"If you lost an arm or go blind, that is devastating. But medication is not the answer in those case, yet invariably meds are pushed on to anyone who has any crisis. "
This is probably an overgeneralization - it may not be automatically needed by everyone in this situation, but some people would certainly find themselves in a clincal depression following a similar event, and meds might help them a great deal.
I think we’re just going to have to agree to disagree. From my own personal experience, I’ve had it with medication. And that includes my own experience, as well as seeing my friends. From my own experience, this is how it works: You are put on a medicine, say Zoloft at 100. It takes months to start working, but let’s increase it anyway. And add some adjuncts to it. When you finally start feeling better, you’re on five different meds at very high doses. You have a bad day sometime, just add another adjunct.
Also, there are serious side effects associated with these meds. Besides a hundred years ago, a 90 year old widower who lost his wife would eventually come to terms with the death of his wife of sixty years. Today, they’re on Zoloft, Prozac, Remeron, Haldol . . .. and guess what? When they die themselves seven years later, they’re still depressed. I’ve known many people in my family who fit this description.
And as for ECT, I met more than one person in the hospital who couldn’t remember their social security numbers after having that wonderful treatment. I’m not taking Tom Cruise’s side but if some shrink tells me or someone I love to have my brain zapped with electricity because it may help me (probably just placebo), I’ll tell them where they can connect those electrodes (and it won’t be on my skull).
Again, I’m not saying psychiatry is a scam, but it’s seriously flawed. More therapy, less medication, I say.
Can I ask why you didn’t do that? It sounds like you should have.
I continue to be mystified when people say things like this. Even if you choose to go into therapy, you have to choose to see a psychotherapist or you’re not going to get any medication prescribed to you. As far as I know, other types of counselors like social workers can’t prescribe medication. And the concept of prescribing medication to people who are going through crises is that medication may help if their reactions are out of proportion to what has happened and if those reactions are disabling. That’s not to say that’s what always happens, but that’s not the same as prescribing medication to anyone who goes through a crisis or tragedy.
My undergraduate major was psychology.* Does this mean schizophrenia is learned? Since I didn’t pursue psychology in graduate school, does this mean I just have a mild case? Do you get different kinds of schizophrenia if you went to med school and specialized in psychiatry versus attending a non-medical school and studying psychology? By continuing to read books on the subject, am I reinforcing or shaping my schizophrenia? And since it causes a mental illness, should there be restrictions on the study of psychology or the pursuit of psychology-related information? It seems rather reckless for our public schools, libraries, and bookstores to offer such things…
- In school, I learned that schizophrenia usually develops in the late teens or early twenties. This is also the age where undergraduates declare their majors and eventually graduate. Coincidence? I think not!
I don’t understand the “they push meds on you!” cry either. I’ve been to multiple psychiatrists and I currently see a psychotherapist. At no time have they forced me to do anything I didn’t want. No one has ever threatened to withdraw their services if I didn’t take any particular med.
I have argued with some of them, yes. But I was always able to walk out of the door and decide whether or not to fill a prescription. If a med has been too disagreeable to me, I have always stopped taking it. And no one has ever made me feel bad about my choices. Perhaps I am just lucky.
Seems to me that if you make the decision to go to a psychiatrist, you are making the decision that you are at least open to medication. If you are that adamantly against medication (and hopefully your health plan will allow you to make a choice), then go to a psychologist or a clinical social worker. There are plenty who will not even utter the word “medication”.
It’s funny that psychotherapy is being encouraged here. I agree that it is a good alternative (or adjunct), but the same criticisms levied against psychiatrists can be applied to psychologists. They overdiagnose. They push therapy on you. They don’t know what they are doing and make shit up. They throw anything at you and hope it sticks. They make things worse. They are all crazy. So if both psychology and psychiatry are so awful, why do so many people find them so helpful? And what are unwell people supposed to do? Join a gym and sweat out the neuroticism? Join a church to exorcise the demons? What’s the solution?
Because I was a 20 year old kid who didn’t understand why I was so anxious and this dude with a medical degree was telling me there was this magic little pill that would make it all better. That’s why. I’ve learned a lot in twenty years and most of that is that medication is a placebo – a placebo that makes you fat, ruins your teeth, and takes away your sex drive. It’s like when in the old days your television didn’t work and you banged on it. Maybe it’ll work. Maybe it won’t.
Reading this thread has bordered on surreal at times. LOL!
I respect most opinions, but to say that all psychiatrists are mentally ill is pretty silly. Okay, it’s outright silly, but I am treading lightly (or trying to).
First of all the rationale throughout this thread seems to mix symptoms and conditions with illness. I also think there has been some confusion between psychology and psychiatry. Do we as a society tend to over diagnose stuff? Yeah probably. Do we over prescribe medication? Yeah, definitely. According to a piece of software I use daily, I am not suppose to monitor and manipulate my caloric intake AT ALL without medical advice from a doctor. Really? Aren’t I doing that (whether intelligently or not) every day? Should I call a doctor before I order dinner? We’ve become hyper dependent on “medical professionals” to be sure, but one shouldn’t confuse occasional laziness, fear, and / or opportunism as “illness”. Also, we have become a litigious society to be sure and that contributes to much of this. Now if you want to accuse all lawyers of being mentally ill, you may have more evidence and A LOT more fun with this discussion. 
When I say it was pushed on me, I don’t mean anyone was holding my mouth open and throwing medication down my throat into a funnel. But when they have a degree on the wall and they think they know what you’re doing, and you feel like garbage, and the option they throw at you is medication, how can that be my fault if I, or anyone, get suckered into it. No one ever offered me therapy. But that’s because of the way the health system is structured in this country. The only good therapies I have found are those that don’t take insurance or are experimental therapies where you might be in the control group. My point with it being forced on you is that it’s really the only option that they give you. It’s either take the meds or go to another doctor, who will push meds onto you.
And when it comes to being hospitalized, they do force it on you. When it’s time to take a pill, if you don’t show up at the nurse’s station, they’ll come find you.
Tony, I guess I do see how–if you don’t have any other options–it can seem like drugs are the only way to go.
In an ideal world, a person would have access to both therapy and meds if they wanted them.
But mental health isn’t the only area that’s lacking in this way. Although some aspects of alternative medicine are gaining respect, like chiropractors and acupuncture, a lot of health plans don’t provide coverage for them. I don’t see this as an indictment against traditional medicine, though. But rather, it underscores need to expand medical services in health plans.
Wait a minute, you’re roughly my age?(I’m 38). I assumed you had suffered under an earlier stage of the mental health field. I’ve been on meds since the third grade. I WANTED to stay on Ritalin because it helped me sit still and concentrate. Nothing else did. When I started having problems with depression (oh the eighth grade or so) I never let a doctor force pills on me. I always asked about side effects. I always read the little inserts that came with the pills. If a psychiatrist wasn’t listening to me, I insisted to my parents that we find a new one.
I’m not suggesting I was some kind of superkid. Doing all that is normal. I can’t comprehend your story.
If Hentor the Barbarian were a member he wouldn’t have to hear those voices telling him to buy natural Viagra or whatever the ads are selling.
I spend eight bucks a month on generic Prozac off Target’s $4 menu. Nobody’s making money off me.
I can admit that psych wards are hellish pits, little removed from Bedlam itself. The other patients tended to be annoying, and there was one I was going to kill if I hadn’t gotten myself released in time. The common TV was tightly regulated by the nurses and majority rule, so about all we could watch was basketball and hockey. Even The Simpsons was forbidden because it used rough language and might rile up the patients. Odd, since in Chicago nothing riles up folks like the Bulls and Blackhawks. The common phone was only available for an hour a day, but that was okay because I hate talking on the phone. (Yes, I tend to have jobs where I’m on the phone all day, but they’re paying me. Big difference.) And the food? I lived on fruit salad, lime Jello, and English muffins, mostly because I could happily subsist on fruit salad, lime Jello, and English muffins and everything else looked gakky. But worst of all is that I could only get decaf! How the hell is a suicidal nut who is also drying out supposed to get better without proper coffee? Thank God AA had coffee when I got out.
Yes, medical services need to be expanded. It’s a pity. I think that goal-oriented, time-specific therapies would be ideal for anxiety and depression. (In fact, I’ve read somewhere, but not in depth, that in Scandinavian countries, therapy is the first course for people with schizophrenia.) But that’s not the way it works. I know people who have been in therapy (one on one or group) for close to ten years. It becomes just a thing to do. Could you imagine getting a cavity and going to the dentist for ten years to treat it?
As far as this debate goes, I’m certainly not taking the “psychiatry is a sham” opinion by any means. I may even be dead wrong. Maybe in six months I’ll be so depressed that I’ll regret ever stopping the meds. I don’t really know. Psychiatry is a work in progress but we still don’t understand the brain enough to know exactly why there is mental illness or how meds work (or don’t work). From my own personal experience, I just feel meds should be a last resort rather than a first resort.
In the past couple of years, I’ve gone from stopping my meds cold turkey (not a smart idea) because I was sick of the side effects, going into a deep depression (maybe from withdrawal, maybe from lack of meds?), to going to the hospital, and then hooking up with a doctor who insisted I go on Abilify or I’d shoot up a movie theater. After a while, I dumped her and had to find another doctor who could prescribe me meds. It was hard to do. I don’t have great insurance and every clinic I had been to was lacking in many ways. (The therapists were downright awful.) I asked myself if I really need medication and, after a long, scary bit of reflection and research, I determined that maybe I don’t. Maybe I don’t. I could be completely wrong but after some reading, and considering my past and going over past journal entries (I’ve kept a very in-depth journal for most of my life), I determined that I could possibly survive off of medication. If I’m wrong, I’m doomed to severe depression again, which is no fun. But if I’m right, then I can free myself of some bad experiences with psychiatrists. (And this is my own personal experience. I know there are many very good practitioners but with limited money and insurance, it’s hard to get a hold of them.) There’s condescension, for one thing (even people in the profession don’t understand that depression and mental retardation are not the same thing).
So I’m somewhat invested in this opinion against medication right now. Let’s see where I am a year or two years from now. I could relapse badly and have no leg to stand on, or I could do well, through therapeutic techniques, and wonder if others might not be as successful in overcoming mental illness without chemicals.
Let me ask you a question, if I may, DocCathode: About your depression in the 8th grade, what was done about it? What meds did you take (if any) and how long did it last?
My mother is riddled with arthritis. As long as I’ve known her, she has been in severe pain. Can’t hardly bat an eye without wincing. When it’s really bad, all she can do is take pain meds and steroids and pray.
Has modern medicine failed her? Well, maybe. We don’t know how bad she’d be without modern medicine, but things could certainly be better. But is she being scammed by her doctors? Is the medical profession clueless when it comes to arthritis? No. It’s just that in her case, she’s got an intractable disease.
Some people have to take insulin for the rest of their lives. Other folks have to get regular chiropractic ministrations for years on end. And then some people, perhaps those who hear voices constantly or plunge into despair during every full moon, take advantage of long-term supportive therapy. As long as they can afford to pay their bills and they are getting something meaningful out of it, there’s nothing sad or pathetic about it. It is what it is.
It lasted several months. Eventually, I was committed. If memory serves, I was put on a trilafon and tofranil. They helped for a few months. Then, I had to find a new combination of drugs.
No one is denying that there is memory loss from ECT. We’re disputing Matt357’s claim that memory loss is the primary intended effect of ECT.
You may find more agreement here than you expected, primarily because you’re presenting your opinion in a moderate, balanced, and sensible fashion. I think psychiatry is flawed, but mostly because it’s a science still in its infancy. There is simply too much that no one knows.
Meds sometimes seem to do some good – this encourages their use. But everyone is different in how they react to the meds, and this makes their use very hard to assess.
The Prozac family seems to have good results in treating extreme forms of obsessional/compulsive disorders. (One wonders if they might have done Howard Hughes some good…)
Mental health has the same challenges other types of health care has. The desire to help others is greater that our current knowledge is and it will always be that way. Unfortunately that also means that some attempts which are less effective (e.g. talk therapy/homeopathy and “CAM”) are used far longer than any reality belief that they are useful has passed.
You have some mental health therapies which have actually passed clinical trials. E.G. For anxiety CBT as about an 85% success rate. Vs. talk therapy which does nothing to help but hey…some people just like having a friend to talk to each week.
The funny part about the OP is the main issue is a lack of access to qualified doctors and that medications tend to be good 'Treatments" for conditions.
But the part that the OP just plainly ignores is that while everyone may feel sad or maybe a little anxious not everyone does to the point where it effects their ability to live a functional life.
But hey…people like to just discount even physical ailments when they don’t see obvious external indications.
If you won’t read my link, why should I read yours? Actually, I did; indeed, I’ve read all of them. But if you won’t read mine, there’s nothing to discuss. Evidently this is a witnessing thread, not a debate. Not very interesting to me, as I know more about the subject than do you (especially the legal issues). I had no illusion I would change your mind, but I thought it possible you would see that the problem is more complicated than you realize. Apparently not. So it goes. Have a nice thread. I’m done.
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But the part that the OP just plainly ignores is that while everyone may feel sad or maybe a little anxious not everyone does to the point where it effects their ability to live a functional life.
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The difference is some people have very poor coping skills.
How are people supposed to make their coping skills better? I’ll suggest two options: therapy and - in severe cases, with all the appropriate warnings and careful consideration - medication.