http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/10/20/141544135/look-around-1-in-10-americans-take-antidepressants

This is chit chat, so I'm keeping it simple.

Quote :

"About 11 percent of people in the U.S. are taking antidepressants"

Quote :

"Overall, women and adolescent girls are 2 1/2 times more likely than men and adolescent boys to be taking one of the pills."

Quote :

"A common side effect of drugs like Prozac is a reduction in sexual desire and satisfaction."

Quote :

"nearly half (of some people in a study) said they wouldn't tell their family doctor about symptoms of depression. The No. 1 reason: 23 percent said they feared that they would be prescribed antidepressants."

So who takes these? Do they help? Apparently...

Quote :

"Most of the people taking antidepressants — 60 percent — have done so for at least two years. And less than one-third of people taking a single antidepressant have seen a mental health professional in the past year."

Apparently doctors aren't really that important. Can I just go get some over the counter and start feeling better?

And aren't men kind of getting shafted, since this is disproportionately neutering the sex drive of women?

Sorry for being so condescending. This is me trying to be controversial

[Edited on October 20, 2011 at 3:07 PM. Reason : ]

10/20/2011 3:06:32 PM

women are emotional creatures.

They use their emotions rather than logic to make decisions.

similarly,

men are aggressive creatures.

They use their penis rather than logic to make decisions.

10/20/2011 3:14:23 PM

Your statement doesn't make any sense in a thread about using drugs to change those emotions.

Maybe you'd be better off saying we were emotional or aggressive creatures. Characterizations I don't agree were particularly meaningful even to begin with.

10/20/2011 3:18:10 PM

depression is an emotional disfunction, derp derp

10/20/2011 3:19:22 PM

Life is a physics dysfunction

10/20/2011 3:21:41 PM

disfunction sucks, datfuction rules.

10/20/2011 3:22:39 PM

feels good man

10/20/2011 3:23:39 PM

Quote :

"nearly half (of some people in a study) said they wouldn't tell their family doctor about symptoms of depression. The No. 1 reason: 23 percent said they feared that they would be prescribed antidepressants.""

I can understand that. I think the problem is that saying you're depressed automatically gets viewed as you have a mental imbalance or severe issues. Sometime being depressed just means you're going through a shitty period of your life and you just need an impartial person to talk to, not drugs.

10/20/2011 3:23:42 PM

Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm really awfully glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides they wear black, which is such a beastly colour. I'm so glad I'm a Beta.

10/20/2011 3:47:39 PM

^^this

It's ridiculous how many doctors go straight to the drugs when a patient is suffering from depression when a bit of counseling may be all that is needed.

10/20/2011 3:56:45 PM

same with chronic fatigue syndrome. The amount of people (mainly women it seems like) who I have heard or know that have gotten diagnosed with this over the past few years is crazy.

Common threads among most of these people include various combinations of (sometimes all of):

-Poor diets
-Lack of any form exercise
-Poor sleep habits

I would hope a doctor asks about that stuff or at least has them TRY to correct some of those things first to see if it helps give them an "energy boost" before just giving them medicine but that hasn't been the case. Of course it is possible some or all of them do have it - I'm not trying to say it's not possible. The common threads just seem suspicious though...

10/20/2011 4:07:25 PM

^^, ^^^^ you two only agree with like 99.9% of the population.

I think the people on drugs "get it", but what they're going through isn't trivial. Sometimes drugs are the answer. We've stigmatized them to a surprising degree.

[Edited on October 20, 2011 at 4:09 PM. Reason : ]

10/20/2011 4:09:26 PM

Quote :

"Sometimes drugs are the answer. We've stigmatized them to a surprising degree."

dingdingdingdingding

10/20/2011 4:10:37 PM

Quote :

"I think the problem is that saying you're depressed automatically gets viewed as you have a mental imbalance or severe issues. Sometime being depressed just means you're going through a shitty period of your life and you just need an impartial person to talk to, not drugs."

Yeah. I'm a little surprised so many people don't see anyone over depression because they don't want drugs. When my grandmother died I went through a depression, and everyone in my family was like "go get meds now!" but I kept reminding them that I should be sad, and I was fine with dealing with that on my own (and in counseling). But a lot of people seem to think of depression as something that is to be avoided at all costs, even if it's for a very legitimate reason.

^^^ I totally agree with that, but understand what the doc is dealing with too. I imagine they deal with a lot of people who do just want a script, or who "can't" change the diet, exercise, lifestyle type things and "need" the meds because they have something "wrong."

10/20/2011 4:13:49 PM

Quote :

"nearly half (of some people in a study) said they wouldn't tell their family doctor about symptoms of depression."

i wouldn't tell my family doctor bc he's a family doctor. i'd go to a psychologist and/or psychiatrist; someone who is equipped to handle those types of things on a regular basis.

and how do you convince someone that poor sleep habits can actually affect you this way?

[Edited on October 20, 2011 at 4:29 PM. Reason : ]

10/20/2011 4:26:18 PM

Quote :

"but I kept reminding them that I should be sad, and I was fine with dealing with that on my own (and in counseling)."

Yes this. Depression is a normal human emotion but society has decided you should never be depressed. I think where medication helps and has a place is when someone falls into an endless cycle of depression that counseling doesn't help. But often people are given the medication without trying to work out the root cause.

10/20/2011 4:39:35 PM

Quote :

"Depression is a normal human emotion but society has decided you should never be depressed."

Society has decided a lot of things, and the situation is more complicated than this one thing. We sort of went overboard with the pursuit of happiness, and the thinking we default to is that everyone is on their way to happiness.

It used to be that societies had much more of a "life sucks" attitude. If you were a poor surf, then well.. God sure shafted you didn't he, lol? That's "bad fortune". Such a thing doesn't compute for many people today.

Correspondingly, I think that accompanies an attitude of "you're depressed, that's the way you should be!" But then again, the workforce needs are very different today, and if you're in a "good" job, it probably requires a large amount of self-motivation. In fact, this fact explains why so many people still post on TWW - because they're not doing menial labor, and when you tell people they have to think for a living, they do waste time on the internet.

People don't feel they can be happy with just "getting by", although that was plenty sufficient for most of human history. Then again, that attitude shift might just come with the mortality rates. If dying was a more present possibility - something you had to actively work to prevent, you probably wouldn't have as much time to be sad.

10/20/2011 4:56:13 PM