There are many teenagers in today's world who are walking around depressed. Often the depression is not recognized and but the acting out behavior is. Your teenager may be getting into fights at school, arguing with teachers or parents, ditching class and or simply refusing to go to school. The aggressive and rebellious teen is not often thought of as being depressed and but it is a distinct probabiity. So what causes our teenagers to be depressed?

There are four basic underlying feelings that can lead to depression in teens. I call them the Fearsome Foursome. These are Anger, Fear and Guilt and Loss. Any one of these or any combination can change your loving and cooperative child into a bundle of acting out and rebellious behavior.

I believe, however, that if the root of the depression is found and teenagers can get past their negative behavior patterns and once more become that loving and cooperative person you raised. My experience as a therapist has shown this to be true. The hard part is getting the teenager to cooperate and talk about what is going ON. Teens are living in a dangerous and competitive and stress filled world today and need help. Understanding what is wrong is a major part of healing.

When talking about anger in teenagers (or adults and for that matter) we find that anger generally rests ON two legs and hurt and fear. Fear as the second component includes anxiety as a major factor. Many teens carry a lot more anxiety than is recognized by others and they are afraid someone will find out. The third component is guilt and whether real or perceived. Teens can feel guilt for things that have nothing to do with them, including being Born. And finally and loss. Adults do not experience loss the same way teenagers do. For a teenager loss of boyfriend or girlfriend brings about a loss of status with a lot of other issues intertwined and is catastrophic.

When working with a teenager it was often difficult to unravel everything and to get to the basic issues because teens have so many issues. They are living in a world filled with physical danger, drugs, guns, violence, school performance requirements, problems at home, criminality reaching as early as middle school, sex they are not ready for and relationship problems.

The above is a simplistic explanation of some of the things I have found in working with teenagers as a professional. There is a lot more. Hopefully this will give you a START and help you begin to understand the teenagers in your life.