rience depression as the result of pressures and failures in college or in work, or "depression may follow pregnancy and childbirth . . . Postpartum depressions vary widely in intensity and duration" (Irwin 5).
Middle age sees the rise in depression from earlier periods in life: "Infected with the familiar 'middle-age syndrome,' people see their youth fading, their emotional and physical reserves being depleted. Men get bald and paunchy, their virility wanes." For both men and women in middle age, life may bring loneliness and aimlessness when children are grown and leave home. As the retirement years approach, with yet another change in one's place and purpose in life, depression becomes a common phenomenon" (Irwin 6).
The aged are especially vulnerable to depression: "Loss of physical strength and flexibility, adjusting
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