Emotional characteristics of depression

• Lowered mood-When we use the word ‘depressed’ in everyday life, we are usually describing having a lowered mood, feeling sad. Clinical depression is more than this.Lowered mood is still a defining emotional element of depression but it is more pronounced than in daily kind of experience of feeling lethargic and sad. Patients often describe themselves as ‘worthless’ and ‘empty’.
• Anger-Although sufferers tend to experience more negative emotions and fewer positive ones during episodes of depression, this experience of negative emotions is not limited to sadness. Sufferers of depression also frequently experience anger,sometimes extreme anger. This can be directed at the self or others. On occasion such emotions lead to aggressive or self-harming behaviour.
• Lowered self-esteem-Self-esteem is the emotional experience of how

  much we like ourselves. Sufferers of depression tend to report reduced self-esteem, in other words they like themselves less than usual. This can be quite extreme, with some sufferers of depression describing a sense of self-loathing