| This is not medical advice. In England front line treatment for depression is a talking therapy. This would normally be cognitive behaviour therapy, butthere are others. This works best one to one, face to face, with an experienced practitioner. But some people like and get benefit from group therapy, or from telephone provided sessions, or even self-guided by book or website. Meds should help. The side effects can be unpleasant and you need to be able to be honest with your clinicians about what the side effects are and if you're taking the meds. It's really important to hold onto the idea of hope. Things feel overwhelming at the moment, but recovery is possible. Once recovery has started you might want to look at "resiliance" - ways to protect yourself in future. This might be taking part in team sports or gardening or meditation or putting in place some stuff around work. People talk a lot about the curative powers of exercise for depression, but we don't have enough evidence to show that exercise is a cure. http://www.cochrane.org/CD004366/DEPRESSN_exercise-for-depre... > When only high-quality trials were included, exercise had only a small effect on mood that was not statistically significant. Exercise probably won't hurt, but don't beat yourself up about it if you're not exercising. Here's a nice UK website discussing "talking therapies". http://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/content/assets/PDF/publicatio... Here's the recommendations for treatment of depression in adults in England. http://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg90 If you want a book for cbt I've heard "Mind over Mood" is a useful workbook, although it's probably for the milder end or in conjunction with a therapist. I've heard "mood Gym", and Australian website, is also good. https://moodgym.anu.edu.au/welcome There are other computer guided therapies. It's a good idea to check the research because some of them are not very good. The Cochrane Collaboration has checked some computer cbt programmes for anxiety or depression. It's great that you are doing something to tackle this health problem! Good Luck! |