Depression Research
Part 1: What people know about depression
Bullet paragraph notes
My verse on the song My God is started off by my exclamation of disapproval of depression. But as I think about the listeners that may just blindly agree and start claiming depression, I decided to seriously educate myself on the subject. A blog from the site PsychologyToday titled "The Important Difference Between Sadness and Depression," makes it clear that depression is an abnormal state of mind usually that of prolonged sadness stemming from nothing. However once in a state of depression, everything can hit hard and be hard to bounce back from. Sadness is situational and you can come around from fairly quickly but the symptoms of sadness are hard to discern from those of depression if you don't know any information off-hand about the person going through one of these kinds of lows. So it's imperative that any person close to another that is suffering that you don't say anything along the lines of "snap out of it," or "it’s all in your head," or "choose to be happy!" Such sentiments reflect a deep misunderstanding of depression. It only makes the person with depression feel worse.
But as a musician I have to be mindful of what I'm listening to and if that is influencing my mood. Music has a direct relationship to mood. It can be used therapeutically to fight depression or for people already affected, sad songs can just prolong the period of depression or create a cycle that cannot be broken. Everybody needs to be aware what they're listening to before they make decisions big or small. Your mood may change your choice.
After learning this I decided to see what methods schools have in place to combat depression. NYU has counseling and wellness services where you can receive one on one, confidential counseling. There are group therapy session as well so you can receive both or the one of your choosing depending on your needs. In addition to this they have workshops that may get you into a routine that can break the self sabotaging habits of depression.
As a state of mind, it's not always easy to understand depression. There are alot of triggers and alot of cases without any which unfortunately is more common. So it would be wise of everybody to be mindful of how they interact with others and always be alert. You never know when symptoms may appear but don't hesitate if you suspect someone you know may be suffering. It may be too late by the time you make up your mind.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-squeaky-wheel/201510/the-important-difference-between-sadness-and-depression
https://www.lifehack.org/articles/featured/9-ways-music-can-cure-depression-drug-addiction-and-stop-suicide.html
https://www.nyu.edu/students/health-and-wellness/student-health-center/health-information/depression.html
Part 2: The data
In NYC, we have free resources for depression counseling and suicide prevention plus a plethora of other things.
In order for these services to be free, it's written in government policy that there is a budget for these services. But it wasn't written until the year 2015 and didnt go into effect until October of the next year when first lady Chirlane McCray put into full effect in the city of new york.
MSU conducted a federally funded national survey last year involving mental health issues.
It turns out that nearly 8 in 10 people are severely uneducated or miseducated about depression. The other 2 out of 10 are mostly people fighting with depression themselves.(info from adaa) Out of the 18.1% of the population with an anxiety disorder including depression, not even 40% of them get proper treatment.
So while there are services in place the mishandling of our mental health hinders the knowledge of potential supporters, treatment methodologies and the effectiveness of said services.
https://www1.nyc.gov/site/doh/health/health-topics/depression.page
https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2017/national-mental-health-survey-finds-widespread-ignorance-stigma/
https://adaa.org/about-adaa/press-room/facts-statistics