Ability to “Seek Help” Required for Treating Depression

I am presently the head of the Center for Clinical Psychology inside the Academy Common of Meiji University’s Surugadai Campus. At the Center we provide support to all people with mental distress and/or those who seek counseling services. We have received more and more inquiries from business people who are in a depressive state and have lost motivation.

There are many factors that cause depression, and people who are serious and responsible show a greater tendency to experience depression. Such people think that “It is my fault,” or “It is my responsibility” when their work, etc. does not go well. They brood over the problem, and try to solve it by themselves. They think that they are responsible to do their own business by themselves, and that discussing their own problems with others or asking others for help would cause problems to others or be irresponsible. As a result, their problems may exceed their self-efforts to solve the problem or they may be depressed due to stress. If they finally cannot continue working and have to resign their work as a result of the above condition, it actually causes more problems both to the company and their family members.

In order to avoid such a situation, the best idea is to visit the psychiatry department of a hospital at an early stage. If you feel hesitant to visit the psychiatry department, you can go to another organization like our Center for counseling. The point is that you should seek help. You do not have to be ashamed of seeking help if you are distressed. Actually, struggling to solve the problem by yourself until you cannot bear it any more may lead to a serious result, causing more problems to the people around you, including your family members. You will suffer more pain and will need more time to be cured. It is worse if you do not seek help.

We call it, “Help Seeking,” and it means to ask for help when you are distressed. Please consider this as an ability. People who can seek help have a higher self-control ability.

While people with a strong sense of responsibility tended to suffer traditional depression, we now find that many young people suffering depression think that if the business does not go well, it is not their fault, but that other people around them are responsible for it. Such patients believe that people around them do not understand them or have no motivation to do business or to make efforts. In such cases, while the patients lack energy during working hours, they are very active after hours when they are with likable friends. As a result, many people think that they are simply lazy. However, since it is not good for themselves or their company if they cannot continue working, they also need medical treatment.

One of the reasons for new-type depression is that current young people are surrounded by adults who understand or try to understand them during their process of growing since childhood. All the adults they have met, not only their parents, but also teachers from primary school to university have tried to understand them and always praised them. All the people around them were receptive and young people believed that all adults should understand them. As a result, they face reality for the first time when they enter the world of work and do not know how to respond to it.

In case of such new-type depression, the counselor starts to become someone who can understand them well, and can gradually counsel them to have a more realistic social viewpoint. The counselor then advises the patient to find one small thing he/she can do well, and to increase the things they can do one by one. It is called the Small Step Principle. People who can recover from a severe condition are those who are good at finding a small thing they can do. We help the patient become such a person.