Different Types Of Depression: Learning The Categories

There are basically 3 different types of depression that may vary from each other in terms of severity, the presence and number of symptoms, and the persistence of the symptoms and of the main depression.

The Major Types of Depression

First off, we have major depressions that consist of a combination of symptoms. These symptoms interfere with daily life in terms of working, studying, eating, sleeping, and sometimes even showering.

People with major depression look melancholic, without energy and in deep thought. This type of depression needs immediate psychiatric treatment because of the possibility of the patient committing suicide.

Next is a depression type that is not so severe: the dysthymia type. This is evident when there are prolonged and pervasive severe symptoms that just about come short of totally disabling the sufferer. This depression allows the sufferer to function, but with less control on functioning.

Dysthymia is very common to women. However, this mood disorder is relatively easy to treat and can even be treated without any medications. Counseling and group therapy are good options for people suffering from this illness.

The other type is bipolar disorder or manic-depressive illness. Manic-depressive disorder is usually manifested through cyclic or repetitive mood changes, extreme high levels of mania and super-low levels of depression. Here mood swings are abrupt, rapid, even outrageous and dramatic.

Bipolar disorder is a very difficult mental illness to manage. For one, during manic episode a person will feel very bold, loud and invincible. He will then say whatever he wants to without regard to the feelings of the other person. They afterwards, when the mania has subsided, he'll feel depressed from acting like so. This is a vicious cycle that gets into the nerves of the family and of the patient himself. Bipolar disorder must not remain untreated or else the person may fall into a deep psychotic state that resembles symptoms of schizophrenia.

Major Depressive Disorder

Underneath these 3 main categories are subtypes of depression. For example, clinical depression is the severe or chronic depression that requires immediate treatment. Major depression or MDD (major depressive disorder) pervades a continuously depressed mood lasting no less than 2 weeks. This depression may be a single or repetitive occurrence sometimes spanning a lifetime.

Mania

Mania is that level of obviously-elevated mood. The bipolar disorder is usually found in those who have had manic episodes. Non-manic depression is the unipolar depression type as there are no mood swings from "north" to "south" pole.

Melancholy

Melancholy in depression is driving all your pleasures away, even the simplest ones. This type of melancholic depression is worse than grief and excessive guilt. Then there is the type of depression with atypical features, meaning one that is burdened with mood reactivity, weight gain, increased appetite, hypersomnia or excessive sleep and inability to wake up, paralysis and social impairment.

Psychotic Depression

The last subcategory is that type of depression that has psychotic features. This subcategory is characterized by having hallucinations and delusions, whether visual or auditory or sensory.

Other Categories

To complete our list, there are still other depression categories.

Dystheria or functional depression leaves the sufferer still able to function but within a state of apathy and sadness.

Dysthymia on the other hand is long-term depression with a persistent depressed mood that goes on continuously for no less than 2 years.

Then there is postpartum depression or one related to childbirth; premenstrual dysphoric disorder of repetitive depression symptoms linked to the female menstruation cycle.

Finally, there is recurrent brief depressive disorder, a mild depression episode that recurs very minimally. Recurrent brief disorder occurs not merely during menstrual cycle but all throughout the year but with several separate episodes.

Knowing the different types of depression will help you spot symptoms more easily than if you think of the illness as one single entity that encompasses every symptom available.