PDF Ebook Depression
Academia is sparking about "our postmodern melancholy," pharmaceutical companies advertise their magic on television, "Do you want to feel better, be more social...," and self-help sections of bookstores are burgeoning with titles which promise to heal the mind, and cure the soul. Our current issue addresses the shadows of depression and adds its unique perspective to the tumble. As in past issues, we offer a multi-faceted view, gathering writers from various disciplines, to explore from different angles and perspectives, attempting to achieve a broader, more encompassing picture.
It is a great pleasure and honor to have Ms. Peggy Papp as our feature writer. Originally, we planned to transcribe a video of a presentation she gave at Iona College; however, that project posed too many difficulties. Instead, she was gracious to send us an article, "Gender Differences in Depression: The His or Her Depression." Her article takes a multidimensional approach to treating depression as it relates to the gender differences which emerge between spouses in couples' therapy. She uses case examples to illustrate how gender can determine the way depression manifests itself, and consequently how treatment can be shaped to allow for these gender differences. She observes that men and women become depressed for very distinct reasons, cope with depressive symptoms differently, and are responded to differently by spouses. These insights and ideas are significant for those seeking to understand the dynamics of depression, especially within a family context. Included, as an appendix to Ms. Papp's article, is a list of "Key Interventions." These interventions are effective, concrete strategies/ideas to keep in mind when working with couples and families racked with the miseries of depression.
The next article, Kevin Barry's "The Depressed Gender," may have the reader asking the question, "Who is the depressed gender?" He does not answer the question but explores finding ways to properly recognize depression within a gendered context, within adolescence, and how to apply treatment. Barry provides a family systems context for understanding depression and supplies cogent and effective tips for parents dealing with depressed children. He presses for the therapist /parent to treat every client/child as unique, having different ways of expressing himself and being-in-the world. Hope for treatment lies in an atheoretical position, resisting views that predetermine and define an adolescent's world before he has a chance to relate his own unique story.
Within many depression stories lie three common elements as outlined in Robert Monteleone's "Voice, Support and Strategy: Finding Ways to Fight the Despair of Depression." This article probes various depression narratives and provides a structure to use when dealing with a person who is suffering from depression. Finding voice, establishing support, and developing concrete strategies are three stages negotiated along the healing path of fighting depression. Helping someone with depression is a courageous struggle, and having structure will assist the therapist/caregiver, since dealing with this illness is so draining on all parties involved.
The next article, Leonard Feinberg's "The Effects of Maternal Depression on the Emotional/Brain Development of Children" reviews collected findings on the effects of maternal depression on the developing infant brain. Possible long-term effects on subsequent development are considered, along with how positive environmental factors reduce future risks for infant development. The author explores how an infant's relational experience is effected, both internally and externally, by encounters with a depressed mother. The article offers an effective blend of neuroscience, and psychological insight as a way to study depression in a relational context.
The journal takes a literary turn with Margaret McDermott's beautifully written " `The awful daring of a moment's surrender':Depression and Deliverance in the Works of James Joyce and T.S. Eliot." Using Freud's classic definition of depression as it in part being caused by a loss, the article uses the character of Gabriel Conroy in Joyce's short story "The Dead," and Eliot's poems "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," and "The Waste Land" to understand depression in an artistic and literary context. The depressive predicament of certain characters/voices within the literary works are explicated as profound and meaningful states of consciousness containing within their own seeds for healing, or emotional health. The characters/voices are carefully followed on their journey from "excessive self-referentiality," in which they are despairing and disconnected, to a state of deliverance whereby they are less haunted by internal demons and better able to see something other, beyond their own limited vision.
Within the artistic framework of confronting depression, James Hickey's "Writing Through the Pain" addresses the question of whether the process of writing can help a sufferer of depression. In a narrative context, the act of writing is an active step assisting the depressed person to channel his emotional torment into words. Once the feelings are expressed linguistically, the client can then step back from his words to gain objectivity, and will less likely be overwhelmed by his emotions. Examples and suggestions are supplied that can assist in using writing as a way of therapy.
This past summer, Pat Tufano, veteran therapist, professor and AAMFT approved supervisor taught a number of courses to our visiting Irish students. We asked him to write a few pages on his experience in dealing with depressed clients. He has graciously supplied us with an article, "Reflections: Dealing with the Depressed Patient," using his own inimitable, colorful metaphors, which helped him to understand and deal more effectively with his clients. He writes of the initial fears and complexities a new therapist faces when he/she works with someone in the grip of emotional pain.
We continue to publish poetry and are indeed fortunate to feature the works of John Darretta. "Advent," "Deconstruction," "Sinopia for a Dream," and "Askesis" are poems which reflect powerful use of imagery, and an intelligent, sophisticated word play. The simple language and vivid colorful images lead the reader to feel and experience a more personal and spiritual state than would be expected. Like Prufrock of old, each reader is confronted with self-questioning, "Do I dare...?" Perhaps "the mermaids" will sing for us if we let them.
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PDF Ebook Depression
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