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treatment for depression

Unveiling The Benefits: How Therapy Can Help With Depression

How Therapy Can Help With Depression: Unveiling The Benefits

Depression is one of the most common mental health disorders in the world. However, depression can sometimes be misunderstood, misdiagnosed, or undetected in many people. This can have serious consequences as the individual with depression doesn’t receive the help they require and deserve.  Depression requires timely support and professional help, which can be sought through counselling. Therapy for depression holds numerous benefits, and can bring a positive change to one’s mental health.  Here, we will be talking about the advantages of therapy for depression and why it is important to seek professional help when you are struggling.  Understanding therapy for Depression Depression can feel complicated and difficult to move through. There may be mixed emotions that can be difficult to understand and process. You may feel demotivated to take on new things or do activities you like to do. All of these feelings can bring up a sense of helplessness and loneliness.  The nature of counselling is supportive. One of the goals of therapy is to support you through your journey, through coping strategies to manage uncomfortable emotions.  Some emotions may be easy to notice, accept, and process. On the other hand, some emotions may be complicated and uncomfortable to sit with. Sometimes, what you may think could be sadness, could be much more. There could be a tinge of grief, a touch of guilt, or a smattering of loneliness. Depression can bring its own variety of emotions, and navigating through these heavy emotions alone can be difficult.  Taking the guidance of a therapist can help alleviate some of the load that depression brings. A counselor can help you identify, hold, and process these emotions in a safe place. Counselors can provide you with comfort and acceptance which can help you feel open and welcome to express and experience all kinds of emotions.  Therapists are also trained to help you go deeper to understand your emotions. They ask you questions to help you ponder over the thoughts and feelings you have been experiencing due to depression.  Thus, taking up counseling can bring in a great deal of support, self-reflection, and resources to manage depression.  How Therapy Helps To Treat Depression Apart from the obvious benefit of overcoming depression, therapy can be a great addition to your life, providing you support in multiple areas. To learn more about the benefits counseling offers for your mental health, click here.  We have highlighted some other important benefits to seeking counselling for depression:  Provides a safe space: Therapy is designed to help you learn more about yourself in an environment that feels comfortable and safe. A counsellor’s non-judgemental, and accepting nature can be helpful for you to open up and process uncomfortable feelings or thoughts associated with depression. Helps you identify triggers: For many people, there may be situations, thoughts, or people that could trigger depression. For instance, there could be events from childhood, or difficulties in the present that could be one of the causes of depression. Therapists can help you identify these triggers and teach you to be better equipped when there will be triggering events in the future. Helps you probe deeper into your thoughts and feelings: Like identifying triggers, therapy for depression also looks into patterns of thoughts, feelings, or behaviour that could have caused, or is sustaining depression. They can help you be more cognizant of your negative patterns and guide you to more positive ones. Improves your self-awareness: Sometimes, when we are caught up with troubles and difficult situations, we often don’t think of what we can do differently. Seeking therapy for depression makes you more aware of your patterns, and ultimately, yourself. Understanding yourself better can lead to having a better relationship with yourself. This can help you handle your difficulties with more acceptance, compassion, and gentleness. Helps you establish better relationships: Sometimes, depression can cause some strain in your interpersonal relationships. Therapy equips you with communication skills and strategies to manage your relationships with others in a better way. Teaches you coping strategies: One of the main challenges people face with depression is the lack of awareness of what to do when difficult emotions or thoughts come up. Thus, many people resort to unhealthy, and often dangerous ways to cope with them. Therapy is a useful tool to learn effective and healthy coping strategies to manage and overcome difficult situations through gentle support.  Feeling Low? Counseling can be a great tool for you to manage and overcome depression and lead a happy and balanced life. We are here for you. Book an Appointment Process Of Uncovering Underlying Causes And Triggers Of Depression If you are trapped in a dark, suffocating room, it can be difficult to find the key to come out. The darkness may also make you believe that there is no way out, and that there is no key.  But sometimes, the key to getting out of a dark place is right where we are, or it could be in our own hands. It just takes a little bit of searching.  Therapy helps you in that “searching” process. The process of therapy involves helping you find that key to come out of the dark space safely.  The process of therapy for depression is simple and can span over a few weeks to a few months. Step 1: In your initial sessions, the therapist will try to understand your concerns thoroughly and will work with you to set realistic, short-term, and long term goals. This step is to give you and the therapist clarity on what you are seeking from therapy and to give the process more structure. These goals may change as you proceed with the process. Step 2: Once your goals for therapy are set, the therapist would get into creating a treatment plan with you. Therapists can have their unique ways of creating a treatment plan, depending on their therapeutic style. While some therapists believe in working with your negative thoughts, other therapists would be curious to learn more about your

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A Guide To Understanding And Managing Depression Symptoms

A Guide To Understanding And Managing Depression Symptoms

Depression is one of the most common mental health disorders. Currently, around 5% of adults in the world are suffering from depression. With a large number of people suffering from this disorder, there has been increased awareness surrounding it.  Despite this, there is considerable confusion between what can be considered sadness and depression. Therefore, understanding whether what you are going through is depression, lies in understanding the symptoms of depression.  Understanding the symptoms of depression, and what it is like can help you reach out for better mental health resources, treatment options, and work towards improving your mental health. In this article, we aim to give you more clarity on what depression is, it’s signs, some ways to manage depression, and options for treatment. However, if you are curious to learn more about sadness, and how to manage sadness, you can read more about it here.  Understanding The Symptoms Of Depression How can you tell if you are depressed? Depression can have clear, and sometimes vague signs, that go unnoticed.  Depression can be understood as a constant feeling of sadness or hopelessness, which doesn’t go away easily. Depression, like other mental health disorders, significantly impact your ability to function in your personal, social, school, and professional life. While screening for depression, here are some physical, mental, and emotional  Depression also manifests in the form of physical, mental, and emotional symptoms:  Physical symptoms Sudden weight loss or weight gain Shifts in sleep patterns, sleeping too much, or too less Anxiety about the future or past events Random pains, body aches, and numbness that come up without any explanation Excessive crying, or sometimes, finding it very difficult to cry Emotional and Mental Symptoms Irritation or anger towards yourself or others Excessive shame and guilt Engaging in reckless behavior such as binge drinking, drunk driving, so on Difficulty concentrating on tasks Feeling numb and zoned out during conversations Feeling lost and hopeless Feeling tired  Engaging in suicidal and self-harm behaviors, or having thoughts about suicide* We are not a crisis intervention center, hence if you feel actively suicidal or have frequent suicidal thoughts, we strongly recommend speaking to a crisis or suicide helpline. Differences Between Symptoms Of Depression And Sadness Depression can often look like extreme sadness. However, there are differences between the two that can help you effectively identify  what you are going through. -Sadness is a common, normal human emotion everyone experiences occasionally that goes away with time. But, depression is a serious mental health condition  that requires professional help and support.  -Sadness can be triggered by certain life events and usually have a cause behind the emotion. Depression can appear due to a variety of reasons and it can be difficult to identify a single trigger.  -While depression may appear to be similar to sadness to others, depression is more severe and intense, and its symptoms can take longer to alleviate than sadness.  -When compared to sadness, depression can severely impact normal functioning and the quality of our lives. Sadness is only temporary and usually doesn’t affect your daily life.  -Depression is also characterized by suicidal thoughts, and intentions to end one’s life. This, however, is not noticed with sadness. Dealing With Depression Symptoms The signs and symptoms of depression can often feel like there is little to no way out of it. However, there are numerous ways, apart from therapy or medication, to manage depression through self-help techniques. Here are some ways you can support yourself through depression. Seek support from the people around  you: Depression can often make you feel withdrawn from others. However, putting in slight efforts to engage with your family, friends, and loved ones can help you feel better. Talking to your loved ones about your feelings, can also make you feel heard and validated and can lessen the intensity of the depression. Engage in activities you like to do: A common symptom of depression is to lose interest in things you like to do usually. Therefore, trying to pursue your usual hobbies and newer ones can help you feel lighter and can improve your mood.  Maintain regular mild to moderate physical activity: Exercise and mild physical activities help in releasing endorphins, which are known as the “feel-good” hormones. Having a good amount of endorphins in your system helps you feel happier and can alleviate your symptoms of depression. Mild physical activity can also help in managing your sleep cycle and the pains in your body as well.  Manage Anxiety: Anxiety commonly occurs with depression. When anxiety happens along with depression, it can cause you to get stuck in negative thought spirals. With depression it also becomes easier for you to believe in the negative thoughts. Therefore, managing anxiety with the help of mindfulness meditation, therapy, and other techniques can help lessen the intensity of the depressive symptoms.  Notice your negative thoughts: This is inspired by Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, which is a form of therapy that works on unhelpful, negative thought patterns. With depression and anxiety, our mind tends to be stuck onto negative thoughts and core beliefs we hold true about ourselves, others, and the world. These extreme, negative thoughts can bring about negative emotions, which overtime lead to anxiety and depression. One of the first steps to work on depression is to observe the negative thoughts we have in our daily life. Noting these down and learning to believe in a more balanced version of these thoughts can therefore, bring about positive emotions.  Consume a balanced diet: Our gut is known as our “second brain.” Our brain and gut are in constant communication and their activities influence one another. Therefore, what we feed our gut ultimately affects what we think and how we feel. Having a balanced, healthy diet with limited processed foods can improve our gut health, which thereby improves our mental well-being.  Feeling low? Counseling can be a great tool for you to manage and overcome depression and lead a happy, balanced life. We are here for you. Book an Appointment Therapy

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Overcoming Depression

Overcome Depression And Reclaim Your Life

When you are suffering from depression, you may feel like your entire life revolves around managing your negative thoughts and feelings caused by depression. You may be having a sense of worthlessness, hopelessness, and you may think that there isn’t a point in going forward in life.  These thoughts are often accompanied by a feeling of being extremely low. These negative thoughts, feelings, and emotions lead to the diagnosis of depression. Depression is increasingly becoming common, with more than 5% of adults in the world being diagnosed with it.  Having depression can make it difficult for you to feel joy, and can feel like there is no end to these feelings of loneliness, gloom, and sadness. Life can feel monotonous, and can feel like it lacks color and vibrancy. To know more about the symptoms of depression, click here.  No matter how dark or gloomy life may seem when you are experiencing depression, there are ways to overcome depression and manage it. Due to the several studies and consistent research being done on understanding depression, there are now tested ways to work with and manage depression. This article consists of a list of ways through which you help through your depression, and lead a happier and smoother life. Ways To Manage Depression The path to recovery from depression can be challenging. It can be difficult to understand the symptoms, and identify depression in ourselves and others. Even after recognizing these symptoms, there is stigma that is often associated with seeking treatment for depression, despite how common of a mental health condition it is.   This stigma often makes people hesitate to ask for help and look up for resources to manage their depression. Here are some ways that you can improve some of the symptoms of depression you may be experiencing. Understand your depression symptoms: Understanding that depression is a disorder, and not a personal failure or problem on your part is an essential step towards getting better. As you have a condition, it requires support and treatment. You don’t have to go through it all alone. As depression is becoming increasingly common, you can read how others going through depression feel. Understanding your symptoms, and the ways people around you are managing it can give you clarity on what you are dealing with. Listening to people’s stories of those who have overcome depression can also be inspiring and can instill hope within you that it does it get better with time.  Seek professional help: Therapy is an effective tool in understanding the thoughts and negative beliefs that support and prolong the feelings of depression. Therapists help you notice these feelings and create space for the emotions, instead of suppressing or pushing them away. Therapy also helps you uncover and explore the emotions beyond the apparent ones. Sometimes, when you explore depression, you can notice feelings of shame, anger, guilt, and other emotions coming up. Therapy can help you process these complex emotions by dealing with them in a safe space.  Therapists can also help you identify negative thought and feeling patterns that enable depression to stay within your system. Thus, building this awareness helps in developing a deeper understanding of what causes and sustains your depression.  Consider medication: If you feel like your symptoms are too intense, and are affecting personal, work, and social functioning, then you should consider using medications. However, medications for depression should be consumed only under clinical supervision, like a psychiatrist.  Medications for depression can help you manage these symptoms and can make you feel more balanced.  Engage in activities you like to do: One of the main signs of depression is losing interest in doing things you normally do. You may notice that you don’t like following your normal routine or do activities that bring you joy. You may also begin to withdraw from your loved ones. Engaging in joyful activities like talking to friends and loved ones, doing mild exercises, going for a walk, can help even if you are not up to doing them. This is because doing these activities have built in rewards which release feel-good hormones like endorphins into the body once they are done, helping you overcome depression.  Do regular physical activity: Doing mild forms of activities, like slow yoga for even a short span of time like 15 minutes can reduce low mood. Being regular and consistent with taking out a few minutes for mild physical activity can bring a huge difference into your mental health. Mindfulness and meditation: The concept of mindfulness has been around for centuries. Incorporating mindfulness into meditation can bring a huge shift in your mental health. People often have a misconception that mindfulness meditation or meditation in general is to “quieten” the mind. However, mindfulness helps you observe and watch your thoughts and emotions without getting entangled in them.  Since it is a practice, it isn’t something that comes to many people right away. If you are starting out with a new practice like meditation, you can start by taking a course so that you will be doing the course with a group of people motivating you. You can learn more about and register for our 8-Week Mindfulness Meditation Course here.  Or, you can take a small step to simply get started with a guided meditation right away by clicking here.   Having a balanced diet: We refer to our gut as our “second brain.” Our brain and gut communicate constantly, and both are influenced by one another’s actions. As a result, what we put into our bodies ultimately shapes how we think and feel. Depression also alters our appetite levels. If you have an increased appetite, it is best to consume healthy foods, even if you eat often.  Try your best to avoid sugary snacks. Sugary foods can make you feel better momentarily, however it does slow down your digestion, and lower your energy, increase fatigue, and reduce your motivation in the long run. Therefore, try to incorporate more fresh vegetables and fruits

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The Art of Listening