Depression is most often first experienced at early adulthood?

Interesting.

What a lot of people brush off as teenage "angst" may actually be depression....

Teenage is such a vulnerable time. Mine started at about 13/14 when my parents divorced and left my mother and baby sister under my care. I grew up at 14. My mother suffered from it from then on.

It's a time of change and heavy stress, people are finding their direction in life, embarking on their first serious relationships, settling into or finding a career choice... If there is an underlying tendency to depression, it makes sense that it would surface then.

...nowhere near their first serious relationship.

when you peg your self-worth to the differences in the way you and others around you are living their lives. You're not them. They're not you. Everyone's life is different. It's ridiculous that a grown man needs these things explained to him.

I would rather be anybody else. Anybody else has something going for them. Anybody else has a job. A future. They actually have love in their lives. They are not so depressed that they cannot even fill out a job application. Watching their friends move forward and get married, making them feel more and more isolated. I'm not them I know. But I would rather be them.

You know what bothers me? There is such rhetoric about how everybody is different and that things move at different paces and how people learn differently and different things make them tick. But there is either a said or unsaid way of doing things that accommodates a certain group of people. If you are not in that group. Tough shit. Nobody ever wants to change the system. I get short-changed because I am an introvert. I get short changed because I was in special ed. once upon a time. I get told I have my work cut out for me because I don't always like the way things are done in school, because it does not work for my learining style. And anybody else gets hired for jobs because they are deemed good enough, while I am deemed not good enough. Everyone else gets a girlfriend/wife because they are deemed good enough, while I simply get patronized with an "I'll bet that you'll find someone soon" bull shit. If there is anything I have been taught, it is that I am not okay being me.

Like 3/4 of your OPs are transparent cries for help, and you invariably reject out of hand anything anyone has to say and post some pathetic self-validation of your misery. Just like Ginger Snaps. Let that sink in.

But unfortunately many peoples still think depression as something that only affects adults...
I was very much depressed through most of middle school and half of HS- but I didn't realize it until I "snapped out of it" when I got away from my family and went to college. I wasn't one of the typical "angry" or "rebellious" teens, I was just quiet- but I was still depressed.

situational depression, and sometimes removing oneself from the "situation" can "cure" it....but the damage done to you while you were IN that situation can come roaring back at a future date in the form of PTSD...(my particular "demon")..

My first Major Depression hit shortly after my 40th birthday.. Darned near did me in.. None of the meds worked, and I finally just gave up and decided to just put one foot in front of the other and keep pn marching ..

Still have it, but I eliminated most stressors from my life and I can cope with it.

It has it's pros and cons...

I'm a calmer more rational adult because I was treated for it.

But on the other hand, I missed out on a lot of normal, important experience that interfered with my social development.

It's a double edged sword.

many of the friends one makes while in school seem to move away/disappear, or get too busy to maintain friendships. you get out of school and have to start the daily "grind" along with every other adult. ...
depresses me just typing about it... :)

:silly:

then, in my case, true.

That was my experience. I'm a man, but statistically females suffer depression much more frequently than males. If you think back to the studies that said that males and females have the same level of self-esteem through about age 12, when females' levels plummet, you'll see that most likely, first onset of depression is at puberty. (See Ellen, above.)

but then again, my life totally sucked. It still sucks, I'm still depressed but hey, it has always been justifiable depression.

Sometimes life is just the shits period.

:(

:kick:

Although many people with anxiety have been more anxious than average most of their life, it is this age that it really gets away from them and reaches the disability level.
Change is a big trigger for anxiety and depression. Young adults experience lots of change. More is expected from us societally, but the path is less clear than any other time in our life. I don't think that American society is very good to young adults. We go from school, with its community and clearer expectations for success, into the world without a community and a muddled view of what we are supposed to be doing. Is that the price of freedome and independence?

anger, or rather Rage, turned inward; a diversion from the real problem. That's been my experience. If I get depressed, I ask myself what am I mad at? It's taken a lot of practice, but seems to help me greatly.

I have memories of feeling terrible bouts of sobbing, wracking sadness for no reason at the age of 5 and my mom corroborates that. It's chemical, you're probably born with it, and it can show up at any time.

It was at its worst when I was 13, 14, 15...where I had 'being trapped in a town I loathed' on the list of aggravating factors. It wasn't really a family thing, though I lashed out at my parents an awful lot -- they were good parents and they aren't divorced. I know my behavior was a lot worse than theirs. My 20s were pretty bumpy and riddled with it too; add some bad relationships and substance abuse and you've got quite the mix. I'm starting to level out in my mid-30s. Therapy helps (Talk therapy, not meds in my case).