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Few of us feel happy all the time - one day you may feel cheerful, energetic and lively, while the next you might feel gloomy for no obvious reason
These mood swings are a normal part of everyday life, but sometimes they can get out of hand. If your mood swings too low on a regular basis, it could be a sign that you have a depressive illness.
What triggers depression?
Depression starts in the brain's messenger system when the levels of various chemicals become unbalanced. These chemicals - known as neurotransmitters - are responsible for passing messages from one brain cell to another across a tiny gap between them, called a synapse.
Once across this gap, they trigger an electrical response in the next brain cell to increase its activity. After it has done its job, the neurotransmitter is then reabsorbed into the cell that it came from, and is then broken down for re-cycling.
Depression can occur if the neurotransmitter levels fall too low, and these little messages are not being passed from one brain cell to another as often as they should be. This may lead to a variety of psychological and physical symptoms including:
Low mood - feeling sad and crying all the time
Feeling very tired or even exhausted
Regular bouts of nervousness, anxiety and agitation
Headaches and difficulty concentrating
Loss of self-esteem and lack of confidence
Loss of sex drive
Loss of interest in everyday life
Depression is very common. As many as 2.9 million people in the UK are diagnosed as having depression at any one time, with one in five people affected at some stage during their life.
Women are more susceptible to depression than men and are up to three times more likely to suffer, because we go though hormone changes in our lives during menstruation, childbirth and menopause. The World Health Organisation estimates that, by the year 2020, depression will be the second leading cause of disability in the Western world.
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