Health: Depression and the love it takes to overcome it!

 

If someone you love is suffering from depression, you may also feel isolated. In fact, depression is a remarkably prevalent disease.

As many North Americans suffer from major depression as from other leading chronic conditions, according to the 2002 Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS). As Statistics Canada’s The Daily reported, “Some 4 per cent of people interviewed in the survey reported having experienced symptoms or feelings associated with major depression, compared with 5 per cent with diabetes, 5 per cent with heart disease and 6 per cent with a thyroid condition.”

Why then is it so difficult to watch a family member suffer from depression? Part of the difficulty comes from the stigma of mental illnesses, particularly an illness that is often related to “the blues.” The cultural assumption is often that if people didn’t want to be depressed – if they would only get out of bed and do something – they would feel better. However, this is far from the reality and most people dealing with depression cannot simply ‘cure’ themselves by getting up and doing something!

The mind is an incredibly powerful thing and even with all of today’s modern technology and medical knowledge we still only understand a small portion of way our brain’s work. This is complicated by the many, many factors which can complicate one particular issue. Most people suffering from depression need help – and the same can be said of their loved ones who are usually so close to the problems that an objective perspective leading to a course of symptomatic dealing which will end in curative measures is virtually impossible for close loved ones to manage by themselves.

True depression is much more complex than most of us can imagine. Worse yet, identifying depression in and of itself is usually as complicated as understanding other similarly ‘hard to identify’ emotions such as love itself – especially for those suffering from chronic depression, which in many cases, people develop innate coping mechanisms to manage (without dealing with the underlying causal factors!)

The U.S.’s National Institute of Mental Health states on its website: “Depression is a serious medical condition. In contrast to the normal emotional experiences of sadness, loss, or passing mood states, clinical depression is persistent and can interfere significantly with an individual’s ability to function, indeed to live.”

Being the partner of someone who is depressed and potentially starting to experience difficulty functioning through the daily stresses of every-day life can be very difficult.

It is without a doubt therefore that people suffering from depression or who are sharing life with someone who may be suffering from this terrible, invisible, but debilitating and destructive, sad illness.

HOWEVER, there is a silver lining – depression has now been widely acknowledged all over the world as a genuine and serious medical problem – and help need not be costly nor far away – one only needs to take the first step and reach out for help – an end to long-suffering pain will not be too far away.