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"clinical" depression is meaningless. Literally, it has no meaning. Perhaps you mean "Diagnosed by a real doctor", as opposed to "self diagnosed from a check list"? But when we look at depression diagnosed by experts we see a variety of forms, and a variety of strengths. I agree that well meaning people sometimes offer really bad advice. But advice about developing a healthy lifestyle (being careful with caffeine, alcohol, recreational drugs; eating better; sorting out sleep; getting exercise) and developing a social life are important, because these thing help people with very serious, life threatening, illness. In combination with therapy they can be part of an effective cure for many people. (At least leaving others with several years of recovery). If needed, this advice can be combined with medication. And, if needed, all of this stuff can be started if the patient is in hospital. (At least in England all MH hospitals should have programmes of OT to start social life outside hospital and they should have some kind of exercise stuff, and contacts with local gyms.) I've known people who are ill enough to require electro convulsive therapy and they said that this other stuff was important to them, but that they needed help to apply it. And that's the important thing. Saying "I am to ill to do this stuff" is not the same as saying "this stuff would not be helpful to me if I did it". What people need is help to apply this stuff. |
Sure, and it does vary a lot. So perhaps I meant to say severe vs. mild.
People overstate these things to a degree. Like I said, sure they help, but it's scratching the surface IMHO. What's more important is to attack the depression itself, directly.
And, though anecdotal, I've been through periods being severely depressed despite going to the gym a lot, and eating relatively well, and had it make very little difference. I've also socialised a lot and had that make no difference. So this isn't just conjecture.
I guess part of it is that it varies from person to person. Also the degree of the depression at any given time waxes and wanes.
And agreed, a key thing is to admit you can't do it all by yourself, and go and get help.
The key thing, however, is for people to lose that attitude of 'go get a life doing things I think are healthy/fun and you'll be happy' because, basically, that's b.s. projection, and for some it borders on blame-the-victim mentality.
I think diseases like depression are particularly problematic because people don't take them seriously and imagine that they're not all that serious, perhaps slightly made up, or not as solid and easy to diagnose and understand as a physical illness. Perhaps people need to come to respect it more.