To All You Assholes Out There

[algunz]

Somewhat, you've almost made me cry in front of my class. They are editing their papers, so thank goodness their attention is not on me.

I'm truly beginning to see how destitute a suicidal person can feel, and how thoughts of others are not necessarily part of their process. I've had years of therapy and they could never paint this picture for me.

But, now of course, I've also got the image of them trying to reach out to me, and I simply missed it. It terrifies me to think that it all could have been different if I just got the phone call.

[Yablonowitz]

I think many suicides are preventable. If you even have the slightest inkling that a person is getting to that point, you gotta bring it up. At least that's what our behavioral health staff at the company I work say. You should ask them directly if they are thinking about suicide. And if they say they are, they need to get medical help immediately. Although many deny it or refuse to get help. I know, at least from my own experience and from what I'm reading into what Somewhat Damaged is saying (which is similar to what I've gone through), you don't think you will get better, and the most important message I got from my doctor and my family is the certainty that I was going to get out of it. Your feelings are always in flux but often being severely depressed makes you believe that you have slipped into a permanent condition.

Still, though, while it's quite natural to feel responsible or guilty when someone you know and love kills themselves, I know I've never felt the need to blame others for how I felt and I think most depressed/suicidal people feel that they are the ones who failed. Of course, neither is the case, I don't think. Most times. My aunt killed herself when I was 12, she had bi-polar. Wouldn't take her meds, tried killing herself once, was taken to the hospital, released two days later and the next day she killed herself. She had made up her mind. That's not a state I can relate to at all, but bi-polar is a strongly biological condition. People who take their meds get better. But if you're on an upswing, you don't think you need the meds. It's pretty hard for someone to feel responsible for the actions of someone affected by that.


There are also people for whom it seems to sadly be a permanent condition.

[Benis23]

Depression is a disease.

I want to say more but I have no training in the field... and this field is complex and confusing; there is already a lot of bad information circulating around and I don't want to (possibly) add to it.

You're absolutely right about how treating mental illnesses can be very complicated and confusing. I think psychology is a pseudo-science in that there aren't clear, definitive answers to the problems - there's a lot gray area. These aren't chemistry or physics problems where there's one clear, right answer.

I happen to be taking a class right now where a lot of the reading deals with whether or not depression and other mental illnesses are diseases. One psychiatrist, Szasz, makes the case that mental illnesses are not diseases. He argued "only symptoms with demonstrable physical lesions qualify as evidence of disease; physical symptoms are objective and independent of sociocultural norms, but mental symptoms are subjective and dependent upon sociocultural norms; mental disorders result from problems of living; therefore, mental disorders are not diseases but conflicts resulting from differing social values."

Basically, he's saying whatever mental state you happen to be in is only a problem is society thinks that it is a problem. For instance, if you are constantly anxious and worrying about things, that is only a problem if you live in a reality where people around you are less anxious, they expect you to be less anxious, and you want to less anxious like the other people around you. In that way, mental problems are entirely subjective and dependent upon society. In my opinion, a lot of the blame for all these cases of mild to intermediate depression lies with society's expectations. We live in a society where people want and expect you to be smiling and happy all the time. Being sad or melancholy is seen as being bad or abnormal.

Personally, I don't like the idea that depression is a disease because it implies helplessness. If you are depressed, there are things you can do (even besides taking anti-depressants) that have been proven to reduce depression.

And Yablo's right. If someone you know seems to be very depressed - get them to a therapist/clinic as soon as possible.

[Yablonowitz]

You're absolutely right about how treating mental illnesses can be very complicated and confusing. I think psychology is a pseudo-science in that there aren't clear, definitive answers to the problems - there's a lot gray area. These aren't chemistry or physics problems where there's one clear, right answer.

I happen to be taking a class right now where a lot of the reading deals with whether or not depression and other mental illnesses are diseases. One psychiatrist, Szasz, makes the case that mental illnesses are not diseases. He argued "only symptoms with demonstrable physical lesions qualify as evidence of disease; physical symptoms are objective and independent of sociocultural norms, but mental symptoms are subjective and dependent upon sociocultural norms; mental disorders result from problems of living; therefore, mental disorders are not diseases but conflicts resulting from differing social values."

Basically, he's saying whatever mental state you happen to be in is only a problem is society thinks that it is a problem. For instance, if you are constantly anxious and worrying about things, that is only a problem if you live in a reality where people around you are less anxious, they expect you to be less anxious, and you want to less anxious like the other people around you. In that way, mental problems are entirely subjective and dependent upon society. In my opinion, a lot of the blame for all these cases of mild to intermediate depression lies with society's expectations. We live in a society where people want and expect you to be smiling and happy all the time. Being sad or melancholy is seen as being bad or abnormal.

Personally, I don't like the idea that depression is a disease because it implies helplessness. If you are depressed, there are things you can do (even besides taking anti-depressants) that have been proven to reduce depression.

You know, I used to think like this until I experienced real depression and anxiety. I hate to say shit like this, but until you've actually been severely depressed, you can't make arguments like this. My entire outlook on the nature of the self and on the role of biology/genetics, nature/nurture completely changed after going through what I did. My symptoms were completely disproportionate to the actual circumstances of my life at that time. It is a real phenomenon, it's physical and mental at the same time. And it's causes are more than just your personality and how it conforms to social norms. It's more complicated than that. Plus, there are consistent physical and mental symptoms in depression that occur in every one who is diagnosed with it. They manifest in different ways because we're talking about the brain which just happens to be far more complicated and mysterious than any other bodily organ or function.

[TomAz]

I agree with Yablo though I don't think I've experienced it quite the same way.

As far as psychiatry seeming like a pseudo-science, I think that's more because our knowledge is still fairly limited and (as in any new field) there has been a tendency to get things wrong. It's like we've just barely scratched the surface of how the brain works, how personalities are constructed, etc. I mean nobody even thought it was somethign worth thinking about til the early 20th century, so psychiatry/psychology is still in sort of its "leeches and possessions" stage.

[weltschmerz]

Sometimes it seems like such and easy answer.