Do you know anyone who is suffering from depression? Do you know that Depression is the number one and most rampant psychiatric condition worldwide? Still, most of us are unaware of its nature and causes.
Do you know why some people get depressed and others don’t? What exactly is going on inside of a depressed person? Is there any biological basis responsible for this intense feeling of sadness?
In the past depression was thought to be simply a chemical imbalance in the brain. Specifically, scientists believed that a lack of Neurotransmitter Serotonin was to blame, which is often referred to as the “Feel Good” chemical. However, in recent years psychologists, clinical psychiatrists, scientists, and researchers found out that connections with other different environmental and social factors also play an important role in Depression or Depressive Disorder.
On the other hand, no one knows precisely what causes Depression. Often it is thought that the reason behind depression is a combination of psychological, emotional and physical factors.
Therefore, we can divide the causes of depression into two categories. And, they are:
- External or Physical Factors.
- Internal or Mental Factors.
External or Physical Factors:
External factors are the most obvious ones that we would think of for example,
- Grief
- Childhood Trauma
- Loss of a relationship
- Divorce or separation
- Work-related stress
- Loss of loved ones through death or illness
- Personal, interpersonal negligence and conflicts.
- Learned Helplessness.
- Dysfunctional Family Life
These are the main external factors that may cause you to suffer from depression.
The number one cause of Depression is a divorce or going through the process of marital separation, the break up of a significant relationship, death of parents or children or separation from a child are the most common and prevalent reasons behind depression. These reasons are recurrent behind depression. So to sum up when one gets separated from his/their loved ones, it sends that particular person into a dark depression. It makes them vulnerable to any self-harming or other types of depressive activities.
Now the question is why are we so vulnerable to separation or loss? To answer this question I would like to refer to a wonderful book named “General Theory of Love”. This book highlights something that many psychologists explain: the importance of attachment and bonding between a mother and child in all animals, including human beings. According to the authors, when this emotional attachment between a child and mother is broken or ruptured, the offspring or child descends into something called physiological despair. In an example the writer mentioned a mother rat escaped from its cage for only one single night and the next morning when the experimenters came back, they found that the baby rats were super stressed out they named this condition as physiological chaos where the heart starts to beat faster, heart rate gets irregular, stress hormones and growth hormones get suppressed. If this could happen in between a simple rat and its children, what about human beings and their children! In mammals, separation leads to chaos and despair which is why depression pops up and takes a dark shape in the human mind.
Childhood trauma also causes depression and anxiety. If a person goes through any type of abuse such as physical, sexual, and verbal abandonment and neglect or loss in childhood, this makes that person much more vulnerable to getting depressed as an adult if separation or loss of attachment occurs. The earlier these traumas occur in childhood the more extreme their effect later on in life.
Stress is highly related to depression. Stress can be of different types. For example, work, personal, or family even having a newborn baby can bring stress in life which in the end results in minor to moderate depression.
People sometimes feel powerless against their negative events. Although they know they are not okay, something significantly wrong is happening inside them. Still, knowingly they keep living with depression. People feel that there is no way out of this to live a normal life. This is also known as Learned Helplessness.
There are some who always choose to see only the negative side of any situation, and every bad thing happening in life because of his/her own fault or mistake. Furthermore, they keep this thought deep in mind which forges to extremely depressive episodes of one’s life and it stays stable for a longer period of time or even for a lifetime if any psychological assistance is not provided.
These types of thoughts foster a strong sense of hopelessness and everything Bad keeps on happening in the depressed people’s lives. Therefore, a vicious cycle of negativity and depression continues for the rest of their life.
Internal or Mental Factors:
Internal factors are more complex. Here, I tried to explain those complex reasons as simply as possible.
- Genetics
- Medication
- Hormone Imbalances or underactive thyroid gland
- Family history of Depression
- Overactive Endocrine System
Like other disorders, depression also has its roots in hormonal imbalance. Several studies show that low levels of serotonin might be responsible for the development of Depression. The main function of serotonin is to regulate our emotions and any imbalance negatively affects our mood.
An overactive endocrine system can result in an oversupply of stress hormones, which is commonly diagnosed as clinical depression.
A family history of depression makes one 3 times more vulnerable to developing depression. Having one
of the identical twins with depression puts the other one nearly to an 80% or more chance of developing depression. This is because some studies suggest that Depression is a genetically inheritable disorder. But this does not mean one is bound to suffer from it. However, it means having a family history of depression will make you more susceptible to it.
Providing more attention and importance to extrinsic value than intrinsic value also causes Depression. For example, if you have ever stayed at work beyond the time you had to, just to earn more money (Extrinsic Value) so that you can buy something that you don’t need rather than staying at home and spending time with your children(Intrinsic Value). Hence, the more your life is driven by these Extrinsic Values the more you are prone to depression.
Our pain and distress make sense and it is a response to our unmet needs and desires. If those unmet needs could be met, depression will soon go away.
If we consider an example of a person with workplace depression who is having depression because of the lack of control over work. Here in this case, if we can provide him authority or power to lead and control the company, his depression might soon disappear. Therefore, it is more important to identify the hidden reasons behind depression. Antidepressants might not help much if the roots of depression and anxiety are not figured out and sorted out.
Suffering from Depression?
If you feel you are suffering from depression it is incredibly important that you seek help as soon as possible. Because it can cause life-threatening conditions or outcomes. That is why, it is very required and necessary to speak out to y
our loved ones or if not possible take help from a licensed psychologist or any mental health caregiver.
