If your life is characterized by depression, anxiety, worry, or fear, you’ve got company. According to the American Psychological Association, over 19 million Americans suffer from depression yearly, with women twice as likely as men to be affected. Clearly there is an epidemic ravaging our society. Are medication and psychotherapy the only – or even the best - tools we can use against it? 

Finding answers to that question will be the first topic of a three part lecture series for women held at the Thousand Oaks Library beginning Thursday, April 24 at 7:00 pm.  

The Answers for Women Lecture Series will be given by long-time Conejo Valley resident and pastor’s wife, Connie Larson. Connie holds a Master’s degree in Biblical Counseling, but feels it’s her over 30 years of counseling women that has qualified her to speak on this topic. Having counseled hundreds of women, Connie has seen how depression can decimate lives. 

“We can get worn out in this world,” she says. “It’s not an easy world to live in.” She cites external circumstances – others hurting us, having a difficult child, or trying to live up to expectations – that can intensify internal issues. It’s the internal, or spiritual, issues that Connie asserts are at the heart of the matter.

“Medications are intended to help us feel better,” she explains. “But they don’t deal with the root problems. God gives us ways to approach the problems of our heart.”

Connie’s lectures will address the causes, questions, and common solutions to the plague of depression, anxiety, fear and worry, and the ‘super woman syndrome’. She also plans to introduce the biblical alternative. Each lecture is $10, but those registering for the entire series in advance will receive a free copy of the book Will Medicine Stop the Pain? by Elyse Fitzpatrick and Laura Hendrickson, MD.

“It’s a shame to feel that there is no hope,” Connie says. Through her lecture series, she aims to provide some.