Talking is Still Needed to Treat Depression
Psychiatrists say talk therapy along with medication is best
For doctors and researchers who treat and study depression, and for the people who are just trying to get better, the relationship between antidepressants and psychotherapy is a complicated one.
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Beating the Blues
Q. Is depression just a “normal” part of aging?
A: There are a lot of problems to face as you get older. There are losses of all kinds that can get you down. And feeling blue for a while is a normal part of living at any age.
But unrelenting depression is not normal. If you feel this way, you should seek medical attention. Most people get better if they treat their depression. Read more
A Blue Christmas?
Psychoanalyst Dr. Robert Schwalbe knows that when the Christmas carols start playing, the phone starts ringing.
The doctor, who specializes in treating men at his Upper East Side practice, said that much like a retailer, the holidays have become his busiest season.
“My practice booms at this time of year,” he said, estimating that he typically sees a 25 percent spike peaking in January. And that’s on top of the 50 percent increase he’s already noticed since the economic crisis began. Read more
Let the Light In
While high-rise living is quintessential to urban life, it may also be limiting exposure to natural light for people living in a 12-story apartment—especially early morning light—and making those tenanats more susceptible to Seasonal Affective Disorder.
SAD, also known as seasonal depression or winter depression, begins affecting people in late fall and can last through early May; in accordance with the time of year when overall daylight is shortest.
The specific cause of SAD remains unknown. Read more
Simply Happy
Maybe we’ve been wrong about depression. Maybe it’s not simply a biochemical malfunction best corrected by a Prozac prescription or a psychological malady requiring soul-baring confessions to a therapist. Maybe, says Stephen S. Ilardi, associate professor of clinical psychology at the University of Kansas, what’s darkening our lives is the way we actually live.
“There’s increasing evidence that we were never designed for our sedentary, socially isolated, indoor, sleep-deprived, poorly nourished lifestyle,” says the bearded, wiry Ilardi. “If throughout the course of human evolution people were as vulnerable to depressive illness as 21st-century Americans, we would long since have gone extinct as a species.” Read more
