Antidepressant Depression

The recognition of depression as a common mental illness should lead to studies focusing on what treatment is best for a patient, but antidepressants seem to be considered the common solution. While medications are dependable, antidepressants may only suppress depressive symptoms, resulting in few longstanding improvements in a depressed patient (Annells, 55). In contrast, meditative treatments such as guided meditation, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT), and other activities lead to positive, long-term improvements in depressed patients (57). Although many people assume medications are the only way to treat patients with depression, the better choice of treatment may be meditation as it relieves mental limitations such as depressive
In fact, meditation's dependency on a patient's ability to recognize and remove negative thinking patterns may be what removes their depression altogether. To begin with, a single trial focused on treating patients suffering from treatment-resistant depression (TRD) discovered: “by strengthening cognitive control mechanisms, meditation may lessen ruminative processes and thereby diminish depression” (qtd. in Eisendrath, 100). This information reveals that patients actively participating in mindfulness activities created their own defense-mechanism against depression itself. To demonstrate even further, patients continued their usual medication throughout the trial (102), but it was found there was no connection between the use of medication and meditation (108) meaning the factor that reduced depression severity in patients was the addition of meditative treatment (104). Overall, it can be interpreted that meditation does not only cure depressive symptoms, but gives patients the means to overcome their mental illness without the assistance of medication
Firstly, meditation helps remove depressive symptoms through treatments based on the present moment. Secondly, meditative activities teach patients how to recognize and remove negative thinking patterns that often lead back to depression, resulting in lower chances of relapse. Lastly, the brain itself is both strengthened and reconstructed if a patient actively participates in meditation, giving patients long-term mental stability. Overall, considering depression’s outreach in modern society, attempting new treatments such as meditation could lead to a smaller portion of patients affected by recurring depressive