Depression is often associated with a pang of deep sadness and irritability. At some point, we tend to feel down and periods of sadness can be normal but that is not depression yet. However, a person with clinically significant depression experiences persistent sadness and lack of interest in activities they used to enjoy to such an extent that it interferes with their ability to function properly in their daily lives.
Depression makes one see challenges always and often loses the strength to carry on. In severe cases, suicide seems to be the only option. Hopefully, there are some things that can be done to help you survive depression, improve your quality of life, and regain your life.
Read: How to Start a Healthy Lifestyle at Home
How to Survive Depression
- Therapy. Therapeutic sessions with a psychologist can help you survive the depression. Since you have someone to talk to and who is willing to listen and profer solution, it will help relieve the weight of what you carry and gradually, lift you out of the sad mood.
- Build a Support Network. Aside from therapy, developing strong social support can help you survive the depression. Your support network could be your friends, family, or colleagues. They have to be people you can trust to share your feelings with.
- Reduce Stress. Stress as it makes your body produce more of the hormones called cortisol. This hormone helps your body cope with stress challenges but when the stress becomes too much, the hormones can cause severe problems including depression. It is important for you to reduce things that cause you to be stressed, that way, you control your depression.
- Get Adequate Rest and Sleep. Getting adequate rest and sleep improves the general wellbeing of the body. It also helps to improve your mood. It is also true that a depressed person may find it difficult to sleep, but you will have to try. Avoid using your sleep area (bed) for work. Your bed should be associated with rest and sleep to enable your body to relax.
- Learn to Control Your Thoughts. Most time, our actions are a result of our thoughts. Depression ignites more negative thoughts and changing those negative thoughts, however, can improve your mood. Try to engage yourself in activities that improve your thinking pattern.
- Eat Healthily. Studies have shown that there is a link between diet and mental health. Improving your nutrition can help improve mental illness like depression. Some mineral deficiencies like zinc can increase symptoms of depression.
- Avoid Procrastination. Depression can be accompanied by fatigue and lack of concentration hence leading to procrastination. It is important to set daily task routines and deadlines which must be achieved within a space of time.
- Relive Happy Moments. Engage yourself more in activities that make you happy. For most people, listening to their favorite music, taking a warm bath, or reading a good book are just a few activities that might help. Take note of yours and do them more often.
