What You Need to Know About Depression and Suicide

March 16, 2011 By Leave a Comment

What You Need to Know About Depression and Suicide

Depression is a huge risk favor for thoughts of suicide, and many people that are suffering from depression go through periods where they want to die, however brief. These deep feelings of despair and helplessness can go hand in hand with clinical depression. Thoughts of dying or killing one’s self should definitely be perceived as a serious deal, and if you know someone who is exhibiting suicidal thoughts or behaviors, you need to help them get support and help now. It may just be a cry for help, love or attention, but these behaviors may also be indicators that something is seriously wrong.

Someone who has depression may talk about subjects relating to death or suicide.

Someone who has depression may express feelings as if they are hopeless or feeling trapped.

Someone who has depression may seem preoccupied with death or dying on a general level.

Someone who has depression may act in a manner that is perceived to be reckless.

Someone who has depression may phone people up or visit them in an attempt to say goodbye.

Someone who has depression may alternate between extremes, feeling very calm and then feeling very depressed.

Someone who has depression may make comments about being better off dead.

Someone who has depression may seem to be getting his or her affairs in order by giving away property or money.

Someone who has depression may indicate that they would not mind dying or becoming seriously harmed.

If you genuinely believe that someone you know is in danger of attempting or committing suicide, then the ball is in your court to get them the help that they need. Help your friend or loved one seek out the professional assistance that they need now while the thoughts are just thoughts, before they become actions.

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Self Help for Issues Pertaining to Anxiety Disorders

March 9, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Self Help for Issues Pertaining to Anxiety Disorders

If you feel that you might have an anxiety disorder, it would be a wise idea for you to work with a therapist or a psychologist to get yourself some help. Not everyone experiencing some worry is actually suffering from an anxiety disorder, however. Even when you seem as if you are worrying a lot, some anxiousness and worry is actually normal. For example, if you are experiencing a lack of sleep, if you are not exercising enough, if you are experiencing pressure at home, if work is pressuring you, or if your schedule is currently demanding too much out of you, then you may be experiencing a completely normal level of stress. If you are feeling stressed out, the best thing that you can do is exercise some self help and self care and find ways to overcome your stress.

Are you taking good enough care of yourself? Consider the following questions:

Are you giving yourself enough time every single day to have some fun and relaxation time?

Are you making sure that you are getting as much emotional support and care as you need?

Are you ensuring that you are taking care of your entire body in the right ways?

Do you feel as if your current responsibilities or tasks are overwhelming you?

Are there tasks or responsibilities that you can outsource or delegate to take some of the load off?

Are you going to be willing to ask for support or help in situations where you need it?

If your stress level is going through the roof, then you really need to bring your life back down into a sense of balance again. Find out what you can eliminate from your life to calm things down, and then find some time for yourself. Finding time to take care of yourself is really important in making sure that you do not actually develop an anxiety or panic disorder over time.

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Some of the Types of Personality Disorders

March 7, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Some of the Types of Personality Disorders

There are a wide variety of different personality disorders out there these days, generally characterized by a chemical imbalance in the brain that causes mood swings and other often peculiar behavior. Here is a look at some of the personality disorders that exist.

Borderline Personality Disorder – This personality disorder is also called BPD. This is a serious mental illness that has a lot to do with pervasive instability in behavior, moods, self image as well as interpersonal relationships. The most common method of manifestation for this personality disorder is instability in the person’s sense of self. They constantly see the world in black or white, up and down, love and hate, and cannot help it.

Schizoid Personality – This is a type of psychiatric condition that entails social isolation coupled with an indifference to other people. This personality disorder creates an isolated pattern that tends to be lifelong in nature. People that are suffering from this disorder will completely separate themselves away from all other people as much as they possibly can, and as such they tend to develop a very reclusive nature.

Schizotypal Personality – This personality disorder is primarily characterized by thinking and beliefs that are perceived to be odd or peculiar. People with this personality disorder tend to dress eccentrically and they tend to have odd thoughts, interpersonal style and behavior that does not fit in with the norm.

Paranoid Personality – This psychiatric condition is characterized by the person having a very extreme distrust and suspicion for pretty much everyone else, friends, family, strangers and otherwise. This far surpasses the normal level of paranoia that someone might experience. Someone that has paranoid personality disorder may consistently feel as if they are being persecuted, and they may constantly be afraid that they are being under attack. Paranoid personality disorder can become increasingly worse with time, especially when the paranoid personality feels that someone really is out to get them.

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Symptoms and Side Effects When Beginning an Antidepressant

February 23, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Symptoms and Side Effects When Beginning an Antidepressant

When you decide that you want to start taking a medication to deal with depression, one of the considerations that you are going to want to make is the symptoms and the side effects that occur when you begin taking such a medication. All of these medications are going to take a little bit of time before they begin to work inside of your system, and then at that point the symptoms are going to start to slip away so that you no longer have to struggle with your depression. This period of time can generally take between one week and three, meaning that at first you will still be experience the symptoms of your depression when you begin taking your medication. Do not be discouraged if you do not see the results that you seek right away, just be patient and the symptoms will go away.

After you actually begin taking an antidepressant, something else that you are going to need to consider is the fact that there are some basic side effects that you may end up experiencing. It really depends on what type of medication you are taking, however, and you should be aware of the fact that most of these side effects are only temporary, and they will begin to go away as your body becomes accustomed to the new medication. As long as you continue to take your medication the way that your doctor prescribed it to you, the side effects will dissipate just as your symptoms of depression do, leaving you feeling a whole lot better in the long run.

If you ever have specific concerns or questions about the medication that you are taking, then it would be really smart for you to sit down and talk to your physician. Your physician is going to be able to answer questions for you and help you determine whether what you are feeling is normal or not.

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Mental Health is the Key to Physical Health

February 3, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Mental Health is the Key to Physical Health

Trending for many is the overwhelming need for a healthy lifestyle. While many think of their physical health, most do not think of how they need to keep mentally healthy as well. There are so many things people do to destroy their mental health without realizing it such as exhausting themselves to the point of wearing their nerves thin. Being overworked is something that, despite a high unemployment rate, those in the United States are very good at. Most Americans find themselves working more than resting and running on empty at the end of the week. This is not good for the physical or the mental health of any person.

Parents are the worst culprits for this type of self abuse. They get going all day with work and then have to keep running all night with family putting themselves and their body into a situation where it is working on pure adrenaline or caffeine depending on the situation. It is important than when you are running at the high rate of speed that you take time for mental health breaks as often as possible. Even a five minute relaxing break can help to put you back in perspective and help your body recalibrate to the situation at hand. Without this you are doing nobody any good let alone yourself. It is vital that you take care of your mental and physical health if you want to maintain good physical health. Your physical health can be directly related to your mental health.

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Notes and Considerations on Choosing an Antidepressant

February 1, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Notes and Considerations on Choosing an Antidepressant

Are you suffering from depression, or do you feel that you may be? If so, then you should be aware of the fact that there are a wide selection of different antidepressants and mood stabilizers that you can try. Choosing the appropriate medication needs to be an agreement with you and your physician. Luckily, when you first get started your physician will probably have some valuable insight and guidance for you because they already have experience diagnosing depression and choosing appropriate treatment solutions.

Your doctor is going to consider your own feelings and his or her own experience when choosing a mood stabilizer or an anti depressant to help you deal with what is ailing you. There are four things that might go into the choosing of an appropriate antidepressant or mood stabilizer for you, and these are:

- The past experiences that the doctor has had with an antidepressant or a mood stabilizer.
- The past history that you have had with the antidepressant or a mood stabilizer.
- Family considerations or family history pertaining to the antidepressant or the mood stabilizer.
- Health issues that you may have had that could interfere with the antidepressant or a mood stabilizer.

If your doctor has prescribed a certain antidepressant before, then he or she may recommend the same one since then your physician would be dealing with something already familiar to him or her. The same goes for if you have used an antidepressant in the past that worked for you, since it will be likely to work again. Family considerations mostly matter if you have a family member that has successfully used an antidepressant in the past, since the same product may also work for you as it did for a family member in the past. Health considerations may be the most important considerations, because some antidepressants can react badly if you have certain conditions or are taking certain medications, so exercise full disclosure when telling your physician about your medical history.

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Capgras Delusion: who is This Person?

January 25, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Every so often, a random person whom you have never met before is going to come onto the scene and replace someone whom you are very close to.  Well, not really, but it will seem to be that way if you happen to be afflicted with a mental illness which is known as the Capgras Delusion.  In this disorder of the mind, a person genuinely thinks that some actor or other person has essentially taken over the role in the world of someone who is close to them.  There are a couple of different potential explanation for why this would take place (the delusion, not its belief), but none of them are generally curable.  It has even been featured in popular culture, due to the potentially interesting interactions that it can bring about between the afflicted and the person they believe is an impostor.

There have actually been several instances of women who have come to believe that their husbands have either left or been taken away from them, while another man who is pretending to be their husband has come around to take his place.  While this is almost never the case in anything besides a science fiction movie such as Total Recall, the syndrome makes the entire thing feel just as real as the rising of the Sun or the pain on the wall.

In these kinds of cases, the men who are accused (all of the time) of being nothing more than impostors will either end up leaving for real (since nobody really wants to stay where they are not wanted) or end up in a sort of domestic prison, in which their wives are the warden and they are held captive in a section of their own house, forbidden to enter “her” side.  Such a fate sounds terrible, and the fact that other relatives are properly identified simply thows salt on the wound.  It’s a terrible fate to not be recognized.

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Cotard Delusion: Dead, Seriously?

January 22, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Have you ever gotten the distinct impression that you were a dead person?  Have you ever felt as if you were immortal, and that death had already claimed you the only time that it could ever do so?  Or perhaps you have felt as if you had lost your blood, or your internal organs.  If any of these is the case, you just might be suffering from the Cotard delusion.  This is a nasty little mental illness in which a person believes that they have died, or that some part of them that is vital to their continued life has been removed from their body.  While it is a little bit strange, the entire notion can make sense under its own twisted context.

Consider the possibility that a person might believe themselves to be dead, after they have recently suffered through (and gotten over) a serious type of illness.  In those kinds of scenarios, a person may actually come to believe that, instead of getting over what had previously been wrong with them, they had succumbed to it in some manner or another.  Perhaps they had gotten AIDS, or maybe they had died of some common cause that afflicts the people who have had what they had.  The common theme that underlies this is that they have died, and that everything that has come after this occurrence must be something which is dealing with their spirit and its interaction with the spirit world.

A lot of people believe that bad things are going to happen, but the Cotard delusion is one of the strangest things that a person can honestly think.  To them, the idea that they might still be walking around, despite having lost their internal organs or blood (and despite not having the scars which would probably have been needed for such a process to have taken place) is completely logical and realistic.  It could lead to a whole lot of interesting conversations.

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Lima Syndrome: Showing Mercy

January 18, 2011 By Leave a Comment

If you have ever heard of Stockholm Syndrome, you might think that it is the kind of thing which simply could not work very well in the opposite direction.  But if you did think in that predictable type of way, you would actually be wrong in this regard.  There is actually a mental problem in which the captors come to feel and show sympathy and mercy to their hostages after a time.  Known as Lima Syndrome, the entire basis of the illness is predicated on the notion that when people are taken hostage, their kidnappers can actually become all but infatuated with them out of the blue.  This can, just like any kind of love, even inspre them to do some rather irrational things/

For one thing, a kidnapper who all but loves the people he has kidnapped is not likely to be callous enough to treat them with the sort of disconnected cruelty which a kidnapper is often in need of showing off.  In a dangerous scenario, a captor who actually cares about the people he has taken hostage may even end the entire thing by dropping his weapons and surrendering without inciident, just so that they do not end up getting hurt by what would most certainly turn into a dangerous gun battle.

Back in the 1990s, this issue got its name when a group of raiders took several hundred high profile people hostage at the Japanese diplomat to Peru’s house- in Lima.  While the entire hostage situation lasted for several months, most of the hostages were actually let go after only a few days of it all going on.  The best available explanation for that kind of a happening is that they were showing mercy to the people that they had kidnapped.  So when it came time to name this mysterious way of seeing a group of people, Lima was chosen as the place to be put into the officially recognized nomenclature.

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Beware Of Excessive Focus On Life In Virtual World – It Is Unhealthy For Your Mind

January 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Impact of double life in the virtual world along with normal life is beginning to hurt mankind. While the example below may seem like an extreme, it certainly is indicative of how bad excessive computer usage can be on ones mental health.

A lady was arrested after law enforcement authorities broke into her house only to discover that her pet dogs had died of starvation and children were in a terribly malnourished state. The lady had ignored all her domestic duties and chores and was focused on playing games on the computer.

There is no doubt that such a person is mentally ill and requires treatment rather than punishment. However, it is next to impossible to identify such persons in advance. We all may be ignoring our family and our social and marital responsibilities simply because we are more comfortable on the internet.

In such a scenario, not only should we focus on the harmful effects of the web but we should also focus on improving our mental health. Just as we focus on our physical routine and try to incorporate exercises and strenuous activities to keep our muscles fit, we should indulge in mental activities that will keep our mind sharp.

This is particularly true if we have a relatively sedentary lifestyle. If you have a desk job and if you focus on specific task to be completed within a specified time without any application of creativity or inventiveness, then having a hobby or a sport that put strain on your mind will be a very good thing.

You can always use the web to inculcate these habits. However, always remember that relying on offline sources of entertainment and enjoyment will offer additional advantages. Do not be in a hurry to criticize such advice simply because you are asked to move away from your comfort zone. The internet is good but is not without its share of mental health problems.

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