| About 7% of the US population is suffering from | | | | their own capacities and may, for example, work day |
| depression that needs medical attention. The number | | | | and nights for weeks on end without feeling |
| of people who have suffered at one time or another | | | | exhausted.3. Winter Depression. It's also called the |
| in their life from depression is about three times as | | | | seasonal depression, since it occurs usually at the |
| high. According to the World Health Organization | | | | onset of autumn or winter and disappears with the |
| women are two to three times as likely to develop a | | | | coming of spring. This form of depression therefore |
| depression than are men.Medical scientists believe | | | | only lasts up to 5 or 6 months. The most common |
| that the tendency for depression is at least in part | | | | symptom is the lack of physical energy, not the |
| caused by hereditary factors. People who have gone | | | | feeling of being depressed per se.4. Some |
| through a bout of depression once have a higher risk | | | | prescription drugs may cause depression, like those |
| of falling ill again.Depression can me treated | | | | with a high element of cortisone, contraceptive |
| successfully with a combination of drugs and | | | | products like the pill and drugs combating heart |
| psychotherapy.Doctors suspect that certain | | | | disease (beta blockers).It's natural to feel low |
| neurotransmitters (chemical agents that carry nerve | | | | sometimes, but it is different from a depression. In |
| signals) like serotonin and noradrenalin aren't working | | | | most cases it is easy to distinguish between simple |
| as efficiently in a sick person as in a healthy person. | | | | mood changes, even if they come in rapid succession |
| The reasons for this deficiency aren't known, but it is | | | | and a disease like depression.There is not always an |
| believed than genes and hereditary factors play an | | | | outside event that triggers the onset of a |
| important role. Drugs that combat depression do it by | | | | depression. That's why it is so difficult to understand |
| 'helping' serotonin and noradrenalin to do their job | | | | not only for the patient but for his or her relatives as |
| more effectively in the brain.It is usually, but not | | | | well. They definitely suffer through and with the sick |
| always, very difficult and painful events in a person's | | | | person. Since there is no apparent identifiable |
| life that trigger depressive episodes. With the use of | | | | catastrophe that can explain the mood swings of the |
| psychotherapy the doctor tries to help the patient to | | | | patient, he or she very often stretches the patience |
| work through those events or help him or her to | | | | of those around him or her to the limit.The most |
| avoid them altogether.Types of Depressions1. | | | | common symptoms are: feeling generally very low, a |
| Unipolar Depression. This is the most common form | | | | pronounced lack of interest in normal activities like |
| of depression. It's called unipolar because the patient | | | | sports or socializing, loss of appetite and loss of |
| is 'only' depressed, but not manic-depressive. Main | | | | weight (in some cases increased appetite and weight |
| symptoms are feeling very low in the morning, | | | | gain), the inability to sleep well (insomnia), loss of |
| waking up very early, insomniac tendencies and | | | | concentration, indecisiveness, diminished sexual desire, |
| feeling depressed.2. Bipolar Affective Depression. As | | | | general exhaustion and lack of energy, obsessive |
| opposed to the unipolar depression the bipolar | | | | thinking about death, suicidal tendencies and suicide |
| depression is marked by depressive and maniacal | | | | attempts. |
| phases. Patients suffering from it are delusional about | | | | |