health­plus­themag

Known as the silent cri­sis, de­pres­sion af­fects mil­lions of men world­wide. While re­search has shown that the num­ber of men with a men­tal health is­sue is grow­ing at an as­ton­ish­ing rate. When it comes to their health, most men think of their phys­i­cal health…like en­dur­ing a prostate ex­am. Men may be re­luc­tant to seek sup­port for their men­tal health or dis­close men­tal health prob­lems to loved ones. 

This week, Health Plus Mag­a­zine asked psy­chother­a­pist, Shakir Lon­don to shed some light on some is­sues af­fect­ing men’s men­tal health.

Why Aren’t Men Get­ting Di­ag­nosed and Treat­ed for De­pres­sion?

For a man to get di­ag­nosed and treat­ed for de­pres­sion he (or some­one close to him) would have to ac­knowl­edge that there is a prob­lem, and he would al­so have to be will­ing to get help. The chal­lenge for men is in ac­knowl­edg­ing and in will­ing­ness. Men are of­ten so­cialised to ap­pear to be un­af­fect­ed by symp­toms as­so­ci­at­ed with de­pres­sion. We re­sort to al­ter­na­tive ways of cop­ing such as min­i­mal­is­ing symp­toms, mask­ing symp­toms, and es­cap­ing in­to work ac­tiv­i­ties or sub­stance use. Thus the idea of even hav­ing a di­a­logue ex­press­ing a men­tal/emo­tion­al prob­lem in­ter­feres with his abil­i­ty to get help.

Why is de­pres­sion in men some­times over­looked or un­di­ag­nosed?

We of­ten on­ly think of de­pres­sion as ex­treme and pro­longed sad­ness but that isn’t al­ways the un­der­ly­ing symp­tom. Some­times its ir­ri­tabil­i­ty, headaches or oth­er types of pain which can all make it easy to ex­clude de­pres­sion as a di­ag­no­sis. Know­ing the right types of ques­tions to ask and what to look for are very im­por­tant. In ad­di­tion, many men have made a habit of down­play­ing and hid­ing symp­toms of de­pres­sion. As dif­fi­cult and de­struc­tive as these may be they are of­ten prefer­able when com­pared to the stig­ma of men­tal ill­ness.

What are the Most Com­mon Symp­toms of De­pres­sion in Men?

I be­lieve the most com­mon symp­toms of de­pres­sion in men are: pro­longed dif­fi­cul­ty sleep­ing; con­stant lack of ap­petite; reck­less be­hav­iour (eg while dri­ving), no­tice­able in­creas­es in anger or ir­ri­tabil­i­ty; con­stant feel­ings of empti­ness, help­less­ness or hope­less­ness; loss of zeal for once plea­sur­able ac­tiv­i­ties (eg sex); in­creased and/or ex­ces­sive al­co­hol use or sub­stance use; dif­fi­cul­ty con­cen­trat­ing and so­cial iso­la­tion.

What should be fo­cused on to im­prove men­tal health among men?

There are sev­er­al things that can work re­al­ly well for men. 1. A scenic walk, jog or oth­er ex­er­cis­es can boost sero­tonin and dopamine in the brain thus el­e­vat­ing mood and over­all well­be­ing.

2. Find­ing en­vi­ron­ments where a man can so­cialise and de­vel­op mean­ing­ful in­ter­ac­tion are crit­i­cal to his men­tal health. Whether through sports, church groups, or the oc­ca­sion­al “boy’s lime,” these fo­rums tar­get the neg­a­tive im­pact of so­cial iso­la­tion.

3. Nu­tri­tion­al de­fi­cien­cies can be a hin­drances to cog­ni­tive func­tion­ing. En­sur­ing that one’s di­et in­cor­po­rates food rich in B vi­t­a­mins and Vi­t­a­min D can be in­stru­men­tal in im­prov­ing men’s men­tal health.

4. Eval­u­at­ing one’s stress lev­el and prac­tic­ing per­son­al self-care can go a long way in im­prov­ing men­tal health of men. I like to use the tech­nique “What can I do? Where can I go? And who can I talk to?” with my clients. Three pos­i­tive re­spons­es for each can en­sure that men will al­ways have some­thing that they can ap­ply when stres­sors be­come over­whelm­ing.

Things to do for Movem­ber:

Sched­ule an ap­point­ment,

even if you’re not sick

Eat a well-bal­anced di­et

In­crease your vi­t­a­min D in­take

Grow a mous­tache or beard

Movem­ber en­cour­ages men to grow mous­tach­es as a way to raise aware­ness and funds for men’s health-specif­i­cal­ly for prostate can­cer, tes­tic­u­lar can­cer, men­tal health and sui­cide pre­ven­tion.

The goal of Movem­ber is to “change” the face of men’s health. It aims to in­crease ear­ly can­cer de­tec­tion, di­ag­no­sis and ef­fec­tive treat­ments, and ul­ti­mate­ly re­duce the num­ber of pre­ventable deaths.

Movem­ber be­gan in Aus­tralia in 2003 to raise aware­ness for prostate and tes­tic­u­lar can­cers, ac­cord­ing to the Movem­ber Foun­da­tion, a non­prof­it that raised near­ly $21 mil­lion in 2013.