Former counselor here: I think it's important to differentiate between short term anti-depressant use and long term use. Short term use can be effective for motivating you to do all the non-medication things that have evidence of working (particularly together).
Long term use is typically associated with the worst side effects - both the well known things as well as how some may (edit: at least partially) block one's ability to develop and change/grow (1). Further, long term use is not associated with any meaningful enhancement of quality of life (2) and can often be a crutch - because while it alters mood it does nothing about the underlying cognitive patterns which are so ruinous for one's social life.