Is Depression Good for You?

February 29th, 2008

I’ve written about this before. The key is to use the depression as a signal to take action before it paralyzes you. I experienced the paralysis phase and it was… not good.

Via: BBC:

Pills aren’t the answer to helping many people recover from depression, says a report out this week. But there’s growing evidence that gloominess could be a positive experience.

What depressed the cavemen? It may strike us as a particularly modern malaise for a time-poor, fast-paced society but a new reappraisal of depression suggests it has always been around.

A leading psychiatrist says that depression is not a human defect at all, but a defence mechanism that in its mild and moderate forms can force a healthy reassessment of personal circumstances.

Dr Paul Keedwell, an expert on mood disorders at the Institute of Psychiatry, argues all people are vulnerable to depression in the face of stress to varying degrees, and always have been.

The fact it has survived so long – and not been eradicated by evolution – indicates it has helped the human race become stronger.

Dame Kelly Holmes has spoken in the past about how the depression she suffered in 2003 made her a stronger person, a year before her double-gold performance at the Olympics. Alastair Campbell has said it was the making of him.

But there are other qualities depression generates, not just resilience, says Dr Keedwell, author of How Sadness Survived.

“Psychological unease can generate creative work and the rebirth after depression brings a new love affair with life.”

Aristotle believed depression to be of great value because of the insights it could bring. There is also an increased empathy in people who have or have had depression, he says, because they become more attuned to other people’s suffering.

The high and rising incidence in the UK and US – compared to countries like Brazil and Mexico – could be due to the breakdown of family bonds and the fragmentation of society. And compared to past decades, there are increased expectations of success.

Related: Survival Acres Post that Deals with Many Barriers to Preparation

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10 Responses to “Is Depression Good for You?”

  1. sapphire says:

    What about depression that is brought on by your brain chemistry and not life circumstances? How on earth are those people going to be able to deal with their depression? Everybody has bad things happen to them at some point in their life and they have a right to feel down about it but they eventually bounce back but what about those people that don’t bounce back? For a minority of people depression is more than just blip on the radar it is life long companion. There has to be something out there that works for those people. Depression is not good when it takes over somebody’s life and keeps him or her trapped in a life of despair.

  2. anothernut says:

    A good book (available at Amazon, among others) that touches on “depression as a [sometimes, at least] good thing”: The Freedom Manifesto: How to Free Yourself from Anxiety, Fear, Mortgages, Money, Guilt, Debt, Government, Boredom, Supermarkets, Bills, Melancholy, Pain, Depression, Work, and Waste
    by Tom Hodgkinson (Author)
    It’s a great book all around, a light and yet serious treatment on disengaging oneself from the Machine.

  3. RuralNinja says:

    Recent tallies of research relating to antidepressants just seems to suggest that they dont actually help much at all. Placebos seem to work just as well in the majority of cases. And then theres the side effects of drugs – in many cases being more severe than the ailment.

    Also nowadays pills are prescribed far too easily, and in place of any other therapy. All evidence suggests that the efficacy of popular “antidepressants” has been hugely overrated, and is mostly due to the fact that the same companies that manufacture drugs also fund and commit the research into the drugs – and they WILL hide results that dont fit into their marketing departments ad campaigns. Theyve been caught again and again, and still they have the publics trust.

    In alternative research people are quick to point out if the researcher has something to gain, but in Pharma Business its a-ok, the corporations pay the doctors holidays, “seminar trips” and what not. They pay for the research, and they pay for the advertisement. How come this conflict of interest is perfectly okay here?

    This article about scepticism is very good reading in relation to antidepressants as well, and it points out a few unpleasant facts about medical science..
    http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/New/Examskeptics/skepticism_suppressedscience.html

  4. montysano says:

    Perhaps brain chemistry can be affected by life circumstances? This is a very interesting concept: depression as a signal to action/change.

    “Depression is not good when it takes over somebody’s life and keeps him or her trapped in a life of despair.”

    Which is probably why Kevin wrote:

    “The key is to use the depression as a signal to take action before it paralyzes you.”

  5. Miraculix says:

    …and what about nutrition and the connection between the Standard American Diet and depression, oh sapphire?

    There are other ways to combat depression than with pills.

    Genes are adaptable, not fixed and immutable. Letting to of the illusion that one cannot count on clinical medicine beyond what they can do for the Six Million Dollar Man (read: trauma and acute medicine) is depressing enough — until you realize how much destruction is wreaked upon the human species by the garbage we in the west have come to associate with the term “food” over the last several decades of industrial propagandizing.

    Depression is acute sadness. A body’s way of communicating that it you have something to get past, to learn, before you can start anew. We all need fresh starts now and again. Sometimes we need a little more; a jump start.

    I have experienced serious depression, eventually gaining valuable insight as I grew and learned my way out of my own personal situation. I did NOT resort to clinical solutions because I already knew pharma had — and did not have — to offer. Learned that lesson earlier, under different circumstances.

    I am stronger today for having sat down for drinks with my demons and getting to know them better. Finding my way back to health did not come easy though. It required a complete casting off of the old ways and a full-embrace of new ones in nearly every respect. Difficult, but ultimately cathartic. And good exercise, growing our own.

    Health comes from within — and you are what you eat. Nothing more need be said.

  6. Cloud says:

    Testify!

    Industrial society in aggrigate causes depression. Daily smog, soul-killing factory work (manfucaturing trash) or office work (playing with funny money, selling snake oil), junk food — human genetic memory screams at you that this is *wrong*. But everybody gots the meme in their heads that If You’re Not Happy Something Is Wrong With You; and that’s stronger. Whence the pills.

    The pills do work to some extent. I took them for a while. They work to deaden your feeling.

  7. RuralNinja says:

    Yes. I think the raising levels of mental dis-ease is a warning sign to our species as whole. Its a sign that our society as a whole is sick and built on wrong premises. And the “medications” on offer are meant to keep the afflicted person functioning within the parameters of this sick society. How could they really heal anyone, when the symptoms are those of a general wrong direction and values?

    I have also suffered from depression, took me over 2 years to get over it. Luckily I never even thought of asking a doctor for some medications, but just slugged it thru no matter how dark it seemed. Then later I realized how much of it was simply being disappointed with what is expected of me in this society, and my unwillingness to blend in.

  8. sapphire says:

    Guys, I never said that pills are the complete answer to depression but some people have depression so bad they need some sort of assistance. Yes, diet and exercise does help with depression as does talking to people about your problems but you can’t over look the fact that some people’s depression is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain which is not easily remedied with a diet and exercise regime of a saint. Maybe there are some less harsh medicines out there like a herbal medicine that can help with severe depression. Basically, what I am saying is you can’t always exercise and eat your way back to health and happiness but it does help to some extent.

  9. Eileen says:

    Sure wish I had read these posts and gotten into the conversation earlier. I think Depression is the big taboo these days – sheesh- imagine I am communicating with how many people with my writing? Discussing the topic of depression is probably the most important thing to do these days.
    I wrote several days ago that I had been suicidal, I don’t think that’s same as depression now that I think about it. Depressed, or depression, at least in my case, was when I realized that I didn’t have the guts or gumption to kill myself. Now what do I do if I can’t end this horrible pain on my own? Therein lies the rub.
    Depression -HAH- its a beautiful creature. Really. It is!
    I was very fortunate to have my sister drag me out of my depression of my late teens into radical therapy. And I mean radical. I wouldn’t trade those experiences for anything.
    Then when my sister died, I wanted to also. But a friend convinced me to go to grief counseling. And I did, and there it is. Quick and dirty and I didn’t have to a join a cult to get over my loss.
    Therein is the other rub – where to draw the line. When I got help in my youth (early 20’s) I was led by the cult masters to believe that they owned me because they helped me. I escaped from those dirty rotten scoundrels – who had the balls to call me an ungrateful child.
    All of this time – never took one drug (pharma) for depression. Sure I hit the bottle of wine more than anyone should, but I have great bloodwork as a result of my habits.
    Very seriously, if any person reading this feels depressed and needs a hand up for a first step, my advice would be to find a referral for counseling – somewhere. I would start by making an appointment with a homeopath, a chiropractor, or a myofascial-cranio massager or any of the “underground” healing arts people before I called on an MD for help. Quite seriously. In my experience these are people who will talk to you. And maybe that’s all you need. The MD’s will load you up with pharma drugs and other nonesense. And don’t with any group or any one who claims to know the “answer” for heaven’s sakes. Just as MD’s have the perfect solution for you with the “right” drug, there also might be someone from the underground culture who might want to sell you the “drug of belonging to a group.” I say Stay Away from all that nonsense. But then again, I went there did that, done that many times over now, and really don’t regret it too much. But I’m warning you now. Coming out of depression means you become as one with other human beings in a sort of cause.
    This can be great! as opposed to loneliness and depression. But just be careful now, you hear?
    Your Mom

  10. cryingfreeman says:

    @ Sapphire: How do you know “chemical imbalanances” (if this is a real feature at all) are causative of depression, rather than a reaction to it?

    I suffered from severe clinical depression from 1989-1999 on a regular basis. In those days it was called “endogenous” depression. They tried Prothiadine, Prozac and Effexor (or “Ineffexor”, as I called it), but all to no avail.

    My view is that depression is caused by no single factor, but rather comes about as an outcome of a confluence of eclectic influences, namely: bad diet (too much sugar, too much caffeine), insufficient exercise, stress, and lack of sleep. If the three key pillars of health are attacked (diet, exercise and sleep), the door is opened to all manner of illness, and in my case most especially depression.

    The best and lasting cure was, in addition to redressing the three key areas mentioned, fighting abnormality with normality, i.e., working as usual, socialising as usual, going shopping as usual, etc, etc, and refusing to stay at home playing the patient. Starved of introspective attention, it withered up and died before I even noticed. And this is coming from someone who thought he’d never be well again.

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