8 Strategies to Beat Depression - Helping Your Teen Deal with Depression and Anxiety Naturally

8 Strategies to Beat Depression - Helping Your Teen Deal with Depression and Anxiety Naturally

A fairy tale gone wrong

Let's just say I had a different picture of what the teenage years would be like. I have a lot of homeschool friends that I saw before I had my own teenagers – and they seemed to have it all together. (I now know that no one has it all together unless they're lucky.) I had visions of beautiful walks in the park, exuberant family outings, and respectful conversations running through my head throughout my children's elementary school years. After all, I did the hard work of discipline early on so that when we entered our teenage years we would all be close. Right?

I mean, I knew adoption parenthood would have its bumps and jogs due to trauma. I knew that. But overall, I thought it would be manageable and that our parenting would be pretty easy once they were teenagers since we were consistent from a young age and had set firm boundaries.

Also, parentingwasgets easier every year. All the children were doing well and improving every day not only in their academic performance but also in their character.

Teenagers should behave like adults

I know some of you who aren't in the world of homeschooling probably think this is crazy talk. However, in my world, there is a large group of people who, for some reason, feel that the hormonal craziness, physical changes, and violent mood swings caused by adolescence affect a teenager's ability to manage their reactions to school, relationships, and authority. I have to tell you, I was one of those who fully expected my happy-go-lucky 12-year-old to continue his habits of responsibility, good grades, and respect for our authority into adulthood. Sigh.

In the middle of 7th grade I noticed something was wrong. Suddenly he didn't speak. He cried a lot. Everything overwhelmed him and he was convinced that no one liked him and he would never have friends. (Isn't that one of the reasons we didn't send him to public school? To avoid those feelings?) Never mind that he was regularly surrounded by kids his age who clearly liked him. No matter whether he received a lot of praise for an assignment, in his eyes he still wasn't good enough.

What was even worse about this situation was how it began to affect everyone. We all wondered how we were going to get through the day without upsetting him. Tim and I felt completely inadequate as parents and didn't really know how to respond to this completely different person in front of us. The other children who already had rejection issues felt like they had done something to bring about this abrupt personality change.

In short, it was terrible.

Start of medication

Finally, after trying supplements that didn't work for what we recognized as depression, we followed the doctor's advice and put him on depression medication. I'm sorry to say I didn't do my homework on what these medications would do to him because I was so tired. At this point it had been a year and he was starting to talk about suicide. He had a few conversations with a pastor friend who had done a lot of counseling, but other than that, since we were unemployed, we could only give him medication. We felt trapped.

The medication we finally settled on (after months of experimentation) at least made Ezra feel less like harming himself. That was really all we could hope for. We kept refilling the recipe and limping through our days together. It broke our hearts to see him so sad all the time.

Important discoveries

Fast forward three years. My son, now sixteen, feels like he's had enough of medication. He's had chronic headaches and fatigue for months and we're pretty sure it's the medication. So I start researching again. I notice that there is MUCH MORE information available today about dealing with depression naturally than there was three years ago. Additionally, we have experimented with sugar-free and dairy-free diets for my middle son for several other health issues with great success. A side effect of this was a much happier boy. While studying, I find out how important it is to buy organic and non-GMO foods and notice that Ezra has symptoms that indicate an allergic reaction to non-organic products.

Another important discovery is how much good protein and folate-rich foods play a role in certain deficiencies related to depression and anxiety. Grass-fed beef, organic wild salmon, and folate-rich foods like avocados can curb depression in some people.

These things, along with a discovery I made a long time ago about something called leaky gut syndrome and how it can affect the brain, all contribute to him being able to stop taking his depression medication.

We are still at the beginning of the process. It's been about a month since our family started changing our eating habits. It's been about three weeks since Ezra stopped taking his medication. He still has mild withdrawal symptoms, but for the most part the hardest part seems to be over. (The first week was terrible - like coming off heroin.)

Everyone in our house feels much better. I have to say, emotionally speaking, the change is dramatic. All three children (13, 14, 16) talk to me twice as much as before. Ezra seems to have regained his personality and no longer has headaches. He is also much more energetic. I can't tell you how relieved it is to have him back. It was only in the last few weeks that I realized how stressful life was before.

Natural solutions checklist

Here is the list of what we did to get to this point (to help stop the medication)... It is important to note that the whole family is doing this together and not every family needs the same things. That said, one thing that cannot be neglected is giving up refined sugar and switching to organic.

1. Entfernt raffinierten Zucker wie Weißzucker, Maissirup mit hohem Fruktosegehalt und nicht gekeimte Körner und weißen Reis, die während der Verdauung zu Zucker werden.
2. Entfernt typische Milchprodukte und wechselt zu Rohmilchprodukten – um den Konsum von Milchprodukten insgesamt zu reduzieren.
3. Wir kaufen jetzt alle biologischen, gentechnikfreien Lebensmittel.
4. Ein B-Vitamin mit Folat anstelle von Folsäure hinzugefügt.
5. Es wurde ein Probiotikum zu Ezras Therapie hinzugefügt (Gabriel nahm bereits eines als Teil seiner Therapie).
6. Habe eine Ton-Entgiftung durchgeführt, um die übrig gebliebenen schädlichen Chemikalien aus dem Medikament zu entfernen, das Ezra einnahm.
7. Habe den Glutenkonsum drastisch reduziert und isst jetzt nur gekeimte Körner, die viel weniger Gluten enthalten.
8. Eine ausgleichende Mischung ätherischer Öle wurde zu Ezras Tagespflege hinzugefügt.

The strategies we have used over the past few weeks have worked in unexpected ways. Ezra is happier than he has been in years and everyone here is much more relaxed. I hope that if you experience what we went through in your home, that this little article will put you on the path to finding the answers you need for your teenager. Each body responds to depression-fighting strategies in a unique way. For more information on these and other natural health issues, I have taken much of what I have learned from the following websites:

http://www.draxe.com

http://www.drjockers.com

Inspired by Sandra Nardoni