Depressed?

It is almost impossible for those who have never experienced depression to relate
to this malady and to what the depression sufferer is having to endure. The writer
of this article has suffered the very worst kinds of depression - and this for
many years, so please accept my sincere sympathies . . . I know exactly what
depression is all about. I have surely experienced those feelings of not wanting
to live, I know how that dull heaviness settles on the brain and how, when this
happens, nothing in life has any meaning - and how at such times even our most
cherished of dreams and ambitions lose all meaning.
Some of the symptoms of my particular brand of depression included feelings of
self-hate, antisocial feelings - even fear of mixing with people. In my case,
bouts of terrible anxiety sometimes accompanied my depression and these were
sometimes harder to deal with than the depression itself.

The good news, however, is that though I have suffered from almost every manner of
depression, I am now depression-free and, as such, I do believe that I may be able
to help you to overcome this cruel condition. It cost me six years of study and a
small fortune to track down the cause of my second spell of depression and,
knowing what I now know, I am sure I can help you - and save you much time and
money.

In my own experience I have isolated four major causes of depression and I have
confirmed that in each case the depression always lifts when we remove the cause -
and it will always lift permanently if we permanently remove the cause.

So please be encouraged. Your depression is not your unlucky lot in life - you are
not a victim of fate - you are not a "depressive" and destined to always remain
that way. While psychiatrists will usually try and blame your depression on
something in your long-forgotten past, I encourage you to first believe that your
depression has a present physical cause that needs to be removed. Then, provided
you are willing to take the necessary steps, your life will soon be back to
normal, and your enthusiasm for living will return.

The major causes of depression that I have isolated include . . .

(1) food sensitivities,

(2) antagonistic chemical substances that have found their way into the body,

(3) stimulants

(4) current circumstances, and unpleasant memories.

(5) Other causes of depression that are briefly touched on at the foot of this
page include:

Sexual excess

Masturbation

Success (Elation)

Overwork

Amusements
Isolation

Inward Focused Thinking

Complaining

Inactivity

Sadness

Tea, coffee and other stimulants

I will only briefly deal with each of these points in an effort to help you to
identify the cause/s of your depression. Then I will refer you to appropriate web
sites that should provide the information that you will be needing.

(1) Food Sensitivities

For some reason I have a sensitivity to cheese - any cheese. If I eat cheese
today, even a little cheese, I can rest assured that I will be severely depressed
tomorrow - and the depression will usually continue for ten to twelve hours.

We have an Italian cheese factory down the road, and I just love Mozzarella cheese
- either as is, or on pizza. So, as you can imagine, I ate a lot of cheese and, as
a result I suffered a lot of depression. Only after some years did I manage to
link my depression to my consumption of cheese. When I cut out the cheese, the
depression left me.

If your depression is caused by a food sensitivity, the hard part is to identify

what food it is that is causing the problem. The easy part is to stop eating that
particular food.

The following pulse test might help you to identify a particular food or food type
that your are allergic to.

PULSE TEST FOR

ALLERGY IDENTIFICATION

For four to seven days, take your pulse before you get out of bed, before each
meal, and then thirty minutes, sixty minutes, and ninety minutes after each meal,
which should consist of your customary foods. Take your pulse before retiring.
Take all pulse counts for a full minute and in the sitting position and not
immediately after any vigorous exercise.

Keep a chart of all pulse recordings. If you have a cold or the flu, wait until it
subsides. Smoking cigarettes during this testing period may invalidate the test,
as it has been estimated that 75 percent of all humans are allergic to tobacco.
You can test for tobacco allergy by taking your pulse before you smoke and then
again fifteen minutes later.

Take a close look at the very lowest count - usually the one before rising - and
the very highest. If the difference is more than twelve to sixteen counts, a
significant rise, chances are you're allergic to something in your diet. The meals
that produced such a significantly increased pulse at either thirty, sixty, or
ninety minutes contain the allergic item or items. If a meal contained only one
food, and caused a significant rise, it is fairly straightforward that you are
allergic to that food.
(Ralph Golan, M.D., Optimal Wellness, p.254)

If the pulse test does not help, then go on a fruit only diet (with the best water
available in between meals) until your depression lifts - even if this takes a few
days. Then slowly introduce your favourite foods into your diet - only one new
food per meal and watch for the return of your depression. You will need to keep a
written record of everything that enters your mouth - and suspect even your
toothpaste or deodorant. When and if your depression returns, it is probably
related to some food that you have recently introduced to your diet.

If these steps do not highlight the cause of your depression, then you might want
to take a gluten intolerance test. Gluten, as found in Barley, Rye, Oats and Wheat
(BROW) is a major cause of depression. Health stores will be able to supply you
with gluten-free alternatives.

(2) Antagonistic Chemical Substances

There are tens of thousands of chemicals in the environment today. These range
from dangerous toxins to relatively harmless substances. Over-exposure to any
toxic chemical can cause severe reactions in the human system - one of which could
be depression.

To help you to recognize the very real dangers that threaten us in our modern,
scientific world, I will briefly tell you about what must rank as the very worst
experience in my life - one that included the very worst bouts of depression you
can imagine.

At my worst stage, I could hardly sleep at night, I could not cope with stress, I
could not go to work, my memory was very poor, and I was sensitive to noise and
light. When speaking, my words would get mixed up, I experienced terrible anxiety
attacks, I had frequent bouts of unbearable depression and, perhaps worst of all,
I could not socialize freely because I had become strangely shy and was easily
embarrassed - for no apparent reason.

Then, while visiting with a good friend, I happened to pick up a book and there I
noticed all of my symptoms mentioned under the subject of Mercury Toxicity. With
sheer unbelief, it dawned on me that my condition, which at that time had been my
lot for almost three years, was related to the silver/mercury fillings in my teeth
(shiny silver or black fillings). Yes, that's right, mercury is the most toxic
non-radioactive substance in the world. It has no place in the mouth of man.
Mercury is a major cause of depression and of suicidal and anti-social feelings

You can read about my experience at www.keepwell.com/dental.htm . If you wish to

study further into the matter, then please visit www.hugnet.com. Here you will
find excellent links as well as the protocol for amalgam removal - which protocol
MUST be taken seriously if you wish to have your silver/mercury amalgams removed.
Please do not have your silver/mercury fillings removed unless you have researched
the matter thoroughly first. If your fillings are removed without the necessary
precautions being taken, your condition will in all likelihood become much worse -
DO NOT listen to your dentist if he tells you otherwise. I know of two people who
died in the dentist chair while having mercury fillings removed.

Mercury might not be the cause of your depression, but I hope that by sharing my
experience with you, you will start looking a little more suspiciously at some of
the chemicals in and about your home, and especially at the metals that have been
placed in your mouth by your well-meaning dentist. Mercury fillings, nickel based
crowns, porcelain (aluminium) caps and root canals can all cause severe problems -
all of which will be aggravated by stress and burnout.
(3) Stimulants

In our world today people thrive on stimulants to give them a "lift." Most do not
realise, however, that Nature cannot be cheated, and that unchangeable laws demand
that every lift (stimulation) will be followed by an equal and opposite down
(depression). This is why people keep drinking tea or coffee or coke all day, or
why some listen to stimulating music all day - all in a never-ending attempt to
ward off the inevitable down.

Eventually, the body revolts, and one result is depression. We have so stimulated
the body that it now shifts into an extended period of depression.

When we speak of stimulants we speak of any influence that stimulates the

feelings, the senses, or the body. Curry is a stimulant. Tea, coffee and soft
drinks that contain caffeine are stimulants. Beat music and even loud "relaxing"
music can act as stimulants. Adrenalin games and activities, such as fun-fare
rides, bungee-jumping, and parachuting, these are all stimulants and they will,
with constant use or practice, be followed by an equal and opposite measure of
depression.

What is the solution in this case? It's simple. Cut out the stimulant and you will
avoid the depression.

(4) Current Circumstances

And Unpleasant Memories

The words of one song go like this:

Sometimes living takes the life out of you,

Sometimes living is all you can do . . .

I think we all have experienced times when life overwhelms us, and when just
coping with everyday life takes the very life out of us. But what can we do to
better cope when the pathway of life leads us to a point where our nervous energy
is drained and our despairing cries bring no solution?

Friend, I would not be a true friend if I beat around the bush on this one.
Millions of people have found peace despite their past, despite their present
circumstances, and despite their fears of the future. I am one of those, and I do
believe that I can help you to process whatever is troubling you.

In order to do so, however, we first have to investigate the matter of evolution.

What - you might ask - has evolution to do with depression - plenty? Please bear
with me and I will explain a little later.

Is evolution a possibility? Right now, all the scientists in the world, aided by
all the modern technology in the world, cannot make life - not even one cell.

Can we believe, therefore, that nothing, aided by nothing, made life? No matter
how many billions of years you allow for the process, it is infinitely easier to
believe that the moon is made of my favourite Mozzarella cheese than it is to
believe in evolution.

If we keep setting off a bomb in an aircraft scrap yard, will the pieces
eventually descend to earth as an air-worthy, fully functional aircraft? Never!
Yet the human body is infinitely more complex than any aircraft? So how can
scientists claim that this most awesome thing called life just happened along in
the process of time? Did nothing, aided by nothing, make this most complex living
machine?

You see, if the evolutionary theory is true, and life began as a single-celled,
uni-sexed squiggly in some far-distant celestial mud pond, then somewhere between
that time and the present that little squiggly must have split itself into a male
squiggly and a female squiggly. How it ever managed to do this is a mystery in
itself, but if by some miracle it did manage to split itself in two, then we would
have to believe that from the day that the split took place both the male portion
and the female portion would have to have had fully developed sexual parts and
fully-developed reproductive organs - with the female being fully dependant on the
male for fertilization - failing which reproduction would have been impossible,
and so-called "evolutionary life" would have ended there and then.

Now I have stretched my imagination as far as it will stretch and I just cannot
believe that that could ever have taken place. You just think about it. Truly,
evolution is not even a remote possibility - and it only takes a little thought to
prove it.

To illustrate: If the evolutionary theory is true, and if trees evolved along with
all other living things, and if trees only ever grow from fully developed seeds,
and if seeds only ever develop from fully-grown trees, then the only way that we
can believe the big-bang/evolutionary theory is to believe that either a fully-
developed tree or a fully-developed seed emerged out of that big bang. Now that
would have to be some mighty intelligent big bang!

And friend, if you take time to think about it, and you look at yourself in the
mirror, and you recognize the miracle that you are, you will find no end to the
impossibilities of evolution. You see, many use evolution as a means to escape
from a God whom they do not know - a God whom they are afraid of but who is really
a God to be a friend of. These people have been led to believe that God is a mean,
demanding tyrant - and who would want to believe in such a God? But the truth is
that God is an infinitely kind and infinitely loving Father and Friend. Would God
have given His Son to bear your punishment, to suffer your shame, to die that you
might live, if He did not love you as Father and Friend?

And my dear friend, today especially, we need to know that we have a father and a
Friend in God.

But why am I going to such pains to prove to you that God is, and that God is the
only plausible explanation for life? Simply because I am a friend who cares, and
in my darkest moments I discovered that God is a Friend who really cares. In fact,
if not for that discovery, I doubt if I would be here today - undoubtedly I would
have committed suicide.

Yes, I have been there, up to my neck in the mud and the mire of life's
difficulties, and only my Father/Friend God got me out of it - and now, with
hindsight, I have come to realise that only God could have gotten me out of the
difficult situation that I was in.

So if you have grown up believing that God is an exacting tyrant, I urge you to
rid your mind of this altogether false notion. Like any kind father, God longs for
you to come home that He might lavish you with His gifts. He loves you so much
that He paid the penalty for your sins and He has already written your letter of
pardon - and this He wrote with His very own blood. Just give Him a chance and He
will prove what a wonderful friend He really is.

If He has done it for me, as undeserving as I am, and if He has done it for
millions of others, He will do it for you. He will sort out your life and He will
enable you to better cope with life's difficulties. He will also help you to
process the unhappy memories of past years - as only He can do.

I promise you, if you just give Him a chance He will lift you up into His warm
embrace and he will quietly but gently whisper into your ear - "welcome home my
precious child - be at peace, I am here for you and I will always be here for
you."

God is holding out to you the promise of rest and peace - no matter who you are,
no matter what your past, no matter what your present circumstances. He is calling
you to His haven of rest and He is waiting patiently to welcome you home, not just
as a sinner forgiven, but as a child of His by adoption.

So if your depression is related to your present or your past circumstances, I

wish to assure you that no man can give you peace, and that no medicine can give
you lasting peace, but we do have the sure promise . . .

"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the
Almighty." (Psalm 91:1)

newyou.htmGod is waiting to give you a brand new start in life.

himndx.htmspurgeon.htmHope.htmGod bless you.

------------------------------------

For your benefit, we include below a few other common causes of depression.

Depression Sometimes Result of Sexual Excess. `Very many families are living in a
most unhappy state because the husband and father allows the animal in his nature
to predominate over the intellectual and moral. The result is that a sense of
languor and depression is frequently felt, but the cause is seldom divined as
being the result of their own improper course of action. We are under solemn
obligations to God to keep the spirit pure and the body healthy, that we may be a
benefit to humanity, and render to God perfect service.' (2MCP485)

Masturbation Causes Depression: `The practice of secret habits [self-abuse] surely

destroys the vital forces of the system. All unnecessary vital action will be
followed by corresponding depression. Among the young the vital capital, the
brain, is so severely taxed at an early age that there is a deficiency and great
exhaustion, which leaves the system exposed to disease of various kinds.' (CG444)

Temporary Depression May Follow Success. A reaction such as frequently follows

high faith and glorious success was pressing upon Elijah. He feared that the
reformation begun on Carmel might not be lasting, and depression seized him. He
had been exalted to Pisgah's top; now he was in the valley. While under the
inspiration of the Almighty, he had stood the severest trial of faith; but in this
time of discouragement, with Jezebel's threat sounding in his ears and Satan still
apparently prevailing through the plotting of this wicked woman, he lost his hold
on God. He had been exalted above measure, and the reaction was tremendous.' (PK
161-2)

Overwork (intemperance in labor) causes depression. `You should labor with care
and observe periods of rest. By so doing you will retain your physical and mental
vigor and render your labor much more efficient.' (2MCP490)

Amusements Excite, but React in Depression. `Amusements excite the mind, but
depression is sure to follow. Useful labor and physical exercise will have a more
healthful influence upon the mind and will strengthen the muscles, improve the
circulation, and will prove a powerful agent in the recovery of health.' (ML 150.)

Isolation, Inward-Thinking, Complaining and Inactivity Cause Depression. `You are

a dyspeptic. Mental depression causes dyspepsia, and this aggravates the mental
disorder, and unless you can be induced through change of some kind to be
attracted away from yourself and from your complaints, you will cut short your
life, and while you do live be unable to think healthfully and to work
healthfully. Your imagination will be diseased; you take for reality impressions
in which there is no truth and for which there is no foundation. You have been
alone too much and yet you choose this rather than to be connected with others. If
you had now some very light physical employment it would divert your thoughts from
yourself and be of great advantage to you.' (Letter 1, 1883)

Sadness Causes Depression: Sadness deadens the circulation in the blood vessels
and nerves, and also retards the action of the liver. It hinders the process of
digestion and of nutrition, and has a tendency to dry up the marrow of the whole
system. . . . Mental depression causes dyspepsia, and this aggravates the mental
disorder. (Letter 1, 1883)

Tea and Coffee, and Other Stimulants, Cause Depression. `Through the intemperance
begun at home, the digestive organs first become weakened, and soon ordinary food
does not satisfy the appetite. Unhealthy conditions are established, and there is
a craving for more stimulating food. Tea and coffee produce an immediate effect.
Under the influence of these poisons the nervous system is excited; and in some
cases, for the time being, the intellect seems to be invigorated, the imagination
more vivid. Because these stimulants produce such agreeable results, many conclude
that they really need them; but there is always a reaction. The nervous system has
borrowed power from its future resources for present use, and all this temporary
invigoration is followed by a corresponding depression. The suddenness of the
relief obtained from tea and coffee is an evidence that what seems to be strength
is only nervous excitement, and consequently must be an injury to the system.'
(CG403)

May I invite you to take your troubles to Jesus in prayer.

For more on Depression:

www.Relevantlifesolutions.org