Although dysthymia isn’t a very well know mental illness it is just as important as the other more common ones. With only 35 million people suffering from dysthymia compared to depressions 350 million victims, the majority of people don’t take much notice to dysthymia or the problems that it can cause. And the people that do happen to know about it usually can’t distinguish it from depression or they haven’t taken the time to really learn about it. Dysthymia (also known as chronic depression) is defined as a milder, albeit much longer, version of depression. To meet the criteria of having dysthymia the person must have had a “down in the dumps” feeling for at least two years or one year for children and adolescence. This feeling is usually
