Is It Just the COVID-19 Blues or Is It Depression?

January 27, 2021. Dr. Dimitriu was published in Psychology Today in an article titled: “Is It Just the COVID-19 Blues or Is It Depression?”

“Don’t wish it away. Don’t look at it like it’s forever. Between you and me, I could honestly say that things can only get better.”

These words from Elton John’s song “I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues” may be good advice for many of us who have become a bit stir crazy after being cooped up at home for months, compliments of the unrelenting COVID-19 viral pandemic. But what exactly are “the blues?” Do they constitute a mental health disease – like anxiety disorder or clinical depression — requiring professional therapy? Or do those feelings of sadness, loneliness, anxiousness, pessimism, and melancholy ascribed to “the blues” represent simply a transitory “psychological state of mind,” in this case, one effected by the confinement, social isolation, and repetitive daily sameness wrought by the virus?

Click HERE for the full article.