Santosh walked out of the doctor’s office upset. “I am not crazy,” he thought to himself, fuming as he started his car. “How dare the doctor think I’m some kind of a lunatic,” his mind raced.
When he got home, his wife was eager to find out how the doctor’s appointment went. Santosh had been experiencing recurring physical ailments with no physical cause behind them. His irritability had also increased and Ankita was becoming concerned about his health.
“So, what happened?” Ankita said putting everything aside to sit down and give her husband full attention.
“That doctor is a quack,” Santosh said with resentment. “You know what he thinks is wrong with me? He thinks I have depression and I need to go talk about my problems to someone else!” He rolled his eyes. “I gave him a piece of my mind and told him I am not crazy!”
Ankita knew she needed to proceed carefully. While she also did not know much about depression and was surprised that the doctor suggested it, it was the first time they had received an answer to all of Santosh’s seemingly unrelated symptoms that had been going on since he lost his job nine months ago.
“Did he offer any other solutions besides counseling?” Ankita asked carefully.
“No. Because he’s an idiot doctor who doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Santosh said furiously as he washed his hands for lunch.
Ankita was concerned that Santosh’s closed-mindedness about the doctor’s suggestion would leave them stuck in the corner again with no solutions to his health problems.
“Maybe you should go see my doctor,” she offered. “She’s very nice and listens really well.”
“I’m not going to see any more doctors. There is nothing wrong with me. My stomach will settle down soon and that will probably make the headaches go away. Let’s just drop this,” Santosh said, digging into lunch and ready to move on from this morning.
A few days later, Ankita was able to convince him to see her doctor anyway for a second opinion. They did not tell her what Santosh’s doctor had suggested. Instead, they presented her with a history of his symptoms and asked her to come to her own conclusion.
“Well I’m looking at all of your test results here. Overall you’re in very good health Mr. Mehta. That leads me to believe that perhaps your symptoms are not physiologically based. Has anyone ever talked to you about possibly being depressed?”
Santosh was shocked. How can this be happening again?
“It’s very common, especially at this time when the economy is not doing well and it seems most of your symptoms began soon after you lost your job,” the doctor continued. “I would recommend counseling or we can start you on a low dose of anti-depressants.”
Santosh stopped listening because all he heard her say was, “You’re crazy. Your last doctor was right.”
Ankita could tell he had checked out so she asked the doctor to write a prescription and that they would discuss it later whether to take the pills or not. For the rest of the day, Santosh did not want to talk to anyone. He stayed in his office at home playing on his computer. He was the most insulted that he had felt in his entire life.
Numerous South Asians have similar experiences to Santosh. Because of the stigma against accepting the reality of emotional health problems as well as misunderstanding the meaning of emotional health issues such as depression, many South Asians strongly resist mental health diagnoses. This is especially true of South Asian men who are taught from a young age that emotions are for girls and that real, strong men do not have emotional problems.
Because there is such a taboo amongst seeking counseling services amongst South Asians, often they go without treatment. By denying the existence of the problem, South Asians hope they will go away on their own which is unfortunately not true. Without proper treatment, many emotional health issues get worse with time. But with adequate interventions, emotional health problems such as depression have a very high success rate of being successfully treated.
In a research study published in 2011, scientists at University of California, Riverside and Duke University Medical Center, identified a new intervention aside from medication and counseling that can help reduce depression. This has proven very effective in people, like Santosh, who are resistant to traditional treatment methods or for people who have tried counseling and medication and have not responded well to it.
The study suggested that if people who are depressed spent each day engaging in positive activities, they were likely to see a reduction in positive symptoms. Here are some examples of positive activities to try if you are trying to treat depression:
1) Know what you are grateful for. Gratitude has shown to improve overall health and increase feelings of happiness. They also help restructure your perspective which is important in treating depression.
2) Serve others. Volunteer work, helping a loved one or working for a charity are all associated with improving mood and increasing feelings of belonging, all necessary to combat depression.
3) Count your blessings. Making a list of your blessings changes thought patterns and focuses on positive emotions, something people with depression rarely feel.
4) Meditate on positive feelings toward others. Sit quietly for a few minutes every day. Choose at least one person in your life who you care about and focus your energy to send positive feelings toward that person.
5) Identify your strengths. Make a list of all of your strengths and then find at least 1 opportunity each day to use them. This can help boost self-esteem.
Positive activities have been shown to have positive effects on the brain and improve brain functioning that has been dampened by the depression. In addition, being time and cost efficient, anyone can practice them at any time. If you have been told that you are depressed and you wish to try alternate healing methods, making it a priority to include positive activities in your daily routine.
What positive activities do you do on a daily basis? Please leave your comments below.