Homely ways to Prevent Depression

Depression is quite a common occurrence due to several cause, specially among young people. In this blog I write about the home remedies and non medicinal ways to prevent and manage depression.

Firstly, we have to consider that depression occur due to some serious cause which is unavoidable and you can’t just avoid it or forget it. It comes in your mind repeatedly and keeps your mood down.

There are several drugs which can benefit in this situation but in this article, we are discussing management options apart from drugs. Jumping to the management options that you can do at your home, I am listing some options below

1. BRIGHT LIGHT THERAPY (BLT)

This therapy comprise of providing bright light to the patients. A meta-analysis of bright light therapy commissioned by the American Psychiatric Association found a significant reduction in depression symptom severity associated with bright light treatment. Benefit was found for both seasonal affective disorder (in this disorder, patient is depressed at same time each year) and for nonseasonal depression, with effect sizes similar to those for conventional antidepressants.
For non-seasonal depression, adding light therapy to the standard antidepressant treatment was not effective.
Dr Penders, who was the lead investigator on a systematic review and meta-analysis of BLT,explained that he and his colleagues treated patients with nonseasonal depression with BLT in the morning and found it to be helpful. His team found “a fair amount of evidence to show that BLT in the morning had a beneficial effect on depression,” as he said.
A combination therapy of BLT and Fluoxetine can be well tolerated in Adult depression and has consistent effect.

2. EXERCISE

A review of clinical evidence and guidelines for the management of depression with exercise therapy was published in June 2015. It noted that the available evidence on the effectiveness of exercise therapy for depression suffers from some limitations; nonetheless, it stated that there is clear evidence of efficacy in the reduction of depressive symptoms. The review also noted that patient characteristics, the type of depressive disorders, and the nature of the exercise program all affect the antidepressant properties of exercise therapy.

3. MEDITATION AND MUSIC

Meditation has been found to change certain brain regions that are specifically linked with depression. For instance, scientists have shown that the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) becomes hyperactive in depressed people. The mPFC is often called the “me center” because this is where you process information about yourself, such as worrying about the future and ruminating about the past. When people get stressed about life, the mPFC goes into overdrive.
Another way meditation helps the brain is by protecting the hippocampus (a brain area involved in memory). One study discovered that people who meditated for 30 minutes a day for eight weeks increased the volume of gray matter in their hippocampus, and other research has shown that people who suffer from recurrent depression tend to have a smaller hippocampus.
A 2009 review found that 3 to 10 sessions of music therapy resulted in a noticeable improvement in depressive symptoms, with still greater improvement after 16 to 51 sessions.

4. SLEEP

Best way to avoid depression is to temporary shut yourself down and that is, sleep. It can make you fresh and reset your mind.
Sleep has a strong effect on mood. When you don’t get enough sleep, your depression symptoms will be worse. Sleep deprivation exacerbates irritability, moodiness, sadness, and fatigue. Make sure you’re getting enough sleep each night. Very few people do well on less than seven hours a night. It will be optimum if the sleep is between seven to nine hours each night.

Depression is sometimes associated with insomnia – (difficulty in falling asleep, early waking, or waking in the middle of the night). The combination of these two results, depression and insomnia, will only worsen the situation. Thus, you should maintain a regular sleep routines, avoidance of stimulants such as caffeine and management of sleeping disorders such as sleep apnea.

5. ESSENTIAL FATTY ACIDS

A 2016 review found that if trials with formulations containing mostly Eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) are separated from trials using formulations containing Docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), it appeared that EPA may have an effect .

EPA is obtained in the human diet by eating oily fish or fish oil, e.g. cod liver, herring, mackerel, salmon, menhaden and sardine, and various types of edible algae. It is also found in human breast milk.

6. HAVE FUN, WATCH MOVIES, KEEP YOURSELF BUSY

These are quite common methods you know and you can easily get all these methods in internet.

You can read 5 Ultimate Points: How To Cope With Failures

Anyways, beating mild to moderate depression can be achieved by the above ways but it is really difficult to beat moderate to severe depression. So, if the above ways are not giving the result, do not hesitate to go to psychiatrist. Remember, we all should give equal importance to mental health and we all should take these matters seriously. In India, its common not to go to psychiatrist for several causes including social embarrassment. After all, drugs can only resolve or control depression. So, to choose drug and to give best possible regimen, it is the work of psychiatrist who can do it efficiently.

Author: Dr. Dipan Samanta

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