Period Mood Quotes

If it is true that there is no greater sorrow than to remember a happy time in a state of misery, it is just as true that calling up a moment of anguish in a tranquil mood, seated quietly at one's desk, is a source of profound satisfaction.

Do not blame my tone of voice, my lack of patience, or my bad mood on PMS. It's not my period that's my problem.

I've never had a sustained period of medication for mental illness when I've not been on other drugs as well. It's just not something that I particularly feel I need. I know that I have dramatically changing moods, and I know sometimes I feel really depressed, but I think that's just life. I don't think of it as, "Ah, this is mental illness," more as, "Today, life makes me feel very sad." I know I also get unnaturally high levels of energy and quickness of thought, but I'm able to utilize that.

Feeling normal for any extended period of time raises hopes that turn out, almost invariably, to be writ on water.

Lithium tweaks many mood-altering chemicals in the brain, and its effects are complicated. Most interesting, lithium seems to reset the body’s circadian rhythm, its inner clock. In normal people, ambient conditions, especially the sun, dictate their humors and determine when they are tuckered out for the day. They’re on a twenty-four-hour cycle. Bipolar people run on cycles independent of the sun. And run and run.

Call it dysphoric mania, agitated depression, or a mixed state: nobody will understand anyway. Mania and depression at once mean the will to die and the motivation to make it happen. This is why mixed states are the most dangerous periods of mood disorders. Tearfulness and racing thoughts happen. So do agitation and guilt, fatigue and morbidity and dread. Walking late at night, trying to get murdered, happens. Trying to explain a bipolar mixed state is like trying to explain the Holy Trinity, three persons in one God: you just have to take it on faith when I tell you that the poles bend, cross, never snapping.

Life is a sandwich of activity between two periods of bed-wetting,

The period of time it takes a pictsie to go from normal to mad fighting mood is so tiny it can’t be measured on the smallest clock.

These two things are almost all I want, but unfortunately, neither one is my strong suit. I am very strong on blame, and wish this were one of God's values, but trust, surrender? Letting go, forgiveness? Maybe just after a period of prayer, but then when the mood passes and real life rears its ugly head again? Not so much. I hate this, the fact that life is usually Chutes and Ladders, with no guaranteed gains. I cannot will myself into having these qualities, so I have to pray for them more often, if I want to be happy. I have to create the habit, just as I had to do with daily writing, and flossing.

We knew we shouldn’t be ashamed. We weren’t ashamed. We were grown-ass women—which is obviously why we paraded to the restrooms with tampons secretly stuffed into our cardigan sleeves as though we were spies delivering encrypted information. ....We pretended that all of this was a myth. That we had neither fallopian tubes, nor menstrual cycles, nor breasts, nor moods, nor children. And then we took it as a compliment when one of the men in the office told us we had balls. So, tell us again how this wasn’t a man’s world.

Dear friend…' The Witcher swore quietly, looking at the sharp, angular, even runes drawn with energetic sweeps of the pen, faultlessly reflecting the author’s mood. He felt once again the desire to try to bite his own backside in fury. When he was writing to the sorceress a month ago he had spent two nights in a row contemplating how best to begin. Finally, he had decided on “Dear friend.” Now he had his just deserts. 'Dear friend, your unexpected letter – which I received not quite three years after we last saw each other – has given me much joy. My joy is all the greater as various rumours have been circulating about your sudden and violent death. It is a good thing that you have decided to disclaim them by writing to me; it is a good thing, too, that you are doing so so soon. From your letter it appears that you have lived a peaceful, wonderfully boring life, devoid of all sensation. These days such a life is a real privilege, dear friend, and I am happy that you have managed to achieve it. I was touched by the sudden concern which you deigned to show as to my health, dear friend. I hasten with the news that, yes, I now feel well; the period of indisposition is behind me, I have dealt with the difficulties, the description of which I shall not bore you with. It worries and troubles me very much that the unexpected present you received from Fate brings you worries. Your supposition that this requires professional help is absolutely correct. Although your description of the difficulty – quite understandably – is enigmatic, I am sure I know the Source of the problem. And I agree with your opinion that the help of yet another magician is absolutely necessary. I feel honoured to be the second to whom you turn. What have I done to deserve to be so high on your list? Rest assured, my dear friend; and if you had the intention of supplicating the help of additional magicians, abandon it because there is no need. I leave without delay, and go to the place which you indicated in an oblique yet, to me, understandable way. It goes without saying that I leave in absolute secrecy and with great caution. I will surmise the nature of the trouble on the spot and will do all that is in my power to calm the gushing source. I shall try, in so doing, not to appear any worse than other ladies to whom you have turned, are turning or usually turn with your supplications. I am, after all, your dear friend. Your valuable friendship is too important to me to disappoint you, dear friend. Should you, in the next few years, wish to write to me, do not hesitate for a moment. Your letters invariably give me boundless pleasure. Your friend Yennefer' The letter smelled of lilac and gooseberries. Geralt cursed.

I didn’t know that depression isn’t a mood. It’s a set of conditions that cause a whole series of thoughts and behaviors to happen over a long period of time, often things that are wildly different from one another.

Thornton Wilder’s one-act play “The Angel That Troubled the Waters,” based on John 5:1-4, dramatizes the power of the pool of Bethesda to heal whenever an angel stirred its waters. A physician comes periodically to the pool hoping to be the first in line and longing to be healed of his melancholy. The angel finally appears but blocks the physician just as he is ready to step into the water. The angel tells the physician to draw back, for this moment is not for him. The physician pleads for help in a broken voice, but the angel insists that healing is not intended for him. The dialogue continues—and then comes the prophetic word from the angel: “Without your wounds where would your power be? It is your melancholy that makes your low voice tremble into the hearts of men and women. The very angels themselves cannot persuade the wretched and blundering children on earth as can one human being broken on the wheels of living. In Love’s service, only wounded soldiers can serve. Physician, draw back.” Later, the man who enters the pool first and is healed rejoices in his good fortune and turning to the physician says: “Please come with me. It is only an hour to my home. My son is lost in dark thoughts. I do not understand him and only you have ever lifted his mood. Only an hour.… There is also my daughter: since her child died, she sits in the shadow. She will not listen to us but she will listen to you.”13 Christians who remain in hiding continue to live the lie. We deny the reality of our sin. In a futile attempt to erase our past, we deprive the community of our healing gift. If we conceal our wounds out of fear and shame, our inner darkness can neither be illuminated nor become a light for others. We cling to our bad feelings and beat ourselves with the past when what we should do is let go. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, guilt is an idol. But when we dare to live as forgiven men and women, we join the wounded healers and draw closer to Jesus.

Each period is dominated by a mood, with the result that most men fail to see the tyrant who rules over them.

I wasn’t in the mood for therapy, I was about to get my period and it was schnitzel night,

The blues don’t jump right on you. They come creeping. Shortly after my sixtieth I slipped into a depression like I hadn’t experienced since that dusty night in Texas thirty years earlier. It lasted for a year and a half and devastated me. When these moods hit me, usually few will notice—not Mr. Landau, no one I work with in the studio, not the band, never the audience, hopefully not the children—but Patti will observe a freight train bearing down, loaded with nitroglycerin and running quickly out of track. During these periods I can be cruel: I run, I dissemble, I dodge, I weave, I disappear, I return, I rarely apologize, and all the while Patti holds down the fort as I’m trying to burn it down. She stops me. She gets me to the doctors and says, “This man needs a pill.” I do. I’ve been on antidepressants for the last twelve to fifteen years of my life, and to a lesser degree but with the same effect they had for my father, they have given me a life I would not have been able to maintain without them. They work. I return to Earth, home and my family. The worst of my destructive behavior curtails itself and my humanity returns. I was crushed between sixty and sixty-two, good for a year and out again from sixty-three to sixty-four. Not a good record.

Reflecting on various aspects of our lives is essential for a person to grow and adjust to changing phases in their life. Self-analysis entails examining a person’s existing level of self-esteem and documenting the inner voice that speaks to a person, which is frequently either affirming of self-defeating. Failure to periodically engage in self-analysis, make crucial revisions in our personas, and modify our thinking patterns when we encounter transformative events in life can lead to mood disorders, burnout, and other emotional maladies.

But one of the amazing and enduring things about cinema is its ability to take a frozen section of a period of time and allow us to recall moods and emotions we had and have no more.

Barrett said that when we’re dehydrated, we don’t necessarily feel thirsty—we feel exhausted. When we have something odd happening in our stomach, our body doesn’t quite know if we have a menstrual cramp or a stomachache or if we need to poop. We might not even be aware for a long period of time that our stomach hurts. And this isn’t unique to people with PTSD. It’s normal, everyday bodily dissociation that we all suffer from. If we find ourselves in a shitty mood, we might not necessarily be mad about a certain trigger. We could just be running at a metabolic deficit. Our body might be screaming “I NEED FUNYUNS” while we project our hangriness onto, say, this poor sweaty schmuck who’s breathing too loud in the elevator. But Barrett said that PTSD does make these inclinations worse. It affects a variety of systems in the body, throwing them all out of whack. Our hearts might beat faster. Our lungs might pump harder. Our body budget can get tipped off-balance more easily. And when it does, our reactions to these deficits can feel outsized. “Make sure that you get enough sleep, make sure you exercise, make sure that you eat in a healthful way,” she told me when I asked her what I could do to be a better person. When I countered that that didn’t seem like enough, she kindly offered, “You know, all you can do is take as much responsibility as you can. And sometimes it’s the attempt that matters, you know, more than the success.” Then she chuckled at herself. “That’s a very Jewish mother response!” So, first step of hacking my brain: sustaining it with enough oxygen and nutrients

Together, estrogen and progesterone are the perfect yin and yang for mood. Estradiol lifts you up by boosting serotonin, oxytocin, and dopamine. Progesterone calms you down by acting like GABA in your brain.

Real writers write. Period. No, the muse does not come to visit everyday. She’s a lazy, precocious flirt. You cannot get into the habit of being “in the mood” to write. No writer on Earth is in the mood to write everyday, but the good ones do it anyway. They fight through their fatigue, their stress, their doubt, and they write. They get the words on the page. Period. So stop waiting for your muse. Trust me, she sleeps around.

Haute couture and getting hauter. Fire inches down the foyer wallpaper. Me, for added set dressing I started the fire. Special effects can go a long way to heighten a mood, and it's not as if this is a real house. What's burning down is a re-creation of a period revival house patterned after a copy of a copy of a copy of a mock-Tudor big manor house. It's a hundred generations removed from anything original, but the truth is aren't we all?

Not a day goes by without many thousands of people each having sex with their girlfriend, boyfriend, wife, or husband, only because the person they are cheating with is busy, not in the mood, sick, on her period, tired, or not around.

Meanwhile, Mme Mao and her cohorts were renewing their efforts to prevent the country from working. In industry, their slogan was: "To stop production is revolution itself." In agriculture, in which they now began to meddle seriously: "We would rather have socialist weeds than capitalist crops." Acquiring foreign technology became "sniffing after foreigners' farts and calling them sweet." In education: "We want illiterate working people, not educated spiritual aristocrats." They called for schoolchildren to rebel against their teachers again; in January 1974, classroom windows, tables, and chairs in schools in Peking were smashed, as in 1966. Mme Mao claimed this was like "the revolutionary action of English workers destroying machines in the eighteenth century." All this demagoguery' had one purpose: to create trouble for Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiao-ping and generate chaos. It was only in persecuting people and in destruction that Mme Mao and the other luminaries of the Cultural Revolution had a chance to "shine." In construction they had no place. Zhou and Deng had been making tentative efforts to open the country up, so Mme Mao launched a fresh attack on foreign culture. In early 1974 there was a big media campaign denouncing the Italian director Michelangelo Antonioni for a film he had made about China, although no one in China had seen the film, and few had even heard of it or of Antonioni. This xenophobia was extended to Beethoven after a visit by the Philadelphia Orchestra. In the two years since the fall of Lin Biao, my mood had changed from hope to despair and fury. The only source of comfort was that there was a fight going on at all, and that the lunacy was not reigning supreme, as it had in the earlier years of the Cultural Revolution. During this period, Mao was not giving his full backing to either side. He hated the efforts of Zhou and Deng to reverse the Cultural Revolution, but he knew that his wife and her acolytes could not make the country work. Mao let Zhou carry on with the administration of the country, but set his wife upon Zhou, particularly in a new campaign to 'criticize Confucius." The slogans ostensibly denounced Lin Biao, but were really aimed at Zhou, who, it was widely held, epitomized the virtues advocated by the ancient sage. Even though Zhou had been unwaveringly loyal, Mao still could not leave him alone. Not even now, when Zhou was fatally ill with advanced cancer of the bladder.

Even though people experiencing dementia become unable to recount what has just happened, they still go through the experience—even without recall. The psychological present lasts about three seconds. We experience the present even when we have dementia. The emotional pain caused by callous treatment or unkind talk occurs during that period. The moods and actions of people with dementia are expressions of what they have experienced, whether they can still use language and recall, or not.

With his capacity for flight came grimmer moods, and the blackness of his depressions filled the air as pervasively as music did in his better periods. Within a year or so of moving to California, my father’s moods were further blackening, and I felt helpless to affect them.

I didn’t until I was older and she was diagnosed and the possibility of her leaving us became real. But she used to tell me how the moment I was born, she knew she had found her light in the dark. That one lighthouse that, no matter what, was always up. Lighting up the night and signaling her way home. And as a kid, I thought that was either corny or very dramatic.” A low and humorless chuckle left him. My heart broke all over again for him, hurting and begging me to turn around and give him any comfort I could. But I stayed put. “You must miss her so much.” “I do, every day. When she passed and my nights got a little darker, I started to understand what she’d meant.” That was a loss I hoped I wouldn’t experience in a long time. “But what your dad said—about you having this fire inside, that lightness and life, and how it dulled for a period of time …” He paused, and I swore I heard him swallow. “It just …” He trailed off, as if he was scared of his next words. And Aaron never feared speaking his mind. Aaron was never scared. “You are all that, Catalina. You are light. And passion. Your laughter alone can lift my mood and effortlessly turn my day around in a matter of seconds. Even when it’s not aimed at me. You … can light up entire rooms, Catalina. You hold that kind of power. And it’s because of all the different things that make you who you are. Each and every one of them, even the ones that drive me crazy in ways you can’t imagine. You should never forget that.

Studies show that our moods plummet toward anxiety and depression the more we spend time online.1 When we’re busy tweeting and checking our Facebook feeds, we’re constantly comparing ourselves to others rather than listening to and trusting our own inner wisdom. When we zone out to surf the Web, we’re not resting in our spacious awareness, and our bully inner selves sneak in and take over. Unless we train our minds to rest in the present moment, through daily periods of kindhearted mindfulness meditation and active communication with our inner selves, we will become more and more disconnected from our highest Selves.

And what enriched me while reading Adorno, for example, lay not in what I read but in the perception of myself while I was reading. I was someone who read Adorno! And in this heavy, intricate, detailed, precise language whose aim was to elevate thought ever higher, and where every period was set like a mountaineer’s cleat, there was something else, this particular approach to the mood of reality, the shadow of these sentences that could evoke in me a vague desire to use the language with this particular mood on something real, on something living. Not on an argument, but on a lynx, for example, or on a blackbird or a cement mixer.

Bruce has wrestled with his moods, and a psyche genetically prone to extremes, for most of his adult life. Decades of psychotherapy helped reveal and cast light on some of his most primal traumas and conflicts, but his raw moods, and occasional descents into full-blown depression, never quite went away. "You go through periods of being good, then something stimulates it," he says. "The clock, some memory. You never know. The mind wants to link all your feelings to a cause. I'm feeling that because I'm doing this, or because that happened." Eventually Bruce realized that his worst moods had nothing to do with what was actually taking place in his life. Awful, stressful things could happen - conflicts, stress, disappointments, death - and he'd be unflappable. Then things would be peaceful and easy and he'd find himself on his knees. "You're going along fine, and then boom, it hits you. Things that just come from way down in the well. Completely noncasual, but it's part of your DNA, part of the way your body cycles." Bruce knows his particular brain chemistry will never leave him completely in the clear. "You manage it, you learn and evolve, but another recognition you gotta have is that these are the cards you were dealt," he says. "These things are never going to be out of your life. You gotta be constantly vigilant and realistic about these things.

I’m not sure what you want, Piper. Do you want me to send money? Would that help?” Curtiss asked. “He’s not like an abandoned pet, Curtiss. God! He’s your father and you could come up and help me out. That would be helpful.” I was angry with him. I felt like once again he had walked away from me and left me at a critical time. When I was a junior in high school, Curtiss went away to college and left me alone to navigate life with my father, and for those two years I held a vicious grudge. Curtiss left me alone to battle my father’s moods, alone to absorb Curtiss’s portion of his criticisms, alone to protect my mother from his cruel tone and even crueler periods of silence. Curtiss visited home rarely, but when he did I made sure that he could feel my wrath underneath my layers of friendly conversation. Finally, when he returned for my own high school graduation, he addressed my years of quiet fury. “Piper, you just don’t know how it is. It’s not like this in other families. It’s different when you get out into the world.

It was also crucial for me to talk with Zara about how frightening it is for any child to be neglected or treaded with hostility by a parent. Even if they never lay a finger on them. Angry parents generate fear in their children. And over a long period, chronic fear can impair a child’s self esteem, their sense of value and their ability to regulate their moods.

BPII differs from the other main type of bipolar disorder, bipolar I (BPI), in two key ways. First, everyone with BPII experiences one or more periods of depression; however, depression may or may not be present in BPI. Second, people with BPII experience hypomania, a less severe version of mania, the episodic high or elevated mood that is the defining feature of BPI.

PERIODIC MOOD-CHANGES We have already spoken of the affective concomitants of common migraines—elated and irritable prodromal states, states of dread and depression associated with the main phase of the attack, and states of euphoric rebound. Any or all of these may be abstracted as isolated periodic symptoms of relatively short duration—some hours, or at most two or three days, and as such may present themselves as primary emotional disorders. The most acute of these mood-changes, generally no more than an hour in duration, usually represents concomitants or equivalents of migraine aura. We may confine our attention at this stage to attacks of depression, or truncated manic-depressive cycles, occurring at intervals in patients who have previously suffered from attacks of undoubted (classical, common, abdominal, etc.) migraine.

Migraines are described as “one of the most common” pain syndromes, affecting as much as 12 percent of the population.63 That’s common? How about menstrual cramps, which plague up to 90 percent of younger women?64 Can ginger help? Even just one-eighth of a teaspoon of ginger powder three times a day dropped pain from an eight to a six on a scale of one to ten, and down further to a three in the second month.65 And these women hadn’t been taking ginger all month; they started the day before their periods began, suggesting that even if it doesn’t seem to help much the first month, women should try sticking with it. What about the duration of pain? A quarter teaspoon of ginger powder three times a day was found to not only drop the severity of menstrual pain from about seven down to five but decrease the duration from a total of nineteen hours in pain down to about fifteen hours,66 significantly better than the placebo, which were capsules filled with powdered toast. But women don’t take bread crumbs for their cramps. How does ginger compare to ibuprofen? Researchers pitted one-eighth of a teaspoon of powdered ginger head-to-head against 400 mg of ibuprofen, and the ginger worked just as effectively as this leading drug.67 Unlike the drug, ginger can also reduce the amount of menstrual bleeding, from around a half cup per period down to a quarter cup.68 What’s more, ginger intake of one-eighth of a teaspoon twice daily started a week before your period can yield a significant drop in premenstrual mood, physical, and behavioral symptoms.69 I like sprinkling powdered ginger on sweet potatoes or using it fresh to make lemon-ginger apple chews as an antinausea remedy. (Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve suffered from motion sickness.) There is an array of powerful antinausea

She was the kind of person who took care of things by herself. She'd never ask anybody for advice or help. It wasn't a matter of pride, I think. She just did what seemed natural to her. My parents were used to this and thought she'd be OK if they left her alone. I would go to my sister for advice and she was always ready to give it, but she never went to anyone else. She did what needed to be done, on her own. She never got angry or moody. This is all true, I mean it, I'm not exaggerating. Most girls, when they have their period or something, will get grumpy and take it out on others, but she never even did that. Instead of getting into a bad mood, she would become very subdued. Maybe once in two or three months this would happen to her: she'd shut herself up in her room and stay in bed, avoid school, hardly eat anything, turn the lights off, and space out. She wouldn't be in a bad mood, though.

In his person Gascoigne showed a curious amalgam of classes, high and low. He had cultivated his mind with the same grave discipline with which he now maintained his toilette—which is to say, according to a method that was sophisticated, but somewhat out of date. He held the kind of passion for books and learning that only comes when one has pursued an education on one’s very own—but it was a passion that, because its origins were both private and virtuous, tended towards piety and scorn. His temperament was deeply nostalgic, not for his own past, but for past ages; he was cynical of the present, fearful of the future, and profoundly regretful of the world’s decay. As a whole, he put one in mind of a well-preserved old gentleman (in fact he was only thirty-four) in a period of comfortable, but perceptible, decline—a decline of which he was well aware, and which either amused him or turned him melancholy, depending on his moods.

Almost the whole of modern medical research is dedicated to improving health in old age and extending the human life-span and we get more senility, not less. Extending it for what? We give them drugs to improve short-term memory, drugs to raise mood, drugs to increase appetite. They don’t need anything to make them sleep, that’s all they seem to do. What, I wonder, goes on in those senile minds during those long periods of half-consciousness. Memories, I suppose, prayers.

By just spending a few minutes in gratitude each day, you'll notice your thoughts start to shift in a remarkably short period of time. Most of us aren't used to practicing gratitude, so the effects are noticeable immediately since you're using a part of your brain that probably hasn't been used much before, at all. As you notice your thoughts shifting, you'll also notice your mood shifting. You'll feel better. Joyous, even. And when you're in that joyous, happy place-that's when the miracles start happening.

What happens when that recently triggered mood lingers? You’ve been in a bit of a funk since that day, and now you look around the room during a staff meeting and all you think of is that this person’s tie is hideous, and the nasally tone of your boss is worse than nails on a chalkboard. At this point, you’re not just in a mood. You’re reflecting a temperament, a tendency toward the habitual expression of an emotion through certain behaviors. A temperament is an emotional reaction with a refractory period that lasts from weeks to months. Eventually, if you keep the refractory period of an emotion going for months and years, that tendency turns into a personality trait. At that point others will describe you as “bitter” or “resentful” or “angry” or “judgmental.” Our personality traits, then, are frequently based in our past emotions. Most of the time, personality (how we think, act, and feel) is anchored in the past. So to change our personalities, we have to change the emotions that we memorize. We have to move out of the past.

Do not believe those who try to persuade you that composition is only a cold exercise of the intellect. The only music capable of moving and touching us is that which flows from the depths of a composer’s soul when he is stirred by inspiration. There is no doubt that even the greatest musical geniuses have sometimes worked without inspiration. This guest does not always respond to the first invitation. We must always work, and a self-respecting artist must not fold his hands on the pretext that he is not in the mood. If we wait for the mood, without endeavouring to meet it half-way, we easily become indolent and apathetic. We must be patient, and believe that inspiration will come to those who can master their disinclination. A few days ago I told you I was working every day without any real inspiration. Had I given way to my disinclination, undoubtedly I should have drifted into a long period of idleness. But my patience and faith did not fail me, and to-day I felt that inexplicable glow of inspiration of which I told you; thanks to which I know beforehand that whatever I write to-day will have power to make an impression, and to touch the hearts of those who hear it. I hope you will not think I am indulging in self-laudation, if I tell you that I very seldom suffer from this disinclination to work. I believe the reason for this is that I am naturally patient. I have learnt to master myself, and I am glad I have not followed in the steps of some of my Russian colleagues, who have no self-confidence and are so impatient that at the least difficulty they are ready to throw up the sponge. This is why, in spite of great gifts, they accomplish so little, and that in an amateur way.

WARNING: Before commencing any program of sustained physical inactivity, consult your physician. Sedentary living doubles the likelihood of stroke and coronary artery disease, making it as risky as smoking, high cholesterol, or high blood pressure. If unaccustomed to sitting for extended periods, you may experience weak muscles, low bone density, high cholesterol, hyperglycaemia, a rapid resting heart rate, mental decline, mood disorders, and obesity. Start slowly and increase inactivity gradually. If you experience drowsiness, difficulty in concentration, or craving for stimulation, discontinue inactivity immediately.:-)

Next, I called neuroscientist and psychologist Lisa Feldman Barrett, author of How Emotions Are Made. She told me that our bodies have a limited number of metabolic resources. We need a certain amount of sleep and water and nourishment in order to think, to learn new things, to produce the correct hormones. If we don’t get all of those things, our bodies are “running at a deficit.” But we don’t often understand what deficits we’re running at. We are not like The Sims, where we can see our hunger and rest and boredom levels represented as little progress bars at the bottom of the screenBarrett said that when we’re dehydrated, we don’t feel thirsty—we feel exhausted. When we have something odd happening in our stomach, our body doesn’t quite know if we have a menstrual cramp or a stomachache or if we need to poop. We might not even be aware for a long period of time that our stomach hurts. And this isn’t unique to people with PTSD. It’s normal, everyday bodily dissociation that we all suffer from. If we find ourselves in a shitty mood, we might not necessarily be mad about a certain trigger. We could just be running at a metabolic deficit. Our body might be screaming “I NEED FUNYUNS,” while we project our hangriness on, say, this poor sweaty schmuck who’s breathing too loud in the elevator.

symptoms of anxiety, fluid retention, sugar and chocolate cravings, mood swings, irritability, bloating, edema, headache, and sore breasts escalated before her period and lifted the minute her period began. Taking magnesium supplements may be the solution for PMS, advises Melvyn Werbach, M.D. Recent studies showed that of 192 women taking 400 mg of magnesium daily for PMS, 95 percent experienced less breast pain and had less weight gain, 89 percent suffered less nervous tension, and 43 percent had fewer headaches. (Dr. Werbach and several other researchers also advise that women should take 50 mg of vitamin B6 daily with the magnesium to assist in magnesium absorption.)

I was recently on a plane from Raleigh to Boston when I overheard a conversation between two women in the seats behind me that captured the national mood perfectly. An older woman with a Boston accent remarked, “It’s gone to shit. Everything’s gone to shit. The economy is terrible. Crime is crazy—I mean, I just go to work and come home and I don’t even go out.” The younger woman, who had a Southern accent, sighed knowingly. “It makes you wonder if you want to bring a child into this world,” she said. These were women who could afford airplane tickets. They were traveling between two affluent cities during a period of historically low crime rates in the richest nation during the wealthiest period of the history of the world. Clearly, it didn’t feel that way.

A study in the Journal of Neuroscience tested pain sensitivity in women at different times during their menstrual cycle—first during their period when estradiol is at its lowest and then when their estradiol levels were at their highest. The women in the study were subjected to a controlled amount of pain and asked to rate the level of their discomfort. At low levels of estradiol, the women reported feeling much more pain than when the hormone was at its highest. The implication is that when your estrogen levels are low, such as during menopause or during the premenstrual or menstrual phase of your cycle, you are likely to feel pain more acutely, which is also likely true for emotional pain. Just one more reason a smart man is especially sensitive at this time!

It is not just our physical health that a plant-based diet seems helpful for, however, since there are also tentative hints that it can be helpful for our mental health. One study set out to examine whether a diet without meat would have adverse effects on people's mood, and it actually found the opposite to be the case, since, on average, those who ate no meat “reported significantly less negative emotion than omnivores […]”[34] Another study that followed omnivores who had to stop eating meat and eggs for a period of time echoed this conclusion: “The complete restriction of flesh foods significantly reduced mood variability in omnivores.”[35] It is not clear why not consuming meat and eggs seems to have a positive effect on mood, but it may be because of the arachidonic acid prevalent in eggs and meat, especially poultry meat.[36]

support group she was leading for women with premenstrual syndrome. One of their self-help methods was to keep a journal of symptoms. Maureen’s journal for the next couple of months clearly showed that her symptoms of anxiety, fluid retention, sugar and chocolate cravings, mood swings, irritability, bloating, edema, headache, and sore breasts escalated before her period and lifted the minute her period began. Taking magnesium supplements may be the solution for PMS, advises Melvyn Werbach, M.D. Recent studies showed that of 192 women taking 400 mg of magnesium daily for PMS, 95 percent experienced less breast pain and had less weight gain, 89 percent suffered less nervous tension, and 43 percent had fewer headaches. (Dr. Werbach and several other researchers also advise that women should take 50 mg of vitamin B6 daily with the magnesium to assist in magnesium absorption.)

Necessities 1 A map of the world. Not the one in the atlas, but the one in our heads, the one we keep coloring in. With the blue thread of the river by which we grew up. The green smear of the woods we first made love in. The yellow city we thought was our future. The red highways not traveled, the green ones with their missed exits, the black side roads which took us where we had not meant to go. The high peaks, recorded by relatives, though we prefer certain unmarked elevations, the private alps no one knows we have climbed. The careful boundaries we draw and erase. And always, around the edges, the opaque wash of blue, concealing the drop-off they have stepped into before us, singly, mapless, not looking back. 2 The illusion of progress. Imagine our lives without it: tape measures rolled back, yardsticks chopped off. Wheels turning but going nowhere. Paintings flat, with no vanishing point. The plots of all novels circular; page numbers reversing themselves past the middle. The mountaintop no longer a goal, merely the point between ascent and descent. All streets looping back on themselves; life as a beckoning road an absurd idea. Our children refusing to grow out of their childhoods; the years refusing to drag themselves toward the new century. And hope, the puppy that bounds ahead, no longer a household animal. 3 Answers to questions, an endless supply. New ones that startle, old ones that reassure us. All of them wrong perhaps, but for the moment solutions, like kisses or surgery. Rising inflections countered by level voices, words beginning with w hushed by declarative sentences. The small, bold sphere of the period chasing after the hook, the doubter that walks on water and treads air and refuses to go away. 4 Evidence that we matter. The crash of the plane which, at the last moment, we did not take. The involuntary turn of the head, which caused the bullet to miss us. The obscene caller who wakes us at midnight to the smell of gas. The moon's full blessing when we fell in love, its black mood when it was all over. Confirm us, we say to the world, with your weather, your gifts, your warnings, your ringing telephones, your long, bleak silences. 5 Even now, the old things first things, which taught us language. Things of day and of night. Irrational lightning, fickle clouds, the incorruptible moon. Fire as revolution, grass as the heir to all revolutions. Snow as the alphabet of the dead, subtle, undeciphered. The river as what we wish it to be. Trees in their humanness, animals in their otherness. Summits. Chasms. Clearings. And stars, which gave us the word distance, so we could name our deepest sadness.

But what does the role of the anima as guide to the inner world mean in practical terms? This positive function occurs when a man takes seriously the feelings, moods, expectations, and fantasies sent by his anima and when he fixes them in some form—for example, in writing, painting, sculpture, musical composition, or dancing. When he works at this patiently and slowly, other more deeply unconscious material wells up from the depths and connects with the earlier material. After a fantasy has been fixed in some specific form, it must be examined both intellectually and ethically, with an evaluating feeling reaction. And it is essential to regard it as being absolutely real; there must be no lurking doubt that this is “only a fantasy.” If this is practiced with devotion over a long period, the process of individuation gradually becomes the single reality and can unfold in its true form.

It had been obvious to me from a young age that my parents didn’t like one another. Couples in films and on television performed household tasks together and talked fondly about their shared memories. I couldn’t remember seeing my mother and father in the same room unless they were eating. My father had “moods.” Sometimes during his moods my mother would take me to stay with her sister Bernie in Clontarf, and they would sit in the kitchen talking and shaking their heads while I watched my cousin Alan play Ocarina of Time. I was aware that alcohol played a role in these incidents, but its precise workings remained mysterious to me. I enjoyed our visits to Bernie’s house. While we were there I was allowed to eat as many digestive biscuits as I wanted, and when we returned, my father was either gone out or else feeling very contrite. I liked it when he was gone out. During his periods of contrition he tried to make conversation with me about school and I had to choose between humoring and ignoring him. Humoring him made me feel dishonest and weak, a soft target. Ignoring him made my heart beat very hard and afterward I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror. Also it made my mother cry. It was hard to be specific about what my father’s moods consisted of. Sometimes he would go out for a couple of days and when he came back in we’d find him taking money out of my Bank of Ireland savings jar, or our television would be gone. Other times he would bump into a piece of furniture and then lose his temper. He hurled one of my school shoes right at my face once after he tripped on it. It missed and went in the fireplace and I watched it smoldering like it was my own face smoldering. I learned not to display fear, it only provoked him. I was cold like a fish. Afterward my mother said: why didn’t you lift it out of the fire? Can’t you at least make an effort? I shrugged. I would have let my real face burn in the fire too. When he came home from work in the evening I used to freeze entirely still, and after a few seconds I would know with complete certainty if he was in one of the moods or not. Something about the way he closed the door or handled his keys would let me know, as clearly as if he yelled the house down. I’d say to my mother: he’s in a mood now. And she’d say: stop that. But she knew as well as I did. One day, when I was twelve, he turned up unexpectedly after school to pick me up. Instead of going home, we drove away from town, toward Blackrock. The DART went past on our left and I could see the Poolbeg towers out the car window. Your mother wants to break up our family, my father said. Instantly I replied: please let me out of the car. This remark later became evidence in my father’s theory that my mother had poisoned me against him.

Easing Your Body’s Response to Anxiety As explained earlier, anxiety has a strong impact on your body. When you feel anxious, your heart races, breathing becomes difficult, your face gets red, and you tremble. When your body deals with anxiety over long periods of time, you may develop stomachaches, headaches, depression, and sore muscles. To combat these negative effects, you need to learn how to relax physically. Once your muscles relax, then the other components of a relaxed state follow: Your breathing pattern slows and deepens, your heart rate and blood pressure decline, your hands and feet feel warm, changes in mood occur, and you feel calmer. There are many ways to relax your body. Some techniques focus on your muscles. Others center on breathing patterns. Relaxation techniques are most beneficial if you practice them on a regular basis. Your body must have these responses “memorized” for them to be helpful in a time of anxiety.

The case of a patient with dissociative identity disorder follows: Cindy, a 24-year-old woman, was transferred to the psychiatry service to facilitate community placement. Over the years, she had received many different diagnoses, including schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, schizoaffective disorder, and bipolar disorder. Dissociative identity disorder was her current diagnosis. Cindy had been well until 3 years before admission, when she developed depression, "voices," multiple somatic complaints, periods of amnesia, and wrist cutting. Her family and friends considered her a pathological liar because she would do or say things that she would later deny. Chronic depression and recurrent suicidal behavior led to frequent hospitalizations. Cindy had trials of antipsychotics, antidepressants, mood stabilizers, and anxiolytics, all without benefit. Her condition continued to worsen. Cindy was a petite, neatly groomed woman who cooperated well with the treatment team. She reported having nine distinct alters that ranged in age from 2 to 48 years; two were masculine. Cindy’s main concern was her inability to control the switches among her alters, which made her feel out of control. She reported having been sexually abused by her father as a child and described visual hallucinations of him threatening her with a knife. We were unable to confirm the history of sexual abuse but thought it likely, based on what we knew of her chaotic early home life. Nursing staff observed several episodes in which Cindy switched to a troublesome alter. Her voice would change in inflection and tone, becoming childlike as ]oy, an 8-year-old alter, took control. Arrangements were made for individual psychotherapy and Cindy was discharged. At a follow-up 3 years later, Cindy still had many alters but was functioning better, had fewer switches, and lived independently. She continued to see a therapist weekly and hoped to one day integrate her many alters.

Circadian rhythms are implicated in some of the symptoms of depression, such as early awakening and diurnal variation in mood. The possible importance of the circadian system in its pathogenesis is suggested by the capacity of experimental alterations in the timing of sleep and wakefulness to alter clinical state." Biological rhythms range in frequency from milliseconds to months or years. Most rhythmic disturbances identified in the symptoms of manic-depressive illness occur over the course of a day-that is, they are circadian rhythms-and are most apparent in the daily rest-activity cycle. The episodic recurrences of the illness, on the other hand, are usually infradian, oscillating over periods of months or years. Episodic mania and depression may also reflect disturbances in ultradian rhythms, those that oscillate more than once a day, which are common at the cellular level and in hormone secretion, as well as in such autonomic functions as circulation, blood pressure, respiration, heart rate, and in the cycles of sleep.

We should think, as we gather riches, as we sit in positions of great honor, as we indulge in luxurious pleasures. All this only a dream, and moreover a short and frivolous dream. When we wake from it, there will be no riches in our hands. What, then is life? To be brief, the period for which human life lasts is only a point on a line, its very nature changeable, during which we see through a glass darkly. Our bodies are unreliable, our moods variable. Riches are a thorn, lust is a poison. Everything bodily is a running river that passes on. Life is a war; the stay of a guest in a foreign city; an existence full of suffering and effort. Great buildings and strong fortifications collapse; their strength does not help them. The hardest of stones erode. The greatest fame is forgotten after a man's death; the greatest worldly titles disappear like smoke. The most beautiful and praiseworthy thing a man can do before he dies is to devote his life to the untiring performance of virtuous acts, constantly seeking to practice prudence, justice, moderation, endurance; faith, hope, and unselfish love.

The importance of this will be appreciated by any thinking person who realizes what creatures of moods, feelings and emotion the majority of people are, and how little mastery of themselves they manifest. If you will stop and consider a moment, you will realize how much these swings of Rhythm have affected you in your life — how a period of Enthusiasm has been invariably followed by an opposite feeling and mood of Depression. Likewise, your moods and periods of Courage have been succeeded by equal moods of Fear. And so it has ever been with the majority of persons — tides of feeling have ever risen and fallen with them, but they have never suspected the cause or reason of the mental phenomena. An understanding of the workings of this Principle will give one the key to the Mastery of these rhythmic swings of feeling, and will enable him to know himself better and to avoid being carried away by these inflows and outflows. The Will is superior to the conscious manifestation of this Principle, although the Principle itself can never be destroyed. We may escape its effects, but the Principle operates, nevertheless. The pendulum ever swings, although we may escape being carried along with it.

(...) To discuss such, ah, personal matters on the air, especially in an educational setting, is really quite in poor taste.” “It wasn’t that personal,” I say. “Everyone who’s been on social media knows what happened with the 'Bugle' stuff. Also, you know, my locker still says FEMINAZI.” Dr. Guinn clears his throat. “I meant your discussion about . . . feminine hygiene.” It takes me a minute to understand. “Are you trying to say that tampons aren’t allowed on the morning announcements?” Dr. Guinn studies me for a moment. (...) “I’m just trying to ensure that this is an environment where everyone feels comfortable.” Look, I get it. Tampons are embarrassing. Periods are embarrassing. PMS, for some reason, is not, but that’s because it has somehow become a synonym for being in a bad mood while female. The whole specific business with the bleeding, though, is still not cool, except in certain woke corners of the internet. (...) But it’s weird to have Dr. Guinn tell me how embarrassing periods are. The man has never had one in his life—why does he get to have an opinion about it? “Could it be,” I say, in as conciliatory a tone as I can manage, “that maybe it’s not an environment where everyone feels comfortable . . . if we’re not allowed to talk publicly about something that is a normal, healthy part of life for every menstruating student and teacher at Willoughby?

Brian spared her a glance. "I'm just angry altogether." "Oh,that's right." Since violence seemed to be the mood of the day, she gave in to it and stabbed a finger into his shoulder. "You're just angry period. He's got some twisted idea that I don't think he's good enough to defend me against a drunk bully. Well, I have news for you,you hardheaded Irish horse's ass." Now that her own temper was fired, she curled her hand into a fist and used it to thump his chest. "I was defending myself just fine." "You half Irish, stiff-necked birdbrain, he's twice your size and then some." "I was handling it, but I appreciate your help." "The hell you do.It's just like with everything else.You've got to do it all yourself.No one's as smart as you, or as clever, or as capable.Oh it's fine to give me a whistle if you need a diversion." "Is that what you think?" She was so livid her voice was barely a croak. "That I make love with you for a diversion? You vile, insulting, disgusting son of a bitch." She raised her own fists, and might have used them, but Travis stepped in and gripped Brian by the shirt.His voice was quiet, almost matter-of-fact. "I ought to take you apart." "Oh,Travis." Adelia merely pressed her fingers to her eyes. "Dad,don't you dare." At wit's end, Keeley threw up her hands. "I've got an idea.Why don't we all just beat each other senseless today and be done with it?

Bipolar II disorder is a highly misunderstood form of bipolar illness. By its very designation as type II, clinicians, patients, and the public often assume it is less impairing than bipolar I, “the real thing.” When we examine the diagnostic criteria for bipolar II, they sound very mild. Who doesn’t get sad and happy? Who doesn’t have mood swings? Why would a four-day period of excess energy, which does not affect the ability to function, be of any clinical importance? Several longitudinal studies have found that bipolar II is far more impairing than we once thought. It is characterized by lengthy and recurrent periods of depression, comorbid anxiety disorders, and high rates of substance and alcohol misuse. The occasional hypomanias of bipolar II—in which people experience elation and irritability, exuberance, increased energy, and reduced need to sleep—are not as impairing as the full manic episodes of bipolar I, but they can certainly have a negative impact on family members and friends. Moreover, for the person with the disorder, these high periods are often short-lived, and they do little to alleviate the suffering caused by depressive phases. The hypomanic periods may even overlap with the low phases, resulting in an agitated, anxiety-ridden, and highly distressing period of depression. People with bipolar II often have difficulty maintaining jobs and relationships, and, like people with bipolar I, they are at high risk for suicide.

Nostromo is the most anxiously meditated of the longer novels which belong to the period following upon the publication of the Typhoon volume of short stories. I don’t mean to say that I became then conscious of any impending change in my mentality and in my attitude towards the tasks of my writing life. And perhaps there was never any change, except in that mysterious, extraneous thing which has nothing to do with the theories of art; a subtle change in the nature of the inspiration; a phenomenon for which I can not in any way be held responsible. What, however, did cause me some concern was that after finishing the last story of the Typhoon volume it seemed somehow that there was nothing more in the world to write about. This so strangely negative but disturbing mood lasted some little time; and then, as with many of my longer stories, the first hint for Nostromo came to me in the shape of a vagrant anecdote completely destitute of valuable details. As a matter of fact in 1875 or ’6, when very young, in the West Indies or rather in the Gulf of Mexico, for my contacts with land were short, few, and fleeting, I heard the story of some man who was supposed to have stolen single-handed a whole lighter-full of silver, somewhere on the Tierra Firme seaboard during the troubles of a revolution. On the face of it this was something of a feat. But I heard no details, and having no particular interest in crime qua crime I was not likely to keep that one in my mind. And I forgot it till twenty-six or seven years afterwards I came upon the very thing in a shabby volume picked up outside a second-hand book-shop. It was the life story of an American seaman written by himself with the assistance of a journalist. In the course of his wanderings that American sailor worked for some months on board a schooner, the master and owner of which was the thief of whom I had heard in my very young days. I have no doubt of that because there could hardly have been two exploits of that peculiar kind in the same part of the world and both connected with a South American revolution.

MATHEMATICAL MIRACLE Some years ago, I heard a story which has been making the rounds in Midwest A.A. circles for years. I don’t have any names to back up this story, but I have heard it from many sources, and the circumstances sound believable. A man in a small Wisconsin city had been on the program for about three years and had enjoyed contented sobriety through that period. Then bad luck began to hit him in bunches. The firm for which he had worked for some fifteen years was sold; his particular job was phased out of existence, and the plant moved to another city. For several months, he struggled along at odd jobs while looking for a company that needed his specialized experience. Then another blow hit him. His wife was forced to enter a hospital for major surgery, and his company insurance had expired. At this point he cracked, and decided to go on an all-out binge. He didn’t want to stage this in the small city, where everyone knew his sobriety record. So he went to Chicago, checked in at a North Side hotel, and set forth on his project. It was Friday night, and the bars were filled with a swinging crowd. But he was in no mood for swinging—he just wanted to get quietly, miserably drunk. Finally, he found a basement bar on a quiet side street, practically deserted. He sat down on a bar stool and ordered a double bourbon on the rocks. The bartender said, “Yes, sir,” and reached for a bottle. Then the bartender stopped in his tracks, took a long, hard look at the customer, leaned over the bar, and said in a low tone, “I was in Milwaukee about four months ago, and one night I attended an open meeting. You were on the speaking platform, and you gave one of the finest A.A. talks I ever heard.” The bartender turned and walked to the end of the bar. For a few minutes, the customer sat there—probably in a state of shock. Then he picked his money off the bar with trembling hands and walked out, all desire for a drink drained out of him. It is estimated that there are about 8,000 saloons in Chicago, employing some 25,000 bartenders. This man had entered the one saloon in 8,000 where he would encounter the one man in 25,000 who knew that he was a member of A.A. and didn’t belong there. Chicago, Illinois

Obama is also directing the U.S. government to invest billions of dollars in solar and wind energy. In addition, he is using bailout leverage to compel the Detroit auto companies to build small, “green” cars, even though no one in the government has investigated whether consumers are interested in buying small, “green” cars—the Obama administration just believes they should. All these measures, Obama recognizes, are expensive. The cap and trade legislation is estimated to impose an $850 billion burden on the private sector; together with other related measures, the environmental tab will exceed $1 trillion. This would undoubtedly impose a significant financial burden on an already-stressed economy. These measures are billed as necessary to combat global warming. Yet no one really knows if the globe is warming significantly or not, and no one really knows if human beings are the cause of the warming or not. For years people went along with Al Gore’s claim that “the earth has a fever,” a claim illustrated by misleading images of glaciers disappearing, oceans swelling, famines arising, and skies darkening. Apocalypse now! Now we know that the main body of data that provided the basis for these claims appears to have been faked. The Climategate scandal showed that scientists associated with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were quite willing to manipulate and even suppress data that did not conform to their ideological commitment to global warming.3 The fakers insist that even if you discount the fakery, the data still show.... But who’s in the mood to listen to them now? Independent scientists who have reviewed the facts say that average global temperatures have risen by around 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit in the past 100 years. Lots of things could have caused that. Besides, if you project further back, the record shows quite a bit of variation: periods of warming, followed by periods of cooling. There was a Medieval Warm Period around 1000 A.D., and a Little Ice Age that occurred several hundred years later. In the past century, the earth warmed slightly from 1900 to 1940, then cooled slightly until the late 1970s, and has resumed warming slightly since then. How about in the past decade or so? Well, if you count from 1998, the earth has cooled in the past dozen years. But the statistic is misleading, since 1998 was an especially hot year. If you count from 1999, the earth has warmed in the intervening period. This statistic is equally misleading, because 1999 was a cool year. This doesn’t mean that temperature change is in the eye of the beholder. It means, in the words of Roy Spencer, former senior scientist for climate studies at NASA, that “all this temperature variability on a wide range of time scales reveals that just about the only thing constant in climate is change.”4

Another common form of mental illness is bipolar disorder, in which a person suffers from extreme bouts of wild, delusional optimism, followed by a crash and then periods of deep depression. Bipolar disorder also seems to run in families and, curiously, strikes frequently in artists; perhaps their great works of art were created during bursts of creativity and optimism. A list of creative people who were afflicted by bipolar disorder reads like a Who’s Who of Hollywood celebrities, musicians, artists, and writers. Although the drug lithium seems to control many of the symptoms of bipolar disorder, the causes are not entirely clear. One theory states that bipolar disorder may be caused by an imbalance between the left and right hemispheres. Dr. Michael Sweeney notes, “Brain scans have led researchers to generally assign negative emotions such as sadness to the right hemisphere and positive emotions such as joy to the left hemisphere. For at least a century, neuroscientists have noticed a link between damage to the brain’s left hemisphere and negative moods, including depression and uncontrollable crying. Damage to the right, however, has been associated with a broad array of positive emotions.” So the left hemisphere, which is analytical and controls language, tends to become manic if left to itself. The right hemisphere, on the contrary, is holistic and tends to check this mania. Dr. V. S. Ramachandran writes, “If left unchecked, the left hemisphere would likely render a person delusional or manic.… So it seems reasonable to postulate a ‘devil’s advocate’ in the right hemisphere that allows ‘you’ to adopt a detached, objective (allocentric) view of yourself.” If human consciousness involves simulating the future, it has to compute the outcomes of future events with certain probabilities. It needs, therefore, a delicate balance between optimism and pessimism to estimate the chances of success or failures for certain courses of action. But in some sense, depression is the price we pay for being able to simulate the future. Our consciousness has the ability to conjure up all sorts of horrific outcomes for the future, and is therefore aware of all the bad things that could happen, even if they are not realistic. It is hard to verify many of these theories, since brain scans of people who are clinically depressed indicate that many brain areas are affected. It is difficult to pinpoint the source of the problem, but among the clinically depressed, activity in the parietal and temporal lobes seems to be suppressed, perhaps indicating that the person is withdrawn from the outside world and living in their own internal world. In particular, the ventromedial cortex seems to play an important role. This area apparently creates the feeling that there is a sense of meaning and wholeness to the world, so that everything seems to have a purpose. Overactivity in this area can cause mania, in which people think they are omnipotent. Underactivity in this area is associated with depression and the feeling that life is pointless. So it is possible that a defect in this area may be responsible for some mood swings.

The fascination with automation in part reflected the country’s mood in the immediate postwar period, including a solid ideological commitment to technological progress. Representatives of industry (along with their counterparts in science and engineering) captured this mood by championing automation as the next step in the development of new production machinery and American industrial prowess. These boosters quickly built up automation into “a new gospel of postwar economics,” lauding it as “a universal ideal” that would “revolutionize every area of industry.” 98 For example, the November 1946 issue of Fortune magazine focused on the prospects for “The Automatic Factory.” The issue included an article titled “Machines without Men” that envisioned a completely automated factory where virtually no human labor would be needed. 99 With visions of “transforming the entire manufacturing sector into a virtually labor-free enterprise,” factory owners in a range of industries began to introduce automation in the postwar period. 100 The auto industry moved with particular haste. After the massive wave of strikes in 1945–46, automakers seized on automation as a way to replace workers with machines. 101 As they converted back to civilian auto production after World War II, they took the opportunity to install new labor-saving automatic production equipment. The two largest automakers, Ford and General Motors, set the pace. General Motors introduced the first successful automated transfer line at its Buick engine plant in Flint in 1946 (shortly after a 113-day strike, the longest in the industry’s history). The next year Ford established an automation department (a Ford executive, Del S. Harder, is credited with coining the word “automation”). By October 1948 the department had approved $ 3 million in spending on 500 automated devices, with early company estimates predicting that these devices would result in a 20 percent productivity increase and the elimination of 1,000 jobs. Through the late 1940s and 1950s Ford led the way in what became known as “Detroit automation,” undertaking an expensive automation program, which it carried out in concert with the company’s plans to decentralize operations away from the city. A major component of this effort was the Ford plant in the Cleveland suburb of Brook Park, a $ 2 billion engine-making complex that attracted visitors from government, industry, and labor and became a national symbol of automation in the 1950s. 102

When looking back on our lives, it is difficult objectively to evaluate our actions. When retelling our story, it is challenging to achieve balanced journalism. It is understandable why we might be inclined to overemphasize nostalgic feelings of happiness, glamorize stretches of childhood or other periods where life was rather uncomplicated, while assigning a disproportionate amount of anxiety to rougher periods of life. When we create strong, joyous memories, we preserve cherished feelings in the present. By assigning selective pleasant memories to the past, we create a homey place where we can return to visit. Fondness for nostalgic memories provides a buffer from existential threat, improves mood, combats loneliness, increases social consecutiveness, and enhances self-regard.

The period of John Adams’s presidency declined into a time of political savagery with few parallels in American history, a season of paranoia in which the two parties surrendered all trust in each other. Like other Federalists infected with war fever, Hamilton increasingly mistook dissent for treason and engaged in hyperbole. In one newspaper piece, he blasted the Jeffersonians as “more Frenchmen than Americans” and declared that to slake their ambition and thirst for revenge they stood ready “to immolate the independence and welfare of their country at the shrine of France.” 1 Republicans behaved no better, interpreting policies they disliked as the treacherous deeds of men in league with England and bent on bringing back George III. The indiscriminate use of pejorative labels—“Jacobins” for Republicans, “Anglomen” for Federalists—reflected the rancorously unfair emotions. During this melancholy time, the founding fathers appeared as all-too-fallible mortals. An episode at Congress Hall in January 1798 symbolized the acrimonious mood. Representative Matthew Lyon of Vermont, a die-hard Republican, began to mock the aristocratic sympathies of Roger Griswold, a Federalist from Connecticut. When Griswold then taunted Lyon for alleged cowardice during the Revolution, Lyon spat right in his face. Griswold got a hickory cane and proceeded to thrash Lyon, who retaliated by taking up fire tongs and attacking Griswold. The two members of Congress ended up fighting on the floor like common ruffians. “Party animosities have raised a wall of separation between those who differ in political sentiments,” Jefferson wrote sadly to Angelica Church.

Psychologists have reported correlations between the full moon and depressed mood. If the lunar cycle impacts investors, then they may value stocks less during a full moon relative to a new moon, thus causing a lower return around the full-moon period.

she will be best of both you and me. she will have your strength, your thirst of knowledge your love of sports your giving nature your loving heart your tenderness your ability to dream your creativity your values and mine too She will be the best of both you and me Tireless cycles of ovulation tracking month after month the yogas and the chinese herbs the quigong and the accupuncture the IUIs and the IVFs the hormones and the bloating the mood swing and the heart break when I see the read dot of my period she would have had the best of both you and me the baby we never had ​But I know in my heart She would have had the best of both you and me​

Good twin calling evil twin. The weasel crows at midnight. How copy?" "Oh, for mercy's sake... I'm busy! Stop sending me silly messages in code! If you have something to say, just say it; otherwise, radio silence, remember?" "You're no fun anymore. You used to be fun, but lately, I've noticed a change in you. Is it menopause, May?" Cyrene 's question took me aback so strongly, I stopped creeping down the darkened hallway and blinked in dumbfounded surprise at the mirror that hung on the wall opposite. No reflected figure blinked back at me. "Are you still having your period? Do you experience hot flashes at night? Are you now growing, or have you at any time in the recent past grown, a mustache?" "Goddess help me," I murmured to no one in particular, and tried my best to ignore the perky little voice that chirped so happily in my ear as I continued to make my way down to the dark and deserted room. I thought for a moment of just turning off the miniature radio that allowed Cyrene to contact me, but knowledge born of long experience with my twin reminded me of the folly of such an idea. "Boy, you really are in a grumpy mood if you won't rise to the bait of menopause," she said in a mildly disgruntled voice

And then there’s physical dependence. As defined in medical terms, physical dependence is manifested when a person stops taking a substance and, due to changes in the brain and body, she experiences withdrawal symptoms. Those temporary, drug-induced changes form the basis of physical dependence. Although a feature of drug addiction, a person’s physical dependence on a substance does not necessarily imply that he is addicted to it. The withdrawal syndrome is different for each class of drug — in the case of opiates such as morphine or heroin it includes nausea, diarrhea, sweats, aches and pains and weakness, as well as severe anxiety, agitation and depressed mood. But you don’t have to be addicted to experience withdrawal — you just have to have been taking a medication for an extended period of time. As many people have discovered to their chagrin, with abrupt cessation it’s quite possible to suffer highly unpleasant withdrawal symptoms from drugs that are not addictive: the antidepressants paroxetine (Paxil) and venlafaxine (Effexor) are but two examples. Withdrawal does not mean you were addicted; for addiction, there also needs to be craving and relapse. In fact, in the case of narcotics, it turns out that the addictive, “feel good” effect of these drugs seems to act in a different part of the brain than the effects that lead to physical dependence. When morphine is infused only into the “reward” circuits of a rat’s brain, addiction-like behaviour results, but there’s no physical dependence and no withdrawal. “Dependence” can also be understood as a powerful attachment to harmful substances or behaviours, and this definition gives us a clearer picture of addiction. The addict comes to depend on the substance or behaviour in order to make himself feel momentarily calmer or more excited or less dissatisfied with his life.

That the future’s unspecified terms provide a few recognizable basics, and that I might find, somewhere in me, a tension—the good kind—for tapping into what springs me forward, is, I reason, the hope. The discord, the din, what stays the same, what reappears, what’s underneath, the misremembered and all there is to fathom. Growing up, for a long period that’s not worth mentioning here, I thought the expression was “Play it by year.” As in, take your time. A whole year. More. Whatever you need. There’s no rush.” Excerpt From: Durga Chew-Bose. “Too Much and Not the Mood.” Apple Books.

That the future’s unspecified terms provide a few recognizable basics, and that I might find, somewhere in me, a tension—the good kind—for tapping into what springs me forward, is, I reason, the hope. The discord, the din, what stays the same, what reappears, what’s underneath, the misremembered and all there is to fathom. Growing up, for a long period that’s not worth mentioning here, I thought the expression was “Play it by year.” As in, take your time. A whole year. More. Whatever you need. There’s no rush.

Are you blaming my mood on my period?" Zach's face flushed a deeper red. "I'm just saying you don't have to feel bad about it." "I don't feel bad! And, also, I didn't have my period when I first got here. But even if I did, it's none of your business. Don’t ever blame a girl’s mood on her period. It's like saying her feelings aren’t real because hormones are taking over.

My cramps surged and I clutched my stomach with a grimace. I was in the throes of another epic period. This, coupled with hunger, the events from earlier, and the 3:00 a.m. police drama at my house that I wasn’t telling Sloan about, had me in a fine mood. I was so tired I’d just tried to plug my charger into my coffee cup instead of my phone.

Mack is still sprawled out, the covers pushed down to his waist, exposing his broad chest and firm abdomen. His eyes are closed, so I’m quiet as I step over and crawl into bed beside him. Then I squeal when he rolls over on top of me without warning. “You’re supposed to be asleep,” I tell him, giggling as he plants sloppy kisses all over my jaw and neck. “You woke me up.” “So now I have to pay?” He pulls my gown strap down even farther so he can mouth the top of one breast. “If you call this paying.” I’m still laughing softly as I run my hands over the smooth curve of his bare scalp and then down farther to the flat planes and rippling muscles of his back. “Don’t get too excited about whatever you have in mind. My period started.” He lifts his head. “Since when has that ever bothered me?” “Never. You’re never one to let a little blood stand in your way. But I’m not sure I’m in the mood to get messy this morning.” “Okay.” He gives my shoulder one more little kiss before he rolls over onto his back. His expression is relaxed when I check. He’s never once made me feel guilty about saying no, but I still worry. I hate to disappoint him. “I’m sorry.” He slants me a narrow-eyed look.

Here’s a classic case in point: Eva had been taking an antidepressant for two years but wanted to get off it because she was planning to get pregnant. Her doctor advised her not to stop taking the drug, which motivated her to see me. Eva explained that her saga had begun with PMS, featuring a week each month when she was irritable and prone to crying fits. Her doctor prescribed a birth control pill (a common treatment) and soon Eva was feeling even worse, with insomnia, fatigue, low libido, and a generally flat mood dogging her all month long. That’s when the doctor added the Wellbutrin to “pick her up,” as he said, and handle her presumed depression. From Eva’s perspective, she felt that the antidepressant helped her energy level, but it had limited benefits in terms of her mood and libido. And if she took it after midnight, her insomnia was exacerbated. She soon became accustomed to feeling stable but suboptimal, and she was convinced that the medication was keeping her afloat. The good news for Eva was that with careful preparation, she could leave medication behind—and restore her energy, her equilibrium, and her sense of control over her emotions. Step one consisted of some basic diet and exercise changes along with better stress response strategies. Step two involved stopping birth control pills and then testing her hormone levels. Just before her period, she had low cortisol and progesterone, which were likely the cause of the PMS that started her whole problem. Further testing revealed borderline low thyroid function, which may well have been the result of the contraceptives—and the cause of her increased depressive symptoms. When Eva was ready to begin tapering off her medication, she did so following my protocol. Even as her brain and body adjusted to not having the antidepressant surging through her system anymore, her energy levels improved, her sleep problems resolved, and her anxiety lifted. Within a year she was healthy, no longer taking any prescriptions, feeling good—and pregnant.

As the KGB rezident at Leningrad State University and as an employee of the Leningrad Fifth Chief Directorate, where he worked as a member of the active reserves after returning from East Germany, Putin would certainly have had access to the lists of agents and informants who worked for the KGB during the Soviet period. He also would have been tasked to monitor political activity among faculty and students at the university. Lieutenant Colonel Andrey Zykov,XVII the lead Russian investigator in St. Petersburg for especially important cases, who was assigned to examine Putin’s activities for criminal behavior, even went so far as to allege that two of Putin’s later associates, Anatoliy Sobchak and Dmitriy Medvedev, both of whom were teaching law at Leningrad State University at the time, had provided Putin with information (“I Anatoliy Sobchak, i Dmitriy Medvedev byli ego stykachkami”).127 Thus Putin would not have been the only person interested in “cleansing” his own file of damaging materials. Eastern Europe at this time was awash with exposés as high-ranking politicians were unmasked as agents of either the KGB or local security services. No one in Russia wanted a repeat of this, and indeed there has never been such a period in post-Soviet Russia. Clearly the KGB got there first, and files, lots of files, were burned. As mentioned earlier, Putin himself admits that in Dresden, after the Berlin Wall came down in November 1989, he burned so many files that the furnace exploded. But also the entire mood in Russia, the heart of the Soviet Empire, was quite different compared to the rest of the Soviet Bloc—it was one thing to unmask someone in Poland who had worked for the Russians; it was quite another to reveal that a Russian son had been spying on his father, for example.128 Russians as a whole sensed that such a settling of accounts would be divisive, ruinous, and pointless. And those tens of thousands of people coming out of the collapsed CPSU and KGB had other tasks in mind—most notably making a living in new conditions. The elites from these two organizations knew where the money was and how to use it. They had more lucrative assignments in mind than revenge.

To cut sleep to a minimum, Guderian issued pervitin amphetamines to his men, drugs given the nickname “panzer chocolate” by the men of the Heer. This early version of “crystal meth” allowed long periods of being awake and imparted a euphoric mood, but at the risk of heart attacks, suicide, psychotic violence, or a collapse into addiction.

Just a simple premise, back in San Diego DUI Lawyer arrested for drunk Style, this time in the direction of DUI and DWI generally unwanted, then little effect of alcohol is considered a leading progressive life. Americans in the second half of the US states, the sin just because the rules and stricter drunk driving laws more quickly hold. In addition, the results of all DUI lawyers in reality very difficult drive under the influence towards an unattainable production, to begin in San Diego that idea. The crime of DUI evaluation Provide always stops short of energy, but in reality because of traffic law enforcement to detect beautiful website, or you attack affects themselves can take to throw noted "checkpoints drinking water.” In some cases, the federal government said, but if you can do it in your own direction. Perhaps many car hit the rear part of the food as a result, the impact is recorded, your visit to show you the direction of your wine. Sometimes, someone reported an unstable support. Testing and observation around the federal government s decision in the same direction, it is not possible because most almost certainly to predict a jump back in their element. One or suspected poisoning at an affordable price set is designed to bring cases, their own rules and objectives, and with violation of traffic rules and the management style of the design more I can do for others the problem of selection that. They probably own the actual direction of their own drug, think about the purpose of the implementation of a user, then the friendly and with respect to speed, self-revealed the reason behind the purple party, appreciate it is also possible to DUI . San Diego right outcome for prison several internal unique opportunity, California expert is passed on to its customers and the code of .08% blood only a small car in California 23 152 (B) to answer good article Content (BAC) Assumption. Some of the inspiration for a special person for a month was necessary direction behind a person s mood, depends on you in the direction 23 § 152, may continue to be withheld because (). But in general, if not more, the sales people and just keep moving to stay DUI by police and they are removed direction or enough I began to feel, "personal involvement" is more than if under strict bail. Own all presentation of their work is to show. It s just maybe you just conditions, it is deposited in jail until eventually show itself may not be able to move allows. Expenses and income are affected by lead you affects costs, which child to leave behind, if not more than 0.08 per cent BAC does. Orientation, under the influence of the value of his research, the car broke into the possibility that some 23 152 have been found still proof (s). This is a normal move, and then the authority to suspend the system 6 is due to the fact that - 10 weeks, including perceived importance. Speaking of the court will have to apply for leave to the invention apparently drunk over in his address. Need him inside, a number of situations, the judge called a good time without alcohol can be. It is a matter, as long as the direction before the costly DUI do not experience a period of several weeks is legal. Worse, if there is only a repeat show that only a lawyer in San Diego drunk orientation. Too many of the legal rights of citizens under such guidelines as privatization and arms, vote. You own run for the benefit of all to make the removal of the time, which likely cost drivers behind the repeat drink. It is strong enough to get to San Diego recommends a good DUI is for that reason that the domestic legal experts. Obviously, the motivation many cases immediately, in simplest terms, is not swallowed. Self re direction is not the same thing, so you really recommended maximum future problem is to apply to yourself. This is a perfect example of the court had been found.

He knew the symptoms well enough. First there was a period of general uneasiness about nothing in particular, and then a growing illusion of being hemmed in, followed by a desire to escape, and finally an indescribable sense of loneliness mingled with a sort of deep self-pity which he particularly hated. He wished he had not mentioned Jessica Lovell, as she was always a part of the shadows which surrounded him suddenly and swiftly when he was in that mood. The only thing to do was to tell himself to behave, that he would be better in a little while. It was also time to consider the dangers of inheritance, and to remember his father.

Even though people experiencing dementia become unable to recount what has just happened, they still go through the experience -- even without recall. The psychological present lasts about three seconds. We experience the present even when we have dementia. The emotional pain caused by callous treatment or statements occurs during that period. The moods and actions of people with dementia are expressions of what they have experienced, whether they can use language and recall, or not.

Even though people experiencing dementia become unable to recount what has just happened, they still go through the experience—even without recall. The psychological present lasts about three seconds. We experience the present even when we have dementia. The emotional pain caused by callous treatment or unkind talk occurs during that period. The moods and actions of people with dementia are expressions of what they have experienced, whether they can still use language and recall, or not.

He could attribute his mood to having quit smoking. It was that rough period that lasted from the final puff until you died.

I lay down beside him and stared directly into the sun. He turned on his side and propped his head on his elbow. “You’ll go blind doing that,” he said in a low voice. “Leave me alone.” “Why are you in such a bad mood? You PMSing?” “What do you know about it?” “A lot.” “I doubt that, and even if I were, it’s beyond rude to talk to me about it.” I hadn’t started my period yet, but I wasn’t going to tell him that.

It was her concern and commitment to a friend which last year involved her in perhaps the most emotional period of her life. For five months she secretly helped to care for Adrian Ward-Jackson who had discovered that he was suffering from AIDS. It was a time of laughter, joy and much sorrow as Adrian, a prominent figure in the world of art, ballet and opera, gradually succumbed to his illness. A man of great charisma and energy, Adrian initially found it difficult to come to terms with his fate when in the mid-1980s he was diagnosed as HIV positive. His word as deputy chairman of the Aids Crisis Trust, where he first met the Princess, had made him fully aware of the reality of the disease. Finally he broke the news in 1987 to his great friend Angela Serota, a dancer with the Royal Ballet until a leg injury cut short her career and now prominent in promoting dance and ballet. For much of the time, Angela, a woman of serenity and calm practicality, nursed Adrian, always with the support of her two teenage daughters. He was well enough to receive a CBE at Buckingham Palace in March 1991 for his work in the arts--he was a governor of the Royal Ballet, chairman of the Contemporary Arts Society and a director of the Theatre Museum Association--and it was at a celebratory lunch held at the Tate Gallery that Angela first met the Princess. In April 1991 Adrian’s condition deteriorated and he was confined to his Mayfair apartment where Angela was in almost constant attendance. It was from that time that Diana made regular visits, once even brining her children Princes Willian and Harry. From that time Angela and the Princess began to forge a supportive bond as they cared for their friend. Angela recalls: “I thought she was utterly beautiful in a very profound way. She has an inner spirit which shines forth though there was also a sense of pervasive unhappiness about her. I remember loving the way she never wanted me to be formal.” When Diana brought the boys to see her friends, a reflection of her firmly held belief that her role as mother is to bring them up in a way that equips them for every aspect of life and death, Angela saw in William a boy much older and more sensitive than his years. She recalls: “He had a mature view of illness, a perspective which showed awareness of love and commitment.” At first Angela kept in the background, leaving Diana alone in Adrian’s room where they chatted about mutual friends and other aspects of life. Often she brought Angela, whom she calls “Dame A”, a gift of flowers or similar token. She recalls: “Adrian loved to hear about her day-to-day work and he loved too the social side of life. She made him laugh but there was always the perfect degree of understanding, care and solicitude. This is the point about her, she is not just a decorative figurehead who floats around on a cloud of perfume.” The mood in Mount Street was invariably joyous, that sense of happiness that understands about pain. As Angela says: “I don’t see death as sad or depressing. It was a great journey he was going on. The Princess was very much in tune with that spirit. She also loved coming for herself, it was an intense experience. At the same time Adrian was revitalized by the healing quality of her presence.” Angela read from a number of works by St. Francis of Assisi, Kahil Gibran and the Bible as well as giving Adrian frequent aromatherapy treatments. A high spot was a telephone call from Mother Teresa of Calcutta who also sent a medallion via Indian friends. At his funeral they passed Diana a letter from Mother Teresa saying how much she was looking forward to meeting her when she visited India. Unfortunately Mother Teresa was ill at that time so the Princess made a special journey to Rome where she was recuperating. Nonetheless that affectionate note meant a great deal to the Princess.

When fear is your dominant mood over a long period of time, the constant release of stress hormones, specifically cortisol, triggers a domino effect of chemicals that lead to heart disease, weight gain, and depression. As

Existentialism is commonly associated with Left-Bank Parisian cafes and the ‘family’ of philosophers Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir who gathered there in the years immediately following the liberation of Paris at the end of World War II. One imagines offbeat, avant-garde intellectuals, attached to their cigarettes, listening to jazz as they hotly debate the implications of their new-found political and artistic liberty. The mood is one of enthusiasm, creativity, anguished self-analysis, and freedom – always freedom. Though this reflects the image projected by the media of the day and doubtless captures the spirit of the time, it glosses over the philosophical significance of existentialist thought, packaging it as a cultural phenomenon of a certain historical period. That is perhaps the price paid by a manner of thinking so bent on doing philosophy concretely rather than in some abstract and timeless manner. The existentialists’ urge for contemporary relevance fired their social and political commitment. But it also linked them with the problems of their day and invited subsequent generations to view them as having the currency of yesterday’s news. Such is the misreading of existentialist thought that I hope to correct in this short volume. If it bears the marks of its post-war appearance, existentialism as a manner of doing philosophy and a way of addressing the issues that matter in people’s lives is at least as old as philosophy itself. It is as current as the human condition which it examines.

Well, Melinda, you little devil,” John said, grinning. She rested the back of her hand over her eyes while John and Jack studied the ultrasound, examining that little heartbeat in a barely moving mass. John pointed out small buds where arms and legs would be growing. “When was your last period?” John asked her. She took the hand off her eyes and glared at her husband. “Um, she hasn’t exactly ever had one.” “Huh?” John said. “That I know of,” Jack said with a shrug. “A year and a half ago, all right?” she said crisply. “Approximately. I’ve been nursing. I’ve been pregnant. I’ve been cast into hell and will live out my days with sore boobs and fat ankles.” “Whew. Going right for the mood swings, huh? Okay, looks like about eight weeks to me. That’s an educated guess. I’m thinking mid to late May. How does that sound?” “Oh, duckie,” she answered. “You’ll have to excuse my wife,” Jack said. “She was counting on still being infertile. This might cause her to finally give up that illusion.” “I told you if you made one joke—” “Melinda,” Jack said, his expression stern, “I was not joking.” “I would just like to know how this is possible!” she ranted. “David is like a miracle pregnancy, and before I even get him off the breast, I’ve got another one cooking.” “Ever hear the saying, pregnancy cures infertility?” John asked her. “Yes!” she said, disgusted. “You know what I’m talking about—probably better than me. I guess you didn’t think it would apply to you, huh?” “What are you talking about?” Jack asked John. “A lot of conditions that cause infertility are made better by pregnancy—endometriosis being one. Often when you finally score that first miraculous conception, the rest follow more easily. And when you change partners, you change chemistry. You’re going to want to keep these things in mind,” he said. And he grinned.

The Lord my God lightens my darkness. —Psalm 18:28 (RSV) Nursing a grouchy mood, it was with leaden feet I trudged up the hill that morning to check the newborn calves on our family ranch. I determined that nothing could cheer me up, but in an instant my sour grapes were forgotten. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I first saw the calf with her mother standing over her proudly. Normally our calves are around seventy to ninety pounds. We weighed Mini, just to be sure. Full term and full of life…and only twenty pounds. As a precaution, Mini is spending the first few weeks of her life living in an insulated, heated room in the barn, breathing warm air and where her mother won’t accidentally squish her. Twice a day we carry her out to nurse the cow. She can just reach if she stands on her toes. Plus, we bottle-feed her periodically throughout the day and night.  We took pictures of Mini next to the cats, and they’re the same size! I told a friend that I don’t know why Mini is that size; all of the cow’s other calves were normal. “Every now and then,” she replied, “God sends us a present that will always make us smile.” She’s right. No matter what misery I’m dwelling on, whenever I see Mini, it all goes away and I can’t help but grin. There are times when I get caught up in negativity, Lord. Please don’t let me forget Your big blessings in however small a package. —Erika Bentsen Digging Deeper: Ps 21:6; Eph 3:20–21

Perhaps my depression coincided with the start of every academic year and the subsequent increase in my workload. Or maybe there was a more biological explanation linked to the fact that I, like many people with depressed mood, find the absence of light at these latitudes intolerable in the winter months. I didn't know the answer - I still don't. This is who I am. I cope most of the time; I am well for months, sometimes even for more than a year; but there are recurring periods in my life when the world seems a darker, more hostile and unforgiving place. I am a person who gets depressed.

The McLean people recommend fluoxetine because they have diagnosed me with atypical depression. This diagnosis was not easy for them, or for Dr. Sterling, to come by, as the occasional appearance of manic-like episodes (for instance, during my energetic first month in Dallas) might indicate that I suffer from either manic-depressive illness or cyclothymia, a milder type of mood-swing disease. But in the end, the diagnosticians conclude that I’ve been too persistently down and not florid enough in my manic periods to be bipolar. Atypical depression is long-term and chronic, but the sufferer’s mood can occasionally be elevated in response to outside stimuli. This diagnosis seems a better way to explain the periodic occasions when I seemed happy or productive, but would always return to my normally depressed state in perfect boomerang fashion.

The DSM-5 defines depression as a person having multiple symptoms, which may include a depressed mood, loss of energy, diminished ability to concentrate, changes in appetite, and decreased interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities, for more than a two-week period. It also states that depression is disruptive, meaning that a person’s decreased mood is interfering with their ability to comfortably live their lives. A person with depression may have a lot of trouble getting out of bed in the morning, finishing basic tasks, or connecting with friends and family. One of my patients once described depression to me as what happens when life loses its color—and I think that’s a very illuminating description.

I never kept a journal, but over a ten-year period, I realized that Barbara’s moods occurred in six-week cycles. It went like this: Explosive, violent raging that lasted from ten minutes to several hours Silence that lasted for two to five days Friendly, cheerful, affectionate behavior that would last three or four days. (When things were going well, Barbara would apologize and even ask me to find out what might be causing her “crazy behavior.”) A long deterioration that lasted four to ten weeks. Barbara became increasingly more critical, condemning, and short-tempered. She would deny her earlier apologetic remarks. Finally, there would be an angry explosion and the cycle would repeat anew.

You may have heard people say that they feel “manic” on days when they have high energy or are in a particularly cheerful mood, perhaps even experiencing some of the manic symptoms listed in table 1.1, but this is not necessarily mania. For example, over the holidays, people may report feeling very happy and excited, have increased energy, sleep less than usual, and talk more than usual. If these “symptoms” last more than seven days, are these people actually experiencing mania? Certainly not! So, what is the difference between periods of good mood, or high energy, and mania? The difference is that when you are experiencing mania, your symptoms make it difficult for you to fulfill your responsibilities with regard to work, to friends and family, or to yourself (self-care). In other words, the symptoms associated with a manic episode interfere with your ability to function (e.g., to work, to pay bills, to take care of children, to see your friends, to accomplish daily tasks), which causes problems for you (e.g., you show up late for work, you’re not able to pay bills, your relationships with friends and family suffer, you can’t accomplish daily tasks).

Listening to the sounds breaking gently against the rocks, the birds flapping their wings against the push of the warm breeze, he gradually became less restive, the present ceasing to be a void and becoming instead, for a short period of time, a place he could inhabit comfortably and securely. There were few moods that could persist after all when one was in full view of earth and sky, and even the more deep-seated moods that maintained themselves in the chest against all the conflicting feelings that came one's way while out in the world- even these moods thinned slowly into nothingness when confronted by the immensity of the horizon, so that one could feel, at such moments, if not satisfaction or contentment then the peace at least of a brief inner extinction.

The physical benefits of taking time off are substantial. A study sponsored by the Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute at the National Institute of Health followed, over a nine-year period, twelve thousand men who had a high risk for coronary heart disease. The study found that those who took frequent annual vacations were 21 percent less likely to die from any cause and were 32 percent less likely to die from heart disease.14 According to a Gallup study, people who always make time for regular vacations had a 68.4 score on the Gallup-Healthway Well-Being Index, in comparison to a 51.4 Well-Being score for less frequent travelers.15 Professional services firm Ernst & Young conducted an internal study of its employees and found that, for each additional ten hours of vacation employees took, their year-end performance ratings improved 8 percent.16 One study found that three days after vacation, subjects’ physical complaints, quality of sleep, and mood had improved as compared to before vacation.17 And, vacations are good for relationships, too. A study published in the Wisconsin Medical Journal found that women who took vacations were more satisfied with their marriages.18

Under ground, under ground! Down in the safe soft womb of earth, where there is no getting of jobs or losing of jobs, no relatives or friends to plague you, no hope, fear, ambition, honour, duty - no duns of any kind. That was where he wished to be. Yet it was not death, actual physical death, that he wished for. It was a queer feeling that he had. It had been with him ever since that morning when he woke up in the police cell. The evil, mutinous mood that comes after drunkenness seemed to have set into a habit. That drunken night had marked a period in his life. It had dragged him downward with strange suddenness. Before, he had fought against the money-code, and yet he had clung to his wretched remnant of decency. But now it was precisely from decency that he wanted to escape. He wanted to go down, deep down, into some world where decency no longer mattered; to cut the strings of his self-respect, to submerge himself - to sink, as Rosemary had said. It was all bound up in his mind with the thought of being underground. He liked to think about the lost people, the underground people, tramps, beggars, criminals, prostitutes. It is a good world that they inhabit, down there in their frowzy kips and spikes. He liked to think that beneath the world of money there is that great sluttish underworld where failure and success have no meaning; a sort of kingdom of ghosts where all are equal. That was where he wished to be, down in the ghost-kingdom, below ambition.

As it turns out, broad vistas also broaden attention. When you see into the distance, literally, you see into the distance, figuratively. That's why time in nature is so tightly coupled to creative insights. That time acts as an incubation period. And nature tells the ACC [anterior cingulate cortex] to start considering farther flung possibilities. And since nature also has significant mood boosting effects, this further amplifies the ACC's ability to find those far flung connections, and further enhances creativity. Along similar lines, being in small cramped spaces has the opposite effect. It shrinks attention, getting us to focus on the parts, and not the whole. So in practical terms, crawl out from under your desk, go outside, look around, repeat, as needed.

But a heaviness lingers in his limbs, awareness - no diagnostic test can register whether it’s a symptom of the sickness or grief. The darkest moods sometimes descend after periods of unexpected light.

Though, if I’m being completely honest with myself, the reason for his sour mood probably has something to do with me asking him to stop at the first gas station we passed, claiming I got my period and asking him to go in to get me hoochy-coochy wipes and glow in the dark tampons. He didn’t look too fucking impressed when he came striding out of the gas station, telling me he had to ask the chick behind the counter to help him find it, only to have her laugh in his face, but fuck, it was some great entertainment