Often parents and teachers use the word/diagnosis “depression” in the face of the physiological disruptions of the adolescent phase extremely. Let’s see how to recognize this disorder and what are the interventions to be implemented
Like any term that indicates a specific disease or disorder, also the word depression it must be used carefully: the risk of underestimating the signs It exists, but there is also the risk of transforming behaviors related to the normal existential crisis, characteristic of adolescencein a label that explains all the boy’s difficulties and identifies him as “depressed”.
On the other hand, adolescence, a period of growth and discovery, can be accompanied, in some cases, by a strong emotional disorder characterized by feeling of sadnessmoments of despair and Loss of interest for daily activities.
In this article we will try to understand what are the Symptoms of depression in adolescenceor it would be more correct to say the alarm bells, the situations to be attentive and that they indicate that something, in the boy or girl, is changing.
What are the symptoms of depression in adolescence?
More than of Symptoms of depression in adolescence We therefore talk about alarm bells who have to induce parents to observe better, to listen to children without tormenting them and without anticipating, with them first, The word depression.
“Most of the boys and girls who come to talk to me – says Milena Sorrenti, counselor of the Change Institute, who works in numerous listening points for teenagers in schools and consultants – speak of anxiety, of sense of solitude, of misunderstanding; Almost never of depression. They are the parents and teachers who use that word/diagnosis extremely ease, which many kids contest lively ».
The adjective “lively” that Milena uses spontaneously makes you think about what can really be considered a Symptom of depression in adolescence And what is not: a depressed teenager does not contest, is mainly apathetic, not very reactive, or is irritable in a generalized way, with moments of crisis of unexpected and unpredictable anger. Sometimes it doesn’t even appear sadbut simply absent.
It is certainly not easy for parents to understand which signs or behaviors must make one think of a depression. It is certainly good Avoid rushing on the internet With the idea that, after a summary reading of more or less reliable articles, a sort of “recipe” for recognize depression in teenagers With a safe fail and in a very short time.
The best advice is, rather, to observe their children patiently and attention, starting from abrupt and persistent changes:
- Deep and not modifiable sadness from what he first made the boy or girl happy;
- frequent and inhibitual cry;
- decrease in the presence of friends or negative descriptions of their behaviors (“I don’t like anyone …”);
- increase of hours of solitude o reduction of the activities in which the boy or girl was involved before (sports, music, organized groups);
- irregularity in sleep;
- irregularity indiet.
Warning: it’s not yet time to say “but then it’s depressed!”. Rather it is necessary to keep the supervision active without this transforming inquisition, to then find, even with thehelp of an expertthe best way – whether it is or not of depression – to help the boy or the girl feel better; After all, this is the most important thing.
Depression in adolescence: why does it check?
Two questions never to ask the teenager who worries us about his “negative” mood They are: “What do you have?” And “What happened?” Whether it’s sadness (or, to say better, of the painful reflection on the sense of existence, which is typical of adolescence) whether it is really a start of depression, these are questions to which The boys cannot answerbecause it is almost never a single event or a specific experience that produces those changes, but a competition of factors difficult to translate into words.
At the base there is an aspect that unites all teenagers: the appearance of those “Growth tasks” who will transform the child into an adult. To perform that transformation, the boys feel they will have to: be able to establish good relationships with the peers of both sexes; accept your own body and the reactions of others to that body; become more independent, even emotionally, by the parents; prepare for a future of economic independence; etc.
Is it like getting out of an old skin without having a new one ready: how to amaze the hypersensitivity, hyperreactivity to everything that happens, of exasperated attention for what others think?
When to this “physiological” situation Factors that accentuate the difficulties, which lead the boys to feel incapable, inadequate and lonely, can (I underline “can”) establish a depressive state, especially if other factors are added, such as a Family or social context Too an applicant, not very enhanced or poorly emotional, or even excessively ambitious objectives – in sport, in school, in artistic activities … – which prove to be unattainable.
Also the First sentimental and sexual relationships They can bring a boy or a girl with a “normal” reaction of disappointment and suffering to a “state” that tends to radicalize. These are these changes that do not attenuate, and become a condition that persists over time, which we can consider a real alarm signal.
What to do and what is better to avoid
In addition to the indication of avoiding direct questions and of remaining under observation without intervening too hastily, it is important to first of all that the parents are wondering if theirs habitual communication style It is still suitable for the particular moment lived by the Desk. Attention: this does not mean that parents are the cause of a possible depression, but that one of the first things to do is to try to adapt their own relational methods and educational to the situation of difficulty and suffering of one’s son or daughter, beyond the fact that they are depression or not.
Pedagogical advice can be a first step: confront a professional It allows parents to perfect their observations and develop hypotheses on how to improve the methods of communication and relationship with the boy or the girl.
Also propose to their children a psychological help or the intervention of a specialized center In fact, it requires extreme caution and attention: if done in the wrong way and at the wrong time, the proposal can preclude theacceptance of help of this type. For this reason it is very important that parents seek help and support for themselves when they begin to worry about the behavior of their teenage children, to find the moment and the best way to propose help them, and also for identify the most suitable type of help.
Many boys and girls who at first reject sending the psychologist instead accept instead individual or group interventions In which to speak freely, feel listened to/ee and “and to” unravel the problems ” – as he said to his counselor Pietro, a fourteen year old who was developing worrying social closing and communication reduction behaviors. Many schools and many local services make available to teenagers “Listening counters” whose goal is not the diagnosis – that a teenager in crisis can fear, or in any case not desire – but the research and the enhancement of resources Of the boy or girl: the strategies he manages to use to feel better, the things he still manages to consider pleasant, the people with whom he manages to feel comfortable.
Pietro, after a few months of “listening” meetings, decided that he wanted to try to feel better. Has started a psychotherapy and continues to attend the listening center for meetings group on the management of performance anxiety at school. The word depression is, in his life and in that of his family, but as something to manage and not to be considered as a permanent condemnation.
