More fun depression stuff......

So, because the whole point of this blog was to help educate, here's some fun stuff that I've come across and want to share:

One thing that's pretty common from the research I've done, is that a lot of people who present symptoms of depression are reluctant to seek help.  Part of this, from experience, is that they think something is wrong with them.  After months and months of feeling severely depressed I went to my doctor.  I told him flat out I thought I was depressed and wanted him to run all the medical tests to rule out things like thyroid problems, low blood levels of B vitamins, etc.  Long story short, if I heard back from him, something was wrong with me.  If I didn't I should talk to someone.  Never heard back.  So to my dismay, I figured I was losing my mind.  I was in a pretty bad state to begin with - I'd been put on probation at work because, unbeknownst to anyone, the depression was affecting my work performance.  So hearing (or rather not hearing) that something was wrong with me drove me even deeper into depression.

Michael Landsberg from TSN's Off The Record has been battling depression for over 10 years.  He wants to make a difference for others, and so do I.  He observes in an interview with the Toronto Star back on April 1, 2010, "The biggest problem with depression is that people tend to blame themselves for it.  You would never hide from somebody that you'd just got back to work after an appendectomy.  Nobody's going to think that's your fault or a sign of weakness."

And he's right.  But a lot of us who are, or have been, depressed, think otherwise.  At the time I went to the doctor, I thought something was wrong with me.  There was, but it wasn't anything I had actual control over.  You can't just "wish yourself better" or I'd have done it a long time ago.  So would everyone who suffers from depression.

Here's a scary statistic/thought - in a 2008 study 2/3 of people with depression were undiagnosed in primary care settings...now who does that sound like? (Depression symptomatology and diagnosis: discordance between patients and physicians in primary care settings, Ani et al http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2296/9/1) Granted, it's a US study, but still.... Warning:  It's a real research article, so take the route I did and skim it :)  So's this Canadian one, but reaches pretty much the same conclusion: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2173927/

So here's a bit of advice...if you, or a loved one, goes to a doctor who doesn't seem to take your complaints seriously - shop around.  Several disastrous months later...I did.  And guess what?  I started my road to recovery.  But more on that later...I want you to come back.

"This is Dr. Frasier Crane wishing you all good mental health."