Posted by Ines on March 4, 2007, at 9:01:02
In reply to Re: Atypical depression, posted by laima on March 4, 2007, at 7:44:39
I think a problem with atypical depression is that a lot (obviously not all) of sufferers are 'high functioning'- they can function reasonably in day to day life, and it stops other people (and doctors) from realising how bad it is. That could be why 'typical' depression has had so much more medical attention- when someone is going through a bout of typical depression it is obvious that help is a matter of life or death. For an atypical depressive it might not be obvious to anyone but the person that the level of suffering is actually very high. River's post about his niece Jessica struck me as so sad, and so typical of an atypical depressive... I can certainly understand her but like he said, most people wouldn't understand it at all.
In defense of those involved in medical research, noone really knows what is the biological cause of this disease, and what it is about MAOI's that makes them so much more effective in these cases; without that sort of knowledge developing effective treatments is a long process of trial and error... I just think that if it was more obvious to society at large how much suffering this causes, there would be more money going into the research, so the chances of finding something that works would be higher.
Having a blue day as you can probably see....
I.
poster:Ines
thread:737405
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20070302/msgs/738145.html