2023-2024学年高中英语外研版时文阅Surviving a Fierce Depressive Episode 学案

Surviving a Fierce Depressive Episode For many, depression can be severe. There is hope. KEY POINTS Depression can be serious and even life-threatening. More help exists than ever before for treatment-resistant depression. If someone is experiencing serious depression, it is vital that they reach out for help. "It must be something else." This is a comment I hear often from those experiencing significant depression. While it is true that depression often travels with accomplices (the most typical of which are anxiety disorders, OCD, and PTSD), people often underestimate how intense a depressive episode can be. In our culture, the term depression is sometimes unfortunately used outside its clinical context. Someone might say they feel "depressed" because it's raining or because the Cardinals are losing. However, depressive disorders can be quite severe and are never something to be dismissed. According to the World Health Organization, depression is the leading cause of disability in the world (Friedrich, 2017). Around 31 percent of individuals diagnosed with major depression and 34 percent of those with bipolar disorder will attempt suicide within their lifetime (Dong et al., 2019; Dong et al., 2020). Of all psychiatric diagnoses, depression is most associated with death by suicide. Depression can be life-threatening. Severe depression is also sometimes linked to alterations in sensory and information integration called psychosis. This particular type of psychosis tends to take on a dark, depressive-congruent quality. For example, a person may experience persecutory delusions, such as a belief that the people around them hate them and are trying to harm them, or they hear unkind voices. As many as 10 percent of individuals with major depressive disorder (Dold et al., 2019) and 63 percent of those diagnosed with bipolar will experience psychotic features (Aminioff et al., 2022). It is important not to underestimate depression. Yet, many recover from even the most s