Depression Self-Assessment: Shine Light On Your Mental Health
At some point in their lives, everyone will experience sadness or feel depressed. These emotions are normal reactions to life’s obstacles or a loss. However, when feelings of severe sadness (feeling helpless, hopeless, and worthless) continue for weeks to months and hinders you from properly living your life, it could be a sign that it’s more than just sadness. You could have clinical depression, a treatable neurochemical condition. Depression, also known as major depressive disorder, is a common but potentially serious condition that can negatively impact how you feel, think, and behave.
How do I know if I have depression?
All of us will occasionally feel hopeless, sad, or depressed at times. These are normal and natural responses to challenging events and circumstances. But when these emotions persist long beyond the stressful events and evolve into overwhelming weights or begin causing physical symptoms, they can hinder you from living a normal, active, joyful life.
If you’re feeling this way, it may be an indication that it’s time to seek help.
If you suspect you may be suffering from depression the first place to go is your regular doctor. There they can properly assess you for clinical depression and begin to develop a plan to help manage symptoms. If left untreated, clinical depression may worsen and last for months if not years.
Recognizing symptoms of depression is vital in order to begin managing symptoms and feeling like yourself again. Some common symptoms of depression include:
- Brain fog such as issues concentrating, recalling details, and making decisions
- Fatigue or little energy
- Feelings of guilt, worthlessness, and helplessness
- Hopelessness
- Finding little interest in things that previously were enjoyable
- Insomnia
- Sleeping too much
- Irritability
- Overeating or poor appetite
- Loss of interest in once pleasurable activities
- Appetite increase or decrease
- Headaches, body aches, or cramps
- Digestive issues
- Persistent sad, empty, or anxious feelings
- Suicidal thoughts or actions
An important note to understand is that feeling sad doesn’t instantly point to clinical depression. Clinical depression is a condition that compromises not only a person’s mood, but sleep patterns, energy level, appetite, ability to concentrate, and overall motivation.
Take the Depression Self-Assessment
For each of the following questions, you will be asked to select one of the following options to indicate the frequency of your symptoms: never, very rarely, rarely, occasionally, frequently, or always. Your unique answers will then be used to calculate your results and determine whether your symptoms are mild, moderate, or severe. Further unique educational information will be shown in accordance with your results, and all results are strictly confidential.
Please note and acknowledge that this self-assessment is not intended to establish a physician-patient relationship, to replace the services of a trained physician or health care professional, or otherwise to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The aim of this quiz is to provide education about the condition. By filling out this self-assessment and clicking “calculate” you acknowledge that you’ve read and agree with this statement and agree to re-origin’s Terms & Conditions.
Take the Depression Self-assessment
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How often do you find yourself:
Can depression be healthy?
Living depression allows you to look at it from all possible angles — both positive and negative. Depression influences everyone in diverse ways. Whether you’re encountering mild or extreme symptoms, it can be useful to examine this disorder from other mindsets. We are always looking to avoid challenges and discomfort however, it’s thanks to life’s ample setbacks that we can discover and develop ourselves. The same can be said of depression, it can be a means of personal growth.
Occasional feelings of sadness or mild depression can:
- Provide time and space for self-reflection
- Reevaluate personal perspectives and goals
- Increases empathy and compassion
- Develop coping skills
If someone decides to adopt a new perspective of depression and sadness it is still crucial to seek help That being said, if you are experiencing moderate to severe depressive symptoms, such as suicidal ideation, contact your doctor immediately or call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
Health risk related to depression?
The discomfort and anxiety-inducing symptoms of depression can negatively impact a person’s mental well-being. Considerable chronic illnesses have also been connected to elevated rates of depression, including:
- chronic pain
- arthritis
- heart disease
- diabetes
- thyroid disease
- stroke
- cancer
- multiple sclerosis
- Alzheimer’s disease
- dementia
- Parkinson’s disease
- Huntington’s disease
Depression can also negatively impact your physical as well as emotional well-being. For instance, depression has been shown to increase the chance of developing numerous other conditions through extended periods of increased levels of stress hormones such as adrenaline or cortisol. Increased stress hormones can impact your immune system, making you susceptible to infection. The symptoms of clinical depression can also cause extensive emotional damage which can increase the risk of substance use disorder.
Overcoming Depression
There are many treatment options when trying to overcome depression and its symptoms. The common treatment method is through medications prescribed by your doctors such as SSRIs, antidepressants, anxiolytic, and antipsychotic medications. The medical field also implements methods to normalize abnormal brain functioning and chemical levels such as cognitive-behavioral therapy and psychotherapy. The most common interventions and recommendations include:
- Psychiatry or psychology with a qualified mental health provider
- Seeking support from family members or a loved one or joining a support group
- Apps are becoming increasingly common because of their widespread accessibility
- Medication prescribed by a medical practitioner
- Meditation and other mind-body therapies
- Neuroplasticity or brain retraining
Neuroplasticity or “brain retraining” exercises for depression
From a neurobiological viewpoint, depression is the incarnation of a fatigued, overworked brain, specifically an overloaded limbic system. Maladaptive neural pathways can keep us locked in a chronic loop of depression and hopelessness. With the neuroplasticity program at re-origin, you can learn specific neurocognitive exercises, so you can systematically work to create new, healthy neural pathways and get back to a place of balance where normal thought processes, feelings, and reactions can resume. re-origin’s approach does not chase or mask symptoms but rather works to rewire the part of the brain that is causing the dysfunction (the limbic system), resulting in long-lasting recovery.