As more and more is discovered about the association between depression and overall health, we have learned that depression can be treated in many ways. Whether it be psychotherapy, psychiatry, and other forms of therapy, like holistic or animal or art therapy. There’s many ways to lift your mood, and not all are in the form of medication.
Antidepressants are everywhere — it seems that just about everyone could use a form of antidepressant. Whether it be a nice long walk, a pleasant bubble bath, or a satisfying meal, there are many different ways to uplift your mood. It’s been said that regular exercise is as effective as an antidepressant, especially if you exercise on a regular basis.
But when it gets to be that your moods are consistently low, and you can’t drag yourself out of them, you may have clinical depression, which can be more effectively and acutely treated with medication. Depression can worsen, however, when substances are introduced to the mix, and can even cause antidepressants, antipsychotics, and other medications associated with treating depression to stop working.
What are the effects of depressants (like alcohol, benzodiazepines, other downers like heroin, hydrocodone, etc.)?
Depressants can…
- lessen the ability to be excited, aroused, etc.
- depress brain patterns aand cause slower bodily functions
- cause drowsiness
- confuse your state of mind
- deplete coordination
- lower blood pressure
- cause addiction
If you’re depressed, alcohol can provide a brief, albeit false spike in your mood. That’s because the ingredients in alcohol immediately metabolize whatever you just ate, spiking energy, and therefore lifting your depressed state. But at the same time, what’s really happening is that your depression is cyclically out of sorts, and once you sober up, your depression will increase twofold.
That’s why dual diagnosis is so important: depression, coupled with the use of depressants to calm those intrusive feelings of sadness down, can literally feed into one another. Addressing the deep-set reasons behind a substance use disorder disorder is crucial to consistent recovery and preventing relapse.
