«In depression, sadness is not always the main symptom»

mood disorders They are known for having the ability to take on many different forms. Among these, depression is one of the most frequent, and sometimes difficulties when it comes to distinguishing it from normal sadness can keep many people who need professional help from going to therapy.

on this occasion We talked about the topic of depression with the psychologist Begoña Fernández Secoshe, a psychotherapy professional residing in Madrid and with more than 15 years of experience in this field.

• Related article: "Types of depression: its symptoms, causes and characteristics"

Interview with Begoña Fernández: the complexity of depression

Begona Fernandez Seco She is a General Health Psychologist and Director of the Begoña Fernández Psychology Center, located in Madrid. In these lines, she tells us about her experience as a professional of hers who has spent many years helping people with depression.

Is it very common that depression arises without having its cause in a clear event, such as a separation, a layoff or the death of a family member?

Yes, it is quite common. In fact, it is frequent that the symptoms of depression appear some time after a precipitating event, and therefore, that the patient does not see the relationship between your current symptoms and what is happening in your life at that moment, especially if the present circumstances are favorable.

In these cases, it will be necessary to find out if in the recent past, he has gone through a difficult situation or perhaps he has been accumulating several stressful episodes that have kept him in a fighting attitude.

It is often taken for granted that people with depression are very sad. Are there cases in which the person with depression does not feel sad, but experiences other symptoms?

Sadness is one of the most frequent symptoms of depression, but it is not the only one, and it is not always the main one either. Sometimes he gets ahead of the sadness, irritability, reluctance or lack of energy and motivation to do everyday things day to day, guilt, feeling of failure, blockage, difficulty making decisions simple. Sometimes the person goes from one emotion to another in a relatively short period of time, and this can lead to feeling even more confused.

What is usually done in psychotherapy to help a person with major depression?

Major depression is a disorder in which the person has a negative vision of himself, the world around him, and also a pessimistic vision of the future. This negative vision leads you to have automatic negative thoughts about yourself and your circumstances and to distort reality and the way you interpret what happens to you.

Psychotherapy teaches the person tools to realize and change the dysfunctional, exaggerated and refusal to interpret what happens to him, looking for alternatives to his way of thinking about what is happening to him occurs. It also works with the behavioral part, to act in such a way that it brings you closer to achieving your goals.

On the emotional side, psychotherapy helps not to fight against negative emotions, and to learn to see the relationship between what we feel and what we think.

Is the improvement process slow? How is it developing?

Depression is not a disorder we can get rid of overnight. The degree of hopelessness that the individual has will be key to the duration. That is why it is important to work with the feeling of hopelessness, because if we think that circumstances will improve in the future, this vision will help us get out of depression sooner.

Another circumstance that benefits is having a good social and family network, especially so as not to falling into self-absorption and self-attention to the symptoms that is usually so common in this disorder mental. Also rewarding activities, even if they are done with little desire, help the person not to fall into recurring and looping negative thoughts.

In your experience as a psychologist, do you think that friends and relatives of patients with depression tend to hold these people responsible for their own suffering?

It is less and less frequent to hear from family or friends phrases such as: "This is not a big deal", "You have to do your part", "You have a lot of story" or "You are very weak". But until recently, when there was less information, it was a disease that was not widely understood by people in general.

What ideas about this psychological disorder do you think it is necessary to disseminate more, so that people with depression feel more understood and have it easier to improve?

To begin with, the sentences written in the previous section, since in most cases, it is the patients themselves who say all these statements, and not so much those around them.

Improvement does not depend on the will, on "trying" to be better or on "doing our part", but on learning to think and act in such a way that it is useful and adaptive. Let it be realistic. And that the patient, who normally sees no way out, manages to contemplate varied and different ways of thinking and acting to get out of the loop they are getting into.