Posted by psycjw on April 17, 2005, at 16:36:16
In reply to Re: Williams: Guest expert on depression and anxiety, posted by nameste on April 17, 2005, at 4:18:38
hi
thanks for your post
one thing I really like about CBT is that it deals with us as whole people - it doesn't separate us into completely separate boxes of thoughts/feelings/physical/relationships/actions - instead it suggests that each area affects each otheri completely agree that sometimes antidepressants are an essential first step to recovery - when someone is feeling really down, not enjoying things, has low energy and motivation and feel hopeless, it can be the key to starting making changes - without this it may be just seem (and in fact be) too hard to use cbt approaches.
Just exploring a little bit about what it means in practice that each of the five key areas (realtionships/problems, thinking, feel;
ings, physical symptoms, behaviour) affect each other, it means that changes in any one area can affect any of the others. So for example, antidepressants which are a physical treatment can be prescribed when indicated and that means usually when there is a significant physical (sometimes called biological or somatic) aspect to depression. This physical treatment may (if the tablets are effective) lead to:
improved mood
greater energy and activity
less negative thoughts
and a greater confidence to tackle practical problemsie an intervention in one area leads to benefits in all. Similarly, intervening by increasing activity levels in a planned way (esp to increase the things done that give a sense of pleasure and/or achievement) can be an effective treatment for depression. In the UK "prescribed" physical exercise is available in many centres for example as a way of boosting mood (those readers who do things like play squash, run etc may well notice that it gives them a "buzz" - - ie physical activity can also boost mood/ make us feel more positive/energetic etc.). In exactly the same way, CBT focusing ona ctivity or on changing extreme and unhelpful thinking, also can boost how we feel (as focusing on negative unhelpful thoughts can worsen how we feel and unhelpfully alter what we do)
the key point is that tablets and these sort of cbt interventions can be done togther - its not an either /or. some research evidence suggests that cbt and tablets taken together is better than either alone, and cbt + tablets gives less chance of slipping back/relapsing than tablets alone.
ie i do agree that chemical imbalances are part of depression, and these can be altered by antidepressants - however they can also be altered by being more active/challenging negative thoughts etc. it is the case though that the degree of chemical imbalance in really severe depression may require antidepressants first to have a good chance of cbt helping change things
hope this explanation helps - i guess the key point is we are whole people - neither emotion alone, nor thought along, not physical (chemical) alone etc. in sum i agree that integrated approaches - and one's that take into account peoples faiths is a very sensible approach
bw
chris w
poster:psycjw
thread:482701
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/faith/20050312/msgs/485525.html