“Shit! I Think I’m Depressed Again!”

Depression is a word to describe feeling bad or frustrated or sad or fed up or mad and all kinds of other emotions and circumstances. Marriages get depressed and so do churches and businesses. Cities get depressed as when the Canucks lost the final game of the Stanley Cup (June 15, 2011) and hooligans rampage. It is such an encompassing term and confusing experience that any sensible person will misunderstand when someone says “Shit! I think I am depressed” (as a client friend said to me the other day).

So… here is some of what I see when a person says that they or their family are “sick of being sad.” (It’s like when…)

• Persistent sameness and consistent sadness (like when a couple watch TV most nights to avoid conversation or conflict)
• Heavy tiredness and sapping of energy (like when a young Mom can’t get out of bed to care for her newborn)
• Zapped self-confidence (like when a real estate salesman avoids meeting people for fear of rejection)
• Difficulty concentrating (like when the at-home computer consultant who does everything and never completes a task)
• Not being able to enjoy things that are usually pleasurable or affirming (like when couples are too bored to make love)
• Finding it hard to function at work (like when the restaurant server who keeps getting fired for flipping off guests)
• Worrying about suicide and death (like when a church teen wonders excessively about heaven and hell)
• Self-harm (like when a preteen girl is compulsed with avoiding food)
• Undue feelings of guilt or worthlessness (like when the OCD who figures only 100% is ever good enough)
• Feelings of helplessness and hopelessness (like when a grade 4 boy who is scared of school)
• Avoiding people (like when a friend is afraid of getting hurt or harmed so keeps away from even closest friends)

So what do you do? Find someone (a pastor, a counsellor, a friend) who will listen and care and maybe pray. Or contact us to see if we can provide some direction or a referral.