Everyone going through divorce experiences many of the emotions we described earlier. For some, depression or anxiety continues long enough to keep them from effectively managing the legal and financial decisions that must be made during divorce. Without the help of a mental health professional, people dealing with depression and anxiety suffer needlessly. They may additionally make decisions they later regret and increase the cost of their divorce by attempting to use their lawyer as a therapist.
Depression is so common for people going through divorce that we feel everyone should do a regular self-assessment to help differentiate between the depression that is part of all grieving and more serious clinical depression, which is best alleviated by treatment from a mental health professional. The most common quick screening for depression is to consider how many of the following symptoms you are experiencing:
- Persistent sad, anxious, or “empty” mood
- Sleeping too much or too little with middle-of-the-night or early-morning waking
- Reduced appetite and weight loss, or increased appetite and weight gain
- Loss of pleasure and interest in activities once enjoyed, including sex (although that may be hard to judge, since you may not be having much sex at this point)
- Restlessness, irritability
- Persistent physical symptoms that do not respond to treatment (such as chronic pain or digestive disorders)
- Difficulty concentrating, remembering, or making decisions
- Fatigue or loss of energy
- Feeling guilty, hopeless, or worthless
- Thoughts of suicide or death
The presence of five or more of these symptoms for two weeks or more is an indicator that you may have a type of depression that could benefit from treatment with therapy and, possibly, medication.
Anxiety is another condition you need to look out for during this stressful time. Everybody experiences the symptoms of anxiety from time to time. Most people dealing with depression will experience anxiety. Others may experience anxiety without being depressed.
Anxiety becomes a problem when it is experienced intensely and when it persistently interferes with a person’s daily life. Frequent feelings of inner tension, agitation, fear of losing control, dread of a catastrophic event, irritability, or being detached from the world are some of the psychological symptoms of anxiety. The condition has many physical symptoms as well, including a racing heart, shortness of breath, chest tightness, dry mouth, butterflies in the stomach, tremor, and sweating.
The treatment for both depression and anxiety can involve psychotherapy or medication or both. Psychotherapy, sometimes referred to as talk therapy, is a technique for helping people identify the factors contributing to their depression and effectively deal with the psychological, behavioral, interpersonal, and situational causes. Therapy can help ease the pain of depression and the feelings of hopelessness it brings. It should also reduce the pessimism, unrealistic expectations, and overly critical self-evaluations that create and sustain depression.
In all but the most severe cases, the use of medication is optional. When medication is used, it is usually in combination with psychotherapy, because the medication does not solve the problems that lead to the depression or anxiety. Combining medication with psychotherapy can be useful because some symptoms of depression—such as sleep and appetite disturbances, significant concentration problems, and chronic fatigue—interfere with your ability to make the life changes necessary to eliminate the depression. Antidepressant medication can help relieve those symptoms and allow you to make needed life changes.
If you are experiencing depression while going through divorce, it is important that you get help. We also urge you to at least consider using medication to speed your treatment. You might prefer to resolve any mental health issues you have strictly by talking with a counselor. You might have an aversion to the idea of “quick fix” solutions. But using psychotherapy alone may not be the fastest, most effective for you to work your way out of this particular slough of despond. Divorce is a major crisis, and you may need to handle things differently than you ever would have before.
Using medication during this time does not mean you will need to use it forever. It’s not a lifetime decision. However, the legal and financial decisions you make during your divorce may indeed be with you forever. If you are the more dependent spouse, you may never again be in a position to obtain any significant amount of money from your ex. If you have children, significant assets, and potential for receiving or paying alimony—and you are unable to unable to use good judgment because of the anxiety or stress—you will want to use whatever resources are available to help you make good decisions. Once you get past the critical legal and financial aspects in the divorce, you can work on the underlying causes of your mental health issues. You might also find that issues go away when the divorce decisions are resolved.
