What's Depression Like?

[NoahSD]

Depression runs in my family. I'm pretty sure both my parents and both my siblings have been on antidepressants. My brother's pretty severely depressed right now and has been for almost 3 years.

I really wanna know what it's like because I want to know what my brother's going through, and I want to know how to detect it early if it happens to me too.

I assume there are people on 2+2 who've been depressed. So, what is/was it like? Did it come suddenly or gradually? What can other people do to make it more manageable? For those of you who have overcome it, do you wish you'd responded differently in hindsight?

(Mods, I didn't know if I should put this in OOT or psych. I don't really want medical answers, just stories from people, so I decided on OOT.)