Anti-depressants

[Blide]

Originally Posted by Darus Grey

That said, also keep in mind that most mental drugs are a crutch.

In some situations that's not really the case, after a while depression can cause a chemical imbalance which perpetuates the depression; so antidepressants can be necessary to break the cycle. But I do agree that just taking medicines alone is not sufficient for dealing with most mental health issues.

I've been on antidepressants before for quite a while when I was younger and for myself, I feel the benefits were minimal at best. With me, I have very little variation in emotions (never feeling really happy or sad) and I'm indifferent about most things, so some people interpret that as depression. So over the years I've concluded I'm just a rather unemotional person who's relatively easy going. I've been on numerous medicines but the effects seem negligible, the most noticeable was that I felt a bit more emotions than normal which I'm not sure is a good thing or not. I chalk up how I am to being raised in an environment, to put it simply, that was a continuous series of extreme highs and lows ever since I was little so I’ve kept my emotions in check as a result. So while I’m no longer living in that environment, I’m still tied to it for a bit longer, once I’ve distanced myself from that situation some more, I think I’ll get “better” emotionally.

As for anti-anxiety drugs, that’s a completely different deal for me. I’m generally wired for one reason or another and anti-anxiety drugs can certainly help me sleep much better than any sleep aid such as Ambien can. As for anxiety itself, it can certainly take the edge off but for me it has a good chance of winding me down so much that I become drowsy; for me being wound-up is often the only thing that keeps me awake through the day with the amount and quality of sleep I get. I only took it as needed but I don’t use anti-anxiety drugs anymore either but they can certainly be helpful to take as needed in some situations but these days I just do other things to wind myself down.

Medicines won’t help much for being introverted, that just takes being with other people which admittedly I myself need to do a better job at. I don’t really have problems with public speaking or dealing with people per se, I’m just not very assertive and have difficulties starting personal relationships with people since I honestly suck at finding people I can relate to and I really don’t take the initiative to go looking. I’m honestly content being a loner which I know isn’t healthy but to change that is one of my personal goals.

[Millie]

I think the best advice being given on this thread is to go see a psychiatrist, and just open up about everything first. Worry about the drugs later. Let that be the psychiatrist's decision. The reason I say that is because too often people assume antidepressants are some sort of magical pill they can just pop, thereby instantly and permanently solving all of their problems. The truth is that medication is, in and of itself, not sufficient for major depression or anxiety disorders.

You need to develop a long-term therapy plan. This includes weekly (or bi-weekly) sessions with a psychiatrist or psychologist, and possibly medication if the professional deems it necessary and if you consent to it. But the real goal isn't just altering your brain chemistry. It's breaking out of the cycle of what psychiatrists call "learned helplessness" -- that feeling that you are powerless over your fate, and thus, that there's no point to exerting yourself in life. Most, if not all depression sufferers have that feeling to some degree. It's a learned defense mechanism. We go through too many terrible events in life, and/or those events are completely out of our control, and then we convince ourselves that we are powerless to shape or direct our lives. A vicious psychological cycle develops, and pretty soon, we're trapped in it. You're probably not going to break out of that mode of thinking without some sort of cognitive therapy. What a good therapist will do is convince you, intellectually, to look at your negative emotions and see how absurd they can be. Eventually you'll learn to develop a more positive mentality. You'll never make the depression disappear altogether, but you'll learn to overcome it more quickly and easily whenever it crops up.

I suffer from moderate clinical depression. There's not really an anxiety component to it. It's more that I just go into deep, depressive moods every now and then. It's absolutely horrible, because it just comes out of nowhere and/or can be triggered by the slightest bad event in my day. Sometimes it gets so bad that I can't shake it unless I go to sleep and basically avoid it altogether. The depression always convinces me, if temporarily, that I'm not good enough: that I'm ugly, or stupid, or unaccomplished, or worthless, and that there's no point to continuing to try. No matter how silly those thoughts may seem in the light of day, they're terribly real and extremely powerful when I'm depressed.

I'm not on any medications right now, because I think I've gotten to the point where my depressive episodes are few and far between. When they do happen, it's usually at night, just before bedtime. So I can just sleep them off most of the time. If that option isn't available to me, I am now able to have a sort of internal dialogue with myself and try to outwit the depressive mindset. Logic and rationality can point out how the depressive thoughts are wrong.

At any rate, back when I was 22 I had a major depressive episode after the death of a close friend. I couldn't pull myself out of it. I'd been depressed in general before it happened, but after it happened, my depression just took over fulltime. I went on Paxil, but the side effects were noticeable and annoying*, so I switched to Celexa. Same side effects. Switched to Wellbutrin, which I tolerated pretty well. Eventually I just stopped taking the pills altogether, and now, years later, I don't think I need them.

Drugs will make you happier, and not necessarily in a "robotic" or brainwashed way. You'll just feel better about life in general, and if you're prone to social anxiety, you'll probably be more outgoing and friendly. But drugs, in and of themselves, are not a total solution. They can help get you over the initial hurdle of taking action about your depression. But you'll also need therapy to help develop coping strategies.







*Here's some good advice re side effects:

Originally Posted by SalaciousTunare

I strongly suggest you research any medicine you are prescribed, before you begin taking doses. You will not be made fully aware of all the side effects by your doctor. The only ones I was told to watch out for, were the ones he had to watch his ass for, such as muscle tremors, heart palpitations, the life threatening ones, etc.

Definitely put your doctor through the paces about side effects. Most psychoactive drugs have side effects, and the companies that make these drugs are very inclined to hide or minimize them in official pamphlets and literature. Many SSRIs, for instance, have sexual side effects. For women these can include vaginal dryness and loss of sensitivity. For men they can include impotence, premature ejaculation, etc. Your psychiatrist will probably mention these things to you, but will claim that "only 1% of people experience them." Just based on personal, anecdotal evidence, that "1%" number seems VERY low. I'd say that roughly 50% of people I know on antidepressants have experienced some sexual side effects. They're obnoxious. Your doctor will never say "Oh, and by the way, I know you're depressed and all, but to add insult to injury, these pills will make it too painful to have sex!" You've got to bring up the subject with your doctor and, if you're on the pills, don't be too embarrassed to bring up the side effects to him if you're experiencing them.

[Tuco]

Rolling groups in Keshetta is my anti-depressant.

[Zeste]

I find it odd that people say they feel like robots or just like they are content and "don't care".

I never felt like that on any of my drugs. To be honest, I just felt "better". The only side effect I've felt is that I can't "finish" having sex, if you know what I mean. The wife doesn't mind, she gets like 2 hour marathons if she wants it. Good birth control I suppose.


I can only speak for Prozac, Lexapro, and Wellbutrin. I hadn't taken anything for probably 10 year or more when I first took Prozac in 2004. I can tell you that when it kicked in, it was probably the best phase of my life. I felt like a human finally, I could ask girls out on dates without fear, I could actually be social without anxiety, and I just felt BETTER about life. It was subtle, but just like someone slowly was lifting invisible weights off my shoulders.


It's not like being stoned or drunk. Imagine that you always have like a splitting headache. You adapt and life your life with it and you don't really notice it anymore, but it still affects your mood and your attitude. Instead of going out, you stay in because your head hurts and you just want to play WoW. When a girl turns you down, you get bummed out too easy because the headache already made you irritable. Then one day, the headache is gone, and it stops clouding and coloring all the other experiences in your life.

That is what it was like for me. I give it an A+++++++ feedback. It took my quality of life from a 4/10 to probably an 8/10.

And they are right - it is a crutch. But the point of it is, while the drugs help break the cycle and lift your spirits, THEN you change your thinking and your point of view, so when you stop the drugs, you're mindset change is permanent and you don't need them.

[tikkus]

** Celexa is my medication right now, not Celerex.

Anyway, I've actually worked through the sexual side effects. I just kept jerkin' it and eventually things were back to normal. But yeah, your doctor really should tell you that there will be sexual side effects, mine sure did.

Mine had also done a lot of research on depression as a med student and kind of shrugged off the idea of therapy. I've thought about going to try to work through some of my issues but I don't really know if its worth it. They're not extremely debilitating anymore, anyway.

If you're feeling bad though, get help as soon as possible. Life is too short to be miserable.

[Nakilos]

I took anti-depressants as a teenager and ended up fervently against them. That being said, I was getting them through a non profit teen center with an assigned councilor and I never really at the time investigated into the qualifications of these people. That being said, besides the typical teenage self confidence issues most teenagers have, I had really vivid suicide fantasies that would consume massive hours of my life considering how to kill myself.

I can't even remember what I took, except they all resulted in varying degrees of not working at all. First one had no real effect on my mood, except I had the same side effect mentioned above about not being able to "finish" during sex, which is probably the least annoying side effect (though my girlfriend at the time was bothered by it, as though it was a reflection of her inadequacies she thought). Second one had a really interesting side effect. If I fell asleep within 30 minutes after taking them before bed, I slept amazingly well. However, I have always had difficulty falling asleep, usually took me 45-60 minutes to actually fall asleep, and this resulted in completely crippling headaches for the next 3 hours, which resulted in me getting little sleep, unless I fell asleep quickly enough. The next drug made me want to sleep constantly. I'd go to school and fall asleep for about 30 minutes of every class I had that day, then go home, do homework for an hour, then sleep until dinner, eat dinner, maybe stay awake another hour then sleep until 7am. Also I had really bizarre dreams which were basically my suicide fantasies coming to life in far more bizarre and graphic ways. I stopped that one after a few weeks.

The last anti depressant I took simply was doing nothing, and when I told my then current counselor they were doing nothing, he gave me another prescription and I left and through the pills into the street, rather disgusted that I had basically spent the better part of about 14 months taking pills which were completely ineffective and only heightened my depression.

So personally, I just decided if pills weren't going to make me happy I needed to just shit or get off the pot. Let the depression eat away at me until I off myself, or get over it, so I opted to get over it. I haven't had any serious bouts of depression since I was 19 or so, and I wonder if I hadn't just told myself to get over it as a young teen whether I could've avoided the irritating side effects which only compounded my depression. I also wonder, if I had the sufficient monetary support to deal with a real psychiatrist whether my trip into medication would've been more useful to me.

I'm personally very anti medication for treatment of depression, but I probably wouldn't be had I got anything resembling proper treatment.

[Zeste]

A few talking points:


- Taking meds as a teen should not be compared to taking them as an adult.
the teenage brain is a flood of chemical imbalances and hormones as it is, it's near impossible to get the proper dosage and combination to have a full effect.

FYI I took prozac at 24-25 and Lexapro and Wellbutrin now at 26-27

- Clinical Depression is a physical illness that can occur WITHOUT exterior or emotional triggers/causes. It's not always about being emo or "bummed out", if your brain lacks the chemicals it needs to function, you WILL feel like shit.

EXAMPLE: at the univeristy, my mentor was a Neuropsych professor. Long story short, we chemically stopped the production of seratonin in rats, and had a control group of rats that were normal (much more complicated than that but you get it).

We put the "depressed" rats in a bucket of water, and the healthy rats in another. The depressed rats quickly just gave up and drown (we saved them before they died) and the healthy rats swam until exhaustion (saved them too). The depressed rats weren't sad, they weren't emo, they weren't mad at their parents. They had no seratonin, so they said "fuck it, I'm just gonna sink, who cares".

Same went with food - different set of rats, the seratonin denied group wouldn't eat when food was readily available. Without seratonin, you just don't care.

Depression is a physical problem in your brain. Get meds, THEN see how much therapy you may or may not need. The highest success rate for treatments is drugs and therapy combined.

On a side note... we also hooked rates up to wires that stimulated their dopamine centers in their brain, basically giving them a rush of euphoria every time they hit a little lever.

Once they learned the lever would basically give them an orgasmic feeling, they pressed the level for days until they died of thirst, even when food and water is available. They literally awed themselves to death.

[tikkus]

Thats incredibly interesting Zeste. +1!

[Blumpster]

I was on Paxil for about 2 months a few years ago. It fucking sucked. Every morning I woke up and it felt like a pillow was wrapped around my brain. I felt very little difference in my attitude, and I was very complacent. I just stopped taking it and didn't tell my doctor. Not advisable, ya, but that shit fucking sucks. Two years later I feel a lot better as a person. I'm really starting to think I was never really depressed, or I was and just one day decided to get myself out of it. I have a lot of social anxiety too, but a few beers fixes that usually. I've had a panic attack, but it was set off by smoking huge amounts of weed. Smoke weed still and haven't had it again. I'd go in for a Xanax script or something, but I'd abuse the fuck out of it probably.

[Tripamang]

In my youth I was fairly depressed, I just felt helpless about a lot of crap in my life and it just really brought me down. I spent a good many years just being depressed about what in retrospect was just stupid easily fixable crap, but c'est la vie.

I went to university, had some problems there and I was probably at one of my lowest points. I had friends who pitched their meds as wonder drugs and I eventually went to the doctor to pull myself out of it. She subscribed me some pills without really asking a lot of questions, I took them for a few months.. no side effects but definitely no benefits. After blowing probably 4-500$ of my money on random anti-depressants (I think I went through 3 types over 9 months?) pills to no ends, I went and spoke with a professional psychiatrist who after some very lengthy sessions decided I wasn't really a good candidate for anti-depressants as my issues were situational more than anything.

The psychiatrist recommended me to a psychologist, she was horrible :P But the psychiatrist really did point me in the right direction personally, and I started tackling a lot of my problems and I pulled myself out of it.

Really what I'm getting at, is depression is very individualized in the sense that you really have to look at why you're depressed to fix anything. Theres just no blanket cure or wonder drug. Some people have chemical imbalances.. (I know quite a few who do) but I'd say at the very least talk to a professional and spill the beans. Everything last thing that's bothering you write it out, the better you can describe whats wrong and why the better a professional can help you solve your problems.

[Torrid]

Originally Posted by SalaciousTunare

I strongly suggest you research any medicine you are prescribed, before you begin taking doses. You will not be made fully aware of all the side effects by your doctor.

This is very true and I strongly recommend this advice to ANYBODY who gets told to take a pill.

I've taken Paxil for a year or so, and it did absolutely nothing but give me headaches. That was just one in a half dozen prescriptions I've had that did absolutely nothing to solve my problems -- and in every case the doctor failed to mention any sort of side effects I might experience. I've had better luck improving my conditions with diet changes and exercise than any drug.

I watched a BBC documentary several weeks ago that touched on depression and anxiety medication which included an interview with the spouse of a medicated individual, whom said "she is no longer the woman I married." Interviewer: "Is she an improvement?" "No."

All drugs are poisons. They should be used as a last resort. I would recommend exhausting all the avenues of treatment that have no consequences first, and if they fail, determine what the risks are and weigh them against the possible benefits before consuming anything a doctor would otherwise hand out like candy.

[Zeste]

Originally Posted by Rep Hater

So sad to see adults rush to pills because they cant control their minds.

This statement can apply to 2 sides of "depression."

Normal depression happens to everyone. It's the blues. Being bummed out, sad. Usually lasts a few days or a week or 2. Then you return to normal personality equilibrium.


Clinical Major Depression is a physical abnormality in the brain, which is the organ that produces the "mind" and consciousness/sentience. The mind-body connection is reciprocal, meaning if there is a fault in 1, the other soon is influenced.


If your LIFE is having a problem and you have short term depression based on external events, your MIND can probably fix it through cognitive willpower and logic. This is how most people deal with things.

If your BRAIN is having problems and you have chronic major depression, it is a problem that is caused by physical and chemical abnormalities inside your actual brains neurology. Your mind CANNOT usually influence this, no more than you can use your MIND to command a broken bone to heal instantly. Chronic Major Depression is a problem that is located in the Limbic System, especially the amygdala, hypothalamus, basal ganglia, and mammilary bodies.


Since your brain is what creates your mind, if you have depression due to physical sources, be it trauma, genetics, or a combination of many things, "powering through it" or "thinking your way out of it" isn't going to be very successful.

I don't imagine that people who "don't believe in pills" or psychiatry or neuropsychology will really care what I have to say, I just want those who are open to new ideas to be able to clearly understand the point I am trying to get across.

Also, here's a PET scan of a healthy non-depressed adult brain, and of a depressed one. The left is a healthy person, the right is a depressed person. Red is brain activity. The depressed brain just isn't functioning at the level it should, and you can never really know why.

[Flinch]

Originally Posted by Darus Grey

Take Zeste's advice.

That said, also keep in mind that most mental drugs are a crutch

Is chemotherapy a crutch for folks who have cancer?

[Heavens_Myst]

Originally Posted by Flinch

Is chemotherapy a crutch for folks who have cancer?

In case you haven't been to a doctor's office lately, they have sample boxes of anti-d's laying around like free candy. A bunch of people I know have been recommended them recently after going in to get help for stomach pain or heart burn.

[Millie]

I don't think it's fair to describe antidepressants as a "crutch" by any means. But they're definitely not a cure, and the pharmaceutical companies and mental health industry seem to be pushing them as though they are. Most responsible psychiatrists will tell you that pills are not enough; you need to develop a long-term therapy plan in addition to filling a prescription. Pills can help you get started on the road to recovery (really, management), but developing a more positive mindset takes time and effort of your own.