Depression. A word everybody has heard of. A word that describes a mental illness. A word that many people use without knowing its true meaning.
What is depression? What effects does it have? Is it treatable?
Depression is a term that is used when your brain is in a state of chemical imbalance. Depression is a result of insufficient levels of serotonin in the brain. Serotonin is a hormone that plays a major role in our body's functions, such as sleep, mood, and appetite. Therefore, mental illness is also classed as a mood disorder. The most dangerous effect of depression is that it causes the hippocampus (brain structure, which has a significant role in learning and memory) to raise cortisol levels. When cortisol levels rise, the brain shrinks, hence its effect on the development of neurons in your brain.
A depressed person's brain does not function the way it normally would. The affected person might feel sadness, loss, and/or anger. But can the brain recover from depression? Yes, it can, not only with medications, such as antidepressants but also with other methods, for instance, TMS. This treatment is only approached if the medications show as ineffective. According to a study published in 2018 on the 23rd of February by Adam P. Stern “Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS): Hope for stubborn depression”, the Harvard Health Publishing, magnetic stimulations approximately work on 50% to 60% of people with depression.
Defying the symptoms that a depressed person might experience, is hard since everyone is different, and every person experiences things differently. Many individuals suffering from depression have severe symptoms that interfere with their day-to-day activities, such as work, school, social activities, or interpersonal relationships. Some people may be dissatisfied or wretched in general for a longer period of time without knowing why. These emotions can make you unhappy for weeks or even months. Despite the difficulty of collecting the most typical symptoms among individuals, the following are the most common:
Depression can be very difficult to cope with. But there are several things you can do if you think you might be depressed. You can start by telling a friend or a parent, who will help and listen to you. What matters is that you take the first big step by informing someone. After this you could, for example, contact our schools' psychologist:
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