Thoughts for Today

We have friends who are GPs, one who has held a senior role with the BMA. They say many GPs do not think medication has anything more than a placebo effect on the majority of cases of depression. True or not, there does seem to be a lot more emphasis now on talking therapies such as CBT. The problem with that is that if people can't afford to pay for it they may have to wait a long time to receive any treatment, even when their needs are urgent.

 

My son is on a prescribed medication - it does have some beneficial effect but, as with all antidepressants, there are side effects too - getting rid of one problem & starting another isn't really a solution. The one thing that did help him was group therapy - he always came out of those sessions energised and 'normal', in fact he planned his school subjects, degree study choice and career around it. Unfortunately, the sessions were only available for youths & stopped when he turned 18 a couple of months ago - he has now lost interest, and told me this afternoon that he's leaving school, has shelved plans for tertiary education and just wants to look for "any old job". About the only positive at the moment is that his thoughts of self-harming and/or suicide are in the past.

 

That must be very hard for you, BB. Two things experience has taught me. The sufferer has to be convinced the experience of depression is not permanent...it will recur but there are good, worthwhile times in between. In the bad times, there might be things that help...meditation and relaxation exercises work for some. One thing that can give people a lift is simple kindness...a smile, a small act, a kind word. Sadly, as Frenchie says, there's no universal answer.

 

The sufferer also has to believe that he is not his depression - that it is something alien to himself. I know that every case is different and it is easy to advise but there are 2 things which always help - the one is distraction - spending as much time doing things you enjoy doing as possible, possibly taking up a completely new hobby. The other is exercise (even though the energy levels may have fallen) just to get the heart pumping for 10 mins. every day, which releases endorphines into the blood. Or possibly the letting out of anger in a controlled way ?

 

This has been my work for all my life..... there IS a way out in most cases.....

Incidentally i have just read Russell Brand talking about how society alienates....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-41652617

I started in this work when working in a psychiatric hospital in the early seventies and realising that the then hospital fare of drugs ECT and basket weaving was no cure.

I have worked with many 100s of adults and children, and whilst there is no universal prescription..... I have seen so much success.

One of the reasons that even though retired from Univ. I still work three days a week in therapy...

 

I remember when ex mother-in-law was suffering with depression. She was a strong character, happy most of the time but when she was angry or upset, she didn't hold back on letting you know about it if you were the cause. To then see a woman like that suffering with depression to the point where she didn't even want to get out of bed was scary. My in-laws moved to France in 2003, and she didn't suffer with it after they moved, even in the early days when my ex father-in-law was going between there and here every other week to tidy up business on the island, as he was a self-employed computer consultant and had to advise those who were taking on the systems he had installed or upgraded what had been done. Unfortunately, she died of lung cancer about 6 or 7 years ago.

 

One part of the problem is how our society conditions people for life on the conveyor belt and 'punishes' those who dont fit.

R D Laing was a major influence on me for those who have heard of him

The song 'Little boxes' is very pertinent

 

No surprises there Mr Kaftan Man.

 

Wasn't he the psychiatrist who suffered from both alcoholism and clinical depression - and the one who claimed that mental health issues in children were caused by the parents? I'm not sure that I'm prepared to agree with that...

 

This sort of puts a little perspective on the issue of pay for nurses, fire fighters etc

 

I forgot...

 

Yes he was terribly abused by his own parents and saw most mental health problems as being caused by interpersonal issues to include variously relationships, society and the family. He was a pioneer in the use of talking therapies in an era when psychiatric medicine was barbaric. I had to give ECT for example and was told that with new medications 'we have taken the bars of the windows of the psychiatric hospitals and put them in the minds of the patients.' One med was so acidic that it used to melt plastic syringes when we used it to sedate ....
I dont suggest that all mental health problems are caused by parents and neither did he, but remember he was active in the 50s and 60s when society was very repressive.

 

Thanks for that - I really knew nothing about him beyond something I read in the Guardian about ten years ago - an interview with one of his sons if i remember rightly.

 

*rebel leader* - just let that sink in - Americans view the democratically elected President of Catalonia as a rebel leader.

They must be in the planning stage of an invasion...

 

Yes his son and his ex-wife really fell out with him..... very complex character but a real pioneer in alternative approaches to psychiatry

 

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Hope for today "keep our manager" I fear our owners will not pay to keep him