If you're experiencing depression, consistently lowered mood, heightened anxiety, or other mental health symptoms, especially if you don't have a history of it, be sure to rule out physical causes and simple nutritional deficiencies as well with your doctor, in addition to pursuing psychiatric medications and / or therapy.
Especially if frequent tiredness and exhaustion are strong components, you could be experiencing a change in endocrine function, particularly thyroid, a sleep disorder, or any number of other medical conditions.
Sleep disorders especially are often underdiagnosed, and can go untreated for years in lieu of just treating psychiatric symptoms instead (I know this from personal experience). Conditions such as hypothyroidism are often similarly underdiagnosed. So if you're feeling extraordinarily tired all the time, and anemia and other nutritional and medical causes have been ruled out, get your thyroid levels checked and a sleep study done too, or at least bring it up with your doctor.
But also don't hesitate to seek out treatment for mental health problems even if a known medical cause can't be found or has yet to be identified. It's all physiological causes really, but there's a lot we still don't know about the human brain and body, and treating symptoms, especially if they are having a significant negative impact on your quality of life, is just as important as trying to find a cause.
And last but not least since we are talking about depression and depression-related conditions (such as bipolar, etc.), I just wanted to raise a little awareness for borderline (BPD) too. For those of you that have strong emotions, maybe a little impulsive, and/or a troubled childhood and suicidal tendencies, or have people in your life like that, you should find it really worthwhile to read up a bit on BPD:
It's a diagnosis which has gotten a bad but undeserved stigma over the years, that needs better awareness and understanding.
Whether you identify strongly with a BPD profile or not, if you struggle with strong emotions and/or suicidal tendencies in your life, a lot of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) coping strategies and methods might be particularly helpful to you in dealing with those feelings:
Especially if frequent tiredness and exhaustion are strong components, you could be experiencing a change in endocrine function, particularly thyroid, a sleep disorder, or any number of other medical conditions.
Sleep disorders especially are often underdiagnosed, and can go untreated for years in lieu of just treating psychiatric symptoms instead (I know this from personal experience). Conditions such as hypothyroidism are often similarly underdiagnosed. So if you're feeling extraordinarily tired all the time, and anemia and other nutritional and medical causes have been ruled out, get your thyroid levels checked and a sleep study done too, or at least bring it up with your doctor.
But also don't hesitate to seek out treatment for mental health problems even if a known medical cause can't be found or has yet to be identified. It's all physiological causes really, but there's a lot we still don't know about the human brain and body, and treating symptoms, especially if they are having a significant negative impact on your quality of life, is just as important as trying to find a cause.
And last but not least since we are talking about depression and depression-related conditions (such as bipolar, etc.), I just wanted to raise a little awareness for borderline (BPD) too. For those of you that have strong emotions, maybe a little impulsive, and/or a troubled childhood and suicidal tendencies, or have people in your life like that, you should find it really worthwhile to read up a bit on BPD:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borderline_personality_disorder
It's a diagnosis which has gotten a bad but undeserved stigma over the years, that needs better awareness and understanding.
Whether you identify strongly with a BPD profile or not, if you struggle with strong emotions and/or suicidal tendencies in your life, a lot of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) coping strategies and methods might be particularly helpful to you in dealing with those feelings:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialectical_behavioral_therapy
Stay healthy and happy hackers, but don't be afraid to ask friends, family, and professionals for help when you need it either!