Sadness is a response to a particular situation where you could be sad about one thing and happy about another and this is normal, but depression throws itself and effects every situation and aspect of a person. Depression hangs around longer than sadness and impacts more areas of your life.
We need to stop talking about depression as if it's just sadness that the person is just too weak to shake off. We need to stop blaming depression on a person's weak faith. Yes, faith and practicing religion does help with the symptoms, but it does not magically cure it. Now, you might be saying "Allah says the Quran is a cure for all things" yes 100%, but just like diabetes, you can read Quran all your life non stop and the diabetes will still be there, but the diabetic person strengthens himself through the Quran with acceptance of Allah's will and patience with the calamity. Depression is an illness too, a complex one, but it too is an illness.
We actually make depression worse for people with depression when we guilt trip them that their illness is due to weak faith. Imagine being depressed, then being more depressed for being depressed, then lacking in some aspect of faith because of the depression and then feeling guilty for lacking, then getting more depressed for feeling guilty. What a hell of a cycle to live in!
Faith and good deeds definitely help the symptoms of depression but depression is not simply a result of low faith or a weak connection with God.
Along with good deeds and strong faith, a healthy balanced lifestyle like moving your body, organising your day, sleeping well, resting, eating clean, having a secure marriage, having healthy relationships and emotional connections all help reduce the symptoms of depression, and if Allah wills, He can cure it. Medication works well for most people who need it along with all these rather than taking it alone with no other holistic changes (speak with your GP or psychiatrist).
One thing I strongly believe is that healthy relationships and connections with people can truly help manage depression. Living in an individualistic society where healthy connections are very rare and isolation very common, what makes depression worse is when people are living in abusive and unsupportive relationships (especially DV marriages and dysfunctional toxic families). That is why I became a marriage counsellor, to TRY treat the root cause of these illnesses and traumas. To build secure relationships through healthier connections.
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