Text/Zhou Jia
Xiao Ming is in the third year of this year. He is tense in school. He often tells his parents that he has chest tightness, shortness of breath, shortness of breath, and pale face. He pinches his hands together and feels like he is going to die. . For this reason, his family took him to the top three general hospitals, and many examinations did not find any abnormalities. However, Xiao Ming’s situation has not improved, but it has become more and more serious in the past six months. Sometimes he is in a bad mood, often wants to cry, cannot concentrate during class, his academic performance plummets, is upset and irritable, can’t sleep, loses appetite, and loses weight. 30 pounds. The parents even found that Xiao Ming had multiple cuts on his arms. On the advice of the doctor in the general hospital, his parents took Xiaoming to a psychiatric hospital. After detailed consultation, the psychiatrist considered that Xiaoming might suffer from depression .
What are the main manifestations of depression?
Depression is a common clinical mental disorder, the main clinical feature is marked and lasting depression. Most depression patients will take the initiative to say that they are depressed, and now they have no interest in what they used to do, and feel very painful. They may first think of seeing a psychiatric hospital. However, a considerable part of the early symptoms of depression patients are not emotional or mental symptoms, but physical symptoms, which increases the difficulty of early recognition and treatment of depression. This situation is more common among adolescents. Children often do not express whether they are happy or unhappy, happy or unhappy, and often seek medical treatment on the grounds of various physical discomforts. We often find such patients in outpatient clinics. We have gone to different departments of many general hospitals for treatment, and have undergone countless examinations. No abnormalities have been found. Only after repeated recommendations by the general hospital doctors did we have to go to the psychiatric hospital for treatment.
At the end of the 17th century, psychological factors began to be thought to cause physical symptoms. Physical symptoms are mainly related to mood and brain function, which may reflect the patient's inability to face potential inner conflicts. Studies have shown that about 70% of depression patients are accompanied by physical symptoms, which not only affect the quality of life and social function of the patients, but also increase the risk of suicide and the difficulty of treatment. And if the physical symptoms associated with the treatment are not relieved, the patient will not be able to achieve clinical recovery.This is also a hidden danger for the "resurgence" of the illness in the future.
What are the main physical symptoms of depression?
● Sleep symptoms: Mainly manifested as difficulty falling asleep, tossing about 1 hour after going to bed, but still unable to fall asleep; not deep sleep, you will wake up at the middle of the night when you hear a little movement; early waking, generally wake up at two or three in the morning or more Usually wake up early for 2 to 3 hours, and cannot fall asleep again after waking up. A small number of patients manifested as excessive sleep or nightmares after falling asleep.
● Digestive system: Mainly manifested as loss of appetite, not wanting to eat, and not interested in the food that I liked very much before. Weight loss, weight loss of more than 1kg within 1 week. Other patients have dry mouth, nausea, abdominal distension, diarrhea, hiccups , abdominal cramps and other manifestations.
● Cardiovascular system: There are mainly palpitations , chest pain, tachycardia , palpitation and other symptoms.
● Respiratory system: The most obvious symptom in this area is that the patient often feels chest tightness and wheezing, difficulty breathing, exhales and sighs. Xiao Ming showed typical respiratory symptoms.
● nervous system: mainly manifested as dizziness, headache, numbness of the limbs, dizziness and blurred vision.
● Genitourinary system: Adults generally show decreased libido. Female patients with relatively serious illness will also experience dysmenorrhea, menstrual disorders and amenorrhea. Some patients have frequent urination, but are not accompanied by infection symptoms such as urgency and pain.
● Pain: The common areas of pain in patients with depression are the back, neck, limbs, joints and head. It usually occurs in multiple parts at the same time, and even the whole body is sore and the whole body is weak.
Faced with children's depression, what should parents do?
1 Improve vigilance against physical symptoms
Previous studies have reported that the global average recognition rate of depression is 55.6%, while domestic doctors are concerned about depression The recognition rate is only 21%, and the recognition rate of general hospital doctors for depression is relatively low.Increased the possibility of missed diagnosis of depression. Parents need to understand the early physical symptoms of depression: lack of appetite, lack of interest, lack of energy, unable to fall asleep, and suffocation; more serious, there will be depression, sighing, self-blame, feeling that life is meaningless, and even self-harm and suicide. Like the Xiaoming we mentioned earlier, if the physical symptoms such as chest tightness, shortness of breath, difficulty breathing, pale face, or even a feeling of death occur at the beginning, after the family has no problems in the general hospital, the mental and psychological disorders can be considered in time. If possible, seek help from a professional psychiatrist to achieve early detection and early treatment of the disease, so Xiaoming can get effective help as soon as possible.
2 Seek professional medical help
In the treatment of depression with physical symptoms, in addition to taking the medication as prescribed by the doctor, psychotherapy is also very important. Appropriate cognitive behavioral therapy will make the patient correct for depression The understanding of the disease and the confidence in recovery, make the efficacy of antidepressants more effective, help alleviate the condition and improve the quality of life. In addition, a healthy lifestyle is also an important part of the prevention and treatment of depression, such as regular daily living, early to bed and early rise, regular meals, nutrition matching; proper physical exercise, walking, jogging, yoga, etc.; rich life fun, listening to music , Watching movies, reading books, etc.; communicate with the outside world easily and happily, and share worries and happiness with family and friends. However, depression with physical symptoms generally has a long course. When all the symptoms of depressive disorder gradually improve, the physical symptoms often disappear at the end. When depressive symptoms relapse again after remission, physical symptoms may also become the first symptoms.
3 Strengthen social support
The help of family and friends is a very important source of social support. Many parents are easy to accept that their children suffer from other physical diseases, such as colds, fever, gastroenteritis, trauma, and other uncomfortable conditions. They will understand and take care of their children and allow their children to rest until they are healthy before returning to normal studies. However, parents often fail to realize that depression is also a disease, or cannot understand that their children suffer from depression. Parents think that they work hard to provide their children with good living and learning conditions as much as possible. The children are also very cheerful, and how can he get depression or even not want to live at such a young age? The parent meeting subjectively believes that children’s "listening" and "headaches and backaches" are "pretending," "indolence," "squeamish," "unthinking," and "emotional". They believe that children can be diligent through criticism, attack, encouragement, and supervision.Can return to normal.
However, the feelings that this method brings to children are denial and incomprehension, and even feel that they have been rejected and attacked, which increases their guilt and psychological burden, and reduces their trust in parents and their motivation to seek help. Therefore, parents should have a basic and scientific understanding of depression, accept children, respect them, calm their minds, cooperate with doctors, take care of their children’s diet and daily life, and tell children "We will always love you and support you, no matter what happens. Anything, I am here to accompany you", this is the most powerful support. The understanding and help of family members is the best medicine for children to overcome depression.
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