481–490 of 669 posts
Because it's common to hate on antidepressants, I've always personally had a bias against them. For the past 15-20 years, november thru february are basically a writeoff due for me due to seasonal affective disorder. Cold showers, exercise, no alcohol, strict sleeping rituals. Vitamin d. I can still sleep 11 hours and feel like reheated cat shit. Enter citalopram. "It will take up to six weeks to dial in" they said.…
Vitamin D and Omega-3 are the two supplements that consistently appear to be super powerful in small studies and then fail to do anything significant at all in larger studies. Pause for a moment and consider the mere plausibility of the claims in the first few paragraphs: The effect size for antidepressants is 0.4, but the effect size for Vitamin D is 1.8? Are we to believe that Vitamin D supplements have an effect s…
Anecdotally, Vitamin D and B12 had more of a positive effect on my mental health than therapy or any of the half dozen prescription meds I tried. Hiking has the biggest effect though. I think maybe the problem is that therapists are diagnosing people, and psychiatrists are prescribing pills based on those diagnoses, but neither are ordering bloodwork to check for deficiencies. Which leads to a lot of people suffering…
I remember reading that pine trees give off a chemical that is a natural human bronchodilator.
One thought of why people love hiking, especially in piney woods, is that the chemical allows humans to process more oxygen which in turn helps them feel more "energized".
I point this out for two reasons:
1. It's a fascinating bit of trivie
2. It highlights that there are MANY confounding variables so it will always be tough to figure out the isolated impact.
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This is the "people with anxiety should just stop being worried" attitude that failed to help for centuries. Whether or not you believe SSRI's are clinically effective, denying the existence of mental health disorders is not helping. No, anxiety and depression aren't simply a matter of perspective.
My point is that it's hard if not possible to objectively tell if the situation you are in is good or bad. And I'm not trying to deny anything.
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The hate on antidepressants is not because they're not effective, but rather that they're abused by psychiatrists. Ideally, a professional will prescribe them as a necessary helper to becoming (more) mentally healthy whilst tackling the root cause. Most of the time however, it's more of a "here, take these indefinitely". It's like if we took sleeping pills every time we had trouble sleeping. Having said that, I just…
The truth about antidepressants is that the majority of people with depression that respond to an antidepressant would also have responded to a placebo. This doesn't mean that their depression isn't real or that antidepressants "don't work". It just means that placebo has a relatively high response rate in trials for depression. The hate is (among other points) because they are only arguably, marginally, better than…
Only true for some. Inarguably, well-proven false for others.
Likewise, placebos and aspirin are comparable at relieving those headaches where aspirin doesn't really solve the source, but that doesn't mean aspirin's well-documented effects are meaningless in general.
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The hate on antidepressants is not because they're not effective, but rather that they're abused by psychiatrists. Ideally, a professional will prescribe them as a necessary helper to becoming (more) mentally healthy whilst tackling the root cause. Most of the time however, it's more of a "here, take these indefinitely". It's like if we took sleeping pills every time we had trouble sleeping. Having said that, I just…
Also they are often prescribed as a life-long solution, instead of a temporary stop-gap to get through some bad state of mind while, as you said, "tackling the root cause". At some point they will potentially stop working which requires switching meds and often the next one won't work as well, plus, leaving the user stuck with withdrawal symptoms for unspecified amount of time (potentially years) and anti-depressant…
Your second paragraph reveals a biased motive behind your opinion.
I'm really tired of reading anti-medicine testimonials from people who had anecdotal bad results. Yes, penicillin won't stop antibiotic-resistant strains of some germs, and in fact may kill people like me if we take heavy doses. That's worse than what you're describing for SSRIs; does that mean doctors shouldn't prescribe it?
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As someone that falls on the side of “depression is real and antidepressants can help” it is very clear that there are people in this thread that need to hold their tongues because they know not of what they speak. (Not you OP) There are some forms of depression that you cannot think or act your way out of. If you haven’t experienced that, I promise that you do not understand what it is like. You cannot really unders…
Lexapro saved my life
Huge quality of life improvement. 10/10 would medicate again.
Because it's common to hate on antidepressants, I've always personally had a bias against them. For the past 15-20 years, november thru february are basically a writeoff due for me due to seasonal affective disorder. Cold showers, exercise, no alcohol, strict sleeping rituals. Vitamin d. I can still sleep 11 hours and feel like reheated cat shit. Enter citalopram. "It will take up to six weeks to dial in" they said.…
As someone that falls on the side of “depression is real and antidepressants can help” it is very clear that there are people in this thread that need to hold their tongues because they know not of what they speak. (Not you OP) There are some forms of depression that you cannot think or act your way out of. If you haven’t experienced that, I promise that you do not understand what it is like. You cannot really unders…
A particular point he makes about depression in it is insightful: Although depression is conventionally viewed as a medical illness, research studies indicate that genetic influences appear to account for only about 16% of depression. For many individuals, life influences appear to be the most important causes.
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If you view a world at a certain angle there is always something to worry about: 1. World in not perfect, it doesn't confirm to how we want it to be (and could not even in theory given that different people want it to be different) 2. The future cannot be predicted with 100% accuracy so even if all is perfect today you can worry that it will turn bad in the future. When looking at the same reality one persons sees th…
That's incredibly reductive. I'm sure some people's depression can boil down to a matter of perspective, but it's naive to extrapolate that to everyone with depression. I'm incredibly optimistic and am content with my position in life. My default state is being mindful of the present and I don't think about things too far into the future. I very rarely ever feel stressed out over things in life. However, none of that…
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Stupid question - why do you keep suggesting that having a libido equals hypersexuality? Is this your trauma speaking, or do you automatically associate any sexual needs with a pathology? You've done it twice in this thread alone.
I didn't read their comment as insinuating libido is 1:1 to hyper-sexuality. I read it as: "consider if you have a libido, and depression, you may also be hyper sexually." The situation is PersonA has determined they need an anti-depressant. So one thing is 'wrong.' It stands to reason that they may be using sex as a painkilling mechanism. After all, sex feels great. When the anti-depressant kicks in, the body may de…