Dr James Le Fanu: 4 October
In this modern, secular age the pursuit of happiness has become, for many, the main purpose of life – but it can be surprisingly elusive. Indeed, Edward Diener, Professor of Psychology (who studies happiness or, as he prefers to call it, ‘subjective wellbeing’) at the University of Illinois, observes that the belief one should be happy is itself (if paradoxically) a common source of unhappiness.
It is, he maintains, quite unrealistic to ‘wish to be constantly on the edge of joyfulness the whole time’. Those who are, or claim to be, permanently or chronically happy are invariably mentally deranged – refusing to acknowledge past errors and consistently overestimating their own achievements.
This relentless optimism is strongly suggestive of the mania (as bipolar disorder) that the essayist Charles Lamb described to his friend, the poet Coleridge: ‘I look back on those days now with a gloomy kind of envy, for while it lasted I had many hours of the purest happiness.’
The capacity or predisposition to be happy – where appropriate – is a di erent matter, being central to the quality of people’s lives. Here Professor Diener – in his researches in many countries – has identi ed the two main contributory factors: having enough money and living in a stable democracy.
In the developed world, this makes the Scandinavians the happiest, and the citizens of former communist countries the least happy.
He has found, too, the rewards are considerable for those with this capacity for happiness. ‘Their marriages are much more likely to last and they are more likely to be successful in their jobs.’
All the more reason, then, to feel sympathy for those who lack this capacity – a condition known as anhedonia, literally ‘without pleasure’.
This is usually a feature of a depressive illness but can, especially in the middle years, be an isolated complaint.
From the outside the lives of those a ected may appear to be entirely satisfactory and, if asked, they will deny feeling miserable, but they lack the ability to find everyday pleasure in the small things of life. This may sometimes be helped by appropriate medication but, when associated with the menopause, may be due to declining hormone levels – correctable with hormone replacement therapy.
In men, the male sex hormone testosterone, it is claimed, can be bene cial.
This week’s medical query comes courtesy of a lady from Essex who, during a recent spell of hot weather, experienced for the rst time in her life ‘what I can only presume must be the itchy rash of prickly heat’. She assumed it would go when the weather cooled but is still waking in the morning with itchy skin on the side she has been lying on. ‘I am ba ed,’ she writes. ‘What is it and is it likely to just go?’
These symptoms are strongly suggestive of the condition physical urticaria, where ‘physical’ stressors such as heat or pressure can cause an extremely itchy, blistering rash. This is brought on, for reasons unknown, by the release of the chemical histamine from specialised ‘mast’ cells in the skin. Antihistamines are the appropriate (and very e ective) treatment.
Email drjames@lady.co.uk
It is, he maintains, quite unrealistic to ‘wish to be constantly on the edge of joyfulness the whole time’. Those who are, or claim to be, permanently or chronically happy are invariably mentally deranged – refusing to acknowledge past errors and consistently overestimating their own achievements.
This relentless optimism is strongly suggestive of the mania (as bipolar disorder) that the essayist Charles Lamb described to his friend, the poet Coleridge: ‘I look back on those days now with a gloomy kind of envy, for while it lasted I had many hours of the purest happiness.’
The capacity or predisposition to be happy – where appropriate – is a di erent matter, being central to the quality of people’s lives. Here Professor Diener – in his researches in many countries – has identi ed the two main contributory factors: having enough money and living in a stable democracy.
In the developed world, this makes the Scandinavians the happiest, and the citizens of former communist countries the least happy.
He has found, too, the rewards are considerable for those with this capacity for happiness. ‘Their marriages are much more likely to last and they are more likely to be successful in their jobs.’
All the more reason, then, to feel sympathy for those who lack this capacity – a condition known as anhedonia, literally ‘without pleasure’.
This is usually a feature of a depressive illness but can, especially in the middle years, be an isolated complaint.
From the outside the lives of those a ected may appear to be entirely satisfactory and, if asked, they will deny feeling miserable, but they lack the ability to find everyday pleasure in the small things of life. This may sometimes be helped by appropriate medication but, when associated with the menopause, may be due to declining hormone levels – correctable with hormone replacement therapy.
In men, the male sex hormone testosterone, it is claimed, can be bene cial.
This week’s medical query comes courtesy of a lady from Essex who, during a recent spell of hot weather, experienced for the rst time in her life ‘what I can only presume must be the itchy rash of prickly heat’. She assumed it would go when the weather cooled but is still waking in the morning with itchy skin on the side she has been lying on. ‘I am ba ed,’ she writes. ‘What is it and is it likely to just go?’
These symptoms are strongly suggestive of the condition physical urticaria, where ‘physical’ stressors such as heat or pressure can cause an extremely itchy, blistering rash. This is brought on, for reasons unknown, by the release of the chemical histamine from specialised ‘mast’ cells in the skin. Antihistamines are the appropriate (and very e ective) treatment.
Email drjames@lady.co.uk