What Depression Can Do
		The Blues Can Be Sneaky

Everybody gets the blues. Who hasn't felt sad at one time or another?

But what if the blues hang on and on, affecting you day after day? What if a persistent sadness permeates all aspects of your life your ability to perform, how you eat, how you sleep, and how you deal with friends and family? Then, depression may have you in its grip.

• You feel sad or cry a lot, and it doesnt go away.
• You feel guilty for no real reason; you feel like youre no good; youve lost your confidence.
• Life seems to have no meaning. You feel like nothing good is ever going to happen again. You feel pessimistic or it seems like you have no feeling at all.
• You dont feel like doing a lot of the things you used to enjoy like listening to music, playing sports, being with friends, going out and you want to be left alone most of the time.
• Its hard to make up your mind. You forget lots of things, and its hard to concentrate.
• You get upset easily. Little things make you lose your temper; you overreact.
• Your sleep pattern changes; you start sleeping a lot more, or you have trouble falling asleep at night. Or you wake up really early most mornings and cant get back to sleep.
• Your eating pattern changes; you lose your appetite, or you eat a lot more.
• You feel restless and tired most of the time.
• You may be starting to feel so badly that you start to wonder if life is worth living, you think about death, or may even have thoughts about committing suicide.

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• You may ignore it. No tell-tale symptom signals that you have depression. You may think that you are experiencing feelings that everyone goes through from time to time. You may attribute your feelings to a rough day at work or a difficult spouse or just the stress of day-to-day life.
• You may think it's something else. The symptoms of depression are often similar to the symptoms of other illnesses. For example, both depression and anemia may cause fatigue. If you have been diagnosed with a physical illness, you or your doctor may be attributing symptoms of depression to that physical illness. Yet, its possible you now have a second illness: depression.
• You may think it's your medication. Some medications for example corticosteroids, used to treat arthritis, and birth-control pills can lead to irritability and changes in mood. You may pass off symptoms of depression as side effects of your medication.

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