Bipolar4LifeSupport

Researchers argue about why the differences exist, but they agree that men and women are distinct creatures when it comes to emotion. These gender differences can affect emotional health.

Stereotypes of the way men and women are expected to deal with their emotions pervade our culture and society, easily eliciting images of overly reserved men and excitable, emotional women. Boys are told to suck it up; girls are told to let it all out. But do gender differences actually exist between men and women, and if so, how do they affect our emotional health?

The research is mixed regarding the emotional differences between the sexes. Strong evidence has been found that there are differences in the way men and women detect, process, and express emotion. Other studies show that men and women share more emotional similarities than differences.

The stereotypes of reserved men and emotional women are widespread and do affect the way young boys and girls are raised. Some researchers argue that we may be ingraining gender differences that do not naturally exist by accepting and passing on these stereotypes to our children. Other researchers believe these differences have developed due to the evolutionary roles placed on men and women to survive and thrive.

While researchers debate these gender differences, they agree that the differences ultimately can have a negative effect on members of both sexes.

Emotional Women, Emotional Men

Recent research has shown important ways in which men and women react emotionally and perceive emotion in others:

• A global study of 55 cultures found that women tend to be more emotional, agreeable, extroverted, and conscientious than men.
• Women read other people’s emotional reactions better than men, regardless of whether they receive those emotional cues verbally or visually.
• Women reported experiencing love and anger much more intensely than men did in another assessment of gender differences in emotional response. These women also smiled more when recalling memories of happiness or love.
• Men and women respond to stress in different ways. Women display greater sadness or anxiety than men, while men show an increase in blood pressure and a tendency toward alcohol craving.
• Women are more inclined than men to experience disgust when exposed to stimuli intended to elicit an emotional reaction.

And those are just studies over the past few years. Decades of research have found numerous differences in the ways men and women interpret emotions and react emotionally. Also, studies have found that gender differences matter more than sexual orientation — a heterosexual woman and a homosexual woman have more in common emotionally than a heterosexual woman and a homosexual man.

Why these differences occur is less easily explained:

• Some research has found that the differences may be rooted in cultural stereotypes. For example, women are perceived as being more emotional and behave that way because it’s believed that’s what women do, while men express emotion only when the situation warrants it.
• Parents may have a hand in promoting these gender differences, expressing disapproval with boys who cry or express other “weak” emotions while shrugging off similar behavior in girls.
• Other studies posit an evolutionary cause for these gender differences in emotion. Men serving as hunter-gatherers needed to take more risks and be more dominating, while women who stayed home and cared for young needed to be more nurturing and cautious. These roles have resisted change as human society has progressed, and indeed, progress may cause these roles to become even more pronounced.

How Gender Differences Affect Health

Gender differences in emotional processing and response have direct consequences on the physical and emotional health of men and women. Overly emotional women tend to be at greater risk for depression, anxiety, and other mood disorders, while men who repress their feelings tend to be at greater risk for physical ailments such as high blood pressure, and also tend to indulge in more risky behavior and vices such as smoking or drinking.

Researchers and doctors have several different proposals for dealing with these differences. Some argue that we should accept these gender differences, based on the fact that feminine women and masculine men tend to be happier than those who are gender-atypical. According to this line of reasoning, boys and girls should be allowed to develop both stereotypical and non-stereotypical emotional responses without judging them or trying to shape them.

Others believe that parents can help dull or negate these stereotypes by refusing to reinforce them. For example, fathers who take a more involved role in child-rearing tend to raise children who don’t fall into the stereotypical sex roles of the stoic male or expressive female.

Whether you’re trying to bring up children without gender stereotypes or looking after your own emotional health, be aware of these gender differences and how they affect both men’s and women’s experiences of the world.

Losing your cool isn’t always because of everyday stress. Find out why emotional health issues like frustration and impulsivity could be symptoms of adult ADHD.

Have you ever been stuck in traffic and found yourself pounding the steering wheel and feeling like your head might explode? If that’s an all-too familiar scenario, you could have adult ADHD.

About 50 percent of kids with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) grow up to be adults with ADHD, and some adults with ADHD aren’t aware that they have it. Hyperactivity symptoms of ADHD seen in kids may be replaced with emotional health symptoms such as frustration and impulsivity in adult ADHD.

A recent study by Massachusetts General Hospital found that more than half of adults with ADHD have emotional health problems related to excessive emotional reactions to everyday events. They also found that this combination of ADHD and the inability to control emotions tends to run in families and could affect more than 5 million American adults.

“The areas of the brain that are responsible for hyperactivity in ADHD are also responsible for emotional control, so it is not surprising that these symptoms overlap,” says Guy K. Palmes, MD, associate professor of psychiatry at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, N.C.

“ADHD runs in families, and if a child has ADHD, usually one parent has it,” Dr. Palmes says. “Although studies say that about 4 percent of adults have ADHD, I suspect that about half of adult ADHD is not being diagnosed and many adults have ADHD and don’t know it.”

Emotional Health and ADHD Symptoms in Adults

For adults with ADHD, excessive emotional reactions can occur quickly in response to normal stresses that would be difficult but acceptable for people without adult ADHD.

Common emotional health symptoms associated with adult ADHD can include:

• Depression
• Mood swings
• Impulsivity
• Outbursts of anger
• Frustration
• Impatience

“Controlling my emotions can be most difficult even with therapy and medication,” says David G. Hanley, a 61-year-old sales professional from West Hartford, Conn., who was diagnosed with ADHD as an adult.

“Being in sales and dealing with a four-year economic collapse has been tough,” Hanley says. “I have to constantly deal with my tendency for impatience and intolerance. You can’t be successful in sales if you alienate your accounts.”

In adults who aren’t diagnosed or treated for ADHD, excessive emotional reactions can lead to problems in social, family, and business relationships. Untreated adult ADHD is also a common trigger for substance abuse problems.

Getting Adult ADHD Symptoms Under Control

The right diagnosis and treatment can turn around emotional distress. “Finding out there was a reason and a treatment for my symptoms has been a blessing,” Hanley says. “With medication and therapy, I am now able to let go of the things I can’t control, and life is definitely easier.”

Talk therapy and sometimes medication both help control adult ADHD symptomsand can lead to better emotional health. “It’s important for people with ADHD to learn what triggers their symptoms so they can start to anticipate and manage their stress,” explains Palmes. Talk therapy, a form of counseling, can help with that.

Try these other strategies as well:

• Get educated about ADHD.
• Use organizational strategies like making lists and carrying a calendar.
• Get to work early and plan projects for the time of day when you are most able to concentrate.
• Practice relaxation techniques such as deep breathing, meditation, and progressive muscle relaxation.
• Get enough sleep and exercise.
• Avoid self-medication with drugs and alcohol.

Don’t let ADHD ruin your emotional health. If you haven’t been diagnosed but have symptoms, especially if you had ADHD as a child or have a family history of ADHD, talk to your doctor and take steps to regain control over your life.

I’ve always found it curious that more suicides happen in the spring than in any other season. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Center for Health Statistics, suicide rates are lowest in the winter months and highest in the springtime.

What’s so bad about April and May? The sun is out, winter coats have disappeared, people start throwing Frisbees, even our dogs are strutting down the streets with wide grins. Why the anxiety and depression?

1. The Shoulds

The pressure to be happy – it is a fast track to the Black Hole. You think since colleagues are whistling as they hold the door for you at work that you should whistle as well. Or at least WANT to whistle. It’s the comparison thing. It happens to me every year. The voices in my head sound like this: “Be happy. Be happy!!!! Everyone is happy. You’re wearing sandals! Bye bye black wool! Colors, look at that! Pastel blouses! Your yard has a freakin tulip. This is the life. BE HAPPY.”

I classify these symptoms under the “Should” disease, a file in the gray matter of my brain that holds a LOT of material.

2. Chaaaaaannnnnge

For highly sensitive people—and most people who struggle with chronic depression and anxietyare highly sensitive—any kind of change will trigger panic. Our bodies detest any kind of alteration in life style. If a snowstorm that has the kids home for a week is dependable and static and constant, then it actually feels better than a beautiful spring day, because our sensory system isn’t uttering an SOS to the limbic system, our emotional center. Psychologist Elaine Aron explains in her book, “The Highly Sensitive Person,” that a subtle adjustment like a shift in seasons messes with the nervous system and sends the highly sensitive person into a state of overarousal, which unfortunately has nothing to do with sex drive.

The change in us is as physical as it is mental. Just as the lack of sunlight may alter brain levels of certain mood-controlling chemicals – such as the hormone melatonin — in January and February, the same moody chemicals and their messengers get confused when the light comes out in the spring. Although the light is preferable to darkness, change still feels bad.

3. Allergies

Emerging research has identified a link between allergies and depression. At least people who suffer from allergies seem to be at a higher risk for of depression. That makes sense. The headaches, sleeplessness, fatigue associated with allergies are all are symptoms of depression, as well. Anahad O’Connor of the New York Times did the homework:

Several large studies have found that the risk of depression in people with severe allergies is about twice that of those without allergies. In 2008, researchers at the University of Maryland reported that this link may help explain a widely established — but poorly understood — increase in suicides during the spring every year. Analyzing medical records, the authors found that in some patients, changes in allergy symptoms during low- and high-pollen seasons corresponded to changes in their depression and anxiety scores.

A Finnish population study in 2003 found a link between allergies and depression; however, women were much more likely to be affected. In 2000, a study of twins in Finland also showed a shared risk for depression and allergies, a result of genetic influences, the authors wrote.

So there you have it! Three theories on why I’m not as happy as whistlers dressed in pastels and the Frisbee-throwers during the months of April and May, and why I have to work harder at sanity during the springtime.

There’s an absolute link between your emotional health and your physical well-being, so take time to nurture both.

To be completely healthy, you must take care of not only your physical health, but youremotional health, too. If one is neglected, the other will suffer.

Understanding the Physical Health and Emotional Health Connection

There is a physical connection between what the mind is thinking and those parts of the brain that control bodily functions. According to Charles Goodstein, MD, clinical professor of psychiatry, New York University School of Medicine in New York City, and president of the Psychoanalytic Association of New York, the brain is intimately connected to our endocrine system, which secretes hormones or chemicals that can have a powerful influence on your emotional health. “Thoughts and feelings as they are generated within the mind [can influence] the outpouring of hormones from the endocrine system, which in effect control much of what goes on within the body,” says Dr. Goodstein.

“As a matter of fact, it’s very probable that many patients who go to their physician’s office with physical complaints have underlying depression,” he says. People who visit their doctors reporting symptoms of headache, lethargy, weakness, or vague abdominal symptoms often end up being diagnosed with depression, even though they do not report feelings of depression to their doctors, says Goodstein. Depression causes you to be over-aware of physical discomfort.

While unhappy or stressed-out thoughts may not directly cause poor physical health, they could be a contributing factor and may explain why one person is suffering physically while someone else is not, Goodstein adds.

Physical Health and Emotional Health: Examples of Links

There are many circumstances that support the link between physical health and emotional health, including:

• White-coat syndrome. This is a condition in which a person’s blood pressure increases the minute they step into a doctor’s office. In white-coat syndrome, anxiety is directly related to physical function — blood pressure. “If you extrapolate from that, you can say, what other kinds of anxieties are these people having that are producing jumps in blood pressure? What is the consequence of repeated stress?” asks Goodstein.
• Personality and heart disease. Some people are more at risk of heart attack because of their personality, specifically those “hard-driving, hard-charging” Type A individuals.
• Chronic disease and depression. People who are having a hard time coping with a chronic illness are more likely to become depressed.
• Physical symptoms of emotional health distress. People who are clinically depressed often have physical symptoms, such as constipation, lack of appetite, insomnia, or lethargy, among others.

And on the other hand: “Those individuals who have achieved a level of mental health where they can manage better the inevitable conflicts of human life are more likely to prevail in certain kinds of physical illness,” says Goodstein.

Physical Health and Emotional Health: Caring for Both

The best way to care for your total health, emotional and physical, is to follow the advice of your mother:

• Eat right. A healthy, regular diet is good for the body and mind.
• Go to bed on time. Losing sleep is hard on your heart, may increase weight, and definitely cranks up the crankiness meter.
• If you fall down, get back up.Resilience in the face of adversity is a gift that will keep on giving both mentally and physically.
• Go out and play. Yes, work is a good thing: It pays the bills. However, taking time out for relaxation and socializing is good for your emotional health andyour physical health.
• Exercise. Exercise is proven to improve your mood and has comprehensive benefits for your physical health.
• See the right doctor, regularly. Going to the right doctor can make all the difference in your overall health, especially if you have a complicated condition that requires a specialist. But if your emotions are suffering, be open to seeing a mental health professional, too.

Total health depends on a healthy mind and body. Take time to nurture both.

You’ve probably heard your share of stories like the following told by Marcelle Pick, Ob/Gyn NP, on the site “Women to Women”:

A patient came in to see me describing constant heavy bleeding menorrhagia. We tried dietary changes, supplements and other purely physical approaches, with only minimal improvement. I began to probe for the emotional basis of her condition. She shared a description of her marriage to a man who did not support her emotionally and was often verbally abusive. I helped her see the connection between her relationship and her symptoms. One day a few months later, she came into my office and told me she had finally found the courage to leave the relationship. Her heavy bleeding stopped the next day, and has not returned.

The story was especially intriguing to me because I had the opposite happen to me when I was living abroad my sophomore year at college. The Gulf War was about to erupt and there were tensions in pockets of France. Our program director instructed us to keep a low profile, yet a fellow student was hit with a glass bottle by a Muslim fanatic yelling some anti-American sentiments. I was anxious and depressed. Maybe I would have fared okay if I had self-medicated with some of the red wine that was on the table every night, but I was newly sober, which wasn’t fun — schlepping myself to 12-step support groups in strange places where I didn’t understand half of what they said. My body literally shut down and I stopped menstruating (amenorrhea) the whole time I was there. No angel came to me and informed me that I was with child, so I knew I wasn’t pregnant.

Our body holds our emotions.

Some people will break out in hives during a stressful period; others get shingles. Many developmysterious, unexplained illnesses that will disappear when their emotional issues are resolved. For those who maintain that our physical symptoms are completely unrelated to the content in our hearts and souls, consider “broken heart syndrome,” the sudden heart failure that is brought on by emotional trauma. Different from a heart attack, broken heart syndrome is caused by a flood of hormones that impedes the ability of the heart muscle to pump. According to a 2005 Johns Hopkins study, a number of emotions — including joy and surprise — can cause it, not just sadness.

I was complaining to my psychiatrist last visit about all the side effects of my medications — the toll they could be taking on my body, especially over time.

“Lithium could kill my kidneys,” I said, “and I have no idea what the others are doing.”

She listened and then responded with rationale that I have often used in my argument to anti-medication friends on why it’s not always best to let a depression dissolve on its own.

“These medications do have risks,” she said, “but so does depression. It wears the body down over time.”

Most people know that depression can be triggered by various illnesses, especially cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hypertension, and arthritis. However, it might be news that untreated depression can actually increase the risk of developing some illnesses. In fact, a 2007 Norwegian study found that those participants with significant depression symptoms had a higher risk of death from most major causes, including heart disease, stroke, respiratory illnesses (such as pneumonia and influenza), and conditions of the nervous system (like Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerosis).

The good news is that by treating depression — and by attending to your emotions — you cut down on physical illnesses. A new study published in the January 2014 issue of Psychosomatic Medicine found that the treatment of depression before any apparent signs of cardiovascular disease can decrease the risk of heart attacks and strokes by almost half.

In the mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) course that I attended at the local hospital this spring, we often located areas of tension in our body — places we hold our stress — and deliberately relaxed those muscles as we practiced deep breathing. In one homework assignment, we described the physical sensations in our body as we experienced something negative. Then, in formal meditation, we would direct our attention to those places and breathe into and out of them, trying our best to let go.

With lots of practice, the idea is that we would be able to hear our bodies earlier in emotional dips so that we wouldn’t end up with shingles or menorrhagia or amenorrhea. By attending to our emotional distress — and by treating depression and anxiety — we can become more resilient to illness and disease.