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Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

psychologytoday.com

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Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#251

Post by [deleted] »

NoGravitas wrote: post #243
md224 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have this wacky idea that maybe, just maybe we should reconsider the point at which opiates would be appropriate for treating depression. I mean maybe make them a 2nd or 3rd line treatment... right now I'm pretty sure they'd only give you opiates once that whole "induce a controlled seizure" thing fails. Sure, they're addictive, but the "opium cure" was used up until the 1950's[1] and it's not like society was over…

The way I've heard it put is that opiates are an extremely effective treatment for anxiety and depression, with the common and serious side effect of ruining your life. But I hear they're working on eliminating the side effects: http://mentalhealthdaily.com/2014/12/20/ly-2456302-for-depre...

[deleted]

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#252

Post by [deleted] »

oxide wrote: post #246
DanBC wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Opioids are not a suitable treatment for long term pain, especially in the elderly. People need rapid access to pain management clinics, with weight loss and strength building exercise, and access to meds (which in long term pain are often not opioids). Giving those people opioids increases their risk of accidental death, and suicide. It gives them an addiction. But worse it does not treat their pain - they will stil…

This is ignorant at best and naive at worst. God help anyone you treat, and if you aren't a medical professional its probably for the best. Your comment makes me physically ill.

[deleted]

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#253

Post by md224 »

raverbashing wrote: post #190
dools wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying that prescription opioid use is a cause of heroin overdoses ignores the fact that the reason people move to heroin is because of the paranoia about addiction which causes their prescriptions to be cut off in the first place. In the same vein (no pun intended) I've been looking for stats but not being able to find anything about what percentage of prescription opioid overdoses occur while the patient is being a…

> that the reason people move to heroin is because of the paranoia about addiction which causes their prescriptions to be cut off in the first place Well it seems they are right, if people will move to an illegal substance right after they get cut from it

Pretty sure if coffee was outlawed tomorrow you'd see a lot of people moving to illegal substances. Doesn't mean people can't handle the substance, just means people who are cut off from substances they depend on will go out of their way to satisfy that dependency.

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#254

Post by pc2g4d »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #61
pc2g4d wrote: post #19

Amen to this article. As one who myself once believed my depression "came out of nowhere" (but which, in retrospect, was an obvious symptom of my emotionally destructive family and school environment) and who tried for many years to smother those feelings with antidepressants, I feel strongly that this article presents a wiser path. Evolutionarily speaking, it seems likely that depression/anxiety are there for some p…

> Evolutionarily speaking, it seems likely that depression/anxiety are there for some purpose, and yet we treat them both like meaningless pain meant only to be banished using drugs. I believe both are signals that something in our environment is not working for us. They indicate emotional or physical needs unmet---needs for safety, autonomy, connection, etc. > Often the individual suffering is fundamentally unaware…

I appreciate this challenge to the article's viewpoint. My response would be that regardless of our unawareness of the causes, both emotional and physical pain are signals of things we need to pay attention to. Maybe chronic pain is the perfect analogue to depression/anxiety exactly because it seems to have unknown or untreatable causes. Maybe there is a need for painkillers in difficult chronic cases, but the vast majority of experiences of pain are functional and helpful.

Additionally, chronic pain conditions generally strike late in life whereas depression/anxiety come earlier. The emotional pain seems more likely to be adaptive whereas the seemingly meaningless physical pain later in life seems more like people's bodies breaking down.

Thanks for the critique.

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#255

Post by spangry »

alfapla wrote: post #188
spangry wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Speaking as a sufferer of a serious depressive disorder, one well educated on the current medical science, I find these discussions incredibly frustrating. Everyone brings out their anecdotes about how their aunt 'just got better through positive thinking, and you can too!' Or people just throw in whatever pop-psychology is currently in fashion. If we were having this conversation in the 1950s, all the smarty…

At the risk of sounding snarky or disrespectful, I can't fail to notice how often people suffering from depression become all passionate and fiery when discussing the cause of (their) depression.

No worries, I get what you're saying and it's something I've observed in myself. I'm usually very calm when discussing my depression with an open-minded person. And by open-minded I mean someone who just genuinely wants to know, asks the question and then listens to the answer.

The thing that gets me (and others) worked up is when people make sweeping generalisations regarding the causes and treatments of depression. No one likes being painted with a broad-brush, but it adds insult to injury when something that has caused me so much suffering is dismissed as trivial and easy to solve. I've spent more than a decade trying to treat my condition. It's not as simple or easy as most people think.

I guess it's also an issue of semantics: 'depression' is a very broad term that gets narrowed down in our minds, based on our own personal experiences. When I hear it, I tend to think of the more serious kind because that's what I've lived through: not leaving my house for two weeks, not showering, eating or sleeping for three days etc... I can understand why some others might think of it more like 'that time my goldfish died and I was sad': this is the fortunate extent of their experience of low moods.

Or maybe I just envy those without brain cooties...

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#256

Post by rifung »

ars wrote: post #249
jjbiotech wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, you're incorrect on this one. You as a human aren't somehow totally disconnected from your environment. The environment you live in, is a part of yourself, the two can't be separated. You have more foreign bacteria living in your body than human cells. "life flows on within you and without you".

> Yeah, you're incorrect on this one No I am not. And like I said, till it happens to you, or you are with someone like that, you will never believe it. I certainly never did. For some people it's environmental - for other? They are depressed for no reason whatsoever. The rest of what you wrote is just empty phrases and has zero to do with this subject.

> And like I said, till it happens to you, or you are with someone like that, you will never believe it.

Just because you have experienced it before does not mean that you understand the causes of depression any more than anyone else. After all, you don't assume that people who have cancer have a better understanding of what causes cancer (all else being equal).

As a society we still don't really understand much about depression. You could be right or wrong, but how would you even know? Your case could be environmental without you knowing or understanding it. On the other hand you could also be correct that it's something else entirely.

Without more studies, we just don't know. I would believe that depression is not necessarily a disease and instead a group of symptoms. That's not to say that you don't have a disorder, but that I think our idea that all cases of depression are the same is incorrect. This would explain why some cases of depression are environmental whereas others may not be; they could actually be different diseases that both cause these symptoms.

As someone who is bipolar, depressive episodes are extremely similar to depression. In fact, about 1/5 cases of bipolar are initially misdiagnosed as depression, reportedly. As far as I know though, we aren't actually sure if they were misdiagnosed or depression developed into bipolar.

Indeed some studies have shown there is a link between bipolar, schizophrenia, and depression. See here: http://www.nimh.nih.gov/news/science-news/2013/new-data-reve...

I don't think it's fair for others to say you are incorrect but it's also premature to say you are correct too. I hope that we will uncover the truth sometime in our lifetimes but it seems we are still pretty far away from understanding psychological disorders.

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#257

Post by Sophistifunk »

raverbashing wrote: post #190
dools wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saying that prescription opioid use is a cause of heroin overdoses ignores the fact that the reason people move to heroin is because of the paranoia about addiction which causes their prescriptions to be cut off in the first place. In the same vein (no pun intended) I've been looking for stats but not being able to find anything about what percentage of prescription opioid overdoses occur while the patient is being a…

> that the reason people move to heroin is because of the paranoia about addiction which causes their prescriptions to be cut off in the first place Well it seems they are right, if people will move to an illegal substance right after they get cut from it

This is a tautology. You're not "right" to fear illegal drug use if your reaction to said fear (cutting off access to quality-controlled, measured doses) causes it.

Re: Anxiety and Depression Are Symptoms, Not Diseases

#258

Post by DrScump »

Domenic_S wrote: post #58
graycat wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My info was first hand from the Chief of Psychiatry, Westchester County Hospital, NY, USA. He seemed darned serious, bright, well informed, enormously experienced, and competent.

Perhaps you misunderstood the Chief; CBT is the gold standard for treating anxiety-related disorders. See this meta-analysis: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3263389/

It isn't, necessarily, the best solution for everyone anyway.

CBT is based on challenging negative thoughts, assuming that those thoughts are manufactured or, at least, grossly exaggerated. That kinda puts you in a corner if those thoughts are factual.

ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) has more recent science behind it and gives you strategies on how to minimize the effect of unhelpful thoughts, factual or not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_and_commitment_ther...

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