Health & Medical Depression

The Varying Symptoms of Depression

People often consider the actual feeling of being depressed as the most definitive indicator of this mental illness among the various symptoms of depression.
What everybody needs to know is that there are other symptoms which can manifest physically.
These are unique to a patient's age, sex and the kind of depression the patient is diagnosed with.
Hence, a female teenager will exhibit signs which are entirely different from that of a male in his 50s.
To conclude that a person is suffering from depression entails ascertaining that the actual feeling of being depressed is accompanied by other symptoms.
Physical Symptoms There is a list of the usual signs that may be observed in people who are suspected of this mental illness.
The list includes the unexplainable feeling of being helpless, changes in sleeping patterns and diet and having low levels of mental focus and liveliness.
However, there are others that manifest only in women.
Relative to men, women are more susceptible to what is called seasonal affective disorder which is depression that sets in during the coldest months of the year, particularly in winter.
The physical signs that are observable in women also run a different course.
A classic example is atypical depression which is characterized by women who sleep and eat more.
As a result, they gain more weight as opposed to patients who get thinner because they eat and sleep less.
Symptoms in Older Adults As we age, we are subjected to more physiological, emotional and social strains such as ailments and deaths of people we grew up with.
These are more evident in older people and the elderly and could readily cause them to enter a state of depression.
The signs you will usually see in older people are very different as they do not even exhibit any changes in their emotions, such as sadness or being depressed.
Hence, for an individual who constantly interacts with older adults or the elderly, it is crucial to be very conscious of the telltale signs in their group to immediately address the problem.
The usual indicators for their age group include constant headaches, worsening body pains, increasing stints of unease and bad temper and a fixation for criticizing.
Depression occurs in some people at a more hyper level.
They are often diagnosed as having manic depression.
Their indicators of depression are very distinct and can be easily detected by a person who is knowledgeable about this type of depression.
Manic depressive patients often have a series of mood swings with interchanging enthusiasm and depression that go for weeks.
When depressed, a manic-depressive shows the usual indications of depression.
When symptoms of depression and mania kick in, the person starts talking at a very fast pace, becomes overactive or acts impulsively.


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