Explain to me why MY life is worth living?

[Lorizael]

What does western medicine even have to do with anything?

I've been depressed for eight years. I've tried... attempts at suicide, talking to my friends, talking to a therapist, failing at life, anti-depressants, reorganizing everything in my life that mattered, delving deeply into philosophy to give new meaning to my life, meditation, getting myself addicted to mountain dew, and obsessing over and stalking several girls.

Of all of these, two have had noticeable effects.

Meditation. Made me significantly happier for a significant period of time. Gave me a clear head. Gave me energy. Gave me a sense of direction.

Drugs. Prevented the random, physically debilitating bouts of depression that made me so miserable that I could not move or speak or think.

Drugs would be the "western" solution, I'd imagine, and meditation the "eastern".

Both failed to cure me of my depression.

The meditation... I simply did not have the will to do on a regular basis. I failed to make it a part of my life. I cite as reasons for this failure... the fact that I was horribly unmotivated - which just might be a sympton of depression.

The drugs... weren't meant to cure me of my depression. They made it so that I could function. Again, I did not have the willpower to overcome the depression, despite the anti-depressants helping me to get through the day.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by Darius871
Eh, correlation and causation are two different things.

I don't necessarily agree with Neomega but if he is right, perhaps the personal choices regarding one's environment, illogical assumptions about the future, refusing to accept that life is unfair, etc. all gradually alter brain structure.

Who cares if it's true? Personal choices are always paramount. If my dad had wanted to prevent his heart attack, he could have changed his lifestyle thirty years ago and never gotten any hints of heart disease. But he didn't. And he did have a heart attack.

When he was rushed to the hospital, the doctors didn't try to tell him that he should have acted differently thirty years ago. They treated the immediate condition. They made it so that he could survive.

Now. Now that the immediate danger is gone, he is trying to change the way he lives. He is trying to rid himself of the poor lifestyle that led to having a heart attack.

Depression is no different. Depression can be so bad that you simply cannot function. Cannot move. Cannot get through the day. And a doctor must treat that first and foremost, before getting to the root of the matter.

Anti-depressants do this. Anti-depressants make it so that one can actually function again.

Turning your life around is a completely different matter. Turning your life around is what involves personal responsibility and willpower.

[SlowwHand]

Ummm, did you happen to notice you lost your patient?

[NeOmega]

Originally posted by Lorizael
What does western medicine even have to do with anything?

A pill full of hormones is not the answer.

The drugs... weren't meant to cure me of my depression. They made it so that I could function. Again, I did not have the willpower to overcome the depression, despite the anti-depressants helping me to get through the day.

I can't help you holmes. There is only one person in the world that knows you well enough to know what the real problem is. There is only one person that has seen and experienced every moment of your life. Nobody knows better than you what your real problems are. They are all personal, but if you are honest with yourself, you can do it.

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by NeOmega
A pill full of hormones is not the answer.

Well then it's a good thing that none of the various doctors I've been to have ever suggested that it was! Every doctor/pyschologist/therapist/psychiatrist that I've spoken to has told me... well... has told me what you just said below. They've only ever suggested that medicine can help, not cure.

I can't help you holmes. There is only one person in the world that knows you well enough to know what the real problem is. There is only one person that has seen and experienced every moment of your life. Nobody knows better than you what your real problems are. They are all personal, but if you are honest with yourself, you can do it.

Uh, this discussion isn't actually about me. I was using myself as an example. That said, your statement is still innacurate. This is the way things should be, but it's the not the way things are.

Just as humans do not have an intimate rapport with every cell in their body, humans do not fully communicate with and understand what happens in their minds, either. We are too complex for our own good.

Any human that were able to fully grasp the enormous complexity of their own mind would surely be able to overcome any mental malady they might have, but this is a difficult thing to actually achieve. Buddhist monks can spend their whole lives attempting to understand the pain they go through, and the wants and needs that cause this pain, and still not get it.

What you spoke of there, knowing yourself better than anyone else does, seeing everything that is you, that's the finish line; that's not where we start.

[Lodi]

When it comes to mind altering drugs for problems or states of mind that do not need them, I just consider the doctors pimps for the pharmaceutical industry.

OK 'conspiracy' tie-in.

And guess what us Americans get! Forced mental screening! Hooray!

According to a Progress Report, The New Freedom Initiative is a new project announced by the White House to "help Americans with disabilities ...". But apparently, President Bush plans to unveil next month a sweeping mental health initiative that recommends screening for every citizen and promotes the use of expensive antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs. Under the initiative, every citizen of virtually every age, including preschool children, is to be screened for mental illness. Schools will be used as the screening centres for the 52 million kids and 6 million teachers who attend them.

Sounds lovely doesn't it?

http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2...tiative_us.htm

http://www.fightcps.com/articles/newfreedom-2004.html

Official government links and sites on it to show it is real.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/newfreedom/

http://www.hhs.gov/newfreedom/

Think we have seen an overdiagnosis of mental problems yet? Man I fear for our THX 938 (sorry can't remember the movie's name) like future.

[Lodi]

Oh, I am not against CPS. I am neutral on them.

[civman2000]

My experience with my sister was exactly the same as Lorizael's. The purpose of the drugs is to make it possible to function at all, to prevent constant attacks of depression. They don't actually cure anything, and the doctors never claimed they did.

I'm willing to grant the possibility that mental disorders are being overdiagnosed and overhyped. But that doesn't mean that they aren't ever real.

[Elok]

Originally posted by NeOmega
A pill full of hormones is not the answer.

No, a pill full of hormones would in all likelihood exacerbate the problem, since depression is treated via medications which alter the flow of neurotransmitters. While some neurotransmitters pull double duty as hormones, hormones as such have relatively little to do with it. Now please stop parroting Tom Cruise, it demeans all of us.

[NeOmega]

Originally posted by Lorizael

Just as humans do not have an intimate rapport with every cell in their body, humans do not fully communicate with and understand what happens in their minds, either. We are too complex for our own good.

balderdash. Many just choose to ignore the unpleasant aspects of themselves.

Buddhist monks can spend their whole lives attempting to understand the pain they go through, and the wants and needs that cause this pain, and still not get it.

Buddhist monks can be misguided, they are, after all, humans.

What you spoke of there, knowing yourself better than anyone else does, seeing everything that is you, that's the finish line; that's not where we start.

How can you fix something if you don't know what needs fixing? It is difficult to be self-critical when on happy pills. Happy pills are part of the problem. Like coke or x or tweak. They aren't helping the situation.

[Elok]

Er, they helped my situation immensely. Although they weren't "happy pills" so much as "stop wanting to curl up in a little ball and die for no reason pills."

[NeOmega]

Originally posted by Elok


No, a pill full of hormones would in all likelihood exacerbate the problem, since depression is treated via medications which alter the flow of neurotransmitters. While some neurotransmitters pull double duty as hormones, hormones as such have relatively little to do with it.

Everything is run by hormones, it is ludicrous to belittle their contribution to human thinking.

Now please stop parroting Tom Cruise, it demeans all of us.

I have never heard tom cruise speak... nor do I know much about scientology, except they reject medicine or something like that.

I learned this from my 29 years on this planet. The psyhopharmacuetical industry pwns joo. It tells you everything is wrong with you, Intermittent Explosive Disorder, (IED) Societal Anxiety Disorder (SAD) attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

the list goes on and on. It's stupid. Its part of the culture of victimization. A disease is out of your control, and in the hands of professionals. Do you seriously think, in 15 -20 years, there will not be a rash of lawsuits, claiming all these chemicals caused damage to peoples bodies? Do you think these drugs, if ingested over long periods of time, are harmless?

When you see someone in the hospital dying of lung cancer or emphysema, who claims they didn't know smoking was dangerous, don't you think, "well duh, it's only obvious, inviting a foreign substance into your body like that for a long period of time, will kill you"


I have met very few people who have actually beaten depression, while on medication. Most people I know who are medicated have been for years, some for decades. In fact, the only people I know who beat it, gave up the drugs because they thought it wasn't working... go figure.

[NeOmega]

Originally posted by Elok
Er, they helped my situation immensely. Although they weren't "happy pills" so much as "stop wanting to curl up in a little ball and die for no reason pills."

and you no longer take them?

[Lorizael]

Originally posted by NeOmega
It is difficult to be self-critical when on happy pills.

That a fact? Being self critical was never a problem for me, even when I was on anti-depressants. I have always known what my problems are, but as every GI Joe knows, knowing is (only) half the battle.

This is what I mean by wild and innacurate. From what orafice did you pull a claim such as that? Do you have anything other than anecdotal evidence to back up this fact that being self critical is difficult when on anti-depressants? Are there studies that show this? Have you polled the millions on anti-depressants? Researched this? Consulted the stars? Asked God? Where's it come from?

[NeOmega]

Originally posted by Lorizael


That a fact? Being self critical was never a problem for me, even when I was on anti-depressants. I have always known what my problems are, but as every GI Joe knows, knowing is (only) half the battle.

This is what I mean by wild and innacurate. From what orafice did you pull a claim such as that? Do you have anything other than anecdotal evidence to back up this fact that being self critical is difficult when on anti-depressants? Are there studies that show this? Have you polled the millions on anti-depressants? Researched this? Consulted the stars? Asked God? Where's it come from?

common sense. One cannot find the source of pain when one's mind is clouded by chemicals designed to mask said pain.

I don't need a study to tell me this. It is a simple logic that bypasses all the doublespeak and wieghted arguments and studies pushed by the psychopharmaceutical industry.