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Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

sciencedaily.com

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Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#51

Post by LorenPechtel »

antonymoose wrote: post #33
HauntingPin wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also question the universality of it. No amount of exercise changed my depression or made life any less miserable. Anti-depressants finally helped me get past the trauma I was unable to properly process otherwise.

I don’t think depression is a universal root-cause diagnosis so I’m inclined to agree. I’ve been diagnosed clinically several times in life with depression and the pills never did anything for me. Sometimes exercise worked, sometimes it was of little or no use. With retrospect, all of my episodes of depression were a function of environment. As a child, growing up in a broken home situation and bad school environment…

I definitely agree, there are two fundamental forms of "depression"--internal and a reaction to a bad external situation. Very different causes, what works for one doesn't work for the other. And I don't even like the "depression" label for bad situations--as with the previous post about willpower. We have a limited ability to cope with bad, when it's exceeded (or our efforts are misapplied resulting in the same end) we get "depression". No, we get reality! That's why things like forcing rehab does nothing about addiction--it doesn't remove what drove the person to the drugs in the first place.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#52

Post by javier123454321 »

gehsty wrote: post #19

If it helps anyone I take antidepressants and have had a positive experience with them. Depression can be caused by a chemical imbalance and no amount of exercise or talking about it will fix it. One of the most frustrating things when your really low is people giving advice like do exercise to feel better - please don’t do this.

Jim Carey had the best way to think about this: “I believe depression is legitimate. But I also believe that if you don’t exercise, eat nutritious food, get sunlight, get enough sleep, consume positive material, surround yourself with support, then you aren’t giving yourself a fighting chance.”

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#53

Post by CrossVR »

LorenPechtel wrote: post #48
boplicity wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have a certain amount of "willpower" that can overcome motivational barriers. This willpower is limited, though. It's very helpful to have clear guidance on where to allocate this very limited resources, especially in situations where people are otherwise struggling. All of which is to say -- these exhortations can play a useful role. :)

Yup, which is why diets fail. People who are fat generally do not have enough available willpower to lose weight.

This has more to do with hunger requiring a tremendous amount of willpower to ignore rather than fat people having less willpower than people of average weight.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#54

Post by LorenPechtel »

refulgentis wrote: post #15
cheald wrote: post #2

This is a finding that keeps coming up, and I've certainly found it true in my life, but there's a significant chicken-and-egg problem in that depression frequently precludes the motivation to exercise, and if you don't already have a deeply-disciplined routine to overcome the lack of motivation, people won't do it. Exhortation to develop those good habits in the good times, I suppose.

This is 100% true, and what I'm about to describe isn't an attempt to falsify it: took me 11 years and 3 cities to figure it out. You don't have to exercise so much as get moving . I'm the best I've been in 37 years, and it's because in August I started forcing myself to just keep walking whenever I went out to have a cigarette. I was in Boston, and would end up ~nowhere and exhausted. Then started doing random stuff…

Getting moving *is* exercise.

No way could I do a gym and these days most things in a gym would be just begging for joint pain. But the wilderness is a great gym (assuming you know what you're doing safety-wise, I see too many idiots out there.)

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#56

Post by denim_vampire »

I think one of the tricky things about depression is how unique each person's experience with it can be. I can only speak from my own history. For me, medication was indispensable in getting me to a point where lifestyle changes could occur.

That being said, I do believe that exercising, eating right, maintaining a healthy sleep schedule, etc., all the boring lifestyle things have been key to preventing myself from slipping back into that depressed state, years after stopping medication.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#57

Post by heavyset_go »

cheald wrote: post #2

This is a finding that keeps coming up, and I've certainly found it true in my life, but there's a significant chicken-and-egg problem in that depression frequently precludes the motivation to exercise, and if you don't already have a deeply-disciplined routine to overcome the lack of motivation, people won't do it. Exhortation to develop those good habits in the good times, I suppose.

> Exhortation to develop those good habits in the good times, I suppose.

This is what medication for more severe cases of things like depression is supposed to offer: an opportunity to learn, usually through therapy, to cope with the condition in a healthy way.

Re: Exercise can be nearly as effective as therapy for depression

#58

Post by heavyset_go »

HauntingPin wrote: post #5
cheald wrote: post #2

This is a finding that keeps coming up, and I've certainly found it true in my life, but there's a significant chicken-and-egg problem in that depression frequently precludes the motivation to exercise, and if you don't already have a deeply-disciplined routine to overcome the lack of motivation, people won't do it. Exhortation to develop those good habits in the good times, I suppose.

I also question the universality of it. No amount of exercise changed my depression or made life any less miserable. Anti-depressants finally helped me get past the trauma I was unable to properly process otherwise.

I'm a non-competitive athlete, and yes exercise can help depression, but no, it will not be sufficient for anything but your mild to average case of it.

Exercise is a crucial part of dealing with it, but it is not a panacea.

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