Handling Acute Depression: Tips from a Christian Counselor

For many people, depression is an ongoing experience that lasts for years and even decades. They never manage to fully eliminate depression from their lives, though not for a lack of trying. Long-lasting depression like this is known as chronic depression, or recurrent major depressive disorder.

On the other hand, some people have never experienced depression before, but have suddenly become so severely depressed that they cannot function in their daily lives. A sudden, severe episode of depression like this is known as acute depression. Since the 2020s, research shows that as many as 21 million adults across the country experience acute depression in the course of a year.

Although it is treatable, acute depression is often sudden and more severe than other types of depression. If you have never experienced depression before, acute depression can feel like being on a rollercoaster that stops suddenly and without warning. It is a jolt to your routine that has you suddenly feeling exhausted, numb, irritable, unfocused, and heavy.

This sudden shift in mood will inevitably impact your relationships, career, and physical health. Even though depression may eventually pass with time, it helps to know what to do when the weight of depression suddenly hits.

What goes up must come down

No one’s mental health stays consistent, especially when stressors and life events happen. Some people tend to be far more neutral and steady in their mood than others, but even the most stable mind will eventually experience occasional mood swings and dips in morale and energy to varying degrees.

Many people seem to pride themselves on their ability to remain level-headed under pressure, logical in the face of heightened emotions, and focused on tasks despite being stressed. These same people often learn to mask depression symptoms so effectively that they even fool themselves into believing that they are fine. Sometimes depression is the most logical thing to experience under certain circumstances.

Medically speaking, an acute condition arrives suddenly and intensely, lasting for a short period of time, but causing much damage. If your regular mood moves up and down like gentle ocean waves, then acute depression is the equivalent of a tsunami wave coming out of nowhere and destroying the landscape.

Just like with an actual tsunami, acute depression doesn’t appear out of nowhere. There are often signs and warnings that it is coming, though you might have missed them. Though acute depression is not a formal medical diagnosis, it has been a recognized form of depression diagnosis for decades.

Experiencing depression is not a failure on your part or anyone else’s. Some people experience depression because of a chemical imbalance in their brain, some experience it in response to a tragedy or an ongoing struggle, while others spend years trying to learn why they are depressed but never get to the bottom of it.

Acute depression is most often a response to life events and natural stressors. If you have been overworked, recently experienced a loss or trauma, or undergone a significant life change, your nervous system will need to process this information. Sometimes it becomes severely overwhelmed and shuts down, resulting in acute depression.

Acute depression can also be the inevitable conclusion of a strenuous lifestyle. You might have gotten away with having done one too many unhealthy substances, having had too little sleep, and proverbially burning the candle at both ends, until now.

Everything needs fuel to function, and if you have not been fueling your life in the right way, you have made your soul, mind, and body vulnerable to a crash. Even so, depression is not your fault, but it is your responsibility to recognize the signs and get help in overcoming it.

Decoding Acute Depression

If you have never experienced depression before, you are likely unaware of the symptoms of depression. While it can be helpful to describe acute depression as a tsunami wave or a rollercoaster crash, it can be felt as mostly a physical experience.

Depression feels like exhaustion, irritation, numbness, being completely unmotivated, and feeling incredibly heavy, sad, or guilty. You have likely experienced some of these things before, but never to the extent and intensity as when you are acutely depressed.

With acute depression, it is as if you wake up one morning and you suddenly don’t want to participate in life anymore. You lie there listening to your work alarm going off, and you feel absolutely nothing. None of the small daily tasks feels necessary anymore, and the things that once brought you joy and excitement seem to have lost their color and importance.

To be medically diagnosed with depression, you have to experience at least four of the following symptoms for more than two weeks: loss of motivation, changes to sleep patterns and appetite, low energy, poor concentration, guilt, and suicidal thoughts.

Often, your closest friends and loved ones will notice the abrupt change in your mood and attitude before you do. While you try to fake being fine, they see the dark rings under your eyes, your unkempt appearance, and your complete disinterest in everything. When you experience acute depression, these changes are often sudden and jarring to those around you.

Handling Acute Depression

Sadly, statistics consistently show that only a minority of people with depression seek any kind of effective treatment for it. This might be linked to a range of things, from lack of knowledge about mental health to guilt and shame surrounding depression.

Though you might try to ignore, avoid, or deny having depression, you can’t ignore the effects of depression, especially when the intensity is too much to overcome. Acute depression can last anywhere from three months to over a year, in which time it affects your daily life to a disastrous effect if left untreated.

Some people are overwhelmed even at the thought of getting medically diagnosed with depression because it means having to commit to a lifestyle change and potential long-term treatment.

The idea of potentially being diagnosed with a long-term condition is scary, but scarier still is the idea of what will happen if you don’t get the support you need. Treatment for depression is something you do one day at a time, involving as many or as few friends and loved ones as you choose.

No one can tell you how you ought to cope with your mental health struggles, but many people will willingly support you if you reach out. If you’re exhausted, numb, fragile, and struggling to cope, admit it first to yourself. You can tell a loved one or seek a medical diagnosis as a next step.

Once you have a better understanding of what is going on with your body by way of a formal diagnosis, you can choose what direction to take next. You may want to consult with a mental health professional for guidance on next steps or consider rescheduling your workload.

There is no guarantee that acute depression will lift or improve over time. On the other hand, countless people have sought treatment and support for depression and learned to cope in healthy ways.

Regardless of the events leading up to it, you are not to blame for the depression you feel. It is a common and natural experience that you can’t avoid, but that you can learn to deal with. It is not your fault, but it is your responsibility to choose how to handle and treat depression.

Perhaps you only know that you need help, but you’re not sure what to do next. If so, please know that you are not alone. Whether or not you have been medically diagnosed with depression, you can always speak with a counselor about how you are feeling. They will listen to you as you share, and ultimately, they will help you decide on your next steps. Please reach out today if any of this information resonated with you.