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What I have learned from my suicidal patients

theguardian.com

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Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#151

Post by heavyset_go »

pasabagi wrote: post #118
heavyset_go wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most anti-depressants have almost no side effects for most people. This isn't true for all anti-depressants, especially when you look at dosage. For example, if you look at clinical trial data and studies for a certain drug, 60% of people experienced weight gain. Another drug caused nausea in nearly 70% of patients. Paroxetine has a reported sexual dysfunction rate of nearly 75%, and patients who take 20mg of vorti…

You're right, of course. However, first, I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone who prefers depression to sexual dysfunction, weight gain, or nausea. Second, you can just try different medications until you find one that has none of the above problems. To be honest, I find the discussion of side-effects in anti-depressants really strange. Depression is an extremely dangerous, life-threatening, life-ruining con…

> However, first, I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone who prefers depression to sexual dysfunction, weight gain, or nausea.

All three of those can be depressing in their own right. In the past, I stopped what was effective treatment with certain drugs because of those side-effects.

If you look at the clinical trial data for vortioxetine, the nausea component was so bad that many people dropped out of the study altogether.

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#152

Post by aalleavitch »

hestipod wrote: post #145
aalleavitch wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your story alone is enough to make you an effective activist. There is nothing more powerful than lived experience. You may be surprised at the amount of help that you will be able to find if you go to the people who are fighting to prevent what you've gone through from happening. There is support out there for people who truly want things to change. I understand the desire to get away. I understand the reluctance to…

I think this is the last post I am going to make because I find myself feeling nothing but anger, resentment, defensiveness as even well meaning people don't get it and keep saying things I feel I have to explain and justify because for some reason I still care about proving I am not a jerk, crazy, wrong somehow and fighting the idea that this is my fault or I am not doing enough or I somehow failed. I did not. I was…

I didn't mean to talk down to you or invalidate your completely justified response to your own situation, I apologize. Nor did I mean in any way to belittle your accomplishments or the amount you have already done for others. You are absolutely right to feel the way you do; you were failed, this is not your failure, you have done nothing wrong.

You have no obligation to anyone. I'm just trying to offer you an option of where to look for aid with those practical realities. Maybe you have already thoroughly exhausted your options, but this is just one more place to reach out to if you haven't already. I don't know where you live, but it's possible they may have a similar program at your local chapter: https://dsabuild.org/medicaldebt

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#153

Post by sdegutis »

ryugarden wrote: post #133
sdegutis wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is objective truth and objective reality. I’m sad that so many people reject this utterly necessary fact and spread misinformation against it.

Yes, there are objective mathematical truths, but you cannot be sure there exists a physical reality or anything that corresponds to our experiences. You just know that there are subjective experiences right now. That's the only thing you can be absolutely certain about. So I see no sense in talking about "reality".

This is so incredibly confused. You live in reality. You exist. The things you can observe exist observably. People who choose to believe such existential nonsense remind me of the xkcd with the super soaker.

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#154

Post by sdegutis »

0db532a0 wrote: post #134
sdegutis wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is objective truth and objective reality. I’m sad that so many people reject this utterly necessary fact and spread misinformation against it.

You might be interested in learning a bit about Wittgenstein. Here is a conversation between a Wittgenstein-denying scientist, and a psychiatrist: https://www.nature.com/articles/351010d0.pdf?platform=hootsu... .

Just because some people choose to live in their own reality in their mind and reject objective reality outside their mind has no bearing on whether an objective reality exists. What a sad age of fallacies and confusion we live in where people even deny that they exist!

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#155

Post by 0db532a0 »

sdegutis wrote: post #153
ryugarden wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, there are objective mathematical truths, but you cannot be sure there exists a physical reality or anything that corresponds to our experiences. You just know that there are subjective experiences right now. That's the only thing you can be absolutely certain about. So I see no sense in talking about "reality".

This is so incredibly confused. You live in reality. You exist. The things you can observe exist observably. People who choose to believe such existential nonsense remind me of the xkcd with the super soaker.

Maybe you should increase your scope beyond xkcd.

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#156

Post by 0db532a0 »

sdegutis wrote: post #154
0db532a0 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might be interested in learning a bit about Wittgenstein. Here is a conversation between a Wittgenstein-denying scientist, and a psychiatrist: https://www.nature.com/articles/351010d0.pdf?platform=hootsu... .

Just because some people choose to live in their own reality in their mind and reject objective reality outside their mind has no bearing on whether an objective reality exists. What a sad age of fallacies and confusion we live in where people even deny that they exist!

The psychiatrist opens the scientist up to the idea that the schizophrenic person, in his psychosis, may have insight into certain ideas which sane people do not, which nevertheless still may apply to them.

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#157

Post by [deleted] »

hestipod wrote: post #128
bmer wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hello hestipod. I have been in your situation, and I have had certain privileges you do not have which helped me. So, I do not want to tell you: "just do XYZ and you'll be better". In fact, I agree with you that suicidal tendencies are not due to mental health issues; rather, they are due to deep societal injustices. Since I can't fix those, I can't truly help you. There is a reason why indigenous communities are par…

It's not freedom to "accept" being permanently and worsenginly sick and homeless or constantly living under that threat. It's not freedom to "accept" being in severe pain every day. It's not freedom to be in the "present" in those situations. Freedom is having positive choices, agency, hope. This stuff is nothing more than a psychological trick that I cannot sustain to say "I am powerless and this sucks but that's ok…

[deleted]

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#158

Post by hestipod »

aalleavitch wrote: post #152
hestipod wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is the last post I am going to make because I find myself feeling nothing but anger, resentment, defensiveness as even well meaning people don't get it and keep saying things I feel I have to explain and justify because for some reason I still care about proving I am not a jerk, crazy, wrong somehow and fighting the idea that this is my fault or I am not doing enough or I somehow failed. I did not. I was…

I didn't mean to talk down to you or invalidate your completely justified response to your own situation, I apologize. Nor did I mean in any way to belittle your accomplishments or the amount you have already done for others. You are absolutely right to feel the way you do; you were failed, this is not your failure, you have done nothing wrong. You have no obligation to anyone. I'm just trying to offer you an option…

And I am sorry if my pain and desperation made it sound personal. I have always been a "helper" and hyper empathetic so a big psycholgical part of my problem is NOT being able to do anything useful for those in need and raging at the injustice all around. But I can't help anyone else if I cannot help myself. I think you for the well meaning...but that's not enough anymore.

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#159

Post by hestipod »

techdreamer wrote: post #122
hestipod wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes of course. Fought for it with lawyers for years. Denied despite evidence by a very biased judge. Appealed. Same judge denied again. The system is broken. I am out of credits to apply now. I have done everything you are supposed to and that people think works. It doesn't. It's just the same advice recycled and disbelief it didn't work...then on to blaming me for it...and me getting more upset and hopeless. Over an…

It's me again. (Sorry). "I had a nightmare just last night about a victim I recall from early in my career...in such a horrible personal situation...who died in such a terrible way. She didn't have to. She was pushed to it and then allowed to because nobody she reached out to would help. I've seen dozens like that...and not a single one of them had to die." I wonder if your earlier career gave you PTSD and if your cu…

It's too late to edit and I need to just not read or post anything anymore since it never helps and makes me more depressed and angry seeing how true my assessment of the world is. But I couldn't stop worrying I made you feel bad should have expounded on my first sentence in my last reply. You have been there kindly since my first post here. I appreciate that. You are clearly a good human being. That's just not enough and it feels like anything I say to well meaning but ultimately unhelpful advice either makes me seem ungrateful, unwilling, or deserving of this decline. None of that is true but you can only take so much, only explain so much. Only refute so much. That always results in people giving up on you as if that's your fault. And I don't mean giving up on being nice...if niceness was enough I would be ok because I know some nice people. But they give up on anything that would really help. I am not setting any artificial deadlines...they keep making threats...and I live every day wondering when the hammer will drop. I have tried to prepare things so I CAN leave if an opportunity arises but so much is still wrong, lacking, and accessible. I have no agency here but to suffer...or end the suffering...and if they kick me out even that becomes harder with less options. I can't live like that on top of everything else.

Re: What I have learned from my suicidal patients

#160

Post by bmer »

hestipod wrote: post #128
bmer wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hello hestipod. I have been in your situation, and I have had certain privileges you do not have which helped me. So, I do not want to tell you: "just do XYZ and you'll be better". In fact, I agree with you that suicidal tendencies are not due to mental health issues; rather, they are due to deep societal injustices. Since I can't fix those, I can't truly help you. There is a reason why indigenous communities are par…

It's not freedom to "accept" being permanently and worsenginly sick and homeless or constantly living under that threat. It's not freedom to "accept" being in severe pain every day. It's not freedom to be in the "present" in those situations. Freedom is having positive choices, agency, hope. This stuff is nothing more than a psychological trick that I cannot sustain to say "I am powerless and this sucks but that's ok…

Okay, sorry for being presumptuous.
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