Posted by YoYoMe on November 15, 2003, at 22:55:51
It may be a scary notion, and they're certainly not for everyone, but has anyone noticed lately that it just may be so? I wonder. The only legitimate investigation into it that I could find says that of 7 very depressed people in a month trial, 6 got much better. One got worse. All 6 felt less fatigue and more vigor, and a couple said they felt "more normal." My own experience tells me they are a sure-fire quick jump start and mood elevator, though prescribing them would be crazy, as docs can't be sure that you won't forget your thinking cap and succumb to addiction, even with, say, ample brains and talent on loan from God. But for me, the feeling normal is more important than any fleeting euphoria. I know better than to chase that, and I know to be ever vigilant. Anyway, for this group, improvement happened fast - within one week - not slowly like most depression-fighting drugs. Two of the people in the trial went from very depressed to very happy in week one, and stayed that way for at least 2 years. That, among other things, “argues against this being a placebo response,” says the doc who did this study. He thinks maybe what’s broken in some of our brains when they get low on happiness has more to do with abnormalities in natural opioid neurotransmission than with serotonin. He claims dead people who’ve killed themselves have nine times more opioid receptors than dead people who haven’t! What do you make of that? Am I the only one noticing this?
poster:YoYoMe
thread:280166
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/subs/20031014/msgs/280166.html