Less or no desire to do anything

One of the most giveaway symptoms of depression is a decreased, or no desire at all to do anything.

Hobbies you might’ve previously enjoyed, like weightlifting, and running for example, suddenly mean very little to you.

But it’s not only about your interests. Even things such as getting out of bed, and even showering yourself can suddenly become very hard to do because you have zero motivation, arousal, and energy to do so.

Your thoughts get darker and more negative

It becomes increasingly harder to see the affirmative things in life or the positive in other people around you, the more depressed you become.

You tend to get more negative, nihilistic, cynical, and overall more pessimistic the worse your mood gets. Perhaps these antagonistic thoughts get increasingly worse because we start to lose hope since we simply don’t see a way out anymore.

Overthinking

You tend to start overthinking when things are going poorly, which is basically what depression is. Feeling bad all the time.

It seems like there’s no ‘off’ button to your mind and thoughts anymore. That’s why you continue pondering, even though it’s detrimental and worsening your mental health.

The problem is that countless possible unfavorable scenarios can happen in life. And continuously focusing on the negatives will inevitably lead to you not being able to see the positive in others, and life in general anymore.

In my opinion, certain personality types are more at risk for developing overthinking behavior than others. That’s not to say that they’re automatically doomed to overthink, but they’re more prone to developing said disorder and should take preemptive precautions to protect themselves.

Anxiety

All these damaging, unsupportive thoughts and patterns of overthinking mean we’ll experience more anxiety than the average person. And we know that there are a lot of different anxiety types that can impact our lives for the worse.

This anxiousness can be about the smallest things in life, which might seem insignificant to other people who are not suffering from a mental disease. Popular examples include being scared to talk to others, afraid of losing their keys, and even being alarmed that someone will break into their house.

Fortunately, there are some things we can do to reduce stress and anxiety such as calling or visiting your friends for regular social interaction and to empty your mind.

Ruminating

Negative thoughts keep running rampant through your head without any option to stop these contents from happening.

This means that you can’t get any rest during the day, while being tense since you’re constantly worrying what went, and might go wrong in the future.

As a result, you’re not able to sleep at night since your sympathetic nervous system is overactive because you’re so wound up. Our sympathetic nervous system should only be active in life-threatening situations since it occurs during a fight or flight response. It drains our energy and is devastating for our well-being in the future when used too frequently or long.

Irritable

You start to get a lot more irritable because your thoughts tend to get darker while overthinking and ruminating at the same time. This coupled with a decrease in sleep quality is devastating to our temper.

You could be irritable as being in a ‘foul mood’ all the time.

The smallest thing might trigger you and set you off on an emotional tantrum. Even if the person in question didn’t even say, or do, anything wrong.

Increased desire to self-medicate

You might have more desire to drink alcohol, especially during the week.

I guess that’s because drinking alcohol or consuming any drugs for that matter, is addictive and will release dopamine, which is our ‘happiness hormone’. This will make us feel better instantly, improving our mood in the process, even if short-lived.

Your sleep quality decreases

Your sleep quality will almost inevitably get worse if you suffer from depression. That’s not abnormal if we know that you’re overthinking and ruminating all the time you spend awake.

The increased amount of anxiety and stress you feel also play a large factor in not being able to catch much sleep. And if you do manage to fall asleep, you probably can’t sleep through, making you feel exhausted, and unrefreshed when getting out of bed after a night of rest.

Appetite changes

You might forget to eat because you are so stressed out and sunken in negative thoughts during the day.

It might also be the case that you react oppositely and start eating a lot more than you did previously. This is what we call stress eating, and is an attempt of our body and mind to reduce tension.

If this happens, chances are that there will be a lot of sugar and fast food in your diet, which are addicting because they release endorphins as well. These neurochemicals being released are hormones that make us feel better, hence the term ‘stress eating’.

Feeling of helplessness

Because of all those negative thoughts and feelings floating around in your head, you may start to doubt yourself, or your ability to get better at all. And we know that we need enough hope to take action.

You might begin to wonder if you can ever recover from your depression because you don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel anymore.

If you feel that you’ve lost control of your life, then you will start feeling helpless because ‘it’s not under your control anyway’. Of course, that isn’t true, and there’s always something we can do to improve our situation.

Having a hard time thinking clearly/concentrating

This is probably linked to poor sleep hygiene because depressed individuals sleep too little and with little to no consistency. Being stressed out all the time is also a big factor in not being capable of sleeping well.

This in turn makes your thinking more foggy, and thus less clear and fast. You might have trouble concentrating on tasks while being easily distracted.