Depression– it affects more than you think

When people see someone depressed, they tend to create a distance or a boundary to that person. Their excuse being because “he’s always crying” or “she’s always by herself,” instead of helping that person in any way possible they just hide from them. But what others don’t know is that anyone can have depression. Even though someone you know seems happy all the time, you don’t know what’s actually going on with them. As people say “The ‘happy’ ones are the most depressed.”

So how does one know if they have depression? Some symptoms include feeling sad or empty for a few weeks, having anxiety and restlessness, having anger management issues, fatigue, insomnia, increase or decrease appetite, losing or gaining weight, thoughts on suicide or death, and many more, according to “Causes of Depression” by Amber E. Gabbey.

Does depression have a time period? Is it forever? Or just a few hours or days? Well sadly it does not have a time period. It can last as long or as least time as possible. People could get treatment or medicine to help with one’s situation but no one knows how long it can take to get cured. Being cured doesn’t mean the illness is gone forever, it can come back whenever and come worse to handle or easy to take care of.

But how can someone overcome depression? Well depression typically involves with lack of sleep, doesn’t matter if you sleep little or too much. Better your sleeping schedule. Also do things that make you feel good like exercise, sports, games, take a day and go out with friends, beach, museum, or hike. Have fun and forget about everything. Talk to someone about how you feel. Play with pets. Ask a loved one to check in with you. Go to a therapist. These are just a few possible ways to overcome depression.

People think you can control depression but depression is in fact an illness. They also think that depression is something when people are sad all times or all types of depression are the same. There are two types of depression. One being dysthymia, a mild but long-term form of depression, meaning that one can be feeling depressed but it doesn’t affect them as much in a day-to-day basis. The second one being major depression disorder, which is a brain disorder characterized by persistently depressed mood or loss of interest in activities, causing significant impairment in daily life, this type of depression is the worse one. It can seriously affect your daily life and it will mess with your mind.

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about 350 million people around the world currently suffer from depression, which is about 5 percent of the world’s population. This may seem like a small percentage but as the days pass the number of people dealing with depression grows. This is a problem because not everyone can get help or least they don’t feel comfortable getting it.

In high school, one in four high school students suffer from a type of depression. The reasons being are stress, loss of appetite, relationship problems, not getting enough sleep, bullying, etc… all these things can lead to depression and even suicide, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. I also know this because it has happened to my own friends, siblings, and even myself.

I am not diagnosed with depression but I strongly feel that I am in fact a depressed person. I say this because I did have and still having experience with some symptoms. I have trouble eating, basically eating one small meal a day. I have sleeping problems, I sleep but maybe three to six hours max. It has gotten to the point where I sleep in class every day. Also most of the time, I have felt lonely, I have felt hopeless, like if no one cares about me or like if people don’t know or even care that I exist.

I know it is ironic that I am writing a piece on depression when I’m not even cured myself but I just want to spread the word about this illness because if we don’t act fast it will take over our lives and it will control us.