Depression

To understand depression, we can look at the word “depress.” To depress is to press down upon. The depressed person is acting from within the model of choices he or she has. To be depressed is to press down upon yourself. In other words, when an individual is depressed, they are taking the energy and anger they have and turning it toward themselves. This comes in the form of excessive guilt, shame, and/or impoverished ability to forgive.

The more we understand about the nature of anger, the more we can comprehend depression. We learned that anger occurs when there is an area of heart/soul/person which feels violated or unprotected, vulnerable to attack by others.

Depression is:

• When a person feels vulnerable, powerless to protect self
• When a person is angry at others for stepping over boundaries
• When a person does not know how to express their anger or protect themselves.

Often emotions are pressed down or blunted to block the pain, but, this also results in blocking enjoyment in activities the individual would normally enjoy.

Physically, a depressed person is often fatigued, and either over-sleeps or experiences a lack of sleep, is slow or lethargic, or has low energy.

The combination of missing sleep and stressing the body out by directing all of the energy towards self can result in a chemical depression with low levels of serotonin. Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft, Effexor-SR, Celexa, Lexapro and other anti-depressants were created to raise a person’s level of serotonin to a normal state so that the individual has enough energy to work on the underlying dynamics and problems of the depression.

NOTE: If the individual you are seeing is crying often rather than showing a flat affect, you may be witnessing a grief reaction of some kind and not necessarily depression. (If this is so, see: “Grief”).

• It is important to refer a depressed counselee when you notice there are physical symptoms (i.e., significant weight loss or gain, sleeplessness/excessive sleep, lack of energy/fatigue, or agitation). This may indicate that medication is necessary for temporary relief of the depression.
• Refer if, over time, the counselee is feeling increased depression, hopelessness, guilt, or suicidal thoughts. NOTE: Depression in a child may appear in the form of irritability.
• Refer is you notice yourself contributing to the dependent feelings of a depressed person. For instance, if you find yourself feeling powerful, irreplaceable, much needed, and persuasive in this person’s life, then you may be receiving secondary gain from this person’s depression.