All-Natural Help in Cases of Adolescent Depression
 Depression is affecting our pre-adolescents, teens and emerging adults at alarming rates, and escalating from depression to desperation. According to 2006 research by Harvard Medical School, people between the ages of 15 and 24 now account for 14% of all suicides. Suicide is the third leading cause of death among American adolescents.
While depression is treatable through prescription medications, many parents want to avoid putting their children on dependency forming medications if they can. If you child suffers from mild depression or behavioral problems, many natural aids can help you child. All-natural depression aids:
- Help the body's ability to remain calm.
- Help to reduce frustration and stress.
- Help to re-focus attention and improve concentration capability.
The longer the young person goes without being able to correct their uncontrollable symptoms, the more discouraged and depressed they may become. Unfortunately, the current prescription medications handle the symptoms, not underlying causes, and do so with more than a few detrimental side effects. In TV ads, we hear that depression medications can cause even more suicidal tendencies in teenagers. Since their reticular activating system (the center of consciousness) is involved, at the very least they may walk around in a too-sedated state from the medicine.
But their depression, sadness (we must distinguish passing sadness from the onset of depression) and feelings of worthlessness or hopelessness can last for long periods and begin to take over their lives. They begin to:
- Lose interest in activities they once enjoyed
- Self-sabotage relationships with loved ones and friends
- Turn to drugs or alcohol to mask the pain
- Complain of headaches (they are real) and avoid school or homework
There are various forms of adolescent depression, such as dysthymia, a mild but chronic depression, which interferes with a teen's ability to enjoy life, and cyclothymia, a mild form of bi-polar disorder where the mood swings from depression to high energy. For information on these and more, see our article, Teenage Depression.
All-natural depression aids can help in cases of mild depression or bouts of sadness in your teen during rough times in their life, but it is important to distinguish between the blues and a real problem. If you choose to turn to homeopathic remedies for your child's depression and their symptoms worsen or do not improve, it is important that you speak with your physician.
Express your concern about harsh depression medication and work with your doctor to create a treatment plan that not only works for you, but for your child as well.
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