It is estimated that up to 45% of people will experience mental health issues at some point in their lives in Australia. In any one year around 1 million adults will experience depression. We all experience low mood from time to time, but depression is a more prolonged, deep, and intense feeling of sadness that lasts longer than 2 weeks.
Depression not only affects the way you feel, but also the way you think and behave. It affects your judgements and decision making, your insight and awareness, and also your ability to problem solve. It can affect your sleep and your appetite and make you more irritable than normal. Depression can significantly affect relationships with others and can make people socially withdraw and reduce pleasure in activities that the person once enjoyed. This can sometimes lead to feelings or thoughts of suicide which connected with impaired judgement and insight can be a dangerous outcome.
Depression can appear on it's own, or alongside other conditions such as anxiety and panic attacks, pain, relationship breakdown/grief, and many other conditions including physical health conditions and or injury or disability.