La nacion

Autora: Mónica P. Diner

16/02/2000

Something more than sadness

By Florencia Bernadou

Because of excessive expectations that are too demanding on themselves or on others, many children fall into depression. This is a disorder seen across all social classes and it is not money-dependent, specialists say.

Feeling like doing nothing, feeling that life has lost sense, staying in bed all day long, crying all night long. "You do not need to be an expert in Psychiatry to recognize a depressed person, or rather, a depressed adult. Because, when it comes to diagnosing, depression in children is much more difficult to diagnose than in adults", explains Dr. Ricardo Rodulfo, Full Professor of the Chairs of "Children and Adolescent Clinical Medicine" and "Childhood and Juvenile Pathology" of the School of Psychology of the University of Buenos Aires, "as only occasionally does it become evident in the form of sadness or despondency".

Childhood depression may also assume a totally different modality; such is the case with unruly, antisocial, "difficult" children, whose parents claim "he is always looking for it, he asks for it, I don't know why". "These children solve their tendency to depression by seeking some kind of punishment, while others take the road of self-reproach. They tell themselves 'I'm dumb, I do everything wrong'. At school, they usually leave their work undone. They are like anemic children", compares the specialist, "but instead of red blood cells, they lack self-esteem."

"Self-esteem", defines Licenciada* Monica Diner, author of the book The self-protection capacity in children, and in charge of the graduate course on Child Abuse and Prevention at the School of Psychology of the University of Buenos Aires, "is the set of feelings a person has about himself. If what one is and one wishes to be matches, self-esteem will be positive, but", she points out, "when the demands inside and outside are too strong, what those children wish to be becomes impossible. They are never satisfied with themselves and even when they do well, it is never enough."

Specialists agree that when a child's ideals are too high and the likelihood of success is low, one must look into the nature and degree of expectations -sometimes unconscious expectations, clarifies Diner- that parents have placed on that child. However, we must be alert -warns the specialist-, as a sudden or severe depression may be a sign that this child is going through a traumatic situation; for example, sexual or emotional child abuse.