Depression

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is a mental condition that affects sufferers with anything from deep depressive symptoms to overwhelming anxiety and panic attacks. It is characterized as the response to a particularly distressing life event, such as rape, surviving a serious accident or experiencing war at first-hand (also called 'shell-shock'). Having said that, it doesn't have to be an actual experience that triggers PTSD; some people who hear about a traumatic experience one of their loved ones has experienced can trigger it off. For example, a mother whose son who lost his leg after stepping on a land mine in the army might develop PTSD because empathizes with his suffering. ...

If you are experiencing persistent feelings of sadness or anxiety don’t worry there are several treatments available for depression sufferers. Some opt for therapy alone, or therapy plus medication is often a suggested path to recovery by doctors. Options include talk therapy, which breaks down into two schools of thought, one being cognitive behavioral therapy. This type of therapy is the most prevalent today and involves incorporating methods of psychology to correct negative behavior and alter negative beliefs to alleviate your mood and improve your outlook. Another option is psychotherapy. Often more expensive for sessions, psychotherapy is a method for examining your life from your earliest formative experiences, up to your present state of mind, to seek answers to what is bothering you, and find resolutions for your suffering long term.

In some cases, medication is an option rather than a necessity and it is most often used in severe depression and in bipolar depression it’s often required in order to maintain stable mental states. Antidepressant medications like Prozac and Wellbutrin are common for treating depression Antidepressant medication can help to relieve depression symptoms like fatigue, weight gain or loss, and persistent anxiety or sadness. Antidepressants and therapy also allow you to make needed life changes to improve your circumstances dramatically. ...

Post Natal Depression, also known as PND or the 'baby blues', is a mental condition experienced after childbirth and characterized by symptoms that are very similar to depression experienced at any other time in life. It is thought to affect 1 in 10 mothers, so the instances are quite high, and luckily for mothers in the 21st century there are standard medical procedures in place to ensure that it is detected as early as possible. ...

The primary treatments given for depression are solutions such as counselling, therapy, anti-depressants and consistantexercise. Diet, however, can play just as important a role in the life of a depressed individual, and improving your diet could improve your condition significantly.

People suffering with depression will often look to food to feed their emotions. From infancy people learn that a sad or irritable mood is soothed with milk, which naturally progresses to solid food. Getting comfort from food is a good thing, otherwise we would starve, but the problem comes when we start to crave unhealthy amounts of food beyond our essential nutritional needs. Foods high in sugar and fat make us feel almost instantly 'good'. The reaction is like taking a drug, and the hit of sugar is addictive. Our body learns that if we feel sad and eat a lot of chocolate, the serotonin and sugar in the chocolate make us happy and energetic (regardless of the sugar crash we get afterwards). ...

As many people know, insomnia (an inability to fall or stay asleep) is one of the primary symptoms of clinical depression. What many don't realise is that a need for additional sleep is also a symptom of clinical depression and is known as hypersomnia.

Insomnia is much more common in depressed people than hypersomnia, with an average of 15% of it's sufferers experiencing the latter. Having said that, depression can cause instances of both, occurring in cycles, where a person may oversleep for one week, and then spend the entire next month struggling to get 5 hours of sleep night every night. ...

Let us debunk this age old myth with a qualifed yes. Of course men experience depression and the stigma has been lifted in our society in many ways in the past few decades regarding male depression. But not as a separate, stand-alone condition. Men suffer the same depression disorders as women, it's just that their brains cause the symptoms to differ, and the reactions to various social stimuli to vary. Men can even suffer from Post Natal Depression (PND), a condition which is often mistaken as being 'female'. ...