YawningAnus said:
I think it is funny that through your entire post you refer to mental disorders as if they are a biologically caused malady.
You act as if depression or any "emotional disability" is some extrinsic disease that you can catch or be born with.....
I believe that the majority of people who are labeled as "mentally ill" don't need medication and could probably benefit greatly from a life-style change, but that doesn't mean the problem can't be biological.
Your logic is binary; All or nothing; But life isn't that simple. It's true that anybody who reads the symptoms for depression will agree that they have it to some degree, but when the depression is severely impacting your life, it's a problem that needs to be addressed.
I thought I made it clear in the OP that by "addressed" I mean that it should be handled in whatever way works for the patient. If the dude is severely depressed but finds falling in love, trying LSD, meditating, seeing Fight Club or just going out to meet new people have helped him - GREAT! This dude doesn't need medication.
But what if the dude can't fix his problem? He has exhausted every route, or he's just so out of it that he can't even exercise for a week and the only thing everybody tells him is that he's depressed cause his life sucks. Now he is reluctant to take medication, but now what?
To me, you sound like you're saying "those that can fix their life on their own deserve to survive, and those that must resort to medication should be left to die off."
My view on mental illness changed radically when I went to visit my mom at a Mental Ward. Try going to one and telling the patients there that their problem isn't biological. The point is that it doesn't matter whether the problem is biological, or just due to having a shitty job. Everybody deserves a high quality of life.
Obviously, being med-free is better than being on meds, but being med-free, chronically fatigued, unable to concentrate in school or hold down a job, and being unable to socializ is far worse than taking a pill a day, experiencing a headache or diarrhea/constipation once in awhile, but being able to function at your optimal level.
Everyone accepts the fact that humans may be born with physical defects, but if the patient can walk and talk, his brain (WAY more complicated than the body) must be working 100% correctly. How do you make sense of this? I think you fail to see that many of our emotions and what drives our daily actions is actually beyond our control.
We also know of many infections that can greatly alter our cognitive abilities, judgment and thinking. Read up on Phineas Gage.
We know a lot about neurotransmitters and the brain. The more we learn, the more we realize how much stuff is biological - and is it surprising to those of us who aren't religious?
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Dopamine
Dopamine in the thinking areas of the brain might be considered the neurotransmitter of focus and attending. Low levels impair our ability to focus on our environment or to "lock on" to tasks, activities, or conversations. Low levels of Dopamine make concentration and focus very difficult with low levels also associated with Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). On the other end of the Dopamine dipstick, as Dopamine levels in the brain begin to raise, we become excited/energized, then suspicious and paranoid, then finally hyperstimulated by our environment. With low levels of Dopamine, we can't focus while with high levels of Dopamine our focus becomes narrowed and intense to the point of focusing on everything in our environment as though it were directly related to our situation.
Known as an "idea of reference" in psychiatry, we begin thinking unrelated experiences are suddenly directly related to us. People observed talking across the street are now talking about us. As Dopamine increases, it can become so intense that we feel the radio, television, and newspaper contain secret messages directed at us from Hollywood or elsewhere. It's as though we are attempting to incorporate/add everything we witness into our life. Planes flying overhead are snapping pictures of us and motorists talking on cellular phones are calling in a report on us. Our mind speed increases and races in an attempt to add all we see into our life. In an attempt to make sense, we may become extremely religious, paranoid, or feel we are a very important person. Increased Dopamine also increases the perception of our senses, as though turning up the volume in all our senses ¿ hearing, vision, taste, smell, and touch.
Norepinephrine
Low levels of norepinephrine are associated with a loss of alertness, poor memory, and depression. Norepinephrine appears to be the neurotransmitter of "arousal" and for that reason, lower-than-normal levels of this neurotransmitter produce below-average levels of arousal and interest, a symptom found in several psychiatric conditions including depression and ADHD. It is for this reason that medications for depression and ADHD often target both dopamine and norepinephrine in an attempt to restore both to normal level.
Serotonin
When Serotonin is low, we experience problems with concentration and attention. We become scatterbrained and poorly organized. Routine responsibilities now seem overwhelming. It takes longer to do things because of poor planning. We lose our car keys and put odd things in the refrigerator. We call people and forget why we called or go to the grocery and forget what we needed. We tell people the same thing two or three times.
Like all neurotransmitters, we can have too much Serotonin. While elevated levels of Serotonin produce a sense of well-being, bliss, and "oneness with the universe"
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Quote:
All drugs will do is mask the problem.... and of course that is most peoples biggest argument FOR the use of psychopharmaceuticals... because it can make the symptoms (of not enjoying your own life) go away long enough for you to "fix" these problems.... but why do you need to when you have a pill that makes all your worries go away?
Then the day comes where you are addicted to that pill, mentally, physically and emotionally, and you realize that you need to get off of it.... then how easy will it be to "fix" your problems as you fight withdrawl?
There's no withdrawal if you gradually taper off the meds. But you bring up an interesting point. This now becomes more of an ethical issue:
What's wrong with remaining on meds forever? Some people don't mind. People take drugs forever for their physical problems anyway. Shouldn't this be the person's choice?
Should "healthy" people be allowed to take Ritalin, SSRIs, SNRIs, etc? Nowadays, many people do.
It's important to keep in mind that almost everybody experiences depression once in awhile, and especially during puberty and when getting old. This is absolutely normal and part of growing up/life. This isn't something that should be medicated. My post was aimed at the people who have wasted 5 years looking for "alternative medicine" to their problems AND haven't found anything. And yet remain reluctant to try modern medicine simply due to the negative stigma. These people are suffering.
If you DO have a chemical imbalance, the drugs make you NORMAL. They let you feel emotions and actually live life. Exercise, meditation, food, sex, relationships, other humans, hobbies all become enjoyable again. If you don't have a chemical imbalance, then you will likely feel drugged up and shouldn't take drugs.
Quote:
The closest thing I could acknowledge as "should" without falling from the area of common sense is what's natural.
And from what I know, feeling depressed is as natural as it gets.
Feeling depressed for a reason is natural. You shouldn't take Paxil just because your GF left you, and meds aren't prescribed for those situations anyway, unless the patient isn't getting help from CBT/ERP/other forms of therapy.
There is no "should" or "natural" way to live life. I've visited religious countries and they all drilled it into my head that unless you pray on a regular basis and do a dozen rituals a day, you don't deserve to be happy or content. These people believe that unless you follow their religion, your not living life as you should be and you're wasting your time.
This same attitude exists about mental illness and drugs (as well as illegal drugs). Some people feel that being happy 24/7 is a bad thing. They fail to see that other people wouldn't mind a life like this. Others don't mind living a life that to us seems miserable. I know 30 year olds who stay home all day, have very little friends, have never gotten laid and spend all day at work talking to me about how society is stupid and how they're so much more intelligent than the rest of us. And they're perfectly content. They'd never use any drug and they don't want to change. And that's fine. It's their life and they don't need to conform to anybody's standards.
Quote:
Depression happens because we refuse to face our problems and from a simple momentarily state of denial and delusion, the situation can intensify really fast and we get to have schizophrenic or bipolar or god knows what else manifestations.
Some people experience depression because they are delusional, yes, but not all depression is caused by this. I've done years of research on schizophrenia and anxiety disorders. We don't know what causes schizophrenia at this moment, but we do know that these are beyond the control of the patient. Schizophrenia shouldn't be compared to a drug trip - the episodes don't teach you anything, and it causes physical brain damage over time. Schizophrenia and Bipolar are SERIOUS conditions and should not be undermined.
(the paragraphs on neurotransmitters is from http://www.enotalone.com/article/4115.html )
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