Guest Author - Cathy Brownfield
Are you depressed?
Would you recognize if you were depressed? Would you want help? Or would you continue in your depressed state because it just seems easier to do that, or it’s better if nobody knows, or denial of the problem makes it easier to ignore and if you ignore it it will go away? Would you reach out and take the hand offered to you? Would you recognize depression in someone close to you…a spouse, a parent, a child, a sibling, a friend? Would you want to help that someone?
Depression can strike anyone, new moms to blue-haired old ladies, children to white-haired or balding old men. Depression can dig its claws into anyone. It can distance you from the people you love and who love you. It can rob you of time and memories. It can keep you from reaching goals, meeting challenges or even having goals and recognizing challenges. Depression can deny you the pleasures of living, of breathing, of being.
Life should be enjoyed and can be. Depression is treatable. Someone who is depressed doesn’t care about anything, even things that they used to care much about.
Reportedly, 70 percent of people who commit suicide tell someone what they are going to do. From www.Stopsuicide.org:
·I don't see any point in living.
·My family doesn't need me. They'd do better without me.
·I didn't take enough pills. I'll do it right next time.
·I don't need my (collection/valuables) any more. You can have them.
·I don't have to worry about that because I'm not going to be around anyway.
·You’ll be sorry when I’m gone.
·I won’t be in your way much longer.
·I can't deal with all of this any more. Life’s too hard.
·Nobody understands me; they don’t feel the way I do.
·There’s nothing I can do to fix everything.
·I’d be better off dead.
·I feel like there’s no way out.
Suicide is directly linked with depression, the web site advises. Symptoms for suicide include:
·Mood changes
·Sleep patterns change
·Weight and appetite changes
·Speaking and/or moving with unusual speed or slowness
·Loss of interest or pleasure in things the person used to enjoy
·Withdrawal from family and friends
·Tired all of the time
·Difficult to think or concentrate, slowed thinking, difficult to make decisions
·Feelings of worthlessness, self-reproach, or guilt
·Thoughts of death, suicide, or wishes to be dead
·Extreme anxiety, agitation, irritability or risky behavior
·Racing thoughts, excessive energy, reduced need for sleep
·Excessive drug and/or alcohol use or abuse
·Neglect of physical health
·Feelings of hopelessness
National Depression Screening Day was Thursday, Oct. 11, but today can be your wake-up call, your red flag. Today you can take the first step to helping someone you know and/or care about who is suffering with depression.
Mental Health Screening.org reports that “nearly three-quarters of Americans believe that suicide is preventable, yet only 27 percent feel very confident that they could help a loved one who is suicidal.”
The agency’s press release further advises that, according to the Suicide Prevention ActionNetwork, 90 percent of people who die by suicide have depression or another treatable mental illness or substance abuse disorder.”
Do you know…
*Most suicides are related to mental illness?
*Approximately 18 percent of those polled consider suicide a reasonable reaction to stress?
*Nearly half of Americans know someone who has suffered depression or another mental illness.
*Most people over age 65 won’t admit knowledge of anyone with depression, don’t think suicide is preventable and don’t think they could help someone who was suicidal.
*The elderly comprise 12.6 percent of the American population and 16 percent of all suicides in the country.
Most people with depression aren’t suicidal, but most suicidal people are depressed or have a treatable mental health condition, advises Douglas G. Jacobs, MD, associate clinical professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School and founder of Screening for Mental Health Inc. “Suicide is a fatal response to a treatable and reversible condition—that condition most often being depression.”
