A lot of men all over the world struggle with depression, and in fact they very often suffer from it more severely than a lot of women do. We are now at a point where suicide is the number one cause of death amongst men under the age of 40, so this is clearly an epidemic of sorts that needs looking into. Something you can do as an individual man is to recognize the major causes of depression so you can know what to look out for and how to avoid depression in the majority of cases. Here are the major causes of depression in men.

As with women, depression in men can be often caused by a range of environmental stressors. But with men, there can often be more of a pressure with a lot of these, owing to some pretty outdated ideas about men’s role in society. For instance, men are frequently more likely to feel like a failure if they have trouble with their career or with their finances, and this can quickly spiral into more and more depression over time. Avoiding these stressors in the first place, or managing them better when they arise, can really help.

Genetics

As always, genetics play a role here, and some people are just always going to be more prone to depression than other people. You might feel that you are predisposed to depression because you tend to have depressive thoughts or you have always had sadness crop up for no discernible reason. What matters, however, is not whether or not you have genetics that make you more likely to be depressed. What matters is that you are taking active steps to keep depression at bay – something everyone can do ultimately, regardless of their genes.

Low Testosterone

Having low testosterone can also make depression more likely, and it is usually the case that when men are going through a depressed period they do tend to have lower levels of testosterone. Even if you naturally have low levels, you can do plenty of things to increase it over time, and a good first step would be to use a service like Men’s Revival to see what you can do about it. Even working out and sleeping more can help lift your testosterone levels, and all of this will help in keeping depression away in a number of ways.

Sometimes you can become depressed after a period of having poor levels of self-care. When this happens, it can be incredibly hard to get out of the cycle, especially once you become depressed and then wonder what you can do about it. However, taking small steps is all that you really need to do here, and over time this will add up to make a huge difference to your mental health and how you feel internally. Be sure to look after yourself a bit better if you want to try and keep depression away for good, no matter how hard it might be.