Several issues of importance in assessing women’s vulnerability to the onset and recurrence of depression are illustrated here. These include first onset in puberty and young adulthood, premenstrual syndrome (PMS), and menstrual magnification as harbingers of future episodes or incomplete recovery states from prior episodes of depression. There are two periods of especially high vulnerability for first episodes of depression or for recurrence if a woman has already experienced an episode, namely, the postpartum period and the perimenopausal period. (ERT: estrogen replacement therapy.) Risk of depression is greater for women than men starting in adolescence and persisting throughout adulthood. What you can now understand and appreciate is that because of the changes and shifts in the female life cycle, those also seem to increase the risk or rates of depression.