Discussion Should depression be viewed as an energy disorder, not a mood disorder?

[Alexei_Kirillov]

Depression technically falls under the "mood disorder" category, but does this seem like a misnomer to anyone else? Wouldn't it make more sense to call it an "energy disorder," given that the defining symptom is a lack of energy, fatigue, and lack of ambition?

The term "mood" makes it sound temporary and has a negative connotation imo, almost as if you're incapable of regulating your own emotions. In reality, more often than not depression is a chronic state of being, not a transient mood. If it was indeed just the latter, then the fix would be becoming happier, but if it's the former, then it's recharging your life-battery (or for the more spiritually minded among you, revitalizing your lifeforce) -- which is a very different thing from finding happiness.

This characterization of depression is probably partly responsible for the misconceptions laypeople have about it, ex. parents who think you can come out of depression by "changing your attitude." If they were told their child was suffering from an energy disorder, not a mood disorder, I think they'd be more likely to take it seriously and to understand it better.

I think this redefinition would also make it easier to digest the idea that depression might actually be an evolutionarily advantageous set of behaviours that helps you survive in a particular circumstance by essentially putting your body into hibernation mode. Viewed this way, depression is not a sign that your brain is "broken" or "imbalanced"; rather, it would be an expected reaction to undergoing a high-effort activity that was not followed up by an equally restorative activity. The phenomenon of depressed people not wanting to get better is also better understood under this framework, because we understand that getting better requires energy that they don't have to spare.

Just something I've been thinking about lately, haven't looked at it from all angles yet. What are your guys' thoughts? Do you agree? Disagree? @Forever Sleep

 

[avalokitesvara]

This makes sense to me. The defining experience of depression for me is lack of volition and anhedonia. I do not have the drive to do things that other people seem to. The most distress I feel comes from this feeling of wtf am I supposed to do with all this time in this lifespan I am afflicted with? There's just nothing that I feel a desire for, other than peace, quiet and stillness.

"Mood" doesn't make sense to me either. Happiness and sadness are fleeting, sure they come and go, but depression doesn't really have to do with these feelings, to me. I can observe a feeling and feel separate from it. I can't get out from and observe at a remove this condition of being that is depression. It constitutes my reality, it is my inviolable perspective. It's not transient like all moods are.

Anhedonia means I don't receive positive reinforcement from doing things. So maybe there is a reward/reinforcement imbalance element too, perhaps linked to dopamine such as in other disorders such as ADHD.

I also agree that it would help others understand. My mother said to me recently "you know, you're going to have to get control of yourself soon" and I just had to laugh because the notion that I could just suddenly decide to have volition and experience pleasure from life was so misguided.

 

[J&L383]

Some interesting food for thought. The "science" of psychology has always been fraught with the unproved theories of those who claim their sanity to be superior, in my view.

 

[isolatedl111]

Depression technically falls under the "mood disorder" category, but does this seem like a misnomer to anyone else? Wouldn't it make more sense to call it an "energy disorder," given that the defining symptom is a lack of energy, fatigue, and lack of ambition?

The term "mood" makes it sound temporary and has a negative connotation imo, almost as if you're incapable of regulating your own emotions. In reality, more often than not depression is a chronic state of being, not a transient mood. If it was indeed just the latter, then the fix would be becoming happier, but if it's the former, then it's recharging your life-battery (or for the more spiritually minded among you, revitalizing your lifeforce) -- which is a very different thing from finding happiness.

This characterization of depression is probably partly responsible for the misconceptions laypeople have about it, ex. parents who think you can come out of depression by "changing your attitude." If they were told their child was suffering from an energy disorder, not a mood disorder, I think they'd be more likely to take it seriously and to understand it better.

I think this redefinition would also make it easier to digest the idea that depression might actually be an evolutionarily advantageous set of behaviours that helps you survive in a particular circumstance by essentially putting your body into hibernation mode. Viewed this way, depression is not a sign that your brain is "broken" or "imbalanced"; rather, it would be an expected reaction to undergoing a high-effort activity that was not followed up by an equally restorative activity. The phenomenon of depressed people not wanting to get better is also better understood under this framework, because we understand that getting better requires energy that they don't have to spare.

Just something I've been thinking about lately, haven't looked at it from all angles yet. What are your guys' thoughts? Do you agree? Disagree? @Forever Sleep

Hm

 

[KillingPain267]

The defining symptom of depression is not always only lack of energy, fatigue and lack of ambition. There is also anhedonia, prolonged sadness, excessive feelings of guilt, low self-esteem, either insomnia or too much sleeping and irritability.

 

[yxmux]

It would be more accurate to call it an affective disorder, which encompasses what you are describing above.

 

[Alexei_Kirillov]

The defining symptom of depression is not always only lack of energy, fatigue and lack of ambition. There is also anhedonia, prolonged sadness, excessive feelings of guilt, low self-esteem, either insomnia or too much sleeping and irritability.

Right, it's certainly not the only symptom, but I would argue it's the "core" symptom that many of the other ones flow from. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a depressed person who didn't suffer from some form of lack of energy (which anhedonia, prolonged sadness, and oversleeping are all related to), but you might readily find some who, to take one example, don't have low self-esteem (such as myself).

 

[KillingPain267]

Right, it's certainly not the only symptom, but I would argue it's the "core" symptom that many of the other ones flow from. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a depressed person who didn't suffer from some form of lack of energy (which anhedonia, prolonged sadness, and oversleeping are all related to), but you might readily find some who, to take one example, don't have low self-esteem (such as myself).

Yeah okay, I guess it depends on what you mean by low energy. If it's physical fatigue etc. There are depressed people who still work, exercise and are physically healthy. Depression is mainly seen as a mental disorder. But you are right, perhaps it should not be seen as distinct from physical states of being. An energy disorder would be a new way of studying it, especially if it gets rid of the stark mind-body dichotomy.

 

[Alexei_Kirillov]

Yeah okay, I guess it depends on what you mean by low energy. If it's physical fatigue etc. There are depressed people who still work, exercise and are physically healthy. Depression is mainly seen as a mental disorder. But you are right, perhaps it should not be seen as distinct from physical states of being. An energy disorder would be a new way of studying it, especially if it gets rid of the stark mind-body dichotomy.

Yeah my bad, I probably should've been more clear that I'm not necessarily referring to physical energy. I used to fall under the "high-functioning" bucket and so was working, exercising, etc. but I still suffered from lack of energy in the sense that all of these activities took more out of me than they would've in "the before times." I've often heard it analogized to moving through the world with a sack of bricks tied to your ankle -- it's like there's just an extra mental hurdle you have to overcome for everything you do.

 

[Praestat_Mori]

Exhaution (mental and physical) can be result in a depressive disorder. I would say that is the part when we feel we have no energy.

 

[Forever Sleep]

Depression technically falls under the "mood disorder" category, but does this seem like a misnomer to anyone else? Wouldn't it make more sense to call it an "energy disorder," given that the defining symptom is a lack of energy, fatigue, and lack of ambition?

The term "mood" makes it sound temporary and has a negative connotation imo, almost as if you're incapable of regulating your own emotions. In reality, more often than not depression is a chronic state of being, not a transient mood. If it was indeed just the latter, then the fix would be becoming happier, but if it's the former, then it's recharging your life-battery (or for the more spiritually minded among you, revitalizing your lifeforce) -- which is a very different thing from finding happiness.

This characterization of depression is probably partly responsible for the misconceptions laypeople have about it, ex. parents who think you can come out of depression by "changing your attitude." If they were told their child was suffering from an energy disorder, not a mood disorder, I think they'd be more likely to take it seriously and to understand it better.

I think this redefinition would also make it easier to digest the idea that depression might actually be an evolutionarily advantageous set of behaviours that helps you survive in a particular circumstance by essentially putting your body into hibernation mode. Viewed this way, depression is not a sign that your brain is "broken" or "imbalanced"; rather, it would be an expected reaction to undergoing a high-effort activity that was not followed up by an equally restorative activity. The phenomenon of depressed people not wanting to get better is also better understood under this framework, because we understand that getting better requires energy that they don't have to spare.

Just something I've been thinking about lately, haven't looked at it from all angles yet. What are your guys' thoughts? Do you agree? Disagree? @Forever Sleep

I saw once in an article where they broke down depressed into 'deep - rest'. As you say- the bodies natural reaction in dealing with too much stress is to basically shut it down. That in that way- it is supposed to benefit us.

I truly wish they would define and diagnose it more accurately though. I'm not even sure if I'm depressed to be honest.

You're definition of an energy disorder does make sense but again, there are variations I suppose. There are plenty of people working full time who are suffering with it. 1 in 3 employes in my friend's workplace was on antidepressants!

Sometimes I wonder if something awful happens that triggers it and then, we just (sometimes) don't seem to fully recover. One thing I definitely believe is- we have brains that learn well via repetition. If we think pessimistically on a regular basis, it seems logical that we become really good at it! In that sense, I agree with the OP, that prolonged depression can start to feel like a part of our personality. To the extent that we can't picture 'us' as being 'us' without it.

 

[SilentSadness]

Depression to me doesn't seem like a disorder, it seems perfectly reasonable considering the tragic state of living and the suffering one has to experience, for no reason at all. Someone who's happy despite that is the unreasonable one, that's just blissful ignorance and delusion. Depression does not have a scientific description and is diagnosed by "someone with low mood or energy" which just doesn't make any sense because that's a symptom. Generally, the problem is suffering and living conditions so the treatment for depression would be improving the life situation. Unfortunately, people are obsessed with inventing illnesses to describe people who are not as delusional as them. But I agree, depression is not a sign of disorder, that's why so many people have it and so predictably.

 

[OnMyLast Legs]

Even when I can get myself to exercise depressed, performance is lower.

 

[MatrixPrisoner]

No, it should be classified as an "in-touch with reality" non-disorder.

 

[Tombs_in_your_eyes]

Calling depression a 'mood disorder' makes little sense to me. It would be like calling a broken leg a 'pain disorder' - like, yeah, if you've just broken your leg it's going to hurt, but calling it a 'pain disorder' doesn't give you any useful information as to what's actually wrong with your leg that's causing the pain.

The characterisation of depression that makes the most sense to me is that of learned helplessness.

Learned Helplessness: Seligman's Theory of Depression

Learned helplessness is a psychological phenomenon in which a person learns that they cannot avoid bad things happening in the future. This causes a person to stop trying to prevent them. Learned helplessness is often associated with depression.

www.simplypsychology.org

If you try and try and try at something (being happy / fulfilled / whatever your goals in life are) and you keep failing, eventually you'll learn that nothing you do really matters.

 

[OnMyLast Legs]

No, it should be classified as an "in-touch with reality" non-disorder.

I kind of like this aspect of it, honestly.

 

[-Link-]

I wouldn't take issue with "mood disorder" as a label itself so much as how the label is used: Telling a parent their child has a "mood disorder" as if that's supposed to mean something to the parents.

It would be better to say, "Your child has a clinical condition that manifests as an episodic or persistent low mood, inability to feel pleasure, loss of interest and motivation, and diminished energy levels. Science does not fully understand how or why this happens. We just know that it's a thing, and we make informed guesses on how to best treat it. Here are some information pamphlets that describe it in layman's terms instead of making you discern what we mean when we say 'mood disorder.'"

Picture it: Parent takes their child to the doctor. Doctor tells the parent, "Your child has depression. We'll put them on a two-year wait list to see a psychiatrist. In the meantime, here are some antidepressants, and there's the door."

Whether we label it a "mood disorder" or an "energy disorder," we will be misunderstood either way. (See the stigma against people with chronic fatigue syndrome who I might imagine would caution us, "Don't be so quick to adopt the 'energy' label.")

The crux of this, I think, is in the messaging and having doctors proactively answer questions that patients, parents, and other concerned parties don't even know to ask. This, of course, in addition to efforts to reduce stigma on a wider societal level -- part of which would involve putting much less emphasis on the clinical labels and more focus on the actual symptoms.

 

[notreallybored]

ב''ה,

If you're miserable in mood but moving around, and can afford medical attention, you'll possibly be diagnosed with something other than "depression" based on the whimsy of doctors and whatever the current situation of the DSM or equivalent where you are is.

Technically as much as civilization and its discontents melancholia is common, and "depressant" drugs including alcohol, benzos and cannabis can bring out these symptoms in enough of the population that they were ever called that, and the original somewhat imperfect ("barbaric," "stone-age" some might say) medication research approach was with the forced swim test in rodents, acknowledging the symptoms had anything to do with mood was meant to encourage a more holistic approach. In practice it also medicalizes and imprisons anyone simply unhappy, but the intention was perhaps to attempt to quantify and improve actual happiness and life satisfaction, just filtered through a billion business needs and those annoying psych majors you knew from school.

It's entirely possible to take 'stimulants' (the classic original antidepressants) and end up simply 'stuck on' existential problems and low mood, and since most of those psych majors did I believe there may have been some good faith Itrying to address that rather than continuing to get everyone tweaked on repeating their complaints.

That said, it's a mess, and numerous physiological components including the various circadian and possible torpor reflexes (lots of populations faced lots of hard winters and famines), nutrition, vitamin D status, actual disease, feed back to the brain's perception of mood, and possibly (fairly absolutely evidenced at this point) vice-versa.

Without this nuance though, OP's proposal is a regression to putting everyone on tweak and then bagging them for psychosis, whether they're handling it well but promoting unpopular societal change, or actually seeing things that aren't there after the honeymoon period with those drugs wears off.

That said a pill that would bring happiness and content with the current state of the world, aside from any minimal peace in global conflicts recently won, is particularly existentially horrifying these days though might be better than actually experiencing not being able to afford food with no way to even work that off without passing modern hiring practices.

 

[avalokitesvara]

Calling depression a 'mood disorder' makes little sense to me. It would be like calling a broken leg a 'pain disorder' - like, yeah, if you've just broken your leg it's going to hurt, but calling it a 'pain disorder' doesn't give you any useful information as to what's actually wrong with your leg that's causing the pain.

The characterisation of depression that makes the most sense to me is that of learned helplessness.

Learned Helplessness: Seligman's Theory of Depression

Learned helplessness is a psychological phenomenon in which a person learns that they cannot avoid bad things happening in the future. This causes a person to stop trying to prevent them. Learned helplessness is often associated with depression.

www.simplypsychology.org

If you try and try and try at something (being happy / fulfilled / whatever your goals in life are) and you keep failing, eventually you'll learn that nothing you do really matters.

This doesn't explain people who seemingly came into the world this way, without any goals and already highly attuned to meaninglessness. It's not a disease but a state of being.