I havent read all of this thread either. But I can see that some posters have been triggered and may walk away from this thread upset and frustrated.

The one thing I would like to present to this thread is that it is important to understand that Depression can present itself as a result of a variety of different psycholigcal issues or even health issues.

At some point there was a discussion about doctors and presenting the condition to a team, which would include a regular GP, a psychologist, a psychiatrist, and if your a female, a gynocologist is a must as well. And it is important that each person who struggles with depression be their own health advocate and keep working on trying to get to the reason behind the depression. This can be very troubling because if it is a health issue, like something gynocological, a therapist, GP,and psychiatrist may misdiagnose and present a medication that truely doesn't treat the main cause. Antidepressant is not going to change a gynocolgical condition that may be triggering a major hormonal inbalance.
A major hormonal inbalance can create such sever depression that someone may be so crippled they may give up on life. And I know this because I went through this in a couple of ways, 1)I had a bad case of endometriosis which truely effected my hormones along with painful cycles. 2) The endometriosis was surgically lazored and I was treated with a drug called Lupron where I received an implant that slowly released a chemical into my system over several months to stop my menstral cycle so I could heal. That drug had a major side effect of presenting depression and even sending a woman into early menoapause.
I was crippled by depression due to the drug presenting no estrogen levels at all. I was incapacitated by severe depression. That would have been missed by a therapist and psychiatrist and I would not have faired well at all. Luckily I did go to my gyno who resolved the problem with hormone treatment and antidepressants. It took me a couple of months to regain a sense of normal capacity. I also want to add that men should have their testasterone levels checked as well, and I believe they also have some estrogen levels as well if I recall. There is also effects from lowering testasterone that can produce depression as well.

What I have now, PTSD, presents depression also. And it could be mistaken or misdiagnosed as BPD or Bipolar or Mood Disorder and who knows what else because the symptoms of PTSD can present similar cycles of mood as these other disorders. And there is mild PTSD and acute PTSD and severe PTSD. And there is a definite pathology that presents in the brain with PTSD. It is important for a person who has it to understand what it means and make sure the appropriate therapy is applied, without the appropriate knowledge and therapy it WILL and CAN get worse and present very bad depression.

Now, if someone is hearing voices that are not there, seeing people that are not there, hallucinating etc. it is important to understand what that means. There are definite disorders of the brain that produce these symptoms that should not go ignored. And, as in many disorders these issues can cause periods of depression as well.

For example, there was a movie that came out that was based on a true story about a man who was billiant and high functioning, however he saw people that were not there and he actually believed these people were real and he got worse and worse following an enviornment that was all in his mind. This movie was called "A Beautiful Mind". And it took a lot of time for this man to recognize that the people that he thought were real, were, infact just fabrications of his mind that was disordered. Finally the facts of what he had made him begin to recognize that he had to learn how to live his life and know that these people he saw were not real.

I cannot stress enough that for anyone who suffers from depression to take it upon themselves to make sure they find out why this conditon is present. And it is not easy, it requires someone to cover all bases and continue to seek help.

Yes there is a flow that suggests that the answer is medication. But medication is not going to help if,as I mentioned, the route cause is not known.

There are normal highs and lows that present in everyone. And yes we can all learn from difficult life situations that can present some lows. And yes, we can practice some productive thinking methods to help resolve some of the lows and we can even practice meditation that can relieve anxiety that can, if anxiety is not controlled, lead to depression as well through mental exhaustion.

So, think as you will, but, make sure you get the facts and don't just run around in circles with a real issue that could be better addressed by knowing the facts behind depression.

This is the bussiest forum in PC. I am very careful about this forum because, personally with my disorder, I do have depressive symptoms. I don't want to feed into those symptoms by coming here and saying I am sad or reading I am sad over and over again. But, that is because I am aware that what I struggle with has that symptom and it is not healthy for me to feed that symptom.

I also know that I cannot come to this forum and tell someone who may struggle with some other severe depression and just tell them to do what I am doing. All I can truely do is perhaps read what someone is saying and make a suggestion to see if they might be addressing my issue or a gynocological issue etc. But I truely cannot, in good conscience tell someone else to just think their way out of depression.

AND, even though I have had my own struggles with various doctors being misdiagnosed, misunderstood more times than I could imagine. I simply cannot tell anyone "NOT?" to BE CONSISTANT AND GET HELP, KEEP ASKING, DON'T JUST SETTLE. Yes, there is a challenge to seeking help, doctors make mistakes. But someone who struggles deserves to take every step to find out why they are struggling. There are truely some conditions that present DEPRESSION that truely cannot be "SIMPLY THOUGHT AWAY".

FOR ALL THOSE THAT SUFFER WITH DEPRESSION, MY HEART TRUELY GOES OUT TO YOU, PLEASE KEEP TRYING, DON'T BLAME YOURSELF, DONT GIVE UP. "YOU DESERVE TO GET THE HELP YOU NEED TO HELP YOU FIND YOUR WAY TO HEALING".

((((SO MANY HUGS TO ALL)))))

Open Eyes