8. Helps treat depression
While we’re all familiar with feeling down and not being interested in doing much, when this feeling starts to interfere with our lives in a big way, it might be classed as depression. Depression, anxiety, and stress affect millions of people the world over. In fact, the World Health Organisation (WHO) says that depression is the world’s most common illness and the leading cause of debility around the globe.
The organization estimate that around 350 million people are affected by depression and America is far from immune. In fact, the CDC has said that 7.6 % of people over the age of 12 experience depression in any 2-week period. Women appear to suffer from depression more than men, but the reasons for this are not fully understood. Scientists do not yet know what the causes of depression are, but they are likely to be a mixture of psychosocial, biological, genetic and environmental factors.
The symptoms of depression are many and varied. Obviously, they include a depressed mood, but also a lack of pleasure in things that the person once enjoyed. There is often a loss of sexual desire, and perhaps unintentional weight loss or lack of appetite. Occasionally, the opposite will occur, and the person will overeat. A person suffering from depression will often suffer from insomnia or its opposite, hypersomnia, where they sleep too much. They might also be agitated or restless and might pace up and down. In contrast to an agitated state, they might display psychomotor retardation, in which they move and speak slowly, and appear low in energy.
There might be feelings of worthlessness or guilt, inability to concentrate or make decisions, and recurring thoughts or attempts at suicide and death. The good news is that for mild depression, banana flowers might help because of their high magnesium content. And there are no nasty side-effects!