Being down is a passing thing. Everyone is down on occaision. Being heart broken is a normal thing. Everyone is heart broken at some point in life. People who are heart broken or just down, get on with life. They are sad. Maybe even miserable, but they are functional.
Being depressed is a whole different ball of wax. Being depressed is laying in bed, listening to your baby cry because it's hungry and just not being able to get up and do anything about it. I don't mean not WANTING to get up and do anything. I mean being physically unable to get up.
You know what you should do. You even want to do those things but you just can't. You know you have no "reason to be depressed", but you just can't shake it.
Being depressed is like living under water. You are semi disconnected to the world. Every little thing is a chore. Just taking a shower is a major undertaking.
People tell you to "snap out of it" as if you would subject yourself to this misery if you had any control over it.
Depression is a chemical imbalance in the brain. It is very difficult to understand if you've never lived it.
All that being said, I totally agree that the United States is becoming an overmedicated society. We do need to be more watchful of what drugs we are taking. No one should take unnecessary drugs. We still don't understand the long term consquences of so may of them.