Mental health has slowly started receiving the much deserved attention. In the haste of attaining success, we have long ago started to compromise on quality of life. The lapping stress and ongoing misery leads to anxiety and depression and it laps the person before he is even able to acknowledge its presence. In this write up, the attempt is to share opinions and observations based on personal experience and hearsay.

What is depression and what are the causes for depression?

Depression is a mental health disorder the occurrence of which is more common in the recent years. Globally, more than 264 million people of all ages suffer from depression. Depression could be an outcome of any hardship faced, whether by the person himself or by someone else to which he was a witness. Death of a family member or friend, failure in career, breakup of a romantic relationship or just an incident of a dog dying on the roadside can act as a trigger. Everyone has got different reasons. Depression is often compared to sadness but it’s not the same. Sadness is a mood that has a temporary relevance to the occurrence of an unexpected outcome. If a person is sad, a good movie or a joke can make him/her happy. However, prolonged sadness edging towards depression is more lasting and temporary shifts cannot make a person feel better, no matter how hard they try. Everyone goes through different situations, it’s not same with everyone but they have one thing in common, pain. The grip of depression is stronger than a generic mood swing and more lasting. Often it reaches a stage of affecting wellbeing of the person, independent of any trigger.

Symptoms of depression:

It is impossible to draw a blanket set of symptoms that will manifest themselves when a person suffers from depression. Depending upon the combat mechanism of each person, the symptoms will differ. Those who have been brave to accept that they are battling depression often open up to how it manifests itself in their life. Even then, no two experiences are similar.

One such discourse from a fighter is as below: –

“It affects you and your life in so many ways. Constant overthinking, having trouble to share things with people, feeling alone and so many other things. You will be standing in a crowded place and still won’t hear anything, you’ll be graduating with good grades but you still won’t be happy. Depression takes it all away from you. You lose yourself in this process. So it’s always good to talk to someone or else the thoughts will start piling up in your head. Those thoughts do suffocate you and then you’ll have trouble breathing, a therapist will tell you what to do if something like that happens. You take the pills but it keeps coming back. It feeds on your fear and then you fear some more. The light at the end of the tunnel is just not visible….”

How conscious are we of the mental health issues in today’s world?

The rate at which people are succumbing to mental health issues, it is not unfair to presume that we have a lot of catching up to do in acknowledging that these problems exist.  Yes, there are people working to create awareness for mental health related problems, but people face difficulties to accept the pain if it is not physical.

It’s not uncommon to see people asking the person suffering from depression to ‘snap out of it’. As humans, we are not equipped with proper understanding of how to respond to a person who suffers from depression. We have acknowledged physical ailments as there are visible symptoms. As for psychological ailments, we still have a long way to go. The empathy and acknowledgement of problems is a good place to start. More often than not, lending a listening ear to a person suffering from depression, without attempting to belittle his suffering, will yield more favorable results. It is unfair to presume that a person who tries to give advice to the person suffering from depression is totally wrong and that it is the right of a person battling depression that people around him should provide him the support he expects.

What nobody tells you is that every individual is battling emotional upheavals at some level. In an ideal world, the person battling depression is surrounded by people who are having a calm and comfortable life and are far from emotional distress and can reach out to him and offer support. But the reality is drastically different.  We have everyone needing a listening ear and none offering it. The social media of today is full of posts saying that we need celebrities to die to talk about mental health. One could argue, that as it is, there is little support to people battling depression, do we need to kill those few who are starting to realize the importance? While urging people to keep a tab on victims battling depression is a good thing to do, is it right to blame their lack of interaction with the said victims as cause of the victims taking extreme steps? Blaming a doctor for death due to medical negligence is one thing and blaming a family or friend who does not know how to cater to the person battling depression is another.

Today convenience takes over rationale and venting of emotions has taken over reasoned argument. The world does not always operate in black and white and there are million shades of grey to consider. Holding empathy is a need for every person, irrespective of whether they are themselves suffering with depression or not. The values of brotherhood, humanity, harmony and togetherness are crucial to survival. If the focus is shifted from success to quality of life, from wants to needs, from give me more to let’s share, there is still hope for mankind.

 

Helplines:

 

There are many NGOs working for the cause of mental health. They also have 24*7 helpline number so you can call them anytime.

Listed below are some of the contact details:

Aasra Mumbai (24*7 helpline)-  +91-9820466726

The link providing suicide helpline numbers of every state in India is mentioned below:

http://www.aasra.info/helpline.html

Some Online organisations helping people to fight depression can be found at:

Hope network – https://www.hopenetwork.in/

Seraniti – http://www.seraniti.com