Depression Medications

You may be surprised to hear that more than 18 million Americans have been affected by a depressive disorder. This means then that a whole lot more have been affected, just by knowing or living with someone who is suffering, or has suffered by some kind of depressive disorder – that’s a lot of people isn’t it?

But wait a minute, only around one third of the people who are suffering from a depressive disorder seek medical help. That means that 12 million Americans have been suffering unnecessarily, because 80% of those who do seek medical help see a dramatic improvement in their lives, that means, wait a minute, that erm 80% of 6 million = 4,800,000 have seen the benefit of depression medications.

Symptoms of Depression

Depressionisn’t simply feeling down in the dumps for a couple of days because it’s your “time of the month” or your spots have come back with vengeance, real depression can be characterized by showing a good few of the following symptoms day after day, week after week, and month after month.

• a depressed mood
• feelings of worthlessness
• loss of energy
• lack of interest in things which you once enjoyed
• inability to concentrate
• changes to sleep patterns
• recurring thoughts of suicide and death
• changes in weight
• restlessness

You really can’t “snap out of it” no matter how hard you try.

Depression Medications

Depression medicationscan help so you really ought to seek medical help as soon as possible if you think that this could be you. The type of medication which you are prescribed will depend on the type of depression you are showing, but remember, there is no instant fix for depression. You can’t simply take two spoonfuls (or is it spoonsful?), have a good nights sleep and expect the world to be a rosier place in the morning – unfortunately life’s not like that.

Depression medications include various different types of antidepressants and other mood stabilizers which work on increasing the availability of certain neurotransmitters found in the brain, and by altering the sensitivity of the brains receptors to these chemicals. By modifying these chemicals it is believed that our emotions can be improved, but depression medications don’t work for everybody and never take away the most important thing, the cause of the depression. The majority of doctors therefore recommend a combination of treatments including depression medications as well as therapy. If you don’t get to the real root cause of the problem, even if the depression medication is successful the problem will just start over again when the treatment stops.

Withdrawal from Depression Medications

If you have been taking antidepressant medication for some time, the idea of stopping can be pretty tough. Some depression medications do trigger withdrawal symptoms which make it difficult to stop taking it. It’s essential that you don’t go “cold turkey” but discuss everything with your doctor and take it slowly, gradually decreasing the amount of medication you take. Every reduction in dosage should be kept up for a couple of weeks before reducing it further.  If you do stop too quickly you could suffer from:

• dizziness
• fatigue
• uncontrollable crying spells
• restlessness
• aches and pains

Crikey moses, it’s enough to make you depressed again isn’t it?

Other Methods of Combating Depression

Apart from depression medications there are other techniques which you can learn and practice to help you to cope with depression. Exercise, support groups, relaxation techniques, stress management and meditation can all help you to deal with this critical period in your life.