A trail of tears and many broken relationships may symptomatic of underlying depression.

A Trail of Tears and Many Broken Relationships May be Symptomatic of Underlying Depression

When a young person graduates from High School there is so much hope and promise for the future. He or she looks forward to meeting the RIGHT person, falling in love, and a lifetime of wedded bliss reminiscent of the epic fable Cinderella.

Instead, many middle age people look back on a trail of tears and broken hearts. Deep within the heart many middle age people may secretively wonder, “what happened to my life and dreams”. Deep within the heart, many middle age people may ask “why”. A middle age person may not have a clue to explain how he or she sabotaged personal goals by making so many wrong decisions and choices.

Many middle age people may look in the mirror to see sagging drooping skin collapsing into layers upon layers of folded winkles. Many middle age people may suddenly realize time is running out.

A trail of tears and broken relationships may be symptomatic of underlying depression. Depression is a clinical pathological disease process.

Depression is an imbalance in brain chemicals. Brain chemicals function as neurotransmitters of sensory and perceptual information from nerve cell (neuron) to nerve cell and from nerve ganglia (groups or clusters of neurons) to nerve ganglia.

Attributing affairs of the heart to natural organic disease process turns off many people. According to Sacred Text, all humans are made in the image of God. The human capacity to love is viewed as a deep profound sacred spiritual ability reflecting the very image of God, the Divine Creator. Human emotions surrounding romantic love tend to be translated into enormous proportion and placed upon a high plane on the same level as the epic Shakespearian drama, Romeo and Juliet.

The act of attributing affairs of the heart to a natural organic disease process is often viewed as belittling God given spiritual endowment for the human capacity to love. It should not be surprising that people often deny depression as an underlying causative factor for a trail of tears and broken relationships.

People often blame extreme sadness and heartache upon events and/or people connected to break ups with significant others. For example, a person may claim that he or she got involved with all the wrong people.

A person may prefer to believe that he or she is extremely unlucky at love and a victim of great misfortune and cruel fate instead of accepting that he or she may have an underlying mental health problem. The act of placing blame for many broken relationships upon external circumstances (including all events and/or people involved) allows a person to conveniently wallow in self-pity as well as a myriad of emotional reactions connected to “love sickness”.

Existentialism is a philosophical system of thought that asserts humans cognitively create meaningfulness associated with people, places, and objects. An Existentialist asserts the world, in and of itself, is completely devoid of meaningfulness.

The existential world we live in can be cold hearted and devoid to a large extent of meaningfulness. In a cold-hearted existential world the choice of an individual to wallow in self-pity and a myriad of emotional reactions connected to “love sickness” can become self-affirmation that one is truly alive.

In a cold-hearted existential world devoid of meaningfulness sometimes a person can feel nothing. The feeling of nothingness equates a human person to a machine engaged from day to day in a rote mechanical process to fulfill obligations.

An imbalance in brain chemicals can cause sensory and perceptual distortions that may contribute to vast discontentment and unhappiness during the course of a relationship. Discontentment and unhappiness as a consequence of sensory and perceptual distortions created by a chemical imbalance associated with depression may produce a domino’s effect leading to a number of dating failures during a lifetime. A

A depressed person tends to be obsessed with past failure. Obsession is mentally focusing upon past events for an extreme inordinate amount of time.

A depressed person obsessed with dating failure may constantly search within him or her self for some type of innate spiritual flaw and human weakness. A depressed person obsessed with dating failure tends to practice extreme forms of self-blame and castigation.

It may not always be the best counseling strategy to encourage a depressed person to focus upon underlying causative factors, such as depression. Depression can be a serious life threatening disease requiring professional treatment.

A clinically trained psychologist may have to perform a delicate balancing act similar to walking a tight rope high up in the air in a circus. A clinically trained psychologist may have to (1) not push a depressed client to do too much obsessive soul searching while exploring basic underlying causative factors, such as depression, and (2) yet, gently challenge the depressed client to accept the real underlying mental health problem in order to promote positive goal directed behavior. A façade of blame and denial is an obstacle to positive goal directed behavior.

In order to promote positive goal directed behavior and establish fulfilling healthy relationships it may be necessary for a depressed person to gain more knowledge and understanding about the underlying causative factor of depression. Knowledge and understanding about depression as a disease process can help a person manage chronic depression in the same way a diabetic may manage diabetes as a disease.

Depression may not always be the underlying cause of dating failure. The task of finding the RIGHT person to fall in love and marry is an extremely daunting complex task. It may not be necessary for all people who have experienced problems in relationships to undergo extensive psychotherapy.

However, depression as an underlying causative factor for a trail of tears and many broken relationships should not be quickly dismissed. A person who has experienced many problems in relationships should familiarize him or herself with all the multiple signs of depression. Depression may be why he or she feels so restless.

The famous song writer and musician Dion Dimucci ( http://www.diondimucci.com/main.html ) captured the restless human spirit in a famous popular song entitled, The Wonderer. Dion Dimucci captured the restless spirit in the following lyrical verse included in his song, The Wonderer:

Oh well I'm the type of guy who will never settle down Where pretty girls are well, you know that I'm around I kiss 'em and I love'em 'cause to me they're all the same I hug 'em and I squeeze 'em they don't even know my name They call me the wanderer yeah the wanderer I roam around around around...

About the Author

Author byline and Bio: Mark Gaffney is a contributing freelance writer. Mark has earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology with a concentration of coursework in physiology, biology, and computer science. Mark is in the process of trying to start a new Not-for-Profit Foundation entitled, Wonderful Life Foundation. Mark plans to submit his online work as a thesis project to earn his Doctorate (PhD.) degree and officially become a Nanotechnology Sociologist. Bookmark this page now and click here to review preliminary plans for organizational development of Wonderful Life Foundation currently published on www.ServeNet.org. ServeNet.org, Idealist.org, and Network-for-Good.org are associated with the government web site portal, www.freedomcorp.gov, an initiative of President George W. Bush to promote volunteerism and provide services to help Not-for-Profit organizations.