Do you ask yourself why some people don't care about "the issues"?

[patrice]

Two-thirds of the global market for antidepressants is accounted for by the United States.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/08/AR2008020803272_pf.html

[Captain Hilts]

1. And a HUGE Nat'l Instit. of Health study said they're useless for half of those that take them. nt

[patrice]

2. One MUST wonder about all kinds of ordinary decisions that folks make, like . . .

"Shall I or shall I not charge this $400.00 whatever?" or "Shall I or shall I not flirt with ____________________." "Can I afford this house?" "Is this work that so-and-so is waiting on good enough, does it meet the need for this project?" "Do the deaths of something like 1,000,000 Innocent people in Iraq matter?" "Shall I tell this lie or not?" . . .

One wonders how these millions and millions of decisions are affected by anti-depressants . . . and other drugs AND alcohol.

[melody]

5. How does taking insulin affect diabetics?

How does TV distort perception? How does fast food? See, everything becomes a target of suspicion with this mode of thinking.

People who need antidepressants are NOT pacified by them! People who need them have more mental energy to care about things with them. Your attitude reveals a deep ignorance about what depression is and how it affects people. How would you like it if someone started sneering at the only remedy to YOUR life-threatening disease?

[patrice]

10. Every person who is taking antidepressants "needs" them? That IS a generalization.

[melody]

11. I didn't say that -- you said that antidepressants trigger a lack of concern about things

I know they do not. You're the one making generalizations. No doubt antidepressants are incorrectly prescribed but they do not act in the manner you have attributed to them.

[patrice]

14. None of the decision making processes of people taking anti-depressants are affected

by their use of anti-depressants?

another generalization.

I said that there is room to question the widespread use of antidepressants. If you are saying there 100% of antidepressant use is okay; that there is absolutely NO reason to ask questions; that decision making processes are absolutely NOT affected, you are making a mistake about the Science that produces this sort of thing for our use.

[melody]

16. Decision making processes are affected by NOT taking antidepressants!

Good grief ... why do you assume that the state of being depressed is the normal one?

I'm not saying anything -- you're the one making rash, across the board statements (like the one you've just made) about something about which you clearly know little.

[patrice]

22. I am asking questions about the exclusive reliance on chemicals, rather than at least some

attempt to adapt one's life in a manner that is more functional, thusly aleviating depression.

You seem to think this it's a zero sum game. You appear to propose a false dichotomy: either drugs or depression.

How did our species survive before chemicals? What is happening to those adaptive processes under the influence of big pharma?

[Captain Hilts]

9. Yes. I also worry about, how does the Army deal with a medicated generation of recruits?

Do they pause and everybody takes their pills? Do they wean them off them? What if they run out in Falujah? etc. Can these folks handle stress as well.

I think there is a lot to be learned from how the military deals with folks on meds as they're a huge control group.

As for alcohol, there is a reason it was so cheap in the Soviet Union. Keeps people politically docile because they're too blotted out or are too busy screwing up their own lives to fight the government.

[melody]

13. People who need antidepressants are NOT made DOCILE by them!

It has the exact opposite effect. Depression is NOT sadness ... it is mental "tiredness", a lack of mental energy.

[Captain Hilts]

20. I didn't say meds made them "docile" or list any effects. I just wonder how they...

deal with people on so many different varieties of meds.

[melody]

33. What did you mean to say by this then?

You said -- here's the quote:

>Keeps people politically docile because they're too blotted out or are too busy screwing up their own lives to fight the government.

[melody]

3. No, but I ask myself why some people don't know anything about depression

I care MORE about the issues because I'm on SSRIs. When you're depressed, you don't have the mental energy to care about ANYTHING.
I'm so sick of the rank ignorance about clinical depression and antidepressants.

[patrice]

4. I know quite a bit about depression.

Including the fact that the exclusive reliance upon chemicals in ALL cases is not a cure.

[melody]

6. Evidently not, given your knee-jerk generalizations n/t

[patrice]

8. Please identify where I said "Every __________ is _______________" and I'll correct it.

[melody]

12. You don't need to say those words, it's your clear implication

>One wonders how these millions and millions of decisions are affected by anti-depressants . . . and other drugs AND alcohol.

You don't give ANY exceptions. This seems to be your opinion on ALL anti-depressants. I would be dead without them. You have
generalized me into the above description.

[patrice]

15. I don't know what you do when you "wonder", but one wouldn't wonder in the first place if one

already knew, as you claim I do.

[melody]

17. Look, if you're afraid of medication, that's your right

But don't attribute simple-minded, unscientific attributes to medications people need to SURVIVE.

[patrice]

24. NO prescriptions are the result of "simple-minded, unscientific" processes?

There is NO absue?

Every one taking drugs is using them appropriately?

Drugs affect decision making and ones life ONLY in positive ways?

[melody]

32. You're totally misreading every post when you're the one making outrageous claims

You sure you don't work for the McCain campaign? lol

Depression affects your decision making in negative ways. Beyond that, you're just angling for an argument
because someone disagreed with you. Welcome to my ignore list.

[patrice]

25. P.S. Note the use of the word "some" in my OP.

Now you've got me wondering why you are so defensive about such a clearly qualified statement.

[melody]

35. I'll make one more try

The very fact you would ask that question about anyone suggests you have the usual simplistic layman's opinion
of antidepressants. It's disingenuous at best to now hide that behind "some". And your last remark is truly
ludicrous.

Now, as I've earlier indicated, welcome to my ignore list.

[Kitty Herder]

18. Everyone is different. Antidepressants caused apathy for me.

Worse than the apathy I was already suffering from with the depression. That doesn't mean antidepressants do that to everybody. They also didn't help with my depression. But for some people, they work wonders.

[melody]

19. Then you didn't need them, as you've said

If you give chemo to someone without cancer, it will kill them.

The reason modern antidepressants work is because they *are* powerful. I'm glad you were taken off of them.

[Kitty Herder]

30. Excuse me?

Have you suffered from severe depression since you were nine, diagnosed at different times by several competent psychiatrists? Are you still waiting for some pill that will actually work? Is drug-resistant depression common in your family? Have you tried almost every God-damned anti-depressant drug known to man with no result?

If not, don't tell me what I need and what I don't. Managing my depression is practically a full-time job that requires cognitive-behavioral therapy, regular physical exercise and meditation. If I get off my routine with those things, I don't function. Unfortunately, after a bout with illness, and three deaths in my family, I've gotten out of the routine and am suffering again.

I would love to see a new break-through drug for depression that can treat the resistant cases like myself and some other members of my family. So would the psychologist I see who prescribes my anti-anxiety medication (which does work). It would be much easier than what it takes now to keep me functioning.

I'm very glad that antidepressants work for you. They don't work for me. And I do need them.

[melody]

31. I was diagnosed at 8 actually

I have severe clinical depression also. My mother died of alcoholism from self-medicating. I'll spare you the gory details
beyond that.

No, you don't need modern SSRIs. They do not work for you. You need something that is not yet available. I certainly hope that is found and quickly. I know what a horrific illness this is.

[Captain Hilts]

23. Same for my room mate. Her psychiatrist has weaned her off them this past year.

She seems to be doing okay.

[SmokingJacket]

36. Was it Paxil?

Paxil did that to me. It was horrible.

[Captain Hilts]

21. I've read a lot of biographies of those with depression problems: TR, ER, Churchill, etc.

and have friends suffering from depression.

[melody]

34. If you haven't had it, you don't know it

I don't know what it's like to suffer from MS because I haven't had it. Knowing someone who does does not
give you the direct experience.

[Draill]

37. I would agree with you about your statement in the subject.

Perhaps you could think about the possibility that it is also probable that you do not know about someone else's depression but only your own. Neurological chemistry is very intricate and complex. Please don't consider anyone asking questions about how much we know or whether there is over-prescription in some cases as being a product of ignorance or ingenuous 'concern'. I don't think it's meant as a poke at people who choose to take SSRIs.

I hope your treatment continues to work well for you.

[Romulox]

7. It if were about "the issues", we'd be hearing NONSTOP about the Financial Industry

Food and Drug safety, re-regulating the economy, the massive unemployment problem, the candidates' views on government bailouts of uber-capitalists, etc. from both campaigns.

It's not about the issues.

It's about lipstick. And I'm pretty sure it's about abortion this time, too. It's always about abortion.

[leftofthedial]

26. between the TV and the drugs and the parasitic preachers

it's a wonder this country doesn't just come to a complete halt.

[Solly Mack]

27. When my doctor said the "C-word" to me I started tearing up

I thought it a normal response to the word cancer (I'm fine) - she wrote me a prescription for prozac. You can find the prozac in my medicine cabinet - untouched.

I'm a military spouse and it seems handing out prozac to a spouse is the common cure for everything - especially now. Worried your spouse will be killed? Here, have a prozac. Constant deployments got you down? Here, have a prozac. Stressed? Here, have a prozac. (and it's not just prozac they are handing out either)

Why not talking? Why not help with the kids? (better childcare) Why not offering up coping activities that don't involve being drugged? Why not end this criminal occupation?

I'm not saying some people don't benefit from meds. Some people actually need them. I am saying that meds aren't a one size fits all solution and to me, it seems the military would rather drug a spouse for a normal response to a very bad situation than deal with the actual problem.

It's not just the soldiers being drugged (and then sent back into combat) to cover up the real problems. They're drugging the spouses too.

I know big pharma is making a killing with military contracts. They'd have to be...

[Javaman]

28. I think most do, however, there are so many problems that it can be overwhelming. nt

[stillcool]

29. Nice swipe at emotional illnesses..

Does it ever occur to people that there are valid reasons why our society breeds these illnesses? Especially with the penchant we have for blaming the victim.