But what if antidepressants increase the rate of youth suicide?
The article you link to was published in 2006. They’ve done further research since then. My understanding is that antidepressants usually give people energy firs,t and they don’t start feeling better until a few days or weeks into the treatment. In severely depressed people apathy can be the only thing standing between them and suicide, so when they get the initial energy spurt from antidepressants it’s just enough to push them over the edge. They don’t make non-suicidal people suddenly decide to go blow their brains out, and education and careful observation can help prevent the suicidally inclined from acting on it during the transition.
And it’s still one of those damned if you do, damned if you don’t kinds of things. What’s worse, the risk of suicide when starting antidepressants, or leaving the depression untreated? It’s got to be handled on a case by case basis.
When I started taking SSRI antidepressants, they told me that it would take about a month before I’d see any effects.
(I’m not on SSRIs anymore–they were not the right match for me.)
What about tryptophan and vitamin b6 as a natural alternative?
Well, as someone with a family member who badly needed anti-depressants and didn’t get them because of parents who bought into this philosophy, I’m going to say that no, these drugs should not be limited to adults and said family member would probably be in a much better place right now if he’d had access to them before he turned 18. Maybe they are bad for the developing adolescent brain, but I can’t imagine that alcohol, pot, shrooms, and cocaine are any better.
Everyone’s body chemistry is so different, it’s impossible to make a blanket decision on who should or shouldn’t be allowed antidipressants. Plus, many of the same medications used to treat things like depression and bipolar are also used as anticonvulsants. You’d have to decide carefully whether those were still allowed or if the kids having seizures would just be SOL because of a blanket recommendation on antidepressants/antibipolar meds.
I was told it’d be two weeks, but in practice I’ve always felt the difference within two or three days. It seems to vary widely. I didn’t notice energy coming before mood improvement either, but I also wasn’t near-suicidal at the time.
After seeing a TV ad for an antidepressant with the warning that it caused suicidal thoughts among adolescents and young adults, I was hoping to find some explanation for why this seemingly contradictory situation would be true. I thought someone on the SDMB would have answered the question by now, but this is all I found with no citation or anything. Does anyone know if there is scientific support for this narrative?