What is Depression?
Unlike the common cold, whose symptoms don’t vary too much from person to person, an illness such as depression can manifest in many different ways depending upon the individual. For some people, depression feels like a heavy cloud of sadness or unhappiness that they just can’t seem to shake. For others, depression manifests as a constant, underlying frustration with life, leading to irrational bouts of anger over even “small stuff”. For still others, depression leads to an anxiety, an agitation, or a restlessness.
How people react to their depression also varies from person to person. Some people can’t sleep when they’re depressed; other people sleep all the time. Some people lose their appetite when they’re depressed; others start eating constantly. Some lose their sex drive; others act out sexually in an attempt to relieve the pain.
What Causes Depression?
Depression, whether mild depression or depression that requires treatment at a depression facility, has a variety of causes, some of which are physical and some of which are not.
Biological causes of depression include brain trauma, an imbalance in brain chemicals, an imbalance in hormones, and hereditary causes. Brain trauma, such as a head injury to the frontal lobe acquired in a car accident, can change the way the brain regulates mood. Such an injury may eventually go away on its own as the brain goes through its natural healing process, or it may require further medical treatment, such as anti-depressants. Brain chemicals such as serotonin, and hormones such as those produced by the thyroid, can also trigger a bout of depression. Menopause, for example, can trigger hormonally-induced depression in women. Other sufferers of depression may have a family history of depression, in which case a genetic cause of depression may be implied.
Non-physical causes of depression are mainly traumatic life events, such as a death in the family, job loss, or high stress. Even if a long time has passed, traumas from childhood can still trigger depression in adults. For these non-biological causes of depression, therapy at a depression facility may be as effective as anti-depressant medication, if not more.
What are the Treatment Options for Depression?
Most people who are successfully treating their depression use a combination of anti-depressant medication and psychological counseling, perhaps inside the context one of the nation’s depression facilities. People who only take anti-depressant medication often do not treat the underlying causes of their depression, such as a low sense of self-worth resulting from childhood abuse. In these cases, anti-depressants may help the person to function more or less normally, but may not solve the problem of depression over the long term.
A Treatment Center for Depression
Depression Facility, is the premier depression facility with locations in Bel Air, Pacific Palisades and Santa Monica. Depression Facility provides a perfect combination of inpatient and outpatient treatment options for people suffering from depression.
With a holistic treatment model, the use of medication is kept to an absolute minimum, with more emphasis placed on discovering and treating the underlying cause of the depression. For individuals in Southern California, Depression Facility is one of the best depression facilities available.