Therapy for Depression
Sadness is a natural part of being human. But depression is something different – it’s a heaviness that doesn’t lift, even when things should feel okay. It can make the simplest tasks feel impossible, drain the color from things you used to enjoy, and leave you feeling disconnected from yourself and others. If that sounds familiar, you don’t have to keep pushing through alone.
Depression shows up in the body, the mind, and in how we act. If you are experiencing depression, you may notice the following:
In your body
Low energy, sleeping too much or too little, changes in appetite, physical aches, or feeling slowed down in a way that’s hard to explain
In your thoughts
A persistent inner critic, difficulty concentrating, hopeless or helpless thinking, or a sense that things won’t get better
In your feelings
Emptiness, sadness, numbness, irritability, guilt, or a loss of interest in things that used to matter
In your behavior
Withdrawing from people, letting things go, struggling to meet responsibilities, or losing motivation for daily life
Depression has a way of convincing you that reaching out isn’t worth it – like you’ve been this way too long, or that nothing will really help. If you’ve been carrying this quietly for months or years, wondering if this is just who you are, we want you to know it doesn’t have to stay this way. Depression is treatable, even when it’s been present for a long time. The therapists at Sequoia Counseling Collective are here when you’re ready.
Common Types of Depression
Major Depressive Disorder
Major depression involves persistent feelings of sadness, emptiness, or hopelessness that last for weeks or longer. It often affects sleep, appetite, energy, and the ability to function day to day. It’s one of the most common mental health conditions and one of the most treatable.
Seasonal Affective Disorder
Seasonal affective disorder follows a seasonal pattern, most often arriving in the fall and winter months when daylight decreases. It can feel like a slow fade: lower energy, more sleep, withdrawal from others, and a heavy mood that lifts as the seasons change. Therapy can help you manage the cycle and build resilience.
Persistent Depressive Disorder
Persistent depressive disorder is a longer-lasting, lower-grade form of depression that can be easy to overlook or dismiss. Unlike major depression, which tends to arrive with an unmistakable weight, PDD is quieter – a chronic flatness, low motivation, or baseline hopelessness that can feel like just the way things are. Because it rarely announces itself dramatically, many people live with it for years without recognizing it as something worth getting help for, or wondering if this is simply their personality.
Depression with Anxiety
Depression and anxiety frequently co-occur, and the combination can feel especially disorienting – exhausted but unable to rest, withdrawn but worried, hopeless but hypervigilant. When both are present, an integrated approach to treatment tends to work best.
Treatment Approaches for Depression
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
ACT helps you build a different relationship with depressive thoughts and feelings by learning to make room for them while still moving toward what matters to you. Many people find this approach especially helpful when depression has led to a narrower, smaller life than they want.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
CBT is one of the most well-researched approaches for depression. It works by helping you identify the thought patterns and behaviors that keep depression in place, and gradually building more balanced, helpful ways of engaging with yourself and your life. CBT is practical and skill-based. The tools you develop in session are ones you can draw on long after therapy ends.
Animal Assisted Therapy
For some people, connection comes more easily through animals than through words. Animal assisted therapy incorporates the presence of a trained therapy animal into the therapeutic process, offering comfort, presence, and a gentle point of entry into healing, especially for those who feel shut down or find it hard to open up.
Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT)
EFT works with the emotional experiences that often lie beneath depression such as disconnection, grief, shame, or unmet needs for closeness and belonging. By helping you access and work through these deeper emotions, EFT can create lasting shifts in how you experience yourself and your relationships.
Attachment and Interpersonal Therapy
Depression is often deeply connected to our relationships and how we learned to feel about ourselves in relation to others, and how we navigate closeness, conflict, and loss. Attachment-informed and interpersonal therapy explores those patterns, helping you understand where depression may have roots and how to cultivate more nourishing connections.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
EMDR is a structured, evidence-based therapy that helps the brain reprocess experiences or memories that may be fueling current depression. For people whose depression is connected to loss, trauma, or painful relational experiences, EMDR can offer relief that talk therapy alone sometimes doesn’t reach.