CEUs and Addiction Counselor Precertification training are available at AllCEUs.com
hey there everybody and welcome back to the addiction and co-occurring disorders
treatment manual unit 1 part 3 the introduction to depression i'm your host dr donnelly snipes
in the last part we discussed mood disorders in general in this part we're really going to do
a deep dive into what depression is and how it may interact with addiction and physical issues
so depression is a term that we use to define or describe when we feel
apathetic and have low mood more days than not we just have
difficulty caring about things and we feel depressed hopeless helpless
depression also is characterized by changes in eating or sleeping patterns
some people don't have an appetite some people are binging on high fat high sugar feel good foods
some people can't sleep at all they have insomnia other people sleep or are in bed most of the time
and they have difficulty waking up their sleep is not quality they're just getting a lot of it
some people struggle with excessive guilt now guilt is self-anger and remember in the last
part we talked about how unpleasant emotions can trigger unpleasant emotions when somebody feels
exhausted and hopeless and hopeless and has has a low mood they may not be behaving the way they
feel they should they may not be doing the things that they feel they should be doing because they
just don't have it in them as a result they start to feel guilty well that guilt is self-anger which
in turn compounds the depression and feelings of hopelessness and helplessness and worthlessness
difficulty concentrating is another symptom of depression and this can be very common when
you're not getting adequate quality sleep because a chemical called
adenosine builds up in the brain and when you're not getting that good restful sleep
it doesn't get cleared out so you feel foggy the next day and it's hard to concentrate
you also may have difficulty concentrating because when you're depressed there's a imbalance in your
neuro neurotransmitters and that imbalance in the neurotransmitters particularly dopamine and
norepinephrine make it more difficult for you to concentrate that doesn't mean you can just take
a pill and suddenly start concentrating again it's important to explore what's causing that imbalance
some people when they're depressed are fatigued if you're not getting good quality sleep well
you're probably going to be tired a lot of the time additionally when people are
depressed it means those excitatory neuro chemicals like norepinephrine and glutamate
are not in high supply which contributes to people feeling low energy
some people when they're depressed also have symptoms that we call psychomotor slowing
and that's when it feels like you're carrying around a hundred pound backpack on your back
all day long everything literally feels harder to do your body feels heavier it may feel like when
you're walking somewhere you're walking into a 60 mile an hour wind because that's just how it feels
other people have what we call psychomotor agitation and these are the people who tend
to have anxiety with their depression and they have difficulty sitting still they may be more
fidgety there's just nothing that really makes them happy they don't have
a lot of energy but they still can't sit still and some people with major depression may also
experience thoughts of suicide if you're having thoughts of suicide right now pause this video
and call 988 or 911 whichever is more appropriate for your situation and get help that's an
emergency if you're not having thoughts of suicide then let's talk about an activity
spend about 50 minutes thinking how could each symptom apathy changes in eating changes in
sleeping excessive guilt difficulty concentrating fatigue and psychomotor slowing or agitation
how could each of those symptoms trigger addictive behavior anxiety anger guilt grief or jealousy
and what are three healthier ways of dealing with each symptom so think about times when you've had
a little blip where you haven't had that symptom what was different or times when you've had
that symptom and you figured out something healthy that you could do to deal with it
what are some strategies that you've used they may not have worked forever
but if they worked for 10 minutes or 30 minutes or a day great let's build on those
it's important to go through each of the issues individually for exa for example
apathy and low mood could trigger addiction because when people are feeling that way
they don't want to continue to feel that way so they may gravitate towards behaviors that make
them feel good that produce pleasure changes in eating or sleeping patterns can trigger
addictive behavior food addiction is one of them and sleeping patterns for
example if you're not getting good quality sleep it may trigger addictive behaviors
and use of addictive substances that are designed to help you feel more awake and alert
excessive guilt can trigger addictive behaviors because it's really painful to feel that
intense searing guilt all the time so some people may engage in addictive behavior to just escape
from that to numb that out for a minute difficulty concentrating may trigger
addictive behaviors because some substances and especially ones that tend to be more
stimulatory or anti-anxiety in nature depending on why you're having difficulty concentrating
may help people concentrate in the short term unfortunately remember addictive behaviors tend
to make the problem worse in the long run because it causes you to burn through all those chemicals
a lot faster so then when you're not using your problems even worse it's intensified fatigue
we already talked about how that could trigger addictive behavior and psychomotor agitation when
people have difficulty sitting still when they're restless they may be looking for something to do
i've seen people have things like internet gaming or gambling triggered
when they're experiencing psychomotor agitation because they just they can't sit still and watch
a television show they're having difficulty getting to sleep they don't want to eat so they
may turn to something else because they don't know what to do with themselves they can't wind down
again go through each one of the feelings anxiety anger guilt grief jealousy
and addictive behavior and think about how each of these symptoms
could trigger those feelings or behaviors and three healthier ways of dealing with each symptom