Depression

DEPRESSION

In a mid-western city, a 35-year~0Id engineer suddenly loses his appetite, is unable to sleep, experiences splitting headaches and alarming chest pains. A thorough medical check shows nothing organically wrong. But the doctor, refusing to leave it at that, discovers that there have been several such episodes before, not quite as bad, but always coming during periods of pressure on the job and always, as now, accompanied by feelings of discouragement and "blues." 

To the credit of the physician, not a psychiatrist but an alert general practitioner, the engineer doesn't get a medicine chest full of drugs, one for each symptom-only a prescription to combat mental depression and some counseling about depression. Before long, the symptoms disappear. In a Boston suburb, a young housewife suffers from overwhelming fatigue and constant abdominal distress.

She has tried vitamins, "tonics," assorted remedies,when finally, she consults a doctor, he notes while examining her that there is a kind of dullness and mental withdrawal about her. And when he finds no physical explanation for her troubles, he gently asks: Has anything happened to make her feel depressed? She had lost her mother ten months before, had grieved, and had thought she had recovered from the grief. Yet, true, her symptoms, she recalled, had come on not long after her mother's death. She, too, is treated for depressionand relieved. These are two of the lucky people. Mental depression is being recognized today as a critical medical problem.

According to some psychiatrists, more human suffering may result from depression than from any other single disorder. Some physicians term it "the great masquerader," noting that it has many faces and often hides behind physical complaints without betraying its presence by an obviously sad or despairing mood. Is depression, in disguised form, right now affecting someone in your family or a friend or neighbor? It could be. More Than a Mood There is nothing unusual about a brief spell of despondency or blues now and then.

 All of us have our ups and downs, days when we feel on top of the world, others when we feel a bit low. But depression-a chronic change of mood, a drawn-out lowering of the spirits-is another matter. It can be triggered by the loss of a loved one, loss of money or job, failure to get a promotion. Such a depression is called reactive or "exogenous," meaning it comes from outside.

But there is another common type that develops without apparent cause. Suddenly, a person may decide that he or she is a failure in life, when that is not really true. Unaccountably, self-confidence and self-esteem vanish. Ordinary everyday problems-family problems, social problems, economic problems-once handled as matters of course may suddenly seem too much to cope with. Such a depression is called "endogenous," indicating that it comes from within, perhaps as the result of some chemical upset in the body. 

Some authorities believe that many depressions are mixed, both endogenous and exogenous. And some argue that there must be some endogenous or internal factor, otherwise a death in the family or other loss would lead only to temporary, normal sadness. When depression occurs, it is not limited to the mind.