Our mental health affects how we think, feel, and constant daily choices. According to the Psychiatric Association (PDSKJI) survey (2019), it is estimated that around 9 million diagnosed Indonesians suffer from mental health. Feeling a massive mood shift and not being able to think properly; unknowingly suffering from
mental health due to the lack of awareness and understanding toward mental health, the majority of them are unable to speak up about their issue, leaving them to deal with their own mental health on their own without knowing what is actually happening.
So what exactly is depression?
Depression is a mental illness that experiences the feeling of sadness or loss of interest in activities that they normally enjoy. This illness will affect people emotionally and physically; major impacts on their everyday routine and motivations. Depression is too complex to understand especially because the majority of the people suffering from depression feel it for no absolute reason. When left untreated, it can go on for a lifetime. However, people may be aware of their depression due to their family history of mental illness.
People are yet still doubtful when it comes to the seriousness of depression. Little do they know that depression is more than just feeling sad, according to WebMD (2020), it can be damaging to the brain in the long term resulting in several parts of the brain shrinking. When the brain shrinks, they will experience memory problems and trouble concentrating. Nevertheless, researchers have found that people that hadn't had depression in years found the less gray volume on the brain.
It is really important to address common myths and stigma of depression that you may have heard of. Depression is not just one type of mental illness, but there are other varieties of depression that many people are suffering from, therefore different people will experience depression with different levels of severity. Here are common myths and stigma statements that you may be aware of.
1. Being sad is equivalent to depression
Although depression and sadness are linked, they are not the same. Feeling sadness is part of being human, especially when you are having a hard time due to loss and problems; sadness is a normal reaction that quickly fades a good cry or venting out frustrations and has no big impact on your life. Whilst depression is categorized as a mental illness for a reason. Depression is uncontrolled to the point that it can happen for no reason. You will experience a major shift in your mood, not being able to understand yourself and your surroundings. Due to different types of depression, they can feel worthless, unreasonably guilty, angry, or even feeling emotionally numb. Depression can react up to more than two weeks depending on how chronic it is and doesn't usually go away when untreated which will eventually have a major impact on your life.
2. People with depression are mentally weak
This is a myth because even highly motivated and successful people have experienced depression. This negative belief that depression is equivalent to being mentally weak has increased this stigma that can interfere with people speaking up about depression and this prevents them from getting the help and support that they need.
3. Sad situation leads to depression
Events that are considered sad and traumatic that people may have experienced have a higher risk of depression, however, this is not always the case. As mentioned previously, depression is uncontrolled and happens at random occasions to the point that some people experiencing depression may lead to suicidal tendencies, even when life is going really well.
4. Taking antidepressants will cure depression
According to the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (2020), how antidepressant work is to increase the availability of the chemicals messenger in the brain, since experts believe that the cause of depression is due to the imbalance of neurotransmitters such as serotonin that are not able to properly pass the signals along the nerves. However, the effectiveness is still doubtful. There are studies that involve adults with moderate to severe depression. The results were from 100 people with depression, 40 to 60 people that took antidepressant have improved, while people with the placebo effect have improved by 20 to 40. Antidepressants do help decrease the risk of depression from getting worse, but unfortunately, when people start to feel as though their depression is diminished, they stop taking their medication which could risk their depression to come back or become even worse. Therefore, antidepressants do help diminish the symptoms of depression but not everyone with depression will be able to be cured with it.
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Mental health is still commonly misunderstood, especially when it comes with depression. Due to the misconception of mental health, people with depression have difficulties in acknowledging their problems and is consumed with fear of discrimination from their own families, friends, and people surrounding them. There's a presence of fear of discrimination until now because we haven't entirely broken the stigma of mental health and the only way to break it is through awareness and educating others about it. Social media have impacted society worldwide and have opened everyones eyes with the exposure of the truth of mental health. Please seek help if you feel like any of the things above have similarities to what you have.
