Tag: depression

Nightmare Disorder

Nightmare disorder is a pattern of repeated frightening and vivid dreams that affects your quality of life. It ranges from mild to severe and can be short-term or chronic. Nightmare disorder is treatable with various psychotherapies and medications. It commonly affects people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Nightmare disorder is one type of parasomnias, which are behavioral sleep abnormalities.

Nightmare disorder ranges in severity based on the occurrence of nightmares:

  • Mild: Less than one nightmare per week on average.
  • Moderate: One or more nightmares per week, but less than nightly.
  • Severe: Nightmares every night.

It can also vary in duration:

  • Acute nightmare disorder lasts one month or less.
  • Subacute nightmare disorder lasts at least one month but less than six months.
  • Chronic nightmare disorder lasts for six months or longer.

Nightmares typically occur during the second half of your sleep period during REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. With nightmare disorder, you remember them upon awakening (unlike sleep terrors).

This condition can significantly disrupt your sleep and affect your quality of life. It can also make underlying mental health conditions, such as depression or anxiety, worse.

Who does nightmare disorder affect?

Nightmare disorder can affect anyone, including children and adults.

It’s more likely to affect people who have any of the following conditions:

Nightmare disorder occurs in people who have social anxiety disorder or generalized anxiety disorder at approximately three times the rate of the general population. It affects 50% to 90% of people with PTSD.   more

Dissociative identity disorder (DID) [formally known as multiple personality disorder]

DID Fact Sheet

What Is Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID)?

Dissociative identity disorder (DID), previously referred to as multiple personality disorder, is a dissociative disorder involving a disturbance of identity in which two or more separate and distinct personality states (or identities) control an individual’s behavior at different times. When under the control of one identity, a person is usually unable to remember some of the events that occurred while other personalities were in control. The different identities, referred to as alters, may exhibit differences in speech, mannerisms, attitudes, thoughts and gender orientation. The alters may even present physical differences, such as allergies, right-or-left handedness or the need for eyeglass prescriptions. These differences between alters are often quite striking.

A person living with DID may have as few as two alters or as many as 100. The average number is about 10. Often alters are stable over time, continuing to play specific roles in the person’s life for years. Some alters may harbor aggressive tendencies, directed toward individuals in the person’s environment or toward other alters within the person.

At the time a person living with DID first seeks professional help, he or she is usually not aware of their condition. A very common complaint in people affected by DID is episodes of amnesia, or time loss. These individuals may be unable to remember events in all or part of a proceeding time period. They may repeatedly encounter unfamiliar people who claim to know them, find themselves somewhere without knowing how they got there or find items that they don’t remember purchasing among their possessions.

What Are The Symptoms Of DID?

Often people living with DID are depressed or even suicidal and self-mutilation is common in this group. Approximately one-third of individuals affected complain of auditory or visual hallucinations.

While the causes are unknown, statistics show that DID occurs in 0.01 to 1 percent of the general population. DID is a serious mental illness that occurs across all ethnic groups and all income levels. It affects women nine times more than men.

In addition to experiencing separate identities, individuals living with DID may also experience many other symptoms. Some of these symptoms include:

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Seasonal affective disorder (SAD)

Overview

Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a type of depression that’s related to changes in seasons — SAD begins and ends at about the same times every year. If you’re like most people with SAD, your symptoms start in the fall and continue into the winter months, sapping your energy and making you feel moody. These symptoms often resolve during the spring and summer months. Less often, SAD causes depression in the spring or early summer and resolves during the fall or winter months.

Treatment for SAD may include light therapy (phototherapy), psychotherapy and medications.

Don’t brush off that yearly feeling as simply a case of the “winter blues” or a seasonal funk that you have to tough out on your own. Take steps to keep your mood and motivation steady throughout the year.

 

Symptoms

In most cases, seasonal affective disorder symptoms appear during late fall or early winter and go away during the sunnier days of spring and summer. Less commonly, people with the opposite pattern have symptoms that begin in spring or summer. In either case, symptoms may start out mild and become more severe as the season progresses.

Signs and symptoms of SAD may include:

  • Feeling listless, sad or down most of the day, nearly every day
  • Losing interest in activities you once enjoyed
  • Having low energy and feeling sluggish
  • Having problems with sleeping too much
  • Experiencing carbohydrate cravings, overeating and weight gain
  • Having difficulty concentrating
  • Feeling hopeless, worthless or guilty
  • Having thoughts of not wanting to live

    Seasonal changes and bipolar disorder

    People who have bipolar disorder are at increased risk of seasonal affective disorder. In some people with bipolar disorder, episodes of mania may be linked to a specific season. For example, spring and summer can bring on symptoms of mania or a less intense form of mania (hypomania), anxiety, agitation and irritability. They may also experience depression during the fall and winter months.   more

Algophobia

What is algophobia?

Algophobia is an extreme fear of physical pain. While nobody wants to experience pain, people with this phobia have intense feelings of worry, panic or depression at the thought of pain. The anxiety of algophobia can also make you more sensitive to pain. It’s most common in people with chronic pain syndromes. Other names for this condition include “pain-related fear” and “pain anxiety.”

How common is algophobia?

Pain-related fear in people with chronic pain is common. One study suggests that half of people with low back pain have an elevated sense of fear about their pain. Chronic pain affects between 20% and 50% of people worldwide and is one of the most common reasons that people see a healthcare provider. About 67% of people with chronic pain also have a mental health condition such as anxiety or depression.

 

What causes algophobia?

Sudden fear and anxiety protect us from dangerous situations. If we see a bear, it’s natural to feel scared and want to escape. But people with chronic pain may develop ongoing fear and anxiety as protective measures. They avoid activities or situations that they think could cause more pain or make their pain worse. Unfortunately, exaggerating the threat of pain can actually make the pain worse.

The same chemicals in your brain that regulate fear and anxiety also regulate how you perceive pain. So chemical imbalances can trigger both problems.   more

Dementia

Dementia

 

Overview

Dementia is a term used to describe a group of symptoms affecting memory, thinking and social abilities severely enough to interfere with your daily life. It isn’t a specific disease, but several diseases can cause dementia.

Though dementia generally involves memory loss, memory loss has different causes. Having memory loss alone doesn’t mean you have dementia, although it’s often one of the early signs of the condition.

Alzheimer’s disease is the most common cause of a progressive dementia in older adults, but there are a number of other causes of dementia. Depending on the cause, some dementia symptoms might be reversible.

 

Symptoms

Dementia symptoms vary depending on the cause, but common signs and symptoms include:

Cognitive changes

  • Memory loss, which is usually noticed by someone else
  • Difficulty communicating or finding words
  • Difficulty with visual and spatial abilities, such as getting lost while driving
  • Difficulty reasoning or problem-solving
  • Difficulty handling complex tasks
  • Difficulty with planning and organizing
  • Difficulty with coordination and motor functions
  • Confusion and disorientation

Psychological changes

  • Personality changes
  • Depression
  • Anxiety
  • Inappropriate behavior
  • Paranoia
  • Agitation
  • Hallucinations   more

SUBSTANCE/MEDICATION-INDUCED DEPRESSIVE DISORDER

What it is:

Substance/medication-induced depressive disorder is characterized by a
prominent and persistent change in mood, exhibiting clear signs of depression or
a marked decrease in interest or pleasure in daily activities and hobbies, and these
symptoms start during or soon after a certain substance/medication has been
taken, or during withdrawal from the substance/medication. The individual’s
mental health history, as well as the nature of the substance/medication taken
must be taken into account, to ensure that the depressive symptoms cannot be
better explained by a different diagnosis.

 

The symptoms of the depressive disorder must also be severe enough to cause
impairment in the day to day functionality of the individual. Withdrawal times for
various substances from the body vary, and so the depressive symptoms may
continue for some time after the individual has ceased taking the
substance/medication.

Common symptoms:

1. Constantly feeling sad, hopeless or empty
2. Constantly feeling irritated or agitated
3. Excessive weight gain or loss during a short period of time
4. Sleeping too much or too little
5. Low energy levels or fatigue
6. Low self-esteem
7. Poor levels of concentration
8. Decreased sex drive
9. Increased thoughts of death and dying, including suicidal thoughts and
behavior
10. The above symptoms must all have manifested during or after a specific
substance/medication was taken or during withdrawal  read more

Depressive Episode

What is a depressive episode?

The definition of a depressive episode is a period of depression that persists for at least two weeks. During a depressive episode, a person will typically experience low or depressed mood and/or loss of interest in most activities, as well as a number of other symptoms of depression, such as tiredness, changes in appetite, feelings of worthlessness and recurrent thoughts of death. The length of a depressive episode varies, but the average duration is thought to be six to eight months.

Depression is a common illness, and many people will experience one or more episodes of depression in their lifetime. While people of all races and ages can experience depressive episodes, they tend to be more common among women than men. People who have a history of depression, other mental health conditions such as bipolar disorder or anxiety, or chronic physical conditions such as diabetes, chronic pain or multiple sclerosis, also have a higher risk of experiencing a depressive episode.

The severity of a depressive episode varies; it may be classified as major or minor, depending on the number of symptoms and degree of impairment (social, domestic and work) experienced. Regardless of the severity, all depressive episodes should be taken seriously and treated promptly by a professional healthcare provider. Effective treatment, which typically involves medication and/or therapy, for depression is available.

Without appropriate treatment, the risk of experiencing further episodes of depression is thought to be higher. The risk of another depressive episode occurring seems to increase with every new episode, with each one likely to last longer and be more severe than the previous one. Timely treatment can alleviate the symptoms of depression and help shorten the duration of any future episodes.  read more

Everything You Need to Know About Bipolar Disorder

What is bipolar disorder?

Bipolar disorder is a mental health condition marked by extreme shifts in mood.

Key symptoms include:

  • episodes of mania, or an extremely elevated mood
  • episodes of depression, or a low mood

Older terms for bipolar disorder include manic depression and bipolar disease.

Bipolar disorder isn’t a rare condition. In fact, the National Institute of Mental HealthTrusted Source says that 2.8 percent of U.S. adults — or about 5 million people — have a bipolar disorder diagnosis.

read more

 

Creed – My Own Prison (Official Video)

Album: My Own Prison (1997)
Charted:  54
Creed guitarist Mark Tremonti wrote the music to this song, and lead singer Scott Stapp composed the lyrics, which are about his struggles with life at a time when he was questioning his faith. He realized he had created a prison within his own mind.

After Creed became wildly popular (and at the same time, reviled), Stapp created another kind of prison for himself with drug addiction, alcoholism, and a series of unflattering incidents the tabloids lapped up.