The Depression Thing
zachholman.com
The Depression Thing
1–10 of 348 posts
Re: The Depression Thing
#2My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness.
I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression.
Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
Re: The Depression Thing
#3My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness. I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression. Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
Are there legitimate other views of depression?
Re: The Depression Thing
#4My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness. I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression. Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
It's a condition that can largely be controlled through medication, but based on my wife's experience it's a condition that has a horrible tendency to rear it's ugly head without notice and for seemingly no apparent reason so I'm not sure I'd generalize it as being "treatable" for everyone.
Re: The Depression Thing
#5My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness. I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression. Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
It currently feels like we're stuck in the stone-age when it comes to treating depression and mental illness in general with drugs.
Things do seem to be improving however. For example, second generation antipsychotics like aripiprazole seem to be a significant leap.
Re: The Depression Thing
#6My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness. I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression. Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
It currently feels like we're stuck in the stone-age when it comes to treating depression and mental illness in general with drugs. Things do seem to be improving however. For example, second generation antipsychotics like aripiprazole seem to be a significant leap.
From my experience, we're in the stone age when it comes to treating depression without drugs as well. I reached out to my PCP at my HMO, they made me talk to a specialist who cleared me for treatment and referred me back to my PCP. My PCP seemed skeptical that anything was wrong and went against the recommendation that I had been given by the specialist office by strongly recommending that I don't try anti-depressants. He referred me to get therapy but the internal office is understaffed with a 3 month waitlist, so I had to fill out forms to try to find a approved out of network provider. I do all that to find out that I absolutely hate therapy (socially anxious and bad at discussing emotions). I'd like to try a cognitive behavioral therapist instead but it's really not worth the institutional barriers.
Meanwhile my cancer screenings for a large lump that required 4 visits were done in 2 weeks and super straightforward.
Re: The Depression Thing
#7My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness. I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression. Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
It's a condition that can largely be controlled through medication, but based on my wife's experience it's a condition that has a horrible tendency to rear it's ugly head without notice and for seemingly no apparent reason so I'm not sure I'd generalize it as being "treatable" for everyone.
I feel like it's treatable the way cancer is treatable -- lots of times we can totally 'cure' it, and sometimes we can't. But that doesn't mean you don't try, and we're getting better every day.
Now that I write that out I guess it's like every other health disorder. We're pretty good at a subset of them, so-so at another set, and have no flipping clue what to do about the last set.
Re: The Depression Thing
#8The solution is that every one of you listen to a friend who is in need and empathize and say, yeah -- i'm here.
Kudos to Zach for opening up about this. I'm going through a similar shit show and I'm hoping that folks who grok it stick close and the others just sway with.
Re: The Depression Thing
#9[deleted]
Re: The Depression Thing
#10My view is that depression is a treatable medical illness. I've never been depressed, but I've lost friends to depression. Edit: to the down voters, I'm not implying it's any easier than, say, beating cancer.
Are there legitimate other views of depression?
Some psychologists reject any hint of medical modal, and say it's only social factors.
(that's not what I think. But these psychologists are reasonably common.)