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Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

economist.com

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Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#131

Post by hjgjhyuhy »

voisin wrote: post #115
cameronh90 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely agree. I believe we have no idea how these drugs work at the moment. For one, serotonin receptors are _everywhere_, notably the gut, which also has a strong relationship with emotional state. And as you point out, they don't just affect serotonin. Given we have a whole bunch of drugs that attempt to be serotonin selective, but where each one affects different people in different ways, it seems likely to…

> what‘s the reason so many of use are anxious, depressed, neurotic, autistic, ADHD, etc. without obvious cause? Because modernity hasn’t been an unmitigated success. In the pursuit of abundance, we’ve made all sorts of trade offs that we are now realizing have had unintended consequences to mental and physical health. Every leap forward has felt like progress but has underlying negatives. The world has trade offs! T…

No post body was provided.

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#132

Post by TchoBeer »

gilded-lilly wrote: post #50

I’m someone who has dealt with mental health issues over the course of my life. The main causes are the following: 1) Illicit drug use. 2) Stress/anxiety/fear/grief The answer is to accept the hard truths and understand what is the root cause of your depression. Is it lack of friends and family? Lack of hope for the future? Lack of enjoyment in things that previously made you happy? Belief that somehow success/truth…

>The answer is to accept the hard truths and understand what is the root cause of your depression. Is it lack of friends and family? Lack of hope for the future? Lack of enjoyment in things that previously made you happy? Belief that somehow success/truth comes at the expense of enjoyment of life (“ignorance is bliss”). Is it past trauma? A job/relationship you hate? Body/health issues? Aging? Feeling like you’ve achieved all your dreams but you’re more unhappy than ever? Bullying? Feeling unsatisfied? Unfulfilled? Shame about past behaviors?

some of these things (body/health issues, bad job/relationship, lack of friends) are causes which can be fixed with direct action. Some (aging, past behaviors, trauma, lack of family) can't be, but can be somewhat mitigated and be made less depressing with therapy. Others (lack of hope, anhedonia, lack of fulfillment) are not the cause of depression but the symptoms. to lump these all together seems strange to me.

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#134

Post by Melatonic »

cameronh90 wrote: post #45
tecleandor wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what we've been reading this last years, it's not like antidepressants are worthless, it's like antidepressants aren't doing what we think are doing. The "depression is lack of serotonin" theories seem to have less and less base every day, but SSRIs don't only act on serotonin (just review their side effects). I've done, mostly, vortioxetine and sertraline. For some of us, some SSRIs or SNRIs work. Some don't. Pr…

I completely agree. I believe we have no idea how these drugs work at the moment. For one, serotonin receptors are _everywhere_, notably the gut, which also has a strong relationship with emotional state. And as you point out, they don't just affect serotonin. Given we have a whole bunch of drugs that attempt to be serotonin selective, but where each one affects different people in different ways, it seems likely to…

Exactly this and I have suspected for years now there is a huge gut connection. I am not saying it is the only cause (or even the sole cause) but I do believe for a lot of people it is exacerbating the issue significantly. The gut also has tons of opioid receptors and there are some scholars who now consider the spinal cord to be a serious part of the brain - and the spinal cord directly branches out in very large nerves all over the gut.

I personally notice a large positive change in my mental health when my gut is functioning properly and I am eating the right fermented foods. I do not take SSRI's and have not been diagnosed with major depression. I also find it hard to believe that it is a coincidence that as a species we have been eating and making fermented food for so long and so suddenly discontinued its use in a widespread way and are now seeing increases in many types of disease. Although lack of exercise may very well also be a huge contributing factor.

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#135

Post by Melatonic »

Dangerous title for this article and I am not sure I like it.

That being said I personally think lack of exercise and desk jobs are having a very big negative effect on mental health in general.

For anyone that has owned a dog - especially a larger high energy dog - what happens when you keep that dog inside all day and do not take it on walks or let it run? What if you then also provided it with all of its favourite food and plenty of fun dog TV shows and games and stimuli but still forced it to sit in a 500 sq ft box all the time? The dog would go nuts - anyone who has owned one knows this - they become an anxious mess. Some of them become self destructive, some of them become neurotic and repeat weird behaviours, and some just sit there and look sad. Are we really all that different than dogs?

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#136

Post by iguanayou »

qzx_pierri wrote: post #93
4ggr0 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would a huge chunk of the population have a imbalance of brain chemicals? That's what I think about from time to time as well. I have ADD and take meds for it. But I'm pretty sure that I only need these meds to be able to work in an open-space, corporate IT environment with dead-lines, responsibilities etc. Without meds I get overwhelmed and panicky quickly, when taking them they turn me into kind of an office…

Same here, man. It’s for the reason you described in your first paragraph. Working in a soul sucking corporate office space is so painful for certain personality types. For me at least, I’ve always thought it would be cool to be a delivery driver or someone who’s out and about everyday moving around… but I stuck with IT because it makes astronomically more money. So sitting at a desk all day will require me be medica…

Hear, hear. There's a lot of us in this same boat. These asocial, sedentary IT jobs + hectic lifestyles are out of sync with our biology and psychology.

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#137

Post by uni_rule »

voisin wrote: post #115
cameronh90 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely agree. I believe we have no idea how these drugs work at the moment. For one, serotonin receptors are _everywhere_, notably the gut, which also has a strong relationship with emotional state. And as you point out, they don't just affect serotonin. Given we have a whole bunch of drugs that attempt to be serotonin selective, but where each one affects different people in different ways, it seems likely to…

> what‘s the reason so many of use are anxious, depressed, neurotic, autistic, ADHD, etc. without obvious cause? Because modernity hasn’t been an unmitigated success. In the pursuit of abundance, we’ve made all sorts of trade offs that we are now realizing have had unintended consequences to mental and physical health. Every leap forward has felt like progress but has underlying negatives. The world has trade offs! T…

Mental illness is not a byproduct of modern society, its study and treatment is. Why is the rate of mental illness going up? It's because the stigma over mental healthcare is dropping rapidly and more people are getting formally diagnosed. That's like saying schizophrenia didn't exist in antiquity, people were just attacked by actual demons and everyone else was "normal".

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#138

Post by prewett »

TchoBeer wrote: post #132
gilded-lilly wrote: post #50

I’m someone who has dealt with mental health issues over the course of my life. The main causes are the following: 1) Illicit drug use. 2) Stress/anxiety/fear/grief The answer is to accept the hard truths and understand what is the root cause of your depression. Is it lack of friends and family? Lack of hope for the future? Lack of enjoyment in things that previously made you happy? Belief that somehow success/truth…

>The answer is to accept the hard truths and understand what is the root cause of your depression. Is it lack of friends and family? Lack of hope for the future? Lack of enjoyment in things that previously made you happy? Belief that somehow success/truth comes at the expense of enjoyment of life (“ignorance is bliss”). Is it past trauma? A job/relationship you hate? Body/health issues? Aging? Feeling like you’ve ach…

Hopelessness and unfulfillment might be considered symptoms of depression if you think that depression is caused by a chemical imbalance. But if hopelessness and unfulfillment create an emotional response by imbalancing chemicals, then the depression is the symptom.

I can't see how hopelessness and unfulfillment would cause you to feel happy, and even feeling neutral seems a stretch. Seems like if you aren't depressed if you are hopeless and unfulfilled then something is wrong! It seems to me like American (Western?) society as a whole is pretty committed to avoiding dealing with hard realities--not just emotions--and we just want to take a "pill" to have it all go away. Anti-depressants have uses, but they aren't the solution any more than meth or pretending the problem doesn't exist or magical thinking are.

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#139

Post by [deleted] »

cameronh90 wrote: post #45
tecleandor wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For what we've been reading this last years, it's not like antidepressants are worthless, it's like antidepressants aren't doing what we think are doing. The "depression is lack of serotonin" theories seem to have less and less base every day, but SSRIs don't only act on serotonin (just review their side effects). I've done, mostly, vortioxetine and sertraline. For some of us, some SSRIs or SNRIs work. Some don't. Pr…

I completely agree. I believe we have no idea how these drugs work at the moment. For one, serotonin receptors are _everywhere_, notably the gut, which also has a strong relationship with emotional state. And as you point out, they don't just affect serotonin. Given we have a whole bunch of drugs that attempt to be serotonin selective, but where each one affects different people in different ways, it seems likely to…

[deleted]

Re: Most people on antidepressants don’t need them

#140

Post by voisin »

uni_rule wrote: post #137
voisin wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what‘s the reason so many of use are anxious, depressed, neurotic, autistic, ADHD, etc. without obvious cause? Because modernity hasn’t been an unmitigated success. In the pursuit of abundance, we’ve made all sorts of trade offs that we are now realizing have had unintended consequences to mental and physical health. Every leap forward has felt like progress but has underlying negatives. The world has trade offs! T…

Mental illness is not a byproduct of modern society, its study and treatment is. Why is the rate of mental illness going up? It's because the stigma over mental healthcare is dropping rapidly and more people are getting formally diagnosed. That's like saying schizophrenia didn't exist in antiquity, people were just attacked by actual demons and everyone else was "normal".

>Mental illness is not a byproduct of modern society, ...

I didn't state that it is solely caused by modern society.

> Why is the rate of mental illness going up? It's because the stigma over mental healthcare is dropping rapidly and more people are getting formally diagnosed.

Source? Or is this just a theory like mine?

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