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Causes of depression
It's all in the mind:
Causes of depression
14/10/11 15:00 View entire series at: It's All In The Mind
It’s All In The Mind is a series of helping tools for doing pastoral care with people suffering from mental illness. It is written by Kirk Vette from Shore Vineyards Churches, who is a clinical worker for YouthLine NZ. Kirk and his wife, Caroline, live in Auckland with their three children and on his day's off you will find him sneaking off for a surf.
Causes of depression
It is important here not to rush to any conclusions about what may be the cause of a person’s depression. Sometimes a person may become depressed from a single event or may become depressed over time. There are often a several reasons for a person’s depression.
There are three areas that can influence a person’s likely hood of becoming depressed. They are called risk factors. These are family history, lifestyle choices and life events. (www.depression.org.nz)
- Firstly family history, this includes a history of abuse in the family and / or a history of depression in the family.
- Life style choices that may cause depression include excessive alcohol consumption, recreational or party drugs, social isolation, lack of sleep,poor diet , lack of exercise and stress.
- Life events include death or loss of someone close, relationship break-ups, traumatic, often life threatening events, financial pressure, unemployment, serious accidents (particularly head injuries) or long-term illness, some medication (check with your doctor),stress or problems at work, school or university, bullying or abuse, some women experience depression during pregnancy or after childbirth
Understanding that some of these areas may be the cause of depression helps to identify those that are relevant and address them. John Kirwin does an excellent job on the depression.org.nz website of helping people to identify the risk factors and then what treatment there is that may be appropriate to help. (depression.org.nz)