In fact, clinical depression, also referred to as major or unipolar depression, is the most commonly occurring mood disorder. For one thing, there is a high rate of relapse and dependency associated with these drugs. One alternative gaining in popularity is cognitive therapy which serves to manipulate brain chemistry by empowering the patient with new tools for daily living. In effect, cognitive therapy teaches the depressed person to replace automatic negative thoughts with more appropriate ones. This restructuring of thought processes not only relieves the feeling of helplessness or loss of control in the patient, but actually results in stabilizing brain chemistry.
Depression has a variety of causes, of both physiological and organic origin.
Since this list is so lengthy, it is important to seek help from a qualified health care practitioner to rule out the presence of any of these conditions. However, mild to moderate depression may show improvement by employing certain botanicals and nutritional considerations. But, you should discuss these therapies with your physician first. It is also imperative that you never combine herbal medications with other anti-depressant prescription drugs. In normal brain chemistry, sufficient amounts of SAM are produced by the amino acid methionine , but this synthesis is impaired in depressed individuals.