Signs of Depression: A Disorder Affecting Millions Worldwide

The word ‘depression’ is commonly used amongst people, without knowing the actual signs and what it entails. At the same time, there are 350 million people worldwide according to WHO, affected by this disorder which makes it even more widespread.

The signs of depression range from enduring feelings of sadness. The hopelessness leads to eventually losing interest in the activities that one used to enjoy once. Depression is a mood disorder that particularly affects a person’s thoughts, feeling, actions and behavior.

The causes of depression can be because of certain damaging life events such as mental, physical or sexual abuse, biased treatment of parents towards siblings, work stress, unemployment, financial difficulties, relationship troubles etc. It can even cause due to certain medical treatments, drug abuse, a non-psychiatric illness like diabetes, Parkinson’s or stroke, psychiatric syndromes etc.

We all have our experiences with feeling low or sad on a daily basis as part of our normal life. But feeling the perpetual sadness, deep negative thoughts and consistently lacking energy is not normal. When these things majorly affect a person’s daily life and activities it’s a prominent sign of depression.

The symptoms of depression:

• People with depression constantly feel sad, empty, helpless, hopeless, ashamed and restless, anxious, worthless, guilty and aggravated.
• Their interests or joy in doing activities they enjoyed reduces drastically.
• Noticeable weight loss or weight gain without any intentions of either.
• Loss of or increase in appetite.
• Sleep disorders like insomnia or hypersomnia.
• Agitated or retardation of mental activity.
• Have the feeling of loss of energy and exhaustion.
• May suffer digestive problems.
• May suffer from aches and pain.
• Feelings of guilt and worthlessness that is delusional.
• The ability to think, process and concentrate are diminished.
• The person suffers from indecisiveness.
• The person has frequent death thoughts, attempts or has ideas of suicide or has a specific plan of suicide.

The symptoms are capable in effectively causing notable damage in the daily functioning of the person in social or occupational settings. If these symptoms prevail for more than two weeks, it may be diagnosed as depression. The person can benefit only from professional treatment.