Depression
by Trinity F.
What is it?
A strong mood involving sadness, discouragement, sadness, despair, or hopelessness that lasts for weeks, months, or even longer.
Signs and Symptoms
- Negative mood and feelings
- Negative thinking
- Sleeping problems
- Low energy and motivation
- Lose or gain weight
- Headaches
- Social withdrawal
- Hard to concentrate and/or focus
- Lighter colored hair
Depressed girl
This girl feels disappointed (as you can tell by the face and background) and seems to be discouraged D:
Very depressed and stressed girl
This girl is so depressed that as you can see, she is crying with her hair really messed up.
2-faced person
Some people who are depressed tend to fake their personalities outside of home, because they do not want others to know that they are in a depressed stage. For instance, this girl seems so happy, outgoing, and cheerful, but in the inside, she is NOT fine at ALL.
How does it affect someone?
- The person will start to withdraw from activities with friends or people they can get along with
- Have the person in an irritable or negative mood, causing them to act more argumentative, angry, and/or disagreeable
- Can skip classes or school because of difficulty concentrating, low energy and motivation
- He/she may fake his/her personality outside of home because he/she probably doesn't want anyone to know that they are depressed, and maybe they want to be happy for themselves too; not acting so gloomy all the time. Although, there will be certain times that he/she will remain "unusually" silent/quiet.
How is it diagnosed?
- Peer pressure
- Abuse from surrounding environments (mental, physical, emotional)
- Stress from work, school, other peers, or other activities that discourage the person(s) from something
How is it treated?
- Psychiatry
- Therapy
- Psychology
- Counseling
- Special medication(s) prescribed by doctors
Interesting (yet depressing) Facts
- Depression can be inherited through genes, based on family history of different illnesses. They can be passed on, and especially for twins, their share 100% of the same genes, so if one of the twins has certain symptoms of depression, the other twin may feel the same way. Non-identical twins share 50% of their genes, (twins who do NOT look alike) has a lower case of major depression because identical twins share 100% of the genes.
- For depression, 50% of it is from genetics, and the other 50% is from physical or psychological factors (Abuse and peer pressure can be examples).
- Heritability (genetics) is 40-50% of the main cause for severe depression, and sometimes, the chances can be higher.