Depression Options

[*disco infiltrator*]

A couple of days ago on Channel One, there was a segment on growing cases of depression in teens. They showed many examples of teens who had been diagnosed as "clinically depressed", "depressed", or "mildly depressed", and went through the symptoms of depression and behaviors commonly linked with depression. The segment poured a can of gasoline on the part of my brain that controls anger and the teens presented in the segment all contributed to lighting the spark.

Depression is not a disease. More often than not, it is brought on by a traumatic or life-changing experience that the person is unable to cope with. Even if nothing terribly awful has happened to a person, they can still be upset about something, or just be changing their views and opinions on life. Being a teenager is a tough time for anyone. Some have issues with even existing.

Some of the symptoms they discussed on the segment were irritability, antisocial behavior, a lack of motivation, a change in grades, and an unwillingness to participate in activities one once enjoyed. These are all absolutely normal occurrences in a teenager's life. I know that I, myself, have been exhibiting a large amount of antisocial behavior lately, simply because I am becoming more and more critical of human nature and do not enjoy spending time with many people. That does not correlate to depression. The bounds of normality seem to be rapidly imploding in our world and the desperation for everything to be happy and good is getting tiresome.

When one thinks of diagnosing people with mental disorders such as depression or bipolar disorder, one must think of prime examples of the destruction that such a thing can cause. Brave New World is a wonderful literary example of this and it was written 40 or so years ago (maybe even 50, I'm not clear on the date of publication). People are supposed to feel sadness and anger, fatigue and doubt. Feeling these emotions and overcoming the effect they have is a large sign of maturity. It's OK to feel sad; the problem comes when one cannot move on from the sadness. But, even if the person is having trouble, there is no call to put the person on medication to make them feel better. They need to cope with sadness, loss, and disappointment in order to grow.

Everyone needs to stop diagnosing and treating.

[*disco infiltrator*]

I understand that sometimes sadness cannot be overcome, but I still wouldn't call that a disease. Being sad is not a disease, even if it's perpetual. You're just a sad person, and you said it yourself - nothing can be done. Diseases can be cured (yes, I know some don't have cures yet, but they probably will in the future). You can't cure sadness. The person has to overcome it themselves. Taking antidepressants is a mind fixture. Studies have shown that if you give patients something and tell them that it's making them better, they will feel better. Antidepressants do the same. They give the person "assistance" and the person thinks that since they are taking these things, they can get over it - that whole enabling thing I talked about. Once they have the idea that they can overcome it, they will. So, when antidepressants work, it's because of the person's willpower and because they were convinced that they could overcome the sadness.

[*Duchess of Dork*]

Taking antidepressants is a mind fixture. Studies have shown that if you give patients something and tell them that it's making them better, they will feel better.

That is something I particularly liked in Donnie Darko: The conversation that he has with his doctor that the medication he is taking isn't actually medication at all. The pills he was given were placebos.

I think that sometimes (not always) much of the medications' (particularly for a psychologically related diagnosis) power is in the suggestion that it will help.

That's not at all to say that all these things are psychosomatic.