Two new ways to stop depression....

Today's Post: Friday, 4-29-2011

Last Tuesday a study was reported that revealed two important new ways to stop depression!

“Tuesday, April 26 (HealthDay News) -- Antidepressants may not improve all symptoms of depression, according to a new study.”

Researchers analyzed data from more than 4,000 people with major depression around the United States. The article said their study is the largest study on depression treatment to date. (The U.S. National Institute of Mental Health-sponsored this study of depression treatment.)

Even with taking the drugs, which are not that great in my opinion, the researchers found that many of these people still had other symptoms.

But the two of the three symptoms reported in the article ARE improvable and we know many ways to improve them! (These were two of the symptoms that most of the depressed people still had.)

To me, that means that whether the depression treatment is with or without drugs, if depressed people are also helped to improve these two symptoms they are more likely to get better or completely better!

These two symptoms were: “insomnia that occurs in the middle of the night (79 percent)” “….and problems with concentration and decision-making (nearly 70 percent.)” According to the researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas who apparently did the study.

We’ll list some of the 7 other ways to stop depression last. (Some of those ways also help improve these two symptoms. And doing all 7 has been found to work better than the drugs.)

1. Here are some ways to improve middle of the night insomnia.

a) If the person drinks alcoholic beverages, that sometimes produces this symptom. When the alcohol wears off you get a bit of extra alertness as your recovery overshoots a bit. And, the sleep you do get before waking makes this more likely as it restores your energy also.

So, drink less and do it earlier in the day than right before bed.

For many health reasons men should drink no more than 2 drinks a day and most women no more than one. Also, if a man drinks 1 or 1 & half drinks instead of two or more or a woman drinks one every other day or a half a drink instead of one, this effect is less. And, it’s far less if they have been drinking more heavily than the health guideline suggests.

Usually stop drinking by at least an hour before bedtime. (More than two hours is better.)

b) If you already have thought through how to lower the chances of whatever bad event is worrying you and how to recover at least some if the worst happens. You are less likely to stay awake if you do wake up in the middle of the night.

Then you can tell yourself, “The things I know to do and am doing make this less of a worry. They actually have a shot at doing the job.

I’ll deal with that tomorrow or when I have it on my schedule to do and leave it alone now.”

c) Another double technique that has worked for me and others is to say to yourself. I may feel wide awake now. But regardless of that, I can get some rest. And, I can rest my eyes. Then keep your eyes shut. If even you don’t fall asleep overall, recent research has found that this will rest parts of your brain. And you’ll feel better the next day from the rest and sleep you do get.

Loosen your muscles a bit. Then it often works to count slow deep breaths. Focus on breathing in a bit extra and doing it smoothly. Then focus on letting each breath out smoothly and a bit slowly. (You can count when you begin or when you finish.)

If you were physically tired to begin with and released your worry at least some, this does often work.

d) Here are the two most effective treatments to sleep better regardless of how many hours that is:

Get vigorous exercise each day even if for just 2 to 6 minutes.

And, get another half hour of moderate activity such as walking on every day you can fit it in. (Twenty minutes twice a week is better than none at all.)

Most people can fit in much of those two kinds of exercise somewhere in each week.)

e) Some supplements work. And supplements work better for some people. If you think they might work for you they likely will if you take one or more of the effective ones.

Melatonin in doses from .3 grams to 1.0 grams at bedtime or up to an hour and a half before often helps. Taking it later in the day or taking more can make you a bit groggy the next day.

(The drugs actually tend to give you ineffective sleep and almost always leave you groggy. They also can be dangerous. None of that is worth your money in my opinion.)

Also, Al Sears, MD sells a melatonin supplement as a spray that works within few minutes! I don’t yet know the dose. But you can adjust it from taking a single super-brief spray to taking two or three depending on how it works for you.

For anxiety or simply being a bit over-amped, valerian often works. (It does smell so bad that you need to put its container in a larger one that you can seal off in between uses. But it does work well for many people. You can take it at bedtime or a bit before to help fall asleep. Or you can take a bit less if you do wake up in the middle of the night.

There are other anti-anxiety supplements. But valerian and melatonin are the two most worth trying and to try first.

f) In World War II people in England and some parts of the United States put up, “blackout curtains” which covered window enough to not allow ANY light to escape to the outside.

You can sharply increase the melatonin your own body makes if you put such curtains in your bedroom and turn off all the lights. (You can put a flashlight where you can always find it even when it’s that dark.)

People who do that do tend to sleep better. And, I read of a study that found women who do that were less likely to get breast cancer.

g) Do what you can to make your bedroom slightly to very cool with blankets and close to completely quiet. Pay for air conditioning or heat proof your house or both. Use earplugs if you have to. Bedrooms that are too hot or loud noises at night both make your sleep less effective even when you stay asleep.

h) Even if you sleep bit less than 6 hours a day, always get up at exactly the same time with your alarm clock at least on weekdays. And, make a special effort to be in bed by 6 hours before that time.

2. There ARE ways to improve your concentration.

a) Use key questions when you work on something.

And do two things. Write down the questions and your answers.

And once that’s done, write down an outline or summary of what actions you will take and when.

Why am I doing this? Who will it enable me to help? How will it benefit me? How can I use this information? What kinds of feedback or new information will help if I can find them by doing this? What might work? What do I still need to know? Who can I ask who might be able to tell me? How can I test my ideas to see what works?

b) Block out chunks of time to work on the thing you want to concentrate on and do nothing else during that time. Routines like getting ready to go to work often are far more time efficient if you do more than one thing at times. But for the things concentration will really help you and are NOT routine. Simply insisting on only doing each thing can more than triple your ability to concentrate.

c) Get regular exercise as we describe above, particularly the vigorous exercise. And, to the extent you know them eat foods and take supplements that boost brain performance.

(Blueberries, B12, and DHA all work.)

It’s pretty simple. If your brain works better, you can concentrate better!

d) Learn Tai Chi and do at least a short session almost every day. This practice give you an enormously valuable double effect.

Your physical level of stress and perceived stress drops so much, if your blood pressure is too high, regular Tai Chi practice will drop it towards or into the desirable zone. (Decreases of 17 over 11 are typical in people who have high blood pressure & who do daily Tai Chi.)

Tai Chi is also surprisingly good exercise for such a slow and easy activity.

That can double or triple your ability to concentrate!

You’ll get less stressed and feel less stressed. So stress will stop messing up your concentration.

And the exercise part will help make your brain work better.

This is the one to go to early if you can if you are under a lot of stress – or have high blood pressure. And it’s the method to add if you do the other things and still need a bit more of a concentration boost.

3. Some of the other methods some of which we’ve covered already are these.

a. Work strategically to build a worthwhile life. Doing this can often double the effect of everything else you do to fight depression.

You think that things will get better and focus on what make life worthwhile for you. You focus on actions to take to achieve that life instead of thinking of why things are or were messed up.

b. If you find yourself thinking over and over about why things are messed up, force yourself to STOP. Why take poison when you want to feel better?!

Do even one thing useful or active instead.

Do something nice for someone even if they seem to not care or won’t know you did it. This may return good things to you or it may not. But doing it WILL make you feel better immediately.

Get some brief and vigorous exercise.

Try something you have time for to make things better or make progress in some way.

c. Do the vigorous and moderate exercise each week – particularly the exercise vigorous enough to get you breathing hard and where you have to concentrate to do it.

This gives you a stress break and makes your brain work better.

And, it has been shown to turn down depression about as well as one of the kinds of anti-depression drugs that actually works to some degree!

d. Slash your intake of refined grains, fat from grain fed animals, and oils such as corn, soy, safflower and canola that are high in omega 6 oils.

Eat neutral oils in nuts, avocados, and extra virgin olive oil instead.

Take DHA and purified fish oil omega 3 oils supplements daily. And eat wild caught fish high in omega 3 oils two or three times a week.

Doing this set of things reverses some of the harm of modern diets. It stops depression in many people. It helps prevent close to all cancers. And it is one of the two or three most effective ways to prevent heart disease.

People who eat this way either never get depressed. Or they get less depressed and recover faster. Their brains work better for several reasons! Then they get all these other health benefits too!

e. People used to be outside in the sun all day. Spend a bit of time outside when you can most weeks. Take at least 3,000 to 4,000 iu a day of vitamin D3. (Taking at least 1,000 mg a day of vitamin C also helps reduce depression according to a study I saw recently.) The sunlight and vitamin D3 are most effective for people who get depressed in the winter or during bad weather that sticks around.

f. Get enough good quality sleep. Your brain works better and you have more energy. Small wonder that helps you stop being depressed! (We covered some ideas how to do that above.)

g. Spend some time talking to friends and family and people you see or meet. Spend some time at group events and participate in some way. Your brain will work better. You will feel and be better supported in most cases. And, people who do this are reliably less depressed in part because this forces them to stop spending time alone just worrying.

The last 6 of the steps are my versions of Stephen Ilardi’s six step method to cure depression which has tested to stop depression for 75% of the people who do all 6 things. PhD Stephan Ilardi’s book is called The Depression Cure.

It’s available on Amazon. He found that early people were not depressed. His six step program was initially designed to mimic what early people did that people have too often stopped doing.

We now know it works. And each of the steps that you do well will help!