Depression in Older Adults

Depression in Older Adults
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Depression in Older Adults
By definition, depression refers to a mood disorder in an individual that causes a constant feeling of sorrow and loss of interest. Depression basically affects the feeling, behavior and thinking of a person. Moreover, this disorder can lead to other physical and emotional problems. People with depression tend to experience hurdles in their day to day activities and sometimes some of them cease to understand the meaning of living. However, depression is not only about feelings. Depression changes the life of an individual by making him function differently and may also not enjoy life like before. Moreover, depression may also make someone to feel lifeless, or even angry and restless in the cases of men. Therefore, it may interfere with the ability of someone to work, sleeping and even on the appetite.
However, it might be difficult and challenging addressing the issue of depression in life but on the other hand long-term treatment, psychological counseling and medication may offer a solution to a depressed patient. It is more important as a patient to discover the symptoms, causes and treatment of depression in order to deal with it in the best way. Depression can be due to the changes that one may experience during retirement, loss of loved ones or even isolation. In many cases, depression has always been associated with the elderly in the society due to the increase of cases among the aged. Besides, there are a number of ways in which one can avoid depression in life. This argument is grounded on the basis that depression only affecting the aged.
Alternative Theories on Depression
Despite there being thoughts that depression only affects the aged in the society, there has been divergent view on the issue. Depression has been regarded as a disorder for all people and does not chose on age. This has been evident especially when children have been reported to have experienced depression at an earlier age. This has been due to the events that they may have gone through in their life hence the development of depression. Moreover, depression does not only occur because of the age but there are also other factors that contribute to its occurrence that also affect the younger age. In this regard, it is evident; depression affects everyone in a society regardless of his or her age (Aguirre, 2008).
Causes of Depression
One of the causes of depression is the life events that one may be subjected to. Hard conditions, which a child is subjected to when young, may affect him or her when old in the form of depression. Physical and sexual abuse on a child will also increase on depression on the child in the later years of his or her life. Some of the other life events that may contribute to the situation are medical problems, for example, depression may affect a patient who may be suffering from diseases like HIV or even cancer diseases (Ainsworth, 2000). This is because such diseases are usually long term and very expensive to cater for treatment and therefore the patient may see no meaning of life and may think that he might be dying soon hence experiencing depression. In some cases, some of the people may remain depressed in the rest of their li...