Posted by OldSchool on February 10, 2002, at 23:38:38
In reply to Re: Real Depression, posted by kiddo on February 10, 2002, at 23:12:19
> Excuse me for interrupting here....
>
> How can you say that someone has never had real depression before? People's experiences are different and what may seem like nothing to one person may be completely debilitating to another...
>
Its easy to say that. Because its the truth. Real depression is not just this sadness/hopelessness/suicidal thoughts stuff, sure thats a big part of it...the emotional part of it. But REAL depression...clinical depression...is where you have the above plus your body starts falling apart on you. Severe depression does weird things to your body. Severe depression totally screws up your sleep...and Im not talking oversleeping here. Try severe, total insomnia. Severe depression makes you lose thirty pounds without trying and makes you totally lose your appetite. Like you eat a third of your normal meal and you are full. Real depression destroys your cognition and makes you demented where you cant think clearly or remember anything. Real depression is where you totally lose your sex drive and cant get it up anymore. Real depression is where when you have an orgasm...no semen comes out you have a dry ejaculation and the orgasm feels shitty like it wansnt even a real orgasm.Real depression is a physical disease. Its not mental illness. All "mental illnesses" should be formally reclassified as Neurological diseases. I get irritated as hell when I read sleep problems in depression being described as "somatic" complaints. Fuck psychiatry. Its way more than a "somatic complaint." If you cant sleep good, your "mental health" as well as your physical health is going to deteriorate.
Im sorry to put things so graphically for you, but Im just trying to point out some major differences between REAL depression and mild depression. There ARE differences.
A person with the severe kind of depression is just grateful for any relief they get thru meds. They are grateful for just a good night of sleep...hell, just being able to sleep at all for some is a feeling of wonderment and joy. Drug side effects seem rather trivial compared to this severe kind of depression.
Im sorry to put it this way, but its just the way it really is. Too many dysthymic depressives and people with "life stress" are taking SSRIs in my opinion and obviously they get turned off by these side effects. But guess what? Many of them dont really have real depression to begin with. A lot of these kind of people just need to do the talk therapy thing and stop partying so much, cut out the booze and increase the aerobic exercise.
Youd be amazed at what cutting out booze totally will do for dysthymia.
Thats why I wish psychiatry was just formally merged into Neurology. Let the people who have real mental illness go to Neurologists. And let the people who just have mild depression or "Woody Allen depression" go to some talk therapy asshole. I dont have the patience for all this psychology/psychobabble crap after what Ive been thru. It gets on my nerves and its an insult to me after what Ive been thru. I have a REAL PHYSICAL disease and I am not going to stop taking my meds cause of "sexual dysfunction" or "dry mouth."
Old School
poster:OldSchool
thread:91928
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20020208/msgs/93689.html