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Therefore, it is not unreasonable, or necessarily fruitless, to prescribe antidepressant treatment or psychotherapy for people who qualify for neither the diagnosis of Major Depression nor that of Dysthymic Disorder. In fact, some of these other, so-called “depressive spectrum disorders” have been proven responsive to antidepressant medications. (continue reading…)

First, the experience of bereavement is not only virtually universal, but often repeated a number of times during the lifetime of an individual. There are not enough doctors, psychiatrists or psychotherapists to evaluate everyone undergoing a grief reaction as to whether or not this bereaved person has entered the realm of clinical depression. (continue reading…)

If — to use a bit of psychoanalytic jargon I should probably not entitle myself — the internal “object representation” of the lost person is “ambivalently held,” in other words, too equally constituted of love and anger, that anger can turn against the self. Once thought to be the psychological basis of depression, “anger turned inwards” still bears on some differences between depression and normal grief. For example, the depressed person, more than the person bereaved, may show signs of self-hatred, such as inappropriate and excessive guilt, loss of self-esteem, or feelings of worthlessness. (continue reading…)

Grief brings pain. Pain, an experience we usually try to avoid or escape, suggests that something is wrong with the body or mind. But most psychiatrists and psychotherapists consider the pain of grief a normal, in fact necessary, response to loss, not a symptom of mental illness. (continue reading…)