Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I will never not talk about my depression

annaschueth.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 125 posts

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#81

Post by _zzaw »

shkkmo wrote: post #68
_zzaw wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I deal with depression. If I could choose between a four-month vacation and not being depressed, I would take not being depressed. I wouldn't even have to think about it. It's like looking at someone who's sick with a debilitating illness and saying "Wow, I sure wish I could just lie around in bed all day." No, t0mbstone, you don't. All the things you're imagining you'd do with that time—you can't really do them when…

I think this is an uncharitable response. There is nothing in this comment that implies the person posting it is not depressed. I think there is a very fair point being made about the privilege of having the possibility of a four month vacation to deal with mental health issues. For many people, a four month break from one's responsibilities has a strong likihood of resulting in homelessness and/or permanent harm to…

If I'd thought that's what they meant, I would have reacted differently. Perhaps I misinterpreted it—I'd agree 100% that most employers are not nearly as understanding or generous as they should be regarding disability leave.

But I was not the only one here who felt that the tone of the comment came a little too close to the "wow, I sure wish I could have a nice vacation if I was feeling sad" business that most of us are very used to hearing from people who have no experience with depression, and think that those who do are just babies who need to stop being sad and go outside.

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#82

Post by xenocratus »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #70
overgard wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can only take the author for her word, she didn't say anything like this in the article.

No, she wouldn't. If the world has broken her of talking about it, obviously, she wouldn't. I'm giving you my take as a woman. But go ahead and do the PC dismissal as more concrete evidence that what I'm saying is both true and utterly socially unacceptable.

If you're already convinced the world is as you see it, there's no point having a discussion. The reality is that the world is a _really_ complex place, and one narrative simply doesn't cover everything, we're not all the same, not all companies are the same, not all societies/groups/cities/nations are the same.

I'm aware that women are disadvantaged in some cases, maybe even in companies that put a lot of effort into promoting them. But there are places where the opposite is happening. I used to work in a big tech corporation that was pushing this quite a lot - if they got two applicants, one was male one was female and they were roughly equally qualified, managers were expected to choose the female. This did make the gender diversity quite incredible, even in software engineering teams - I was in a team that was 50-50 male-female (this wasn't a 4 person team either). Have a look at [1], [2], [3], as well.

At the same time I don't want to discount your experience - there are plenty of awful people out there of all genders and races, and there's no excuse for stuff like that. We need to try and rat out discrimination, whichever way it points.

[1] National hiring experiments reveal 2:1 faculty preference for women on STEM tenure track - https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/04/08/1418878112

[2] Gender discrimination in hiring: An experimental reexamination of the Swedish case - https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...

[3] Man Up and Take It: Gender Bias in Moral Typecasting - https://journals.aom.org/doi/abs/10.5465/AMBPP.2019.15459abs...

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#83

Post by wizzwizz4 »

shkkmo wrote: post #64
wizzwizz4 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you're dealing with con artists, the “pseudo” in “psuedoscience” is usually the explanation. I don't doubt Freud was able to help a lot of people, but I do doubt his explanations of what it was exactly that helped, and why.

The issues is that we are missing the "why" of how most antidepressants work... so do they also qualify as pseudoscience? In my mind, psuedoscience isn't just missing the "why/how it works" but also the "who/when it helps" and as a result don't have clear statistical backing.

We know the why is “because the antidepressants were taken”. But antidepressants only work sometimes – different antidepressants work for different people! We don't know the true, fundamental reason, but at least we've pinned it down a bit.

I call something pseudoscience when the “why” is “pinned down” as something wholly unrelated, and the people involved haven't noticed; if they were doing science instead of just theorising, they would've noticed.

(We agree, but we're using different words.)

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#84

Post by wizzwizz4 »

mdoms wrote: post #62
wizzwizz4 wrote: post #19

There're a lot of people in the comments here who don't seem to know what depression is. Depression isn't just “I'm sad all the time”. Functionally, depression is a reduction in the set of actions that one can take. For some, it can be bad enough that “fill out this form, make this phone call, write the reference number on the form then post it” is too much. No, there's no reason they shouldn't be able to do that. Th…

> There're a lot of people in the comments here who don't seem to know what depression is. > Depression isn't just “I'm sad all the time”. I always see these comments in threads about depression but I almost never see people actually making the comments in question. Can you point to an example in this thread?

They were mostly dead'd, but https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27543212 is the example that prompted me to write this.

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#85

Post by DoreenMichele »

xenocratus wrote: post #82
DoreenMichele wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, she wouldn't. If the world has broken her of talking about it, obviously, she wouldn't. I'm giving you my take as a woman. But go ahead and do the PC dismissal as more concrete evidence that what I'm saying is both true and utterly socially unacceptable.

If you're already convinced the world is as you see it, there's no point having a discussion. The reality is that the world is a _really_ complex place, and one narrative simply doesn't cover everything, we're not all the same, not all companies are the same, not all societies/groups/cities/nations are the same. I'm aware that women are disadvantaged in some cases, maybe even in companies that put a lot of effort int…

The OP said: In my opinion, this attitude she's portraying is a dangerous attitude to have. This victimhood seems core to her identity. I'm not trying to shame the condition, I'm trying to say that the condition shouldn't become some core part of your identity.

So if you are a woman, it's not okay to say "My gender is an obstacle to my career success and it's literally crazy making." And if you do the more socially acceptable thing of chalking it up to a personal problem like depression, then some internet stranger is free to malign you and your presumed victim mentality.

If another woman tries to say "Hey, maybe she has a legitimate reason for feeling victimized and it isn't just some kind of neurotic BS" on a male dominated forum where the comment occured, she gets a pile on of downvotes and various replies that more or less boil down to "How dare you make such an observation!"

I wasn't looking for a fight. I made a comment as someone with firsthand experience of how frustrating it can be to try to pursue a career as a woman in a man's world. A zillion people are vilifying me for it.

Why do so many people feel some need to try to shut me down and act like it's a bad faith comment in violation of the guidelines?

The reactions to my observation are over the top. The observation itself is incredibly mild.

I think I'm done here. It is probably a waste of my time to keep responding to comments where there is some kind of presumed guilt on my part. It's all too easy for other people to decide that's evidence of how fighty and irrational and bad I am when none of that is true.

What's true here is that it's an overwhelmingly male forum and it's socially acceptable for millions of people to watch me starve and shrug and say "Not my problem" and it's not socially acceptable for me to say "I would like to stop starving and wish someone would help me figure out the super secret handshake to being allowed to earn a goddamned living. Please and thank you."

I'm done with this ridiculous nonsense for today.

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#86

Post by schroeding »

grae_QED wrote: post #79
overgard wrote: post #33

I've quit a job because I was going through bad depression before and I didn't think I could do a good job. I even asked for part time work, so I understand where she's coming from, but.. In my opinion, this attitude she's portraying is a dangerous attitude to have. This victimhood seems core to her identity. I'm not trying to shame the condition, I'm trying to say that the condition shouldn't become some core part o…

I couldn't agree more. It was also a red flag when she said that she wanted to normalize her depression. Depression, like any other mental illness, should be destigmatized but not normalized. Through out the entire post she outlined exactly why it should not be normalized. It's a debilitating disorder that should not be left untreated. I think to try and normalize it would leave the impression that severe depression…

I agree with you about "normalization" vs "de-stigmatization", but I can't imagine she meant "normalization" like this?

> people like me are here, everywhere, you could be me at any point in your life

That's a very important point, and I believe that's what she meant by "normalise". "Normalise" in the "people with depression are normal people with an illness, not 'ill people', anyone can be affected because it's a normal illness like an infection" kind of way, which more or less equals de-stigmatization, right?

But English is not my first language, it's totally possible I'm reading this the wrong way, feel free to correct me if that's not a possible way to read this article. :-)

I can't really imagine that anyone with depression would really want to "normalise" it in the dictionary way, by suggesting that it should be untreated and a "normal way of life". On the contrary, nobody should have to suffer from this. :-/

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#87

Post by jokoon »

The thing is, I'm pretty sure 15 to 30% of the population experience depression. Severity varies, but it's difficult for psychiatry to draw a line between melancholy and depression.

I'm pretty certain there are depressed people who are somehow functional and have unhealthy ways to cope and are able to go through it.

But it doesn't mean that people who are functional can give lessons to those who are not.

Talking about depression is okay, and medicating is good, but in my view there are way more people with depression than we like to admit. So talking about it it'sy okay, but it's more about being able to admit weakness.

We don't like to show vulnerability and weakness, but we should.

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#88

Post by shkkmo »

_zzaw wrote: post #81
shkkmo wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is an uncharitable response. There is nothing in this comment that implies the person posting it is not depressed. I think there is a very fair point being made about the privilege of having the possibility of a four month vacation to deal with mental health issues. For many people, a four month break from one's responsibilities has a strong likihood of resulting in homelessness and/or permanent harm to…

If I'd thought that's what they meant, I would have reacted differently. Perhaps I misinterpreted it—I'd agree 100% that most employers are not nearly as understanding or generous as they should be regarding disability leave. But I was not the only one here who felt that the tone of the comment came a little too close to the "wow, I sure wish I could have a nice vacation if I was feeling sad" business that most of us…

> ...felt that the tone of the comment came a little too close to...

Making assumptions as to intent or meaning because of percieved tone isn't very charitable. You are correct in that you are far from the only one to do so. I do it sometimes too, but that doesn't make it productive.

I am not saying you shouldn't acknowledge how the tone came accross and explain how frequently that sentiment is faced. I am saying you should do that while assuming the best possible intrepretion of the comment you are responding to.

> ...think that those who do are just babies who need to stop being sad and go outside

While I don't hear that sentiment from other people very often, my own brain frequently says it to me; It isn't very helpful.

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#89

Post by dkarl »

silicon2401 wrote: post #28
gonehome wrote: post #3

I wonder how much making being depressed part of your identity prevents you from getting better. I'm not dismissing the reality of it, but reinforcing it to yourself and others around you on a constant basis probably isn't helpful? Constantly ruminating on your depressed state probably isn't good either. Pretending everything is great probably isn't a good idea or likely even possible (or desirable?), but I'm not per…

I agree. I wonder why it's so different for depression vs. other illness/challenges. When we see someone without legs, we accommodate them however possible and try to treat them equally, but we also celebrate those who manage to be competitive wheelchair racers or accomplished at calisthenics. Yet for depression, we almost try to convince people that it's simply not possible to be functional and you shouldn't even tr…

> we almost try to convince people that it's simply not possible to be functional and you shouldn't even try

That's not really the way it is, though I can see how you would get that impression. Coping strategies, trying to get the highest level of function out of myself on every given day, and learning how to set myself up for the highest level of function in the future are a big part of my approach to depression, complementary to the reflective, root cause-oriented approach that people associate with talk therapy. My depression varies in a range that includes "not depressed" (I mean, assuming I know what that is) and that is the state I "strive" to achieve as much as possible, using all the means at my disposal.

The thing is, everybody understands the concept of "just try not to be depressed," and they already overestimate its effectiveness, so we don't spend a lot of time talking about it. What people don't get is why it doesn't fix everything, so that's the part we try to explain. To begin with, the reason I put "strive" in quotes: it's not really the right word for trying not to be depressed, because "striving" is sometimes counterproductive and sometimes not even available as a tactic, so you have to try by not-trying, and if that sounds like a catch-22, well, it 90% is.

If you compared chronic depression to a chronic knee injury, you could compare "just try not to be depressed" to using the knee as normally as possible. It helps you get stuff done despite the injury, it's important for maintaining good movement patterns, it helps keep all the muscles around the knee strong so you don't injure yourself further, it's generally a positive thing for promoting whatever degree of long-term improvement is possible (which is near total for some people and not much for others, and you don't know how it will be for you,) but it doesn't cure the injury, and you learn from hard experience that arbitrarily pushing yourself can inflame the injury and set you back.

Re: I will never not talk about my depression

#90

Post by shkkmo »

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #83
shkkmo wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issues is that we are missing the "why" of how most antidepressants work... so do they also qualify as pseudoscience? In my mind, psuedoscience isn't just missing the "why/how it works" but also the "who/when it helps" and as a result don't have clear statistical backing.

We know the why is “because the antidepressants were taken”. But antidepressants only work sometimes – different antidepressants work for different people! We don't know the true, fundamental reason, but at least we've pinned it down a bit. I call something pseudoscience when the “why” is “pinned down” as something wholly unrelated , and the people involved haven't noticed; if they were doing science instead of just…

> We know the why is “because the antidepressants were taken”.

We don't know that. The best we know is that people who take antidepressants on average experience more improvement than a placebo. We actually don't know who got better from taking antidepressants due to the placebo effect.

> I call something pseudoscience when the “why” is “pinned down” as something wholly unrelated, and the people involved haven't noticed;

This is a good point and I would agree that pseudosciences are generally bad at uncovering bad explanations. I will point out that the "chemical imbalance" theory is still widely believed even though it has been pretty thoroughly debunked.

I think the dichotomy science/pseudoscience if often applied to whole fields when there is often a mix of both within any given field. The prevelence can certainly be highly variable from field to field but it isn't as black and white as we like to suggest.

Post reply on HN