Originally posted by Kfamr
I think really, it's all on you. You know whether or not you're depressed, you know what goes on in your mind and your life.
No stranger could say "Yeah, ok, i've talked to you for a half hour, you're not depressed" or "You're depressed."

It's only been a half hour, and for you it's been years (however old you are) -- YOU know what goes on in your mind, and you've seen what goes on through your eyes.
Take it from someone who's got 40-some years of experience with depression--this is not something you can figure out on your own.

Until I was in my mid-20s, I thought I was just a bad, lazy person. I believed that the reason I often thought about killing myself was that I didn't deserve to live. It seemed perfectly reasonable and logical to comtemplate suicide. That's the nasty thing about depression--it warps your thought processes so that you can't think clearly. It's not at all uncommon for people who are severely, clinically depressed to deny that they suffer from depression.

A qualified psychologist or psychiatrist isn't just some stranger. He or she has seen many people with depression and knows the symptoms.

The bottom line for anyone who thinks he or she might be suffering from depression is to SEEK HELP!! Don't bottle it up inside or it'll explode someday.