During my final semester of college, a time when most students are thrilled by the prospect of graduating, I slipped into a deep depression for no apparent reason. Despite the fact that I was graduating with honors, that I had a bright future ahead of me, and that I had a loving partner who supported me, I felt hopeless and spent long afternoons imagining how I might be able to disappear. I saw therapists, read just about every self-help book, exercised, ate right, meditated, and took more Ativan than seemed humanly possible, but nothing seemed to help. No one could figure it out. I distinctly remember taking a sound bath yoga class led by a woman named Deborah (pronounced Deb-bore-ah), and while holding hands with a stranger humming a funereal drone, I thought, this is no place for a depressed person.
On a whim, I decided to go off birth control for a while. I’d been on it for years and figured it couldn’t hurt. Within a week, I felt as if a physical weight had been lifted. I mean, physically I lost the five pounds of bloat I’d been carrying around as a result of the pill, but mentally I felt lighter as well. I could breathe again. And while I don’t believe hormonal birth control pills were the sole force driving my depression, I do think they catalyzed underlying issues.
Now science seems to agree. According to a study recently published in JAMA Psychiatry, hormonal contraception can increase a woman’s risk of depression. After studying more than 1 million women and teenage girls between the ages of 15 and 34 over the course of about six years, Danish researchers found that the role birth control plays in mental health has been understated. Out of the 55 percent of participants who reported using birth control, many were prescribed antidepressants over the course of the study.
Though not all forms of birth control are created equal. Study participants using combination birth control pills—the kind that have both estrogen and progestin—were 23 percent more likely to take antidepressants as compared to those who didn’t use hormonal contraception. Progestin-only pills seemed to have an even bigger impact on antidepressant use, with 34 percent of users being more likely. And antidepressant use increased by 40 percent for those using a progestin-only IUD, 60 percent for vaginal ring users, and an alarming 100 percent for those using a patch.
To be clear, this study does not by any means indicate that all women who start using pills, rings, or patches are bound to become depressed. In fact, only about 12.5 percent of participants—users and non-users alike—started taking antidepressants at some point during the course of the study. Not all women diagnosed with depression end up taking antidepressants and not all women who report feeling depressed receive an official diagnosis.
What does seem clear is that teenage girls are particularly at risk. Lead author and clinical professor Øjvind Lidegaard stressed the importance of doctors informing their patients of the risks and various low-estrogen options, telling Health,
“Doctors should include these aspects together with other risks and benefits with use of hormonal contraceptives when they advise women to which type of contraception is the most suitable for that specific woman. Doctors should ensure that women, especially young women, are not already depressed or have a history of depression and they should inform women about this potential risk.”
Ultimately, it’s up to women to listen to their bodies and minds and to pay acute attention to lifestyle changes that may be having a negative impact. If you’re feeling down and can’t figure out why, maybe it’s time to rethink your birth control plan as it could be a contributing factor. Many women, myself included, make the mistake of feeling guilty or ashamed about being depressed, despite the fact that it may be out of their control. Though it’s only the start of understanding how hormones and mental health relate, what this study does is empower women to investigate their options. In the same way birth control empowered women to take control of their health in the 1960s, women today have the power to choose what works best for them as individuals.
Ladder leads out of darkness.Photo credit 
Woman's reflection in shadow.Photo credit 
Young woman frazzled.Photo credit 
Will your current friends still be with you after seven years?
Professor shares how many years a friendship must last before it'll become lifelong
Think of your best friend. How long have you known them? Growing up, children make friends and say they’ll be best friends forever. That’s where “BFF” came from, for crying out loud. But is the concept of the lifelong friend real? If so, how many years of friendship will have to bloom before a friendship goes the distance? Well, a Dutch study may have the answer to that last question.
Sociologist Gerald Mollenhorst and his team in the Netherlands did extensive research on friendships and made some interesting findings in his surveys and studies. Mollenhorst found that over half of your friendships will “shed” within seven years. However, the relationships that go past the seven-year mark tend to last. This led to the prevailing theory that most friendships lasting more than seven years would endure throughout a person’s lifetime.
In Mollenhorst’s findings, lifelong friendships seem to come down to one thing: reciprocal effort. The primary reason so many friendships form and fade within seven-year cycles has much to do with a person’s ages and life stages. A lot of people lose touch with elementary and high school friends because so many leave home to attend college. Work friends change when someone gets promoted or finds a better job in a different state. Some friends get married and have children, reducing one-on-one time together, and thus a friendship fades. It’s easy to lose friends, but naturally harder to keep them when you’re no longer in proximity.
Some people on Reddit even wonder if lifelong friendships are actually real or just a romanticized thought nowadays. However, older commenters showed that lifelong friendship is still possible:
“I met my friend on the first day of kindergarten. Maybe not the very first day, but within the first week. We were texting each other stupid memes just yesterday. This year we’ll both celebrate our 58th birthdays.”
“My oldest friend and I met when she was just 5 and I was 9. Next-door neighbors. We're now both over 60 and still talk weekly and visit at least twice a year.”
“I’m 55. I’ve just spent a weekend with friends I met 24 and 32 years ago respectively. I’m also still in touch with my penpal in the States. I was 15 when we started writing to each other.”
“My friends (3 of them) go back to my college days in my 20’s that I still talk to a minimum of once a week. I'm in my early 60s now.”
“We ebb and flow. Sometimes many years will pass as we go through different things and phases. Nobody gets buttsore if we aren’t in touch all the time. In our 50s we don’t try and argue or be petty like we did before. But I love them. I don’t need a weekly lunch to know that. I could make a call right now if I needed something. Same with them.”
Maintaining a friendship for life is never guaranteed, but there are ways, psychotherapists say, that can make a friendship last. It’s not easy, but for a friendship to last, both participants need to make room for patience and place greater weight on their similarities than on the differences that may develop over time. Along with that, it’s helpful to be tolerant of large distances and gaps of time between visits, too. It’s not easy, and it requires both people involved to be equally invested to keep the friendship alive and from becoming stagnant.
As tough as it sounds, it is still possible. You may be a fortunate person who can name several friends you’ve kept for over seven years or over seventy years. But if you’re not, every new friendship you make has the same chance and potential of being lifelong.