Customer Reviews

The Depression Workbook: A Guide for Living With Depression and Manic Depression (New Harbinger Workbooks)

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This is one of the "must have" books for anyone newly diagnosed with depression or bipolar disorder (manic-depression). It is invaluable in teaching both sufferer and supporter the symptoms and symptomatic behavior associated with these brain disorders.

It is also one of the best books I have read for learning coping skills. Coping skills are needed while you are trying to find a treatment to end your suffering. Since that can take weeks, months or even years, coping skills are vital to keep you on track with your treatment efforts - and to help you during times of suicidal ideation.

This book was monumental in helping me get through a severe depression that lasted nonstop for half-a-decade. Now that I have been symptom-free for the last five-years (due to medication), I am able to look back in hindsight to see what got me and my wife, Melissa, through that personal nightmare. This book was one of those lifesaving gifts which got us on track immediately after I was diagnosed. It is a book of which we are most grateful.

I recommend this book to all my readers, and anyone suffering with depression or biplar disorder.

It's obvious from the other reviews that this book has been very helpful to many people suffering from depression. However, it ended up making me feel even more depressed than I was before. It gives suggestions such as surrounding yourself with things to remind you of why life is worth living, but the severely depressed may be so isolated that they really have nothing to live for. It also suggests a heavy reliance on support from friends and family, and, again, a severely depressed person may no longer have friends or close family members to rely upon. I can imagine that people suffering from mild to moderate depression would be helped a great deal by this book, but for those who are so depressed that they've withdrawn from the world and really have nothing left to live for, this book will only make them feel more depressed, hopeless, and isolated from the world.

I have recently been diagnosed w/depression & my counselor recommended this book to me. It's great. I love the fact that it makes me take responsibility for my own healing. This book makes the reader an active participant and holds the reader accountable. The workbook exercises are great and extremely thought-provoking. They are helpful and have given me new insights. The text treats people with respect, is never "preachy", and doesn't trivialize the depression. Buy this book!

I agree with the last person's review of this book. I felt even more isolated and depressed while and after reading it. The strategies and techniques are terrific--if you can actually get a support network of family and friends. That means overcoming the embarrassment and stigma of being mentally ill, as well as gaining the courage to face it yourself. Overall, the book is terric--just not for me. I felt too far gone to relate and did not have the discipline to "work" with the workbook--which of course made me feel worse! Good luck!

Excellent resource. Deeply probing the individual for every feeling and explaining triggers, possible complications, and offering gilded direction to being whole emotionally. No other book on the subject compares. Perfect. 5 Stars!

Felecia Constance Rowe, Executive Director of The Institute for Advanced Mind Research

I've owned this book for several years and I refer back to it again and again. It not only contains tips for helping yourself out of a depression, but its checklists and forms actually encourage you to do the work you need to do. This book is also good for someone who is not depressed but just needs help with their lifestyle. Wonderful book. I think it will help anyone who actually uses it.

On the recommendation of my spouse's therapist we purchased this book. I read the whole thing in one evening, but my spouse is reading it slowly.

One of the biggest changes is hearing my spouse say "I have a goal now" or "I need to keep charts." This would never have happened without the book "telling" him to do it. After 3 years of dealing with the wrong diagnosis and medications it finally seems as if we are on the right track and there is some hope and light at the end of tunnel. I don't know if we will ever exit this long tunnel, but now at least I know my spouse wants to try and the book gives us logical steps to work in that direction.

This book shows in a practical way how patients suffering from depression live day by day and how they cope with it, and how they find deliverance and healing. Another book along these same lines which has helped me so much as I'm now free from depression for already a very long time, and I must highly recommend this book is Dietmar Scherf's "I Love Me: Avoiding & Overcoming Depression" which is also available at Amazon.

I found that this book was heavily skewed to bipolar depression. While the information and exercises given are no doubt helpful to those with bipolar depression, I found that they did not really pertain to my unipolar (postpartum) depression. I would look for different resources if you are suffering from unipolar depression.

I have had two children who grew up suffering with Manic Depression and this book was a life-saver (literally) for them and us as parents. Mania can be turned to positive attributes like creativity. One daughter is a published author and lecturer on clinical psychology techniques and new trends in treatment. She recommends this book as number one to read for parents and adults suffering. I highly recommend you buy this book for your family or friends suffering from these symptoms.