Depression Is a Flaw in Love

I can't say enough about this clip of Andrew Solomon speaking about depression from a TED Talks from December 2013. 

It requires amazing courage to write about one's experience with severe depression, or in his words "an illness of how you feel." 

Nevertheless, it is an illness; he reminds us that it is the leading disability world wide, and people die of it every day.

Here are some extraordinary bits of wisdom I will always want to remember.

• Opposite of depression isn't happiness. Vitality is its opposite. 

• Depression is a flaw in love.
• Quote from another sufferer: Depression is "a slower way of being dead."
• True clinical depression is characterized by delusional perceptions.
• For the depressed, truth lies. An example: We will all die eventually, but it's not necessary that we dwell on it because it keeps us from living.
• Our needs are our biggest assets. I hope to experience this some time soon.
• What are our treatment options for depression? Chemical cure or psychological cure?
  Neither are very effective and inaccessible to the poor, who are more likely to suffer from depression as a result of poverty-created environmental stressors.
• Treatment for depression (talk therapy) is expensive.
• Side effects from antidepressant medications keep people away from its imperfect solution, even though many people do benefit from pharmacotherapy.
• Sadness, grief and depression are often confused. Grief is a reactive response to loss, which resolve over time. Time heals.
• Sadness is sadness. But depression is much too much sadness.
• Depression can be triggered by catastrophic loss.
  
  http://andrewsolomon.com/