Depression becoming an EXCUSE?

[hEaLiNgViSiOnAnGeLicMiX]

Here's my first shot at a CT thread.

Depression is becoming an excuse, and I am going to take a girl who is in nearly EVERY SINGLE ONE of my classes as an example; let's call her Kathy. Kathy has supposably been depressed since 6th grade. She's been to the hospital on multiple occasions for checkups, takes pills on a daily (if not weekly?) basis, and to my knowledge has attempted to slit her wrist on atleast 3 ocassions. This all sounds like the traits a 'typical' depressed person would carry, but that is the problem. The 'typical' depressed person image.

The problem I see with this is Kathy's behaviour. I am friends with 3 other people who have depression, and Kathy carries one trait that is different to them. They do not carry the same 'image'. She is not afraid to admit she has depression, infact she often STRESSES the idea that she has depression. The other three people I know with depression often try to hide it. People who don't know them as well as I do aren't even aware of the fact that they have depression. I'll give you a few recent examples of how Kathy is acting.

1) During drama class, all of the studenst were seperated into two seperate groups. Kathy and I coincidently were put into the same group. Everyone was seemingly ontask and what we were to do was that we had to make up a dance. The dance's actions have to reflect on the lyrics of the song we were given. Now here's the thing, Kathy IMMEDIATELY assumed she was the leader of the group (she even referred to herself as 'leader' a couple times) and started ordering us to do this and that. A friend of mine was becoming annoyed with being bossed around and said "Ok Kathy can't we try ______ instead? 'Cause noone really seems to like that idea..." and Kathy's immediate reaction was "Well I'M the leader of this group so I GET TO DECIDE." My friend then replied with "Noone ever ASKED nor WANTED you to be leader". Kathy then BURST out into tears and said "THAT'S NOW HOW YOU TALK TO SOMEONE WHO'S DEPRESSED!"

2) French class we were to write speeches for a speech competition called 'Concours Oratoire'. Kathy wrote about depression and used the idea of HER BEING depressed as the main topic. When she was given an A+ for speech presentation (she's a good public speaker) but a C for 'speech content/ideas" she flipped, while again stressing the idea that she was 'depressed'

3) There was a new kid named Kyriel in our class a little while back named Kyriel. At one point I was talking to him and Kathy joined in. The bell then rang and Kathy pulled out a pill bottle. Kyriel then asked "what's that for?" Kathy's reply was "Oh they're my happy pills! I'm depressed!" with a PROUD tone of voice.

Is she really DEPRESSED? I think not, but you might disagree. My point is not solely about her, but I'm talking about this whole 'depression' idea getting way out of hand. There are byfar too many people saying they are 'depressed' who really aren't. I think that it's a cry for attention, an excuse to be treated differently. Maybe I'm wrong? Discuss.