It is normal to feel sad when bad things happen around you. Often, we can recover from those feelings without needing to seek treatment. When those feelings of sadness last longer than a couple of weeks and start to affect your ability to complete your work, carry out normal activities and your ability to have carry out personal relationships with friend and family, it may be time to seek help.

Signs & Symptoms of Depression in Athletes

• Decrease in athletic performance; problems with motor skills
• Decrease in athletic motivation and effort
• Isolating from team members
• Drop in grades and/or academic motivation
• Skipping class and other responsibilities
• Significant weight loss or weight gain; changes in appetite
• Problems sleeping, either too little or too much; insomnia or hypersomnia nearly every day
• Problems concentrating, thinking, remembering, or making decisions
• Loss of energy, feeling tired all the time/fatigue, feeling lethargic
• Feeling slowed down or restless; psychomotor agitation or retardation
• Loss of sexual interest
• Markedly diminished interest or pleasure in all, or almost all, activities
• Feeling sad, blue, or down; depressed mood most of the day, nearly every day
• Thought of death or suicide, suicide gestures/attempts
• Anhedonia – the inability to experience joy in things that you normally experience joy in
• Feelings of worthlessness, or excessive or inappropriate feelings of guilt
• Hopelessness
• Anger, irritability, restlessness; excessive irritability or easily becoming upset
• Overeating or loss of appetite
• Increase in alcohol and/or drug use – self-medicating
• Emotional withdrawal from friends

Signs & Symptoms of Suicide

• A sudden switch from being very sad to being very calm or appearing to be happy
• Always talking or thinking about death; preoccupied with death
• Clinical depression – deep sadness, loss of interest, trouble sleeping and eating
• Having a “death wish”, tempting fate with risky behavior that could result in death, e.g., driving thru a red light
• Anhedonia – the inability to experience joy in things that you normally experience joy in
• Making comments about feeling helpless, hopeless, or worthless
• Putting affairs in order, tying up loose ends, changing or making a will, giving away possessions
• Saying things like “It would be better if I wasn’t her” or “I want out”
• Talking about suicide
• Visiting or calling people/teammates one cares about to say their last (spoken/unspoken) good-bye
• Family history of suicide
• PLAN, ACCESS, INTENT