8 Ways To Defeat Depression In Your Life
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According to Dr. Peter Ventre of Ventre Medical Associates, depression is “when feelings of intense sadness — including feeling helpless, hopeless, and worthless — last for days to weeks and keep you from functioning normally, your depression may be something more than sadness.“
In other words, when you feel sad for a day due to something bad that happened to you, there’s nothing wrong with that but when time doesn’t seem to be healing your emotional wounds and you find yourself constantly feeling helpless, hopeless, and worthless, sometimes for days or weeks, then you’re experiencing a depressive episode and you need to do something about it.
Signs You’re Experiencing a Depression according to Dr. Peter Ventre
According to Dr. Peter Ventre, a Psychiatrist, President of Ventre Medical Associates and resident of Research Centers of America, here are some of the signs you’ll see that reveals that you have depressive symptoms:
- It needs to cause clinically significant distress or impairment.
- It cannot be due to the direct effects of a substance, for example, a drug or medication.
- It can’t be the result of a medical condition such as hypothyroidism.
- You can’t be diagnosed to have depression if depressive symptoms occur within two months of the loss of a loved one.
Sometimes, seeing a Psychiatrist like Dr. Peter Ventre will be of immense help when it comes to defeating depression but what do you do when you can’t see a psychiatrist for one reason or another?
Here are 8 ways to defeat depression in your life:
1. Don’t Drink or Drug Your Way Out of It
You can’t drink your way out of depression and using drugs won’t help either; these will only appear to help momentarily but they’ll make the problem worse over time.
If you’re experiencing depression, you need to need to know what is causing your depression and address the root cause instead of drinking or drugging your way out of it.
2. Take Vitamins and other Supplements
Taking vitamins and supplements can also help you overcome depression; vitamin D, magnesium and fish oil supplements can be helpful when trying to overcome depression.
It’s important to only take these if you don’t have contraindications to taking them and you might want to see your doctor for suggestions about using vitamins and supplements.
3. Watch How You Eat
You can probably relate to eating more than necessary when you’re depressed; sometimes, you’ll even find yourself eating crap you wouldn’t otherwise eat.
Often, when we’re depressed, this will reflect in our eating habits and we can find it difficult to control what we eat and how we eat it.
This won’t help the problem but it’ll instead alleviate it since you’ll only feel bad and more depressed once you’ve finished eating.
Avoid eating crap when you’re depressed and also try to control how you eat; it can be difficult to defeat the cravings but you’ll be able to prevent the guilt and shame that often comes with loading your stomach with junk you didn’t really want to eat.
4. Take a Walk
Exercise can also help overcome depression and you will often be amazed at how effective going out and taking some fresh air can be.
Try taking a walk whenever you feel depressed; try to feel the things around you and appreciate them.
5. Surround Yourself with Positive People
Sometimes, your depression could have to do with the people you’re moving with; if you’re with people who constantly talk down at you, reject you and demotivate you, you’ll often start to absorb their negativity and will constantly find yourself depressed.
If they’re people very close to you, let them know the impact their actions is causing to you and work with them to make things better. If this doesn’t work, you might need to start moving with positive people who are going to support you and fill you with their positivity.
6. Change Your Environment
Your environment can also contribute to your depression; perhaps you’re living in an environment associated with some sad memory or where you’ve lived the worst periods of your life.
Unless you change to a better environment, there’s probably nothing you can do to overcome the kind of depression that is triggered by an environment you’ve had a bad experience with.
7. Reduce Your Use of Sugar
Sugar increases your insulin resistance and high levels of insulin resistance have been linked to severe depression symptoms.
By reducing your sugar intake, you’ll also be lowering your risk of insulin resistance and as a result will be able to minimize your chances of being depressed.
8. Get Some More Sun Exposure
Low levels of vitamin D will increase your chances of experiencing depression and mood disorders. By regularly exposing yourself to the sun, you can improve your vitamin D levels and as a result reduce your chances of being depressed.
Conclusion
Data from the CDC has revealed that 1 out of 10 Americans older than 12 are taking antidepressants, most of them without consulting a doctor.
If you can’t see a doctor or a psychiatrist like Dr. Peter Ventre, the above are some interesting things you can do to help yourself feel less depressed.
Also, feel free to let us know in the comments section how you’re dealing with depression.
