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Lansing SDA Church

Vicki Griffin

Depression: The Way Out

I have already been blessed by all the music.

My son, when he was little, he played that very song and I remember approaching him after he performed it and saying, Anthony could you smile when you do that?

And he was his age and he said, my teacher said there are 50 things going on in your brain when you do this.

Well we have had a wonderful time doing the Foods for Thought series.

I am very thankful for this opportunity this morning and I bet some of you may be thinking well I'll bet this lady is talking about depression because she's just happy all the time and she's just going to tell us all what to do about it.

Depression, the way out is our topic and I have spent probably more time getting ready for this very complex topic than maybe any other presentation I've ever done.

I've put a lot of heartfelt prayer into it.

I've been calling people that I know have really suffered, who've had a shadow over their hearts and minds their entire life.

And I've asked them, what is it that would be the worst thing that could come out of a speaker's mouth in the topic on depression?

Can anybody relate to hearing some things that you just can't believe would come out of somebody's mouth when you're suffering?

And what would be the thing that you would really need to hear and want to hear?

And I got some very interesting and wonderful input in this.

I'm not gonna take time with it, but I was not raised a Seventh-day Adventist.

I came from an extremely violent home and suffered serious and brutal beatings from the time I was very small and so I started running away from home when I was 5.

I don't have a recollection of feeling safe.

I don't have a recollection of not being sad.

I don't remember waking up being excited about a new day.

And so I think this veil was over my own heart for very many years.

And so the title of this topic today, Depression, The Way Out, is actually the name of a book.

And I remember I would like to recommend this book to those who want to delve further into this topic in terms of a holistic approach to climbing away from depression.

I think if I were going to name it in terms of a goal, I would call it getting unstuck.

Has your brain and your mind ever been stuck?

How many of you would like to get unstuck?

If I were going to talk about the process of what we're going to talk about today, the process, it would be restoring and building connections in the brain with others and with God.

And it is my hope and my prayer today that this presentation will bring some clarity to the topic of depression, that it will bring some inspiration and motivation and most of all hope to anyone who is suffering from flying negatrons circling around their head all the time.

Depression has been defined as a state of feeling gloomy, sad, and apathetic.

Now major clinical depression affects about 15 million Americans.

And it's the leading cause, this surprised me, it's the leading cause of disability in the United States and Canada even ahead of heart disease and any single cancer.

It is increasing by 20% in our population and in Canada every single year.

It is described as an episode of sadness or apathy along with multiple other symptoms that lasts at least 2 consecutive weeks and is severe enough to interrupt daily activities.

I think most of us have experienced disappointment in life.

Has anybody in here experienced disappointment?

And you know, if we don't learn how to deal with disappointment, it can degenerate into discouragement.

And if we don't know how to get out of discouragement, then it can devolve into depression and despair and finally, self-inflicted death.

Suicide is a leading cause of young men from age 12 to 20 in the United States today and it is climbing.

I would like to quote from an author, we're just taking a few minutes to understand what's going on in your head with clinical chronic depression.

John Rady is a neuropsychiatrist from Harvard University.

1 is called The User's Guide to the Brain.

And it's about getting a spark in your brain from exercise, the effects of exercise on the brain and other body systems, other mental health issues, including depression.

And I would like to share what he says about what's going on in the head of a person who is suffering from clinical depression.

Because there's a lot of misunderstanding out there.

There's a lot of judging going on when people fall into these states.

And the last thing that a person would want or need to hear is, well, we all have ups and downs, just get over it.

And so we want to know how to think about this disorder, what it means, how it affects us.

There are so many different types of depression and there are numerous causes and we're not gonna go through all of those but we're gonna talk about principles today.

In your life as well as in your brain, your brain cells.

There are distinctly different types of depression and actually depression mimics the flu.

I spent a day at a seminar with a specialist called a psychoneuroimmunologist.

They study, You know, these specialists know more and more about less and less, and he was 1 of those people.

And they studied the link between the stress system, the immune system, and the brain, this brain-body connection.

Do you think there's a connection between the brain and the body that we need to be aware of.

So, when a person is experiencing a decline in mood state, there are flu-like symptoms that occur.

Without the fever, what do you feel when you have the flu?

All of these things are flu symptoms and your brain is literally putting you into hibernation when you are experiencing this depression.

There are physical alterations taking place in the emotional circuitry.

Now can it be driven by emotional states?

Can a mood or an attitude or a lifestyle promote and promulgate depressive symptoms?

We're going to look at some of those things.

So these are alterations that take place and a shutdown, winter time, is occurring at the cellular level in the brain.

So there's lack of energy and motivation, appetite and sleep, irritability, inability to concentrate or experience pleasure.

I have talked with people that have such serious depression they couldn't put a key in a keyhole.

When the emotional landscape turns wintry, our neurobiology tells us to stay inside.

Victims of depression become trapped in a loop of self-hatred, hopelessness, and worst of all, apathy.

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Depression: The Way Out

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