Live data from Hacker News

The Depression Thing

zachholman.com

91–100 of 348 posts

Re: The Depression Thing

#91
post #75

Cutting gluten out of my life basically "cured" my depression, which sounds crazy, since it is just something I'm eating... I'm not allergic, but probably intolerant. I ate wheat for most of my life. I'm pretty sure it is related to inflammation, and how eating wheat products probably screwed my digestion up. I also rarely get sick anymore. Not trying to suggest that medicine, therapy, etc. does or does not work, jus…

1 hour hold account 1 hour old comment. I am not trying to be negative but i have seen no science to state that cutting gluten is going to do anything at all for anyone unless they have Celiac disease. You want to back that up with study or something? Its just WOO if i am wrong i will be happy to eat some crow. Further more the comment near this one about some imaginary threshold of MEME count gives something legitim…

I believe there are a few other conditions besides Celiacs which are pretty serious that make eating gluten a bad look, though less prominent.

Re: The Depression Thing

#92
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Careful with that advice. It might have been good for you, it might be good for a lot of depressive people, but definitely not for all. Before I turned twenty I met two people my age who took your advice and exercised until ambulances had to pick them up (literally). Whatever you do to counter your depression, have a trustworthy, knowledgeable aid at your side: a therapist.

This is an almost absurd criticism ("be careful telling people to sleep, people I know who were depressed followed that advice and slept for 12-14 hours every day"). Let's fix it by being more specific, so we don't accidentally cause any more problems: "daily moderate-intensity cardiovascular exercise" (or, if you prefer, "resistance training 3x week"). Or even, "a healthy level of exercise". I agree that therapy is…

I didn't read the criticism that way; seemed like a warning against "one size fits all" thinking when dealing with a complex system like a human brain.

Maybe you are both right!

Re: The Depression Thing

#93

I was diagnosed with "major depression" when I was 14, did the medication and therapy thing for a bit but the medication made me a zombie. Therapy helped me learn to cope a little better, but I was never "cured" of my depression. My 20s have been pretty bad, but in the last year and a half I've lost 100+lbs and have been running and lifting. It turns out the common sense advice to depression was really what I needed…

It's also a viscous cycle once you stop doing these things. I had everything going well for me, but then a bunch kinda blew up at once and I stopped eating healthy, quit working out, and was losing sleep because I was trying to solve all these other problems and felt those things were pointless. "Oh, I can't get in the mindset to lift today I'm too stressed out and depressed/hopeless." That led me from only skipping…

And that's where therapy supports the physical care aspect: It can provide you with the tools to deal with these traps. It can provide you with the tools to identify these traps long before your mirror tells you.

Mere therapy isn't everything, but neither is only taking care of the non-brain parts of your body.

Re: The Depression Thing

#94
post #81

Nice thread and here my top 10 list of antidepressants (in that order): 1. Most of the times, there's a clear reason for a depression, something which is not that easy to change and worse not that easy to identify as the real cause (e.g. wrong boss, wrong cofounder, wrong investor, wrong friends, toxic workplace, big nose, etc.); before looking at the other antidepressants, try to get rid of the main issue; often it…

> Most of the times, there's a clear reason for a depression I'm gonna have to disagree pretty strongly with that assertion without any supporting evidence. In fact, I would argue that rarely is depression caused by a clear reason which has a direct path to resolution. This is the exact perspective that makes those going through depression feel like others are trivializing what they're going through. That's probably…

> In fact, I would argue that rarely is depression caused by a clear reason which has a direct path to resolution.

I'm gonna have to disagree pretty strongly with that assertion without any supporting evidence.

Re: The Depression Thing

#95
post #16

Cutting gluten out of my life basically "cured" my depression, which sounds crazy, since it is just something I'm eating... I'm not allergic, but probably intolerant. I ate wheat for most of my life. I'm pretty sure it is related to inflammation, and how eating wheat products probably screwed my digestion up. I also rarely get sick anymore. Not trying to suggest that medicine, therapy, etc. does or does not work, jus…

Did you ever feel like gluten was affecting you? Or was this a random change you made that happened to have a noticeable effect?

Not sure for gblain, but for me I actually broke out in pimples when eating excessive wheat/bread. Under a certain limit, I just felt bad.

However, I'm not sure if it's just gluten or glyphosate toxicity [1] (being concentrated in GMO wheat as that includes "roundup ready wheat" which, clearly gets more roundup on it).

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15862083

Re: The Depression Thing

#96
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most of the times, there's a clear reason for a depression I'm gonna have to disagree pretty strongly with that assertion without any supporting evidence. In fact, I would argue that rarely is depression caused by a clear reason which has a direct path to resolution. This is the exact perspective that makes those going through depression feel like others are trivializing what they're going through. That's probably…

> In fact, I would argue that rarely is depression caused by a clear reason which has a direct path to resolution. I'm gonna have to disagree pretty strongly with that assertion without any supporting evidence.

Sure, let me quote Harvard[1]:

"It's often said that depression results from a chemical imbalance, but that figure of speech doesn't capture how complex the disease is. Research suggests that depression doesn't spring from simply having too much or too little of certain brain chemicals. Rather, there are many possible causes of depression, including faulty mood regulation by the brain, genetic vulnerability, stressful life events, medications, and medical problems. It's believed that several of these forces interact to bring on depression."

Enjoy your continued confusion as to why your 'advice' is being downvoted.

[1] - https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/what-causes-dep...

Re: The Depression Thing

#98

Nice thread and here my top 10 list of antidepressants (in that order): 1. Most of the times, there's a clear reason for a depression, something which is not that easy to change and worse not that easy to identify as the real cause (e.g. wrong boss, wrong cofounder, wrong investor, wrong friends, toxic workplace, big nose, etc.); before looking at the other antidepressants, try to get rid of the main issue; often it…

I agree that these are all good parts of a holistic treatment plan, but therapy and medicine also deserve to be on here. A more accurate title would be "ways to get out of a rut."

Re: The Depression Thing

#99
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Careful with that advice. It might have been good for you, it might be good for a lot of depressive people, but definitely not for all. Before I turned twenty I met two people my age who took your advice and exercised until ambulances had to pick them up (literally). Whatever you do to counter your depression, have a trustworthy, knowledgeable aid at your side: a therapist.

We're treating psychological problem like pathological ones. Mental health is not a pathological problem necessarily, but rather an physiological responsive one. As such giving medications as to "treat mental health" is the wrong perspective, and more proper perspective would one were certain physiological responses to certain environmental conditions are deemed as negative. As such to an extent the physiological res…

Therapy can work entirely without medication.

There's a difference between psychologists and psychiatrists, and the article even spells it out.

Re: The Depression Thing

#100

Cutting gluten out of my life basically "cured" my depression, which sounds crazy, since it is just something I'm eating... I'm not allergic, but probably intolerant. I ate wheat for most of my life. I'm pretty sure it is related to inflammation, and how eating wheat products probably screwed my digestion up. I also rarely get sick anymore. Not trying to suggest that medicine, therapy, etc. does or does not work, jus…

My naturopath put me on a neurotransmitter (which I'm intentionally not naming, seek help if you are depressed). My depression was caused by anxiety, that was caused by, evidently, something with my chemical balance.

Scientifically speaking, administration of my supplement is inconclusive. Don't take natural medicines for chronic conditions unless a qualified professional is looking out for you.

Post reply on HN