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MENTAL
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Depression is a mental disorder - not a physical illness.  There is no research that supports the fanciful notion that depression is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. Depression is what we call the disordered thinking that occurs when something happened that we didn't want - or didn't happen that we wanted.

Depression is characterized by the following: feeling sad or empty, diminished interest, weight loss or gain, insomnia or hypersomnia, fatigue, feelings of wothlessness or guilt, diminished ability to think, recurrent thoughts of death.

Not all of these need be present for a diagnosis but there must be severe impairment for a clinical diagnosis.

Depression, by it's nature, must come and go.  It is not hereditary - and is generally a learned behavior that can be unlearned.

The National Institute of Mental Health estimates that less than 7 in a hundred US adults are diagnosed with clinical depression.  For information on treatment - click
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