Life Stressors
and Transitions

Distress after a major life change is not pathology. Most people adapt, and treating an ordinary reaction as an illness does harm of its own — it medicalizes a normal process and can start a medication that's hard to stop. The opposite error is just as real: a genuine depressive episode gets waved off as understandable because there's an obvious reason for it, and goes untreated for a year.

Adjustment disorder occupies the space between. It describes symptoms that begin within three months of an identifiable stressor, exceed what the situation would ordinarily produce, and impair work, relationships, or daily function. It's also inherently time-limited: symptoms typically resolve within six months of the stressor ending. That shape should be reflected in the treatment plan, which is why care here is designed to end.

Grief deserves particular care. Grief itself is not a disorder and doesn't follow a schedule. But DSM-5-TR added prolonged grief disorder in March 2022, placed in the trauma- and stressor-related chapter, requiring that at least twelve months have passed since the death for adults — six months for children and adolescents — with persistent intense yearning or preoccupation plus at least three of eight further symptoms, including identity disruption, avoidance of reminders, and a diminished sense of meaning. That twelve-month threshold exists precisely so that ordinary grief isn't pathologized.

Several other conditions present after a stressor and need excluding: major depression, PTSD following a traumatic event rather than a difficult one, an anxiety disorder that predates the transition, and a rise in alcohol use that started as coping. Retirement and late-life transitions carry their own considerations, including social contraction and the medical contributors that become more common with age.

Dr. Farkas brings MD/PhD neuroscience training, NIH research center experience, and board-certified psychiatric practice to that judgment. Her 30–60 minute evaluations determine what is actually present — including when the answer is that no diagnosis applies and no medication is indicated.

A new patient evaluation with Dr. Farkas runs 30–60 minutes. It covers what changed and when, how you were before it, what's affected now, what support you have, your psychiatric and medical history, and every medication tried.

You'll leave knowing whether a diagnosis applies, what would help most, and roughly how long it should take — including when the honest answer is that this is adaptation and doesn't need treating. Telehealth is available throughout South Carolina and New York. In-person appointments are available at the Bluffton, SC office.