Antidepressants don't work?

[RetiredGySgt]

How many times do you need to be inoculated for tetanus?...How can you be inoculated if the pathogen hasn't been, at least loosely, isolated?

OTOH, people go on antidepressants and never ever get off the shit...I think I'd rather be hooked on smack.

Most anti depressants are not addictive at all. None I take are.

I have a permanent condition why would I stop taking my meds? When I do I just get worse.

If it works, why do you need to keep taking it?

Personally, I'd suggest going out and finding the best hypnosis trainer you can find....What do you have to lose?

I have my life to lose. I have to keep taking it because obviously I do not produce or possible don't properly use the transmitters I have, it is a permanent condition, probably inherited from my father. You are an idiot. You should know as an EMS that there are conditions that simply never go away.

 

[Oddball]

Most anti depressants are not addictive at all. None I take are.

I have a permanent condition why would I stop taking my meds? When I do I just get worse.

If it works, why do you need to keep taking it?

Personally, I'd suggest going out and finding the best hypnosis trainer you can find....What do you have to lose?

I have my life to lose. I have to keep taking it because obviously I do not produce or possible don't properly use the transmitters I have, it is a permanent condition, probably inherited from my father. You are an idiot. You should know as an EMS that there are conditions that simply never go away.

Hey...I haven't jumped your shit over anything...In fact, I believe what you have been experiencing is real enough...So knock it off with the invective.

Now, if you can look at the clinical side of this and clearly recognize that there is no quantifiable pathogen to your condition, which you have already done, then the speculation that it was inherited is, well, speculation.

As someone trained in EMS I know that there are physically verifiable organic medical maladies, like hypertension and COPD, that never go away...There is no such verifiable diagnostic procedure for mental dysfunction like depression...You've said so yourself.

So, all medical science can do is look in on brain scans an see which areas of the brain are firing...But here's the rub...They've hooked up perfectly healthy and functional athletes to brain scans and had them run their events in their minds...Turns out the same areas of the brain fire when they're imagining themselves going through, say, a giant slalom race course, as when they're skiing it in the real world.

So, whether you may or may not be able to imagine how such information could impact your life and situation, doesn't it at least make you at least a little bit curious?

 

[geauxtohell]

How many times do you need to be inoculated for tetanus?...How can you be inoculated if the pathogen hasn't been, at least loosely, isolated?

OTOH, people go on antidepressants and never ever get off the shit...I think I'd rather be hooked on smack.

That doesn't answer the question. There is a logical reason whey there are no "quantifiable" tests for psych disorders like depression and schizophrenia. What are you going to do? Get a punch biopsy into the brain's limbic system (deep in the brain)?

Obviously not. It's pure anti-psychiatric propaganda to harp the "no quantifiable tests" line. There are many diagnosis in medicine that are purely clinical. That doesn't impeach anything. It does make psychiatry a very subjective field and gives a large degree of error in diagnosis.

I don't know how many heroin addicts you've dealt with, but I'll assume you are being facetious in claiming that smack is more desirable then SSRIs (which are benign and not addictive).

I don't have much of a dog in this fight. I am going into Emergency Medicine not psychiatry. However, it's galling to see people act like psychiatry is a bunch of made up junk. It is not.

I'm trained in EMS, advanced NLP and clinical hypnotherapy...I've worked with two very good friends and got them to kick Paxil...Turns out that, for them, getting their moods out of a bottle was getting more depressing than the bullshit in their heads that they were refusing to deal with.

If you're going into EMS then you certainly know the difference between signs and symptoms...All of depression is diagnosed purely off of anecdotal symptoms....That's no propaganda.

Er... I am not going into EMS. I am going into Emergency Medicine. I will have a medical degree and will be specializing in Emergency Medicine. Of course the ED is where EMS brings the patients, but I won't be "EMS" per se.

Of course in the ED, you see plenty of psych and you have to do a certain amount of psych to get an MD. I know the symptoms of depression, but in the ED you are really just worried about if the patient is stable enough to put back on the street or not, as opposed to diagnosis and certainly management.

 

[Oddball]

Er... I am not going into EMS. I am going into Emergency Medicine. I will have a medical degree and will be specializing in Emergency Medicine. Of course the ED is where EMS brings the patients, but I won't be "EMS" per se.

Of course in the ED, you see plenty of psych and you have to do a certain amount of psych to get an MD. I know the symptoms of depression, but in the ED you are really just worried about if the patient is stable enough to put back on the street or not, as opposed to diagnosis and certainly management.

Gotcha.

Just to compare notes, I'm trained in the Elman style of clinical hypnosis...It's a very direct, no-nonsense approach that guys like RGS and you could very well appreciate...My trainer/mentor (Google "Major Mark Cunningham") is an unrepentant former special ops guy, who was involved in the Southeast Asian War Games, and refers to that time as "the time I got to run around killing people and get paid for it"....So, it's safe to say that he's pretty well grounded and at peace with any demons he may have had.

If someone with his background can come through it and not need to be on a daily dose of Thorazine, I figure just about anyone can.

 

[eots]

There is also no quantifiable test for tetanus. It's strictly a clinical diagnosis.

Does that mean tetanus also has no pathology?

Thanks for the tip on how "real medicine" works.

How many times do you need to be inoculated for tetanus?...How can you be inoculated if the pathogen hasn't been, at least loosely, isolated?

OTOH, people go on antidepressants and never ever get off the shit...I think I'd rather be hooked on smack.

That doesn't answer the question. There is a logical reason whey there are no "quantifiable" tests for psych disorders like depression and schizophrenia. What are you going to do? Get a punch biopsy into the brain's limbic system (deep in the brain)?

You could do so and nowhere would you find mental illness ...nowhere in an autopsy can one find mental illness "deep in the brain"..there is no scientific test for mental illness of any kind

Obviously not. It's pure anti-psychiatric propaganda to harp the "no quantifiable tests" line. There are many diagnosis in medicine that are purely clinical.

name three..

That doesn't impeach anything. It does make psychiatry a very subjective field and gives a large degree of error in diagnosis.

it doesn't confirm anything either

I don't know how many heroin addicts you've dealt with, but I'll assume you are being facetious in claiming that smack is more desirable then SSRIs (which are benign and not addictive).

heroin or synthetic heroins like oxy cotin in proper dose could indeed be better for you than ssris and if one can not withdraw from a drug without serious side effects it is addictive..so so they are indeed addictive

I don't have much of a dog in this fight. I am going into Emergency Medicine not psychiatry. However, it's galling to see people act like psychiatry is a bunch of made up junk. It is not.

quackery.. voodoo science doing more over all harm than good..treatments now will seem equally as ludicrous one day as the ice picks and ice baths and electro shock of the 50s

 

[eots]

Er... I am not going into EMS. I am going into Emergency Medicine. I will have a medical degree and will be specializing in Emergency Medicine. Of course the ED is where EMS brings the patients, but I won't be "EMS" per se.

Of course in the ED, you see plenty of psych and you have to do a certain amount of psych to get an MD. I know the symptoms of depression, but in the ED you are really just worried about if the patient is stable enough to put back on the street or not, as opposed to diagnosis and certainly management.

Gotcha.

Just to compare notes, I'm trained in the Elman style of clinical hypnosis...It's a very direct, no-nonsense approach that guys like RGS and you could very well appreciate...My trainer/mentor (Google "Major Mark Cunningham") is an unrepentant former special ops guy, who was involved in the Southeast Asian War Games, and refers to that time as "the time I got to run around killing people and get paid for it"....So, it's safe to say that he's pretty well grounded and at peace with any demons he may have had.

If someone with his background can come through it and not need to be on a daily dose of Thorazine, I figure just about anyone can.

They test these drugs for psychosis against placebos and the margin between the placebo and what is called an effective drug is remarkable low..to me the
the research might be better spent on finding out how people came out of psychosis from a sugar if it is an organic brain disorder ?

 

[Oddball]

They test these drugs for psychosis against placebos and the margin between the placebo and what is called an effective drug is remarkable low..to me the
the research might be better spent on finding out how people came out of psychosis from a sugar if it is an organic brain disorder ?

I'd be very careful lumping people who have relatively perfunctory internal communication dysfunction (neurotics, depression) and psychotics with very deep-seated and strongly dissociated emotional problems....Careful as in don't do so.

 

[freedombecki]

Anybody watching 60 minutes tonight? If not, watch it online. It's very interesting how some researchers are now saying that antidepressants don't work in mild or moderate cases. Heck, it sounds like the UK has already admitted it.

Take a view, it's good.

They don't work in most cases because "depression" has no pathology....There's no "disease", in the traditional clinical sense, to treat.

Most of today's unquantifiable "disorders" are pretty much dreamed up by PhD candidates, who needed to make a "new discovery" for their dissertations.

Clinical Depression exists. I have it and I suffer major depression pretty much all the time. It is caused mostly by a lack of one or more neurotransmitters in the brain. They have not developed a way to test medically for it.

The problem currently is that people that are NOT clinically depressed are diagnosed as such and given pills that won't help them because they have no deficiency of those transmitters.

Kids are the most over diagnosed of the lot. Act up as a teenager naturally does and an over concerned parent or Teacher will get you seen by a therapist or Doctor that has a vested interest in you being depressed.

The local mental health facility went from treating adults and senile old to no old people only about 10 beds for adults and almost exclusively treating teenagers and small children.

Further in children and teenagers the drugs that are common to the current era do not work on them. They actually induce the very effects they are supposed to treat.

Gunny, I thank you for having the courage to write this post. I have a transmitter-related disease called fibromyalgia (muscle pain), a disease that carries odd and uncontrollable muscle pain here, there, and everywhere. When I first got the disease about 12 years ago, my doctors tried everything to rid me of pain. I got pretty uncooperative when I couldn't efficiently do math in my retail store, and began to quit taking some of my prescriptions. My doctor insisted I had to take an antidepressant, because the majority of fibriomyalgiacs are supposed to be depressed. I couldn't figure it out. I was so not depressed that their antidepressants caused me to laugh or giggle, which is not always appropriate, i.e.--Oh, your husband died? hehehehehe. Good grief. I spent the first two years trying to rewire responses, when I just set aside the antidepressants, which had a nil effect on pain anyway. Finally, my phisician just gave up on me. He prescribed Neurontin, a product that was being used in surgery that stops pain at the spine. It didn't take long to figure out that while I wasn't hurting while taking it, it was causing total lapses in my mathematics. I lost all connection I had learned in working for an accountant between the column and its total. When you get good at numbers, you can just glance down a column and know if your answer is too great or small or has an error. To make a long story short, I hated the product with a passion, would prefer total torture to not being in charge of my brain. I stayed home a lot and developed sewing skills to keep my mind off pain. That worked really well, but it is deleterious to a mom and pop business to have its principal staying home 80% of the business day. Eventually, I found some health products that did stop my pain, and I still take one of them today to be sure I don't have that problem.

When we moved, my new physician practitioner specialized in bones, and she noticed I had a problem with calcium levels in my blood. She knew exactly what to do. She ordered a scan of my parathyroids and found 2 of the 4 were glowing on the scan and needed removal. She sent me on to an endocrinologist who tested me for 6 months, then concluded the same as she, so their surgeon friend did the procedure. I don't know what to make of an operation that doesn't show results for a while, but after about 4 months, not only had my parathyroids healed, my fibromyalgia was put on the back burner, and for the first time in 10 years, I could stand my life. I cannot, however, take calcium because I am allergic to it in all its tablet forms. However, being a transmitter important in muscle synapses, I decided I'd better drink a small amount of milk 3 or 4 times a day. My bright new physician also worked out a way for me to take a medicine that caused itching with another product that stops that particular allergic reaction, even in a fibromyalgia sufferer, who may have litterally dozens of allergies.

Knowing that depression is a problem of neurotransmission as is fibromyalgia reaction makes me realize the great strides that have been made in medical science recently by physicians, researchers, and clinicians. I've read some theorists attribute a possible link between some human diseases and a bout with certain diseases. One of my books on fibro says 80% of sufferers seem to have had a disease called Epstein-Barr virus in their medical history. So whether a virus inserts itself into its victim's dna is not really clear to me, but my thinking is it may in concert with other viruses, change the way the human body reacts to a stimulus.

Something in my vitamin regimen does fight the pain, but when I stop taking the drugs prescribed following parathyroid surgery, I have 2 hours before the fibromyalgia returns with a venom. The disease feels like a deadly fire, and once the fire starts, it's harder to stop than an oil rig burning.

Also, the disease is associated with other autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis and diabetes. I wonder if that means depression could also be of an autoimmune bent. If so, I am sure others are onto depression and will find a cure in the near future. I pray it is so, and along with it, my hopes and prayers that you will be able to fight it off with attention to nutritional aids that help others with autoimmune issues.

Life is so short, and mankind that can now travel to a moon and research its chemicals, might consider more human chemistry that will help people out as the thread of life runs thin.

I'm just thinking we're knocking off deadly diseases one at a time, some are autoimmune, and some seem to be caused by outside agents.

Here's to progress in medicine:

 

[geauxtohell]

You could do so and nowhere would you find mental illness ...nowhere in an autopsy can one find mental illness "deep in the brain"..there is no scientific test for mental illness of any kind

There currently isn't a definitive test. There are many good hypothesis about the differences in brain structure.

Dopamine D4 receptors elevated in schizophrenia

More importantly, absence of clinical tests does not equate to absence of pathology.

HIV/AIDS was killing people before there was a test for it.

name three..

Alzheimer's, tetanus, fibromyalgia.

heroin or synthetic heroins like oxy cotin in proper dose could indeed be better for you than ssris and if one can not withdraw from a drug without serious side effects it is addictive..so so they are indeed addictive

You have to be joking? You advocate giving depressants that have a low therapeutic index to the clinically depressed? That's absurd.

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

quackery.. voodoo science doing more over all harm than good..treatments now will seem equally as ludicrous one day as the ice picks and ice baths and electro shock of the 50s

Needless to say, your opinion is not "evidence based".

 

[Oddball]

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

The withdrawal is the recurrence of the symptoms....For those who whom the antidepressants aren't a matter of life and death, which is most of the people who are on them, the addiction becomes the emotional state where the tops and bottoms of their emotional sine waves -so to speak- are eliminated....Problem is that many of those people miss out on the peaks of joy that they used to have in their lives...This is exactly what happened with the friends I mentioned earlier.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

The withdrawal is the recurrence of the symptoms....For those who whom the antidepressants aren't a matter of life and death, which is most of the people who are on them, the addiction becomes the emotional state where the tops and bottoms of their emotional sine waves -so to speak- are eliminated....Problem is that many of those people miss out on the peaks of joy that they used to have in their lives...This is exactly what happened with the friends I mentioned earlier.

Meanwhile millions of people that HAVE recurring problems are lumped into your.,,,,, There is no defect claim and No one needs these meds.....

I acknowledge we have a problem with people over prescribing and over diagnosing the conditions, the answer is not for some EMS to tell people to stop taking drugs that DOCTORS have prescribed, the answer is to get a separate opinion or two.

Once again I have stopped my meds before and within 6 months I am back where I was on well on my way back to there. And there are millions with similar problems and conditions. And my family history tends to show it is inherited as my father had similar problems and my sister does too.

 

[geauxtohell]

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

The withdrawal is the recurrence of the symptoms....For those who whom the antidepressants aren't a matter of life and death, which is most of the people who are on them, the addiction becomes the emotional state where the tops and bottoms of their emotional sine waves -so to speak- are eliminated....Problem is that many of those people miss out on the peaks of joy that they used to have in their lives...This is exactly what happened with the friends I mentioned earlier.

Well, depression isn't a terminal state. The morbidity and mortality from depression has always been suicide. In that light, it's impossible to really assess risk/reward as it's very hard to figure risk on most suicidal patients.

I don't know if I agree with your assessment of depression. That sounds more like bipolar to me. For most people, antidepressant work to keep them from the extreme lows that keep them virtually catatonic so that they don't experience "impairment of function" (the main criteria for differentiating pathologic vs. non pathologic psych problems).

In the end, I am content that patients make their own decisions on their medical management (with the few exceptions that are involuntarily held). When it comes to oral psych meds, the patient ultimately has to consent to be treated and if they feel they have a benefit from SSRIs, then what is the harm?

Why does the system have to be changed for those who don't?

BTW, for any psychiatric condition, medicine is only 1/2 of the treatment. Counseling should be the other 1/2.

 

[geauxtohell]

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

The withdrawal is the recurrence of the symptoms....For those who whom the antidepressants aren't a matter of life and death, which is most of the people who are on them, the addiction becomes the emotional state where the tops and bottoms of their emotional sine waves -so to speak- are eliminated....Problem is that many of those people miss out on the peaks of joy that they used to have in their lives...This is exactly what happened with the friends I mentioned earlier.

Meanwhile millions of people that HAVE recurring problems are lumped into your.,,,,, There is no defect claim and No one needs these meds.....

I acknowledge we have a problem with people over prescribing and over diagnosing the conditions, the answer is not for some EMS to tell people to stop taking drugs that DOCTORS have prescribed, the answer is to get a separate opinion or two.

Once again I have stopped my meds before and within 6 months I am back where I was on well on my way back to there. And there are millions with similar problems and conditions. And my family history tends to show it is inherited as my father had similar problems and my sister does too.

Ironically, a person has a complete psychotic breakdown in the street outside of my house yesterday. He was crunched over and screaming in the middle of the street. The family was trying to get him in the car. I went out to see what the problem was. The answer: "he is off of his meds".

I think people's opinions would change if they were exposed to a psych ward and saw how bad mental illnesses can be and how different patients are when they submit to treatment (and the patients will tell you that).

The problem, as I am sure you can relate better than me, is that people get medications, feel better, and then stop taking their medications and revert back to their original state.

I find suggestions that the problem isn't "real" to be absurd (not saying Oddball is claiming that, but many people do).

People act as if the psychiatrists have pulled the wool over millions upon millions of people's eyes and are manically and systemically abusing patients because they are sociopaths.

It's absurd.

 

[Oddball]

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

The withdrawal is the recurrence of the symptoms....For those who whom the antidepressants aren't a matter of life and death, which is most of the people who are on them, the addiction becomes the emotional state where the tops and bottoms of their emotional sine waves -so to speak- are eliminated....Problem is that many of those people miss out on the peaks of joy that they used to have in their lives...This is exactly what happened with the friends I mentioned earlier.

Meanwhile millions of people that HAVE recurring problems are lumped into your.,,,,, There is no defect claim and No one needs these meds.....

Didn't say that...Watch your universal qualifiers.

I acknowledge we have a problem with people over prescribing and over diagnosing the conditions, the answer is not for some EMS to tell people to stop taking drugs that DOCTORS have prescribed, the answer is to get a separate opinion or two.

I spoke of my experience in EMS in terms of having a basic understanding of pathologies, not as someone qualified to speak of your particular case.

BTW, have you obtained the opinion of a well qualified and experience hypnotist?

Once again I have stopped my meds before and within 6 months I am back where I was on well on my way back to there. And there are millions with similar problems and conditions. And my family history tends to show it is inherited as my father had similar problems and my sister does too.

That experience tends to underscore my assertion that the meds aren't a cure.

Also, mind you that his is not to say to seek that route in lieu of the meds, just as a possible adjunct and/or alternative route to take.

 

[Oddball]

The case reports of people withdrawing or having serious consequences after cessation of SSRIs or SNRIs are miniscule. They are relatively benign. Obviously acute withdrawal isn't going to be much of a problem in drugs that take 2 to 4 weeks to work.

The withdrawal is the recurrence of the symptoms....For those who whom the antidepressants aren't a matter of life and death, which is most of the people who are on them, the addiction becomes the emotional state where the tops and bottoms of their emotional sine waves -so to speak- are eliminated....Problem is that many of those people miss out on the peaks of joy that they used to have in their lives...This is exactly what happened with the friends I mentioned earlier.

Well, depression isn't a terminal state. The morbidity and mortality from depression has always been suicide. In that light, it's impossible to really assess risk/reward as it's very hard to figure risk on most suicidal patients.

I don't know if I agree with your assessment of depression. That sounds more like bipolar to me. For most people, antidepressant work to keep them from the extreme lows that keep them virtually catatonic so that they don't experience "impairment of function" (the main criteria for differentiating pathologic vs. non pathologic psych problems).

In the end, I am content that patients make their own decisions on their medical management (with the few exceptions that are involuntarily held). When it comes to oral psych meds, the patient ultimately has to consent to be treated and if they feel they have a benefit from SSRIs, then what is the harm?

Why does the system have to be changed for those who don't?

BTW, for any psychiatric condition, medicine is only 1/2 of the treatment. Counseling should be the other 1/2.

I don't believe that the system has to be changed at all...I just don't buy into the notion that, as a generality, people without organic dysfunction are on the effect end of their own bodies.

Does that mean all?...Certainly not...I have learned to watch my universal qualifiers.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

I have Delusional Paranoia, there is no damn way I am letting someone hypnotize me, hell the probably couldn't cause I would be resisting it, but I am not going to test the theory.

And to be clear I spent my whole life like this, I hid it. Pretty damn well till I broke down. My Navy shrink said as bad as I was there is no way I should have been able to pass Boot Camp much less serve almost 16 years in the Corps and be promoted to GySgt.

From 95 to 2004 it was a long list of different meds that just did not work or only worked for a short time. Believe me I do NOT like taking medication. I have a belief about what is coming and me stuck on meds makes it real hard for me to think I will survive. ( remember delusional Paranoia) In early 2004 I went on Geodon and celexa and Provigal, within a month when the meds actually started working well, my voice was gone, I no longer had days when I couldn't get up cause I would kill myself.

It was like crawling out of a huge ass hole.

I have stopped my meds several times cause I don't like taking meds ( which is a recurring problem in most mental patients) EVEN though I KNOW they work. It doesn't take long to be VERY depressed again.

And of course it is NOT a cure, NO ONE claims it is. It is treatment. Effective treatment. Would you suggest a Diabetic go off insulin after 6 months cause it didn't CURE them?

By the way? I tried electro shock therapy. It wipes your short term memory so I lost about 4 months, BUT even though I can't remember the time the Doctors all agreed it did not help. BUT I was so BAD they ask me to do it.

I am ALWAYS depressed, I ALWAYS THINK about suicide, That never goes away. The difference is now I don't have to expend as much time energy and effort to NOT want to act on the thoughts. The medication makes my life liveable.

 

[Oddball]

A diabetic has a clearly identifiable organic failure.

That said, if what you've been doing is working for you, keep doing it....If you've been convinced that medicating the symptom has been the best route for you, that's your call...Even the great Milton Erickson couldn't do anything with a subject who was convinced that what they were doing was working for them.

I only offered up a possibility, which you may or may not be able to find yourself interested in, to explore as an adjunct to the actions you've already been taking, rather than a sole remedy in and of itself.

I'm sympathetic to your plight...No offense is now or has been intended.

 

[eots]

I have Delusional Paranoia, there is no damn way I am letting someone hypnotize me, hell the probably couldn't cause I would be resisting it, but I am not going to test the theory.

And to be clear I spent my whole life like this, I hid it. Pretty damn well till I broke down. My Navy shrink said as bad as I was there is no way I should have been able to pass Boot Camp much less serve almost 16 years in the Corps and be promoted to GySgt.

From 95 to 2004 it was a long list of different meds that just did not work or only worked for a short time. Believe me I do NOT like taking medication. I have a belief about what is coming and me stuck on meds makes it real hard for me to think I will survive. ( remember delusional Paranoia) In early 2004 I went on Geodon and celexa and Provigal, within a month when the meds actually started working well, my voice was gone, I no longer had days when I couldn't get up cause I would kill myself.

It was like crawling out of a huge ass hole.

I have stopped my meds several times cause I don't like taking meds ( which is a recurring problem in most mental patients) EVEN though I KNOW they work. It doesn't take long to be VERY depressed again.

And of course it is NOT a cure, NO ONE claims it is. It is treatment. Effective treatment. Would you suggest a Diabetic go off insulin after 6 months cause it didn't CURE them?

By the way? I tried electro shock therapy. It wipes your short term memory so I lost about 4 months, BUT even though I can't remember the time the Doctors all agreed it did not help. BUT I was so BAD they ask me to do it.

I am ALWAYS depressed, I ALWAYS THINK about suicide, That never goes away. The difference is now I don't have to expend as much time energy and effort to NOT want to act on the thoughts. The medication makes my life liveable.

the point is that in control groups large numbers of people receive the same benefit from a placebo so how can this be an organic brain disorder ?..having said that once one has been on medications you will most definitively suffer with and sudden withdraw as you have become chemically dependent it is not something that should be done without a doctors supervision and a gradual reduction in dosage

 

[eots]

correlation does not equal causation

 

[Oddball]

You can knock it off at any time.

Even considering the placebo effect, what the man is doing is working for him...The least you can do is acknowledge that much.