A loss always seems fresh, even when the calendar tells me otherwise. Depression can really sneak up on you. It’s not like you wake up one day with all of the symptoms, pull out your checklist, make an appointment with a doctor, talk it out for 30 minutes, swallow a pill, and call it a[…]
“The first large study to compare mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT)—a psychological therapy designed to change the way people think and feel about their experiences—with maintenance antidepressant medication suggests that MBCT could offer an alternative to antidepressants for preventing depression relapse. The study investigators aimed to determine whether MBCT with support to taper or discontinue antidepressant[…]
“In April 2013, Insel announced that the NIMH would shift its $1.4 billion annual research budget away from projects focusing on DSM diagnoses to instead concentrate on underlying disturbances of brain circuitry. That means using brain imaging to look at the activity of these circuits, as well as studies of brain chemistry, genetics, and thinking[…]
“When I initially informed my first wife of my diagnosis and the associated concerns I held for our three boys, she expressed strong reservations about saying anything to them. This, however, is exactly the problem for men with depression. It actually needs to be talked about more, and if I don’t talk with my sons[…]
“Isn’t there something lost in taking drugs?” I asked him. “A great deal would be lost if we had medication that eliminated sadness,” he said. “We need sadness to have our basic human experiences of love and connectedness. I would not want to lose that. Antidepressants deal with a lack of vitality: the shift for[…]
“Until that black box warning there was a progressive decrease of suicides among young people,” he says. “Now, I do think some kids are suffering because they just aren’t getting the right treatments. And for many that’s medication combined with some type of therapy.” Read the Full Article Source: NBC News, Joan Raymond
“Antidepressants are an excellent treatment for depression and anxiety. I’ve seen them improve — and sometimes save — many young lives. But a growing number of young adults are taking psychiatric medicines for longer and longer periods, at the very age when they are also consolidating their identities, making plans for the future and navigating[…]
“Antidepressants have had a role to play in the treatment of depression and they should continue to play a role. But the data suggests that we have been expecting far too much. In fact, when it comes to pondering solutions for depression, we’ve mostly been listening to Prozac. And all this listening has not produced[…]
