Depressed Woman Who Has Lost Her Sex Drive

I totally understand your predicament. Your depression caused you to lose your sex drive and now the Zoloft is lowering it further, which is really depressing. There are many different schools of thought regarding how to treat depression. Many experts suggest that a person only consider psychotropic medication as a last resort, when all other treatment options have failed. This is because taking medication may diminish your depression, but it doesn't address the thoughts, feelings and issues that caused it. So, I think you need to decide how active you want to be in beating the problem. Are you willing to go into therapy? According to research, people who do therapy have a much better rate of success than those who only take medication. In therapy, you will probably discover that there are many reasons why you became depressed. The most common cause is unrecognized, or suppressed, anger. Since women have been socialized to be nice, it is easy for them to swallow their feelings and become depressed. Also, women have been socialized to caretake, which means that they will often take care of others before themselves. This leads to feeling used and abused, which also triggers angry feelings. And, if a person can't own the anger, you see how depression can result. It sounds to me like Zoloft was the first and only intervention that has been made. And, the medication will do nothing for helping you to identify and solve the underlying causes of the depression. Plus, the meds. have side effects. At this point, you need to decide if you want to take a more wholistic, drug free approach. Read my Spotlight on Health ( Alternative Treatments for Depression) and see my Wellness Dictionary. As you will discover, many people have beat depression with therapy, exercise, and diet. And, while we are on the subject of diet, there is much research that indicates that hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) is a major cause of depression. Food allergies have also been implicated. So, you have a lot of options. Keep in mind that most people can beat depression by taking a multi-pronged, nondrug approach. Lots of luck.