, from our family but maybe also from our work culture, can influence us to keep quiet and not share our struggle. The longer we do this the worse the problem becomes and the longer it continues. There is plenty of evidence confirming the impact of talking therapies in alleviating the symptoms of depression. One of the biggest reasons people do not seek help with psychological problems is the belief that somehow these problems are not real and that they should be facing these ‘not real’ problems on their own. That is not the case. Asking for help is a sign of courage and of the soul’s desire to heal.
Frida Kahlo –La Venadita - 1946