Depression Therapy

Are Depression Symptoms Wrecking Your Quality Of Life?

Do you often feel irritable, have low energy, and avoid being around people? Perhaps you’ve noticed a lack of enthusiasm for activities that you used to enjoy. In fact, you may have stopped caring about many things that were once important to you and get little joy out of anything lately. As these feelings worsen, your work performance may be suffering, leading you to feel like a failure on top of a lack of motivation.

Perhaps you’re a stay-at-home parent who doesn’t feel fully present for your children. You may lack fulfillment in your life, wondering if your loved ones would be better off without you. Unable to feel a sense of purpose, you may even become preoccupied with thoughts of suicide, running away, or death in general. You don’t want to go on feeling this way, but you can’t seem to snap out of it.

Whether you are working full-time at an office or at home, maybe you wake up each day with a sense of dread, not wanting to face the tasks that lie ahead of you. Even getting out of bed, getting dressed, taking a shower, and going through the motions of basic self-care activities seem to require an exorbitant amount of energy you just don’t have. If you could, you’d rather just waste time on your phone or computer, avoid meetings and all things work-related, not return calls or texts, and possibly even drink to numb your emptiness. 

Are you tired of living this way? And are you ready to use the little energy you have to reach out to someone who can help you better manage your depression symptoms and enjoy life again?

Many Adults Are Affected By Clinical Depression

Depression isn’t necessarily caused by a specific, tragic event. In the past 12 months, 6.7% of adults (or 1 in 15) have suffered a major depressive episode. Depression can manifest in many different ways, but some of the most common symptoms are losing ambition, energy, and persistent irritability, sometimes caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. For others, the root cause can be circumstantial—significant life events such as changing jobs, relocating, toxic relationships, addiction, and other psychological problems.

Unfortunately, there is added stigma of shame around asking for help, especially if our lives appear comfortable and affluent. You may be asking, “How can I be depressed when my life looks so easy?” But it is easy to feel you don’t measure up in a culture that places so much emphasis on what I call “The 3 A’s”: Autonomy (being self-sufficient), Appearance (looking successful), and Achievement (perfect parent/career/social status). 

Fortunately, working with a licensed depression therapist can help you to feel authentic and happy with yourself. You can learn skills to help liberate yourself from patterns and circumstances that may worsen your clinical depression and follow through on goals to help improve your life.

Depression Therapy Can Help Change Your Life For The Better

Therapy can help activate a person’s own internal resources and drive. As an experienced depression therapist, I can enable you to make sense of and normalize your feelings and help you recognize certain patterns or behaviors that may worsen depressed feelings. I can also teach you how to take action to move out of depression toward mental wellness.

Through depression therapy, we will target any false beliefs, such as thinking your life will never change, that you are inadequate, or broken somehow. And I will provide a supportive and sympathetic ear to validate the pain you are experiencing. Before therapy begins, I will give you a professional assessment so that you can understand yourself better and I can understand how your depression affects you. We will collaborate on what to address first, based on your goals and preferences.

I also implement Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to help my clients recognize the interplay between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors in the onset and continuation of clinical depression. CBT can help you learn and implement new strategies and ways of coping with difficult situations and uncomfortable emotions. I also use a technique known as Schema Therapy, which looks more deeply at events from your past and how they may play a part in your present difficulties. 

My practice is compassionate, non-judgmental, and patient. I provide gentle encouragement so that we can overcome your feelings of hopelessness and low energy. My approach is not to emphasize diagnoses and labels, but instead, I seek to understand people in the context of their unique history, personality, and circumstances. I utilize a wide variety of assessments to help provide a highly tailored treatment strategy. And I will help you develop a plan of action to bring you out of isolation and re-learn to enjoy so you can rediscover a sense of purpose and fulfillment. 

Everyone can learn to cope more effectively so that upsetting events in life do not spiral into depression. You, too, can learn to feel more confident and less afraid of life’s inevitable difficulties and know how to recognize your own needs and values. You don’t have to live a life of hopelessness and isolation any longer.

You May Have Some Concerns About Depression Therapy…

How will talking about depression help me?

Our discussions will focus not only on the symptoms but on solutions. I will help you build resiliency and/or remove certain patterns or behaviors that worsen your depression. Talking about your depression in the context of how you want your life to look can help you make beneficial and necessary changes.

How will depression therapy help if it can’t change my circumstances? 

It is not always the circumstances that worsen depression but the mindset of being trapped that results in a lot of our sadness. While depression therapy will not directly change your circumstances, it can empower and equip you to feel and behave differently towards a situation.

I don’t know where to start; I’m just too exhausted to bring myself to see someone.

This is a normal feeling for someone struggling with depression. Seeing a depression therapist means taking a stance against the discouraging voice of depression and signals the start of your recovery. And that alone can already be empowering.

Call To Schedule Your Appointment With A Depression Therapist

If you are ready to receive help for your clinical depression, you can reach me at 936-444-6710 or by email lloyd@reconnectcounseling.com. I offer a free 15-minute phone consultation to see if we are a good fit.