My Speech: Kept Under Wraps: A Hidden Epidemic

Imagine if you will, a teenage girl preparing for a date, a businessman sitting in a board meeting, or a grandmother waiting for her grandchild to arrive. These people appear to have nothing in common. Looking past the surface you find that they have one all too common link many Americans share. Depression affects millions of people with no regard to age, sex, race, religion, or social status. I am one of them. While I have never been formally diagnosed, I have researched this disorder for five years. I am here today to help you understand what depression is, what the warning signs are, and what is being done to treat it.
A major misconception is that depression is something a person could help if they really wanted to. Most, if not all, depression sufferers would be glad to tell you just how wrong that statement is. There are many theories as to what triggers depression but all lead back to a single cause, an imbalance of chemicals in the brain. Yes, the Zoloft commercial may indeed prove to be true. Triggers are thought to include stress, various medications, and certain diseases. Stress is, by far, the most common trigger for depression sufferers. Chronic stress often leads to longer and more frequent depressive spells and is the hardest to treat. If the main trigger is a medication, stopping use of the offending drug will usually clear the symptoms. Diseases that can trigger depression include hypothyroidism and anemia.
Symptoms of depression are often mild and may include: concentration problems, slowing of speech or thoughts, difficulty with things you do every day, and sleep pattern changes. Depression in children shows itself in even subtler ways than in an adult. A child may complain of vague pains, cry over small things, or even lose weight. Doctors often do not even recognize these as being symptoms of depression so it takes diligence to get a sure diagnosis. Seeing signs of depression in a loved one is often easier than realizing your own. Because symptoms are mild and generally internal it is easy for individuals to hide their depression from others even though it is detrimental to their mental and physical health. While doctors are unsure as to why, untreated depression increases the risk of stroke and possibly heart disease.
Methods of treatment vary based on the type and severity of an individual’s depression. Psychotherapy, more commonly known as talk therapy, is considered the first step of treatment. Often taking place in groups, an individual is encouraged to talk about what they are feeling in hope that they will be more able to deal with their feelings in a healthy way. Medications are considered a last resort no matter how dramatized their usage has become. Recent studies have shown that children and teens have a higher risk of suicide when first starting or stopping the usage of medications. All medications work by correcting the imbalance that causes depression. The most commonly recommended medications are SSRIs. That is short for Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. They have the fewest and most tolerable side effects. A notable SSRI is Zoloft. Another type of medication is monoamine oxidase inhibitors or MAOI. They have the highest amount of side effects and are most often prescribed after other medications have failed to work. There are no notable names in this group because of this. Herbal remedies are not recommended by the FDA but we all know how their track record has been recently.
In conclusion I hope you now know what depression is, what the warning signs are, and what is being done to treat it. Studies have shown that less than one-third of people suffering from depression actually seek treatment for it. If you or a loved one is suffering from depression I encourage further study.

Too long without a post.... So what

I haven't had much to say and there aren't many people that even look at this so :P
I dyed my hair red. Yeah so you're saying So what right about now. It's an unnatural red. It's kinda burgundyish. I love it. It's too bad it's not going to last very long. Weird colors don't last very long unless you bleach your hair within an inch of it's life. I can't wait until I can finally bleach my hair and dye it blue. I was going to do black with blue tips but unless I get some help and some very detailed instructions I will just do a bleach job with blue tips or streaks or something. I found out I can get haircolor junk at Sally's. I'm going to go there and bug the people that work there so I can figure out what kind of developer and bleach I need to use. What happens if you just use clorox? And if you use the color-safe kind would it not do anything? :) Yes I realize I have a weird and sick mind. I wish I could get my camera to capture the color of my hair but it keeps making it show up black. I guess I can't take a shower until Sunday to shock the church. I should tease it into an afro so it really stands out LOL! The best part about the dye is that it is dark at the roots and gets gradually lighter the whole way down.
I got some new earrings for when I can finally change out the piercing ones. Why do you have to wait 6 weeks to change them out? It doesn't make sense to me. I think mine are healed up already so why can't I change them yet? Because the earring industry enjoys surpressing the pierced ears of America into waiting 6 flippin' weeks to change out the stupid piercing earrings. I liked mine until about a week ago. Then they have just been more and more annoying. Most people haven't even noticed that I got my ears pierced. The kids I watch are the only ones that didn't need me to point it out to them. So stupid. Oh well it's not like the members of the church I go to even noticed when I dyed my hair light auburn. It turned out a bright red that was still natural. Maybe the unnatural red will get attention? They also didn't notice much when I came to church with a "nose piercing". It was funny because half the youth group thought I actually pierced my nose. Yeah they don't know me that well.
So there you have it. A long-winded pointless blog. I can go on and on about nothing too :P