What is depression you may ask? Depression is a disorder that affects mood, thoughts, daily life performance, and sexual desire. Depression negatively affects a person mentally as well. A sad feeling is the most common and most widely known symptom of depression, but it’s not the only symptom. Another symptom is a feeling of worthlessness, which cause thoughts that you have no purpose, and that your life is not valuable. Hopelessness and helplessness can make you feel like the depression will never go away and that you shouldn’t seek help because there is nothing that will help you. Depression also causes a loss of motivation to do daily tasks and a loss of pleasure or enjoyment in hobbies and activities you used to enjoy. It can also cause loss of concentration. Depression negatively affects a person physically as well. Some people experience a decreased appetite, which can result in weight loss. This can create problems such as anorexia and vitamin deficiencies. On the other hand, other people will experience an increase in appetite, causing weight gain. The problem with this is obesity, which can cause joint pain and stress on the heart. It can also lead to diabetes and hypertension. Depression can also cause widespread pain throughout your body. And it can even weaken the immune system, making you more prone to illness.
History
Although the topic of depression is not well spoken and with more time society has become more accepting in regard of talking about the subject. The problem of depression has a longer history than one would think. According to the article, “The History of Depression,” written by Nancy Schimelpfening and revised by MD Steven Gans, the history of depression goes way back to the mesopotamian times in fact in the,“second millennium B.C. in Mesopotamian.”(Nancy Schimelpfening)Many authors of the writings described what is now known as depression as a spiritual rather than a physical condition that conflicts with oneself. In fact before depression was known to them as, “Depression was initially called ‘melancholia’.” (Rashmi Nemade, PH.D., Natalie Staats Reiss, PH.D., and Mark Dombeck, PH.D.) However, according to Nancy Schimelpfening many of these writers, “thought of as being caused by demonic possession. As such, it was dealt with by priests rather than physicians.” In fact many ideals that started to develop in the Mesopotamian period indeed carried on during the following years.
However some of ideals started to divide into two different ideas of depression. Taking for example the Babylonian, Chinese and Egyptian they viewed depression a form of mental illness. Yet they also viewed, “ mental illness as a form of demonic possession, and used exorcism techniques (such as beatings, restraint, and starvation) designed to drive demons out of the afflicted person's body as treatments” (Rashmi Nemade, PH.D). Unlike the ideals from the, “Roman and Greek doctors thought that depression was both a biological and psychological disease.” (Rashmi Nemade, PH.D) The Roman and Greek culture treated depression with care in comparison to the chinese and other culture as by treating those with depression with awarding the positive behavior they showed.
As time went on other people started to create different ideas such as for example the 18th and 19th century as stated in the article, “The History of depression and Treatment”,“18th and 19th centuries, also called the Age of Enlightenment, depression came to be viewed as a weakness in temperament which is inherited and cannot be changed, with the resulting idea that people with this condition should be shunned or locked up.” Overtime many of these ideas have changed in a more positive way for those whom are affected by depression.
Geography
Depression disorders can be the outcome of many different problems the individual faces whether it be economic issues, social problems, past experiences and other things. Economic issues are one the most common causes of depression and it affects communities in Los Angeles differently based on which community you live in. During the research process, we have discovered that wealthy communities such as beverly hills had very low depression rates of 4% in adults from 18 years and older; whereas low income communities such as compton have depression rates as high as 32% according to the County of Los Angeles Public Health Institution.
Community organization
https://www.movinglivesforward.org/program/bullying-advocacy/ (we can use the picture in the slides
Phoenix House in Sylmar
The community organization we choose is Phoenix House in Sylmar. This organization is committed to treating with to treating everyone and their families with qualified, professionals. They have an area of open land with psychiatry, medicine mental health, social work, education, and recovery support. “Struggles of clean and decided to help one another through the tough days ahead. Together, they moved into a brownstone on Manhattan’s West Side and lived as a community, encouraging and helping each other to stay sober”(https://phoenixhouse.org/our-history/ ).“In 1968, Phoenix House became an independent nonprofit organization and has since grown to become the nation’s leading provider of alcohol and drug abuse treatment and prevention services operating 97 programs at 52 locations across nine states”( https://phonenixhouse.org/our-history/ ).
Phoenix House is an in network provider for most major insurance carriers, managed care programs, and Medicaid. Their experience is to fight with any issue, and provide help and the treatment you need. They specialize your treatment depending on what type of issue you have. Their mission, they are passionate about healing individuals, families and communities challenged by substance use disorders and related health condition. They have short term and long-term care options, to treat those who struggle addictions where ever they need to be at home,clinic or treatment facilities.
During our visit to the facility of Phoenix House to have an interview with one of the therapist at Phoenix House. All the workers that we came in contact treated us well with a very respectful and kind manner. Our group felt comfortable and everyone was kind toward us. The place looked very clean and well organized. Most importantly the environment was very inviting and felt like a home. Inside the room we had our interview was more like a room where one would spend time to relax and destress. For the fact that there was many encouraging messages of hope and many toys,teddy bears etc.She introduced her name to us and she did answer all our questions that we had. She was very honest to all the questions we had about depression to questions such as why she decided to work for this specific facility of Phoenix House.