Psycho-Babble Medication | about biological treatments | Framed
This thread | Show all | Post follow-up | Start new thread | List of forums | Search | FAQ

Re: Ritch:Juggling Meds and Frustrating life » jumpy

Posted by Ritch on February 15, 2003, at 22:35:15

In reply to Re: Ritch:Juggling Meds and Frustrating life » Ritch, posted by jumpy on February 15, 2003, at 14:49:15

> > My hurdle now is: "imperfection of the available medical treatment". I've went through the acceptance of the diagnosis thing pretty quick, but it took quite some time to work through those "gap issues" you speak of. I finally found the "gap issues" mostly a mirage after awhile. I began to realize that I had known quite a few people over many years that clearly weren't mentally ill that were considered "ne'er do-wells" (but were happy), and other quite successful people (business/family) who weren't mentally ill, but .. they were just very UNhappy people!
>
> I found that many of these chronically "unhappy" people are infact mentally ill. Most meet criteria for dysthmia or cyclothmia and respond to psychiatric medication. Would you agree?

The stickler is the term "criteria". That gets very philosphical. I suppose it would be entirely possible for *everyone* to be responsive in a positive way to psychiatric medication of some form or other. Huxley's "Brave New World" comes to mind (for good or ill).

>
> >The med juggling hassle is starting to wind down some because I've tried nearly everything already. (Not that the stuff doesn't work-it's always tolerability issues, always) I am starting to lose my skepticism about the helpfulness of therapy-and that's a good sign.
>
> I have alway considered therapy similar to brainwashing ... it a good sense. In therapy you continually reinforce optimistic/positive thoughts despite being a a bad situation. This doesn't not resolve your problems, but allows you to accept them and move onward. I guess it is like give a parapledgic a wheelchair. It helps the individual get around, but does not heal or change the physical paralysis ... and the solution is far from perfect. Even with the wheelchair, the individual still has many problems to contend with.

Notions about perfection are often cultural ones. American culture is probably the harshest in regard to intolerance of imperfection.


>
> I had a year of therapy with a very good pdoc. He made me see all the negatives in my life as positives. So he convinced me that my poor work performance was actually good, my fragmented/unloving family was normal/standard, my lack of a relationship was actually me being "independent". So I did not resolve any of my issues, just accepted them and convinced myself that this was "okay" or "normal". I am not sure if this is healthy or not.
>
> Jumpy


The success of SSRI medications probably has much to do with their ability to facilitate "disengagement" with "authoritative" others (parents,i.e.). When I tried Prozac for the first time in 1992, just a few weeks elapsed before I realized that I didn't really give a shit what my parents thought anymore. I stopped trying to convince them that their thoughts were "wrong" and my thoughts were "right". They just became other people that just happened to have different opinions that happened to be my parents. Just other people, not God.


Share
Tweet  

Thread

 

Post a new follow-up

Your message only Include above post


Notify the administrators

They will then review this post with the posting guidelines in mind.

To contact them about something other than this post, please use this form instead.

 

Start a new thread

 
Google
dr-bob.org www
Search options and examples
[amazon] for
in

This thread | Show all | Post follow-up | Start new thread | FAQ
Psycho-Babble Medication | Framed

poster:Ritch thread:140790
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20030214/msgs/200814.html