Could my 8 year old son be depressed?

[knakered]

I have an 8 year old son who has frequent (1-2/week)emotional sessions that involve a lot of painful tears, red faced frustration, distress etc around...nobody loves me, I never get invited to xyz, stop annoying me...they are annoying me...last year it was really bad and I thought directly related to his school change - crying every day for a year..."I have no friends...everyone is mean to me.."...after hoping he would settle and working with school to asses whether there was a bullying situation to no improvement we moved his school - all is now happy on the school front ...but we now have the same outburst over home related incidents and sometimes in the school run car journies -- he either has a low iritability threshold as he seems to be unable to cope with boyish banter - or what is worrying me now is it something more??...there is a history fo depression in the family ...my grandfather, couple of cousins _ I have experienced bleak periods in my life where I have felt paralysed by normal life and had PND - however I had thought the family bit is possibly only the population average (I have a massive familY) and I had a very difficult
childhood was my reason for being depressed. I look at my son and am terrified that He may have to feel and does feel how I felt...is it "just normal"...is it "just his character"...or is it some level of depression?...how do I know?....how can i best help him?...or am I just being unrealistic that all children are sunny little souls - I have 3 others Children and they do not exhibit this kind of emotion. I have also posted this on the parenting topic...so please dont shout at me for posting twice as on reflection I thought i might get a more informed response from this section of MNs

[stoppinattwo]

My DS i 8 and cen get very emotional, weepy,

I find he gets overwhelmed and cant control his emotions. Does your DS get a good sleep?

I dont mean the amount of sleep but the quality of sleep. Sometimes DS gets just too tired and then doesnt deal with things very well, normal every day events become really stress ful and he completely loses his sense of humour.

See if there is a pattern. almost treat him like you would a baby in terms of cosying him up for bed. i put lavendar bath stuff in his bath, he gets really cosey and has a good sleep. I find by friday after a full week at school he is ready to explode and i spend the weekend winding him down, loads of exercise running around footie etc. I do notice the difference. Sorry if youve tried all this but i hope some of this advice may be useful