The Depression Loop & Prozac

Many researchers and mental-health professionals have observed that depression operates as a cycle, or a feedback loop. In other words, things in life can lead you to be depressed and depression can make those same things worse. The loop goes on and on. Consider how it oper­ates in the life of a client named Karrie.

Karrie is a thirty-seven-year old high school teacher who took Prozac recently became depressed fol­lowing the loss of her job. Cutbacks in education funding at the state level had led to many lay­offs, so Karrie knew she wasn’t the only one. Still, she often wonders why this happened to her and what she did to cause it. At times, she can spend hours staring at the television thinking about the things going wrong in her life. Before she became depressed, Karrie enjoyed socializ­ing with friends, exercising, reading, and going to movies. Now she has little interest in these activities. The more depressed she feels, the less she wants to talk to friends or to even leave the house. The more she sits by herself in her house, the more depressed she feels. As the fig­ure below suggests, Karrie is caught in circular trap or feedback loop.

The idea of a loop or cycle helps to explain why depression can be so difficult to end with­out help. If we asked Karrie what she’s doing instead of socializing and exercising, she would probably say she’s trying to feel better. When you’re depressed, it often feels better (in the short run) to stay at home than it does to go out. This raises another important point about the depression loop: The things you do to try to cope with depression sometimes make it worse. Some things that work in the short run may make depression worse in the long run.