Depression Counselling & Treatment
Depression treatment usually consists of a combination of depression counselling and therapy, relaxation techniques, and lifestyle changes. Counselling services and therapy for depression can help you learn how to process your thoughts and change your behaviours so you feel better and prevent relapses. Counselling also teaches you ways to handle stressors and triggers that are causing you physical and mental exhaustion all while helping you understand why you are feeling this way.
Poor sleep, loss of appetite, and binge eating are common symptoms of depression. Maintaining a healthy diet and sufficient sleep has a significant impact on your overall mood and mental health. Managing the most stressful parts of your day-to-day life can also help in managing depression symptoms. Certain lifestyle changes should be adopted as well such as doing regular exercise, building stronger relationships or joining a new social network, having a balanced diet, getting enough sleep, and reducing the number of stressors. Exercise can increase dopamine and serotonin levels in the brain which elevate your mood, while stronger relationships and a new social network can reduce social isolation.
Relaxation techniques such as yoga and meditation can also help reduce your stress levels, improve your listless mood, improve your emotional and mental well-being, and reduce your symptoms of depression.
Depression is a serious mental health condition that is, unfortunately, becoming more common. You might be feeling sad or empty for extended periods as a result of depression, resulting in a negative impact on physical health and thought patterns. Some people turn to self-harm or self-medication with drinking as a way to cope with sadness, while others may experience insomnia or have thoughts of suicide. Everyday tasks and interactions can seem difficult, both mentally and physically, often meaning that we avoid doing things we would normally do.
Did you know that in Singapore, the depression rate is very high? In fact, the country has one of the highest rates of depression in Asia. I often wish that depression will go away on its own, so the estimated 1 in 7 of us who are depressed will not have to suffer. Sadly, depression does not. When depression strikes, it has a strong grip on you. Symptoms of depression can worsen over time, and those who do not seek help may start to have suicidal thoughts. Professional counselling services in Singapore can help you to improve your mental wellness.Physical Causes
Depression can be caused by your body or your circumstances—or a mixture of both. At times, depression is triggered by a specific event; other times, it seems like there’s no rhyme or reason behind your feelings, thoughts, and symptoms. Support from a professional is important because we know how to properly deal with symptoms like depression, extreme sadness, anger, and other inexplicable feelings. Depression can affect all types of people: children, men and women, and even senior citizens. Most mental health experts agree that brain chemistry plays a major role in major depression. The brain has chemicals called dopamine and serotonin. These chemicals affect our well-being and our ability to feel pleasure so if the brain doesn’t make enough of these, clinical depression sets in. But what really comes first, is it the chicken or the egg? Just as brain chemistry can affect life, life events too can cause changes in the brain. Any stressful or traumatic event can greatly contribute to developing depression.Common Triggers of Depression
- Breakups
- Divorce
- Marital issues
- Financial difficulties
- Retrenchment, Business fallout etc.
- Chronic illness
- Long term caregiving
- Social isolation
- Bullying
- Domestic violence
- Emotional abuse
- Sexual assault
- Mental stress
Depression is not the same as the typical grief or mourning process. Grief after loss is normal and fades away. The sadness or guilt is limited to thoughts of the deceased. But with depression, symptoms tend to be persistent, and usually not tied to any specific thought. It’s important to seek mental health-related help if you’re struggling.
Check out the signs and symptoms of depression below:
You have a lot of unanswered questions
Do you often ask the question “Do I have depression?”, or do you find yourself Googling about depression treatment in Singapore? A person with depression is most likely to feel confused and have a lot of self-doubt and unanswered questions.
You always overthink
Are you laying in bed, unable to sleep with so many thoughts about your situation, sick and tired of life, and feeling helpless or worthless? If so, you may be experiencing rumination, overthinking, and loss of interest caused by depression.
You feel a lot of things—all at the same time
Have you been constantly feeling down, hopeless, angry, easily irritable and weepy? Some people also experience intense and persistent feelings of sadness. That is what depression does to your thinking. It makes you feel like you can never be happy again.
You feel sluggish
Are you struggling with seemingly simple daily activities? Find it an enormous task to get out of bed? Or maybe feel unmotivated to start your day? When you’re experiencing depression, you might feel apathy, helplessness and that you can’t change your situation.
You lose focus and concentration
Have you been waking up feeling tired and unable to concentrate on anything throughout the day, even on simple stuff like watching Netflix? Or maybe you always feel numb about everything that has been going on around you? Minutes suddenly feel like hours.
You lose interest in things that you are once passionate about
Depression results in a loss of interest in a lot of things. Things you used to enjoy in your daily life don’t feel enjoyable to you anymore. You might become a lot more pessimistic about situations that didn’t use to faze you.
You feel guilty, worried, and anxious
Are you wondering if this dark cloud will consume you? And hoping that you will no longer have to deal with this awful feeling of dread? Are you maybe thinking, “if I could just ‘be strong’, ‘deal with it’, will this depression go away?”? depression makes a person feel bogged down, heavy, and unable to help themselves; those with depression are usually not aware of the severity of the situation so oftentimes, they don’t seek professional help till things get much worse.
You may also experience physical symptoms of depression including digestive problems, significant weight loss/gain or insomnia.
The types of depression counselling Singapore therapists offer include solution-focused brief therapy, cognitive behavioural therapy, interpersonal counselling, and family counselling.
My practice philosophy is not to unnecessarily delve into your painful past. But instead use your strengths to help you get unstuck. I use a direct, yet compassionate approach, and highly value the use of authenticity and humour in the process. I also use an integrative approach, believing all aspects of our experiences contribute to overall well-being. The dance of therapy and coaching is both an art and science, each individual is unique and deserves customised help to quickly regain clarity, confidence and motivation.
My practice is very much influenced by Steve and Insoo Kim Berg’s Solution Focus Approach, my original training in Cognitive Behaviour Therapy where we work on your behaviour and thoughts that are contributing to your depression. You will learn to process your thoughts and react to situations differently while challenging some of the assumptions and preconceived notions that you have. In interpersonal therapy, we will explore your relationships. You will gain an awareness of the unhealthy behaviours in your interpersonal relationships that contribute to your depression so you can learn to change them. You will get unbiased feedback from me in a way that challenges you to gain new perspectives and to develop new skills to help yourself.
One-on-one counselling sessions with me can help you identify the triggers of your depression and work through these issues while you learn to adopt healthy habits and positive relationships with your loved ones. In some situations, we may need to bring your family in for counselling. Your family can sometimes also be affected by your depression so they might worsen the situation even if the intentions that they have are good.
Through family counselling, your family members can learn more about depression while I facilitate a discussion about the stresses of depression and what you can do together as a family.
Engaging in professional counselling sessions can result in a significant improvement in depression symptoms and overall life satisfaction. You may also have a lower risk of relapse while you learn more about your thought or behavioural patterns that trigger your depression.
Living in our heads can be exhausting, isolating, and frightening. It’s hard to know where to turn to when you are depressed. Depression counselling can help you understand why you are feeling this way and help you navigate your way out. When you know how depression works and what sustains it, you can start to gain power over it. With empowerment comes hope that you can overcome your depression with emotional support.
Over the past decade, I have been treating depression through online counselling and at my counselling practice with the objective of helping patients feel better quickly. The very first thing we will do in our session together is to help you understand why you are feeling the way you do. You might be feeling stressed out because of difficult situations in your life or traumatic past experiences such as emotional abuse, bullying or sexual assault, which can lead to poor physical and mental health. The next step is to learn techniques to relax, de-stress and manage the emotions you might be feeling. Learning to manage our emotions makes it easier for our brains to retain information and pay attention so that we can begin the work of addressing the underlying causes of depression and having the appropriate treatment.
You may feel significantly better after the first therapy session, but that doesn’t mean that you should stop further treatment. Depression doesn’t shift overnight, and a handful of sessions will help realign the areas in your life that originally contributed to your depression.
What to Expect
In the sessions, we will work together to:
- Learn to reduce worrying and how to manage negative thoughts and emotions
- Find solutions to your causes of stress, including unique challenges pertaining to your stage of life
- Learn to work through relationship challenges
- Learn deep relaxation techniques that will help in managing your depression.
- Reduce overthinking
- Learn to balance thought patterns so that they are not always negative
- Provide emotional support through your experiences
- Learn how to protect yourself from developing depression symptoms again as you feel better
Note that no medication prescription will be involved as that must be prescribed by a qualified psychiatrist who is a medical doctor.
Do you wonder if counselling for your depression will really help? Studies have shown that counselling, psychotherapy, and coaching are proven to help with depression. Suicide is a serious matter so we as counsellors or psychologists are always available for a talk.
Hello, I’m Cassandra, a Master Solution-Focused Practitioner and a registered Counsellor with the Singapore Association of Counselling. You can also call me a Thought Mediator or Motivation (Re)builder! I’m able to use my knowledge and vast experience working with clients of different ages and life situations to help you.
Depression counselling in Singapore is just a few taps away. Head to my About page to get to know more about me as a therapist! You can easily set an appointment for a session with me anytime.
Testimonial
Here’s what a client I helped with Depression over 3 sessions had to say:
“Sessions with Cassandra have provided a safe environment and framework to understand the deeper issues and triggers behind my depression. These have been invaluable in my personal growth, reframing perspectives and developing a more positive way of handling situations.”
Worried that you will be spending weeks on end talking about the painful past with your therapist? Fret not, my aim is to get you off depression counselling with the least number of sessions. This way, you’ll be confident to recommend me to your friends. Win, win, all round.
Here’s what another client I worked with for depression had to say about her experience working with me:
“Cassandra is very professional and skilled. More than just listening and advising, she purposefully steers every session into techniques and options I could use in the healing process. Cassandra always involved me in working out solutions or ways of coping. My personal involvement in these decision-making modalities made a real difference in my recovery. One must work hard to change or at least adapt. I didn’t quite believe Cassandra when we talked on the phone to make my first appointment that I would feel much better and see significant results within 3-4 sessions, but it really happened. I am deeply grateful to her.”
To check out more testimonials like these, head here.
Further Questions
Concerned that the cost of depression therapy is too expensive? How often do we save up for a holiday or to buy the latest gadget, only to remain miserable on the trip or found that we lost interest/joy in the new toy after a few days? I promise, a course of depression counselling is going to cost less than the latest iPhone.
For my professional charges, head here.
Check out my FAQ page for more questions about the counselling process. Or contact me with any concerns you may have.
Ready to start feeling better from your depression? Schedule a counselling session today!