Do you feel stuck in a haze of sadness and indifference? Does a sense of guilt and shame hang over everything you do? Maybe even the simplest of tasks feel too hard for you. Just getting out of bed in the morning, going to work, and cooking dinner feels impossible. As much as you want to escape your feelings and just “snap out of it,” you probably don’t even have the energy to.
Depression sucks all the joy out of life. Activities you used to look forward to may fill you with dread or feel like a burden now. You may be so emotionally drained that you’ve started developing physical symptoms—even your body hurts. Perhaps you’re struggling with excessive fatigue, sleeping in during the day but not sleeping at night, and undereating or overeating.
Ultimately, the worst part of dealing with depression is how isolating it can be. Because it seems like no one understands what you’re going through, you probably don’t feel like seeing others. As much as you would benefit from social interaction, your depression tells you: It’s just not worth the effort. It’s better to lay low and not be seen by anyone.
Nonetheless, connection is the root of all healing. By seeking help from a kind, compassionate professional, you can regain your energy, restore your sense of joy, and get your life back on track.
Over eight percent of adults in the United States suffer from clinical depression. And given how many unreported and untreated cases there are, the actual percentage of depressed individuals is probably much higher. Simply put, millions of people are suffering in silence. They may look fine on the surface, but deep down, they feel exhausted, depleted, and hopeless.
Preparing for the worst-case scenario may have helped us evolve, but that instinct makes it difficult to see the positives in life. It causes sadness and shame to take precedence over joy and happiness. And if you have experienced trauma or have a biological or genetic vulnerability to depression, this makes it even harder to disarm negative thoughts and focus on the good in life.
It is possible to re-train your brain to see the world differently, but it isn’t always possible alone. Here at the Boston Center for Health Psychology and Biofeedback, our mission is to help you step back, look at the bigger picture of your life, and come to understand yourself and your world in a more thoughtful, enriching way.
Because of all the negatives messages about depression in our culture, it’s hard to find a place where you can unashamedly share your feelings without fear of judgment or misunderstanding. That’s what therapy provides. Our goal is to validate your struggles and give you a safe space to talk about the difficult feelings in your life.
Moreover, depression treatment will help you make choices about how to act regardless of your feelings. You can learn to act in your own best interest rather than doing what depression tells you to do. We will teach you to expand your awareness and take in the positives around you, rather than succumbing to the predisposition of your mind to focus exclusively on the negatives.
When you first begin to work with our therapists in our Boston, MA offices, we will look at what has triggered depression in the past and discuss what has been helpful and what hasn’t in treating it. From there, the goal is to find healthy ways to respond to sadness and shame while reducing your tendency to try and control those feelings. After all, trying to fight or suppress painful emotions often makes depression worse. We want to help free you from unproductive efforts to control the uncontrollable so you can move on to what’s important in life.
To do so, we often utilize mindfulness-based cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT). At its core, this approach is all about focusing on what is under your control rather than struggling with what is not. You will learn to give up the futile fight against your depression and free up resources for taking action where it matters. This, in part, will be done through choosing value-based action despite the fact that your emotions may tell you not to.
Additionally, we often employ skills for expanding your awareness. In particular, an appreciation journal can help your mind become more aware of the positives in your daily life. We will also help you work on your ability to make more thoughtful, deliberate decisions instead of automatically reacting to difficult feelings. One of our main approaches, Biofeedback Therapy, seeks to help you regulate your nervous system so that you have the energy to act out of intention rather than sheer emotion. This will enable you to do what’s in your best interest even when you don’t feel like it.
Finally, we want to help you enhance your self-compassion and reduce the harsh self-talk that often comes with depression. Self-compassion allows you to approach yourself with kindness. It gives you the comfort and strength to move forward instead of being stuck in self-hatred. You will learn to treat yourself how you would treat someone you love if they struggled with depression.
By reducing self-criticism, directing your efforts toward what is under your control, and learning how to live more intentionally, it is possible to break the cycle of depression in your life. Your brain may have trained itself to focus on the negatives, but with our help and support, we can help you gain a new awareness of the positives in your life and relate to your experiences in a new way.
