Demystifying Mood Swings: What You Need to Know

An abrupt or significant shift in your emotional state is known as a mood swing. Feelings may shift fast from happiness or contentment to sadness or rage. Demystifying Mood Swings may vary from everyday variations to more dramatic or substantial shifts in mood, which may indicate an underlying problem behind your symptoms.

Demystifying Mood Swings

Your mood may be influenced by a number of things, including blood sugar, hormones, stress, temperament, and drugs. However, there are also underlying medical and mental health disorders that might affect your mood, such as hypothyroidism, brain tumours, multiple sclerosis, bipolar illness, and borderline personality disorder.

Fortunately, you can address and stabilize your mood and enhance your emotional well-being by understanding what’s driving your mood fluctuations.

What Do Mood Swings Feel Like?

The majority of individuals have dynamic moods, which means that depending on their actions and the events around them, they may feel a variety of emotions and sentiments during the day. They may feel content and serene at start of the day, but when they encounter difficulties, they may soon become anxious or overwhelmed.

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Occasionally, mood swings might be a bit more intense. This might cause a sudden shift in your mood from pleased and cheerful to agitated, unhappy, or worried. This kind of mood swing might make you feel as if you’re riding a wave or on a roller coaster, since you can be really depressed one minute and on a high the next.

People encounter a broad variety of symptoms, a nd not everyone will experience the same things, depending on the underlying reason of their mood swings. People with mood disorders, for example, may have abrupt changes in mood that have an impact on their day-to-day functioning. Short-term stressful situations, however, may cause a brief shift in mood, albeit the symptoms won’t be as severe.

This is how it may feel if your Demystifying Mood Swings are more severe:

• Trouble focusing
• Guilt, worthlessness, or humiliation
• Abrupt shift in energy levels, either too high or low
• Racing thoughts
• Reduced quality of life
• Having trouble falling asleep
• Alterations in eating patterns
• Loss of enthusiasm for activities
• Encourage doing many things at once

Sometimes, having sudden mood swings may lead to suicidal or self-harming thoughts, particularly in those who have a mental illness. Though it might be difficult to feel these emotions, it’s crucial to remember that support is there if you need it.

Common Causes of Mood Swings

Multiple factors might lead to demystifying mood swings. Medications, underlying medical issues, stress, and lifestyle choices are some of the most frequent causes of mood swings.

Bipolar Disorder

Bipolar disorder is a mental health illness that manifests as sharp fluctuations in mood, energy, and the capacity to do daily chores. Given that this illness produces strong emotional states, it’s one of the most frequent reasons of abrupt mood changes.

Bipolar disorder, which has many subtypes including bipolar disorder I, bipolar disorder II, and cyclothymic disorder, affects 4.4% of people. Depending on how severe your mood swings are and how the disorder impacts your quality of life, you may determine your precise subtype.

Borderline Personality Disorder

Extreme variations in interests and sentiments toward other people, as well as significant demystifying mood swings, are common in persons with borderline personality disorder. For instance, you may, one day, feel really close to someone and, the next, harbour strong animosity or rage against them. Strong emotional suffering, erratic relationships, and abrupt mood swings are often the outcomes of this.

Depressive Disorders

Even though depression often results in a low or sad mood, it is nonetheless regarded as a mood disorder since individuals with depression also suffer other behavioural or emotional abnormalities. Depression may make you feel agitated, restless, and impulsive in addition to altering your thoughts, feelings, and behaviours.

In general, depression is among the most prevalent mental health issues, with at least 21 million adult Americans having had a severe depressive episode at some point in their lives.

Other Mental Health Conditions

Mood swings may also result from a wide range of other mental health issues, including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), schizophrenia, and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Bipolar illness and ADHD are often confused for one another due to the former’s tendency for increased psychomotor activity, rapid speaking, and lower sleep needs. Similar to bipolar illness, schizophrenia may also resemble it. The main distinction is that delusions and hallucinations are also experienced by those who have schizophrenia.

Lifestyle Habits

Habits have a big impact on your mood all day long. For instance, chronic mood swings might be brought on by drug usage, excessive coffee use, or inadequate sleep.

A drug use problem may bring excessive euphoria followed by severe melancholy, while sleep deprivation can make individuals easily agitated or aggressive.

Medical Conditions

Mood swings are often caused by underlying medical disorders such as multiple sclerosis, hypothyroidism, and brain tumours. Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), encephalitis (inflammation of the brain), influenza (flu), cancer, diabetes, syphilis, and dementia are further potential causes.

Studies indicate that managing a chronic illness has an impact on not only your physical well-being but also your mental and emotional state.

Medications

Manic or depressed feelings may be brought on by certain drugs, such as steroids and alpha-interferon, an injection used to treat some malignancies. While depressive symptoms might result in poor mood and diminished self-esteem, manic symptoms can seem as excessive enthusiasm or great vitality.Additionally, there is evidence linking the popular acne medicine Accutane (isotretinoin) to depression.

Discuss your symptoms and thoughts with your healthcare practitioner if you believe that your medication is influencing your mood. They may be able to alter your prescription or modify your dose.

Mood Swings in Males vs. Females

No matter what gender you are, mood swings usually appear the same. On the other hand, some items have a sex-specific effect on your mood. Think about the following:

• Male mood swings: Elevated mood and energy levels are symptoms of hypomania, a disorder that may be exacerbated by high testosterone levels. Depression, however, may result from low testosterone.Another disorder called hypogonadism, or the absence of certain sex hormones, may result in lethargy, irritability, weariness, diminished libido, dysphoria (a general sensation of dissatisfaction), and difficulty focusing.
• Female mood swings: Hormone changes brought on by menstrual cycles, menopause, and pregnancy might exacerbate demystifying mood swings. Premenstrual syndrome (PMS) affects around 90% of persons who have their period, and 5% of those who do suffer PMS also develop premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), a more severe type of PMS that results in even more extreme mood swings.In addition to menopause, pregnancy may also result in mood fluctuations including excessive irritation or uncontrollably sobbing.

How To Manage Mood Swings

You have control over your mood fluctuations, regardless of their underlying reason. The first step in controlling mood swings is adhering to your treatment plan if you have an underlying mental health or physical health problem that is driving your symptoms. Additional management techniques consist of:

• Using methods of relaxation to help you centre your mood, such as breathing exercises or visualization
• practicing yoga, meditation, and mindfulness to promote serenity
• Try cognitive restructuring, a technique that may assist you in altering your thoughts and emotions in response to stressful circumstances.
• Maintaining a mood diary in which you record shifts in your emotions or triggers
• Finding optimism or humour in difficult circumstances
• Giving yourself some space or a change of environment to temporarily distance yourself from the issue
• Getting help from your loved ones during a period of mood swings

When to Contact a Healthcare Provider

Making lifestyle adjustments like increasing sleep, eating nutrient-dense meals throughout the day, and lowering stress levels may sometimes help with demystifying mood swings. In other cases, an underlying problem such as a prescription side effect or medical condition is the source of your symptoms. See your doctor if you have persistent mood swings that last longer than two weeks. Additionally, if you sense a problem, there’s nothing wrong with seeing a healthcare professional sooner.

At some time in their life, an estimated 21.4% of persons will suffer from a mood illness.Seeing a mental health professional might be beneficial if you’re exhibiting signs such as:

• Significant mood swings or enduring depressive or exuberant emotions
• Racing thoughts
• Difficulty concentrating, reckless behavior
• Thoughts of death
• A loss of interest in activities.

A mental health expert can assist in identifying the underlying cause of your symptoms and creating a treatment strategy to help you achieve emotional stability.

Your mood swings’ underlying cause will determine how best to treat them. Medication or counselling may be helpful if a mental health issue is causing mood swings. Changing your prescription, modifying your dose, or using other therapy may help alleviate mood swings caused by certain drugs or an underlying medical issue.

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Tips for Preventing Mood Swings

Although dealing with mood swings may be difficult, sometimes they’re a necessary part of life. Although seeking therapy for your mood swings is an excellent approach to enhance your mental well-being, you can also attempt preventative measures like:

• Getting enough rest
• Cutting down on screen time before night
• Physical activities like hiking, yoga, walking, or sports
• Eating wholesome meals throughout the day at the proper times
• Consuming enough water
• Reducing your use of coffee and alcohol
• Gratitude exercises might help you maintain your attention on the good things in your life.
• Spending time with family and friends might help you feel more grounded and less anxious.
• Saying “no” to chances, people, and activities that make you anxious or exhausted

Conclusion

A mood swing is a sudden, dramatic shift in your emotional state. It may happen to you quickly, going from feeling joyful, at ease, or satisfied to unhappy, agitated, or furious. Certain mood swings are typical reactions.

It’s probably time to see a healthcare professional, however, if your mood swings cause problems in your day-to-day activities or have a detrimental effect on your quality of life.

Mood swings may be caused by underlying medical disorders, certain drugs, hormone variations, and lifestyle choices. Fortunately, you can control your mood and enhance your emotional well-being with preventative measures like exercising and making sleep a priority, as well as treatment alternatives like counselling or medication.