My Thoughts on Depression
By Daniel Miessler on March 1st, 2008: Tagged as Culture | Psychology
A new BBC piece is highlighting an alternate approach to depression. Rather than assume that it’s something that should immediately be countered with drugs, how about addressing the things that are making you depressed?
A leading psychiatrist says that depression is not a human defect at all, but a defence mechanism that in its mild and moderate forms can force a healthy reassessment of personal circumstances. — BBC Article
I first heard about this revolutionary idea from one of my favorite female bloggers. I can’t remember her name right now, actually, but she’s known for being abrasive with her honesty. Anyway, her approach was simple: maybe you’re depressed not because you “have depression”, but rather because your life is depressing. Try improving it.
And that seems to be what this latest commentary from Dr. Keedwell arrives at as well.
“Don’t beat yourself up about being depressed, in most cases it will run its course provided you take yourself out of the situation that caused it.
Take yourself out of the situation that causes you pain? Brilliant!
I’m definitely not an expert on this, and I have no doubt that there are some cases that are seriously chemical and that require medication. I just think that along with many other problems that have industries associated with their remedies, this one is like 95% crap.
I get depressed too, but I can always find a reason for it. It’s always me not taking enough control of my own life — not doing the things that I think I should be doing. This leads to feeling like a victim and the spiral begins. Fixing that, i.e. becoming more active and more productive always fixes it in a very short amount of time.
And that seems to be what the good doctor is saying. Depression is kind of like the pain response when you touch a hot pan. It’s a signal that you need to change something. In short, I think that just as poor diet and exercise cause obesity, poor lifestyles and life perspectives cause depression.:
--
I haven’t looked at the BBC piece yet, but my understanding is that there is a difference between being depressed and having clinical depression.
Comment by Carl M — 3/2/2008 @ 12:52 am
Totally. My wife occasionally says something like how I look down, and I have to remind her, I am down, for one reason or another. It’s a human feeling, I’ll get over it.
The one thing people need to know is that the have the right to feel however they are feeling. Spending some time in that dark place is just a normal exercise in coping with a stressor, or loss, or compilation of such. Dwelling on it shortly is the start of sorting it out, or even simply adjusting to the state of the world you live in.
On the other hand, I have kids who get banged up, scrape their knee, feel cheated on by some friend or what, and my first response is to say, get up, dust yourself off, and get to the next thing.
We are all just big kids with bigger problems, feeling them all in much the same way we did years ago. We did it then and made it here by not devoting our trust to professionals whose job it is to temporarily muddle with our normal brain chemistry.
Medications are being abused. And when they are, it’s not only by individuals, but sometimes by doctors. And when that happens, and we know what we’re walking into, we do it to escape the blame that comes from screwing things up by ourselves.
How do I deal? What’s my method? I pop in a funny movie, listen to some angry music, try to get drunk(though I can’t because I get full after a few beers), or go for a drive to the cliff and just think in the wind and the dark and spend a moment in private.
-=T=-
Comment by TIMM — 3/2/2008 @ 2:30 am
Being depressed periodically, and having clinical depression are completely different.
I think that a lot of people think that having depression is the same thing as being depressed. Everyone gets depressed now and then, whether its for a few hours or even a few days. In many cases you find that there is something around to cheer you up, and you can become undepressed fairly quickly/easily.
On the other hand with clinical depression, it lasts for weeks, months, or even years. Having such long duration, it pretty much destroys your personality. What happened for me was that anything and everything that I had once loved doing, I couldn’t stand doing, I had lost motivation to everything and there was seemingly no way out of it all. I was experiencing physical and mental pain, and the only solution that could’ve helped was medication. Handing me a ‘cheer up’ gift would not have done anything for me.
So I think there is a HUGE difference with long term clinical depression, and your normal ‘feeling blue’.
Comment by jakedahn — 3/2/2008 @ 9:44 am
Gah. This whole “SSRI’s are no better than placebo” crap and the “think yourself better” people dirve me nuttier than I would by if not for my daily dose of Paroxitine. I echo what the people above say about the difference between “feeling depressed” and clinical depression. If you’ve ever been in the grip of the latter, you wouldn’t have been able to write this post.
I suffer from clinical depression. Apparently, my brain just does not make all the neurotransmitters I need, and they have to be supplemented with chemicals on a daily basis. It’s now 8-9 years since my fist attack and, after three bouts of build-em-up/watch-em-fall-away, I am now on permanent medication.
As I spiralled down (1999), I got to the point that I couldn’t make a decision at all - I’d get to the office and spend the day playing Freecell, not because I was lazy, or disinterested but because it was literally all I could do. I was the IT Manager for a government department and I could not make myself do my job. And I had loved my job. My performance (or lack, specifically) became the reason I got diagnosed - my boss said “shape up or ship out - you’ve got 3 months”. I went to the doctor and got the diagnosis (which surprised the crap out of me - I had thought it was something to do with the M.E. I also suffer from - fun being me, I tell ya!), got the pills and got back to my usual self after about 2-3 weeks of treatment.
But only if I keep taking the pills. I can last about 36 hours before I start to feel the precursors. By 48 I will be in the grip of an unending anxiety attack, tachycardia, sweats, trembling, inability to focus and all the other joys.
Being a little down is not the same thing, Daniel. I know you don’t mean it that way, but your last paragraph is more than a little insulting to me and, I’d guess to anyone who’s been bitten by the black beast. Unfortunately, a lot of idiots won’t differentiate and will take this latest furore as being vindication for their view that we should just snap out of it - yeah, right!
At least you should have quoted Keedwell’s other point: “Dr Keedwell says his theory does not cover severe depression, which is an illness accompanied by a catatonic lack of energy, cannot be worked through and requires the intervention of a GP” and, IMHO, drugs are always the last resort of a competent GP.
Comment by Mark Harris — 3/3/2008 @ 11:55 am
This reminds me of a discussion I had with my mom, who is a nurse, about the validity of massage therapy and chiropracters. She argued that it was more or less snake oil. The problem she stated was that people who had medical problems who needed a doctor where going to massage therapist or chiropracter, who resolve their problem for the short term, but not for the long term. My argument was basically they both had their place. Not all back or muscle problems require a doctor’s expertise, and is probably better treated without drugs or surgery. Others do require drugs and therapy. The trick is have a trained professional make the decision based off of scientific fact, not stereotypes of one or the other being good or bad. As an example I told her this. After the big hurricanes swept through Orlando I had a large tree down in my back yard, with just a small hatchet to chop it up. I spent a whole day and got that thing down to size to be hauled off when the city came to haul off debree. The next day my back was killing me. It went on for days. A friend of mine who is a licensed message therapist came over and after thirty minutes she had me back in top shape. After three days of pain she had me cured in thirty minutes. If I had gone to a doctor (s)he likely would have prescribed me some pain killers and advised me to take it easy for a few more days. The winner is clear. Massage therapy was the proper solution. This is the same for depression. If you have a problem you need to work through, it is healthier and safer to work through it. If you have a medical problem, you need, among other things, drugs.
Comment by Maxo — 3/3/2008 @ 4:03 pm
I think the female blogger whose name escapes you is the lovely mostly-anonymous lady who writes asViolent Acres.
I’m a reader of her blog too, and like her straight-to-the-point attitude :)
I think I’d have to agree that generally depression is a sign that there’s something wrong in your life, and a sign that you need to figure out just what it is that’s wrong, and take action to fix it.
Comment by David Precious — 3/4/2008 @ 5:46 pm