Some mental health conditions occur more often in women and can play a significant role in the state of a woman’s overall health. While men experience higher rates of autism, early onset schizophrenia, antisocial personality disorder, and alcoholism, mental health conditions more common in women include:
Depression: Depression is likely to occur in women twice more than men. Women’s increased life expectancy means they are more likely than men to outlive their partner and move into residential care. This means they are more at risk of depression associated with psycho-social factors. Older people are often faced with more difficult life events and daily stresses than younger people and this may explain why they have a slightly increased risk of depression. Losses – whether bereavement or losses associated with growing old such as loss of independence because of physical illness or disability – can trigger depression.
Anxiety and specific phobias: Although men and women are affected equally by such mental health conditions as obsessive-compulsive disorder and social phobias, women develop such phobias as compared to men which include panic disorder, generalized anxiety, and specific phobias.
Post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD): Women develop PTSD after a traumatic event. Women can have traumatic experience and it may develop due to sexual abuse and assault
Suicide attempts: Men die from suicide at four times the rate that women do, but women attempt suicide two or three times more often than men.
Eating disorders: Women account for at least 85 percent of all anorexia and bulimia cases and 65 percent of binge-eating disorder cases.
Hormonal Issues: the Hormonal difference between men and women play role in mental illness. A common misconception is that estrogen is female hormone and testosterone is a male hormone. Both have each hormone in their bloodstream but in different quantities depending on health, age and other factors.
Pregnancy, Birth, and Parenting: it is true that a woman faces physiological changes during pregnancy and childbirth. There are many women who suffer from some kind of postpartum depression. Other factors that are involved are cultural factors etc. Many women are overwhelmed by the demand of parenting, especially in early days. Studies have shown that women who have traumatic childbirth experience, unsupportive partners, poverty or unsupportive partners may likely to develop postpartum depression.
If you feel that either you or your loved one is suffering from any mental health issue stated above, it is best advised that you consult a mental health expert or a psychologist at the earliest.