D Word
Those working Jobs in secondary education will have seen sad, anxious and depressed teenagers much and often. But here’s the question: how can you accurately tell if someone (a teenager or otherwise) is merely sad, or utterly depressed? It’s a problem which has dogged society since the dawn of time and here’s the worst part: as children gain access to more and more technology at a younger age they can not only read more about how to cover the signs of depression up, but interact with others and learn even more. For that reason a sad person may be standout obvious, and a suicidal person may seem happy, content in the knowledge that they are moving closer to death as every minute passes.
Depression is a complex and difficult subject. The fact is that it carries a lot of baggage, and the word is manipulated by the media in some ways, and tossed about casually in others. Another problem is fashion and culture; some people, emulating their heroes, think that depression is somehow a good thing. That someone has killed themselves because they no longer wanted to live should be sad, but in many cases these people become heroes. And from these legends comes the thinking that depression is somehow ‘normal’.
With the word being bandied around by people who have never really been evaluated, it’s also very easy for people to disbelieve those seeking attention and completely miss those who don’t seek attention, and are in dire need of help.
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