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Psychotherapy
Therapy for Depression
Most patients suffering from depression can benefit from treatment.
Treatment for depression most often involves psychotherapy, medications, or
a combination of the two. Depression psychotherapy comes in many forms. A
psychotherapist will determine what form of therapy for depression best
suits each individual patient.
Psychotherapy involves patient and therapist working together to understand
a patient's relationships, events, experiences and feelings. Once
problematic areas are uncovered, these areas are worked on in an effort to
resolve them and/or find more effective ways of coping with them.
Psychotherapy is called many things, including therapy, counseling and
psychosocial therapy. What they all have in common is talk. The goal when
working with a therapist is to learn about your medical condition, how to
identify problem emotions, and how to learn new ways of coping.
There are many kinds of depression psychotherapy. These include:
1) Behavior Therapy
Behavior therapy focuses on adjusting unhealthy and unwanted behaviors, most
often by engaging in a system of reinforcements and rewards for positive
behavior. It often includes desensitization, a process that works to
confront negative feelings and learning to overcome the negative responses
from those feelings.
2) Cognitive Therapy
Cognitive therapy focuses on identifying cognitive patterns (ways of
thinking) that cause undesirable feelings and behaviors and correcting them.
The central tenet of cognitive therapy rests on the belief that how one
interprets experiences determines how one feels and acts. The goal is
changing the interpretations of events that lead to the common symptoms of
depression, such as hopelessness and despair.
3) Cognitive-behavioral Therapy
This therapy combines the two above, and focuses on identifying negative
cognitive patterns and replacing them with healthy ones. The idea is that
negative cognitive patterns, as opposed to people or situations, determine
behavior. The focus is on changing behavioral responses to negative
cognitive patterns.
4) Exposure Therapy
In this type of therapy, a patient is directly exposed to the causes of
negative emotions, with a goal to learning how to better cope and respond to
the causes of the symptoms. This therapy is most often used in patients
suffering from obsessive compulsive disorder or post traumatic stress
disorder.
5) Interpersonal Therapy
Interpersonal therapy focuses directly on the patient's relationships with
others. The goal is to develop better methods of interacting and
communicating with friends, family, peers and strangers.
6) Play Therapy
Most often used with children, play therapy uses several techniques and
activities designed to help children express emotions and feelings. Often,
complex feelings cannot be expressed by children in traditional, verbal
ways.
7) Psychoanalysis
In psychoanalysis, feelings, events and memories are examined to address
their current impact on feelings and behavior. This therapy is based on the
idea that biological urges and childhood experiences form an unconscious
mind that drives adult feelings and emotions. Often included in
psychoanalysis are dream therapy and free association. Psychoanalysis is
usually a long term therapeutic approach that demands working with a
therapist with highly specialized training.
What all forms of depression psychotherapy have in common is talk. They all involve the
patient and therapist communicating about problem areas of behavior, thought
and emotions. Therapy for depression, along with
depression medication, can provide
an effective way of coping with this disorder.
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