Sad
24 Jun
I know a lot of people who deal with some form of mental illness. No one I know is in the crazy house, per say, but I know a bunch of people with diagnosed or undiagnosed depression or obsessive compulsive disorder or anxiety. It’s gotten to the point where “mild depression” should be listed as a synonym for “creative” in the thesaurus.
I’m not trying to make light of what can often be a serious illness and life altering condition. I can speak from experience as someone who has walked out of a shrink’s office with a prescription for an SSRI and an anti-anxiety med.
On the other hand, I’ve gotten fairly fed up with the careless drug dealing that’s going on and lack of responsibility, as I see it, on the part of practitioners who are not holding their patients accountable for making lifestyle changes that may make as much of a difference as meds (if not more) on emotional wellness.
The most obvious (and one that is backed strongly by research) is exercise. IMHO, practitioners should write a script cocktail for an anti-depressant + three days a week of aerobic exercise. AND, hold their patients accountable for the exercise or else no refills.
Less obvious, but just as significant, are dietary changes. For example, if you suffer from anxiety and you’re popping three atavans a day, and you’re still drinking your double skim capp every morning, WAKE UP. You are working against yourself.
Or if you suffer from depression and you eat a diet heavy with refined sugar and processed foods, you are only contributing to your despair. I am not making this up.
It drives me batty that people with mild depression do not first casually research the food-mood connection, nor do they consider how our 9 - 5 sedentary schedules impact our emotional and mental state. Obviously, each person needs to be responsible and accountable for their own health and well-being. (For the record, I’m not talking about suicidal individuals or schizos or psychotics or bi-polar).
However,
Psychiatrists who basically serve as drug dealers: What do you have to say for yourself?
Psychotherapists who do not hold your clients accountable for their diet and exercise: What do you have to say for yourself?
Readers who are medicated, but keep eating sugary foods with no nutritional value and don’t exercise: What say you?
I’d like to know. Because the state of affairs as it pertains to mental health in this country just makes me sad.
And don’t forget the Omega-3:Omega-6 imbalance. Optimum is 1:1, but most people have more like a 1:25 because of our heavily grain-laden diets. Even farm-raised fish is loaded with Omega-6s because they, like most of our cows, are fed grain!
The way it was explained to me is that the Omega-6s, nec. for inflammation (think healing after an injury), when out of whack cause the serotonin receptors in the brain to become rigid and bent. So the serotonin basically hits, misses, and floats on by. Getting the ratio back in balance would make medication unnecessary in some cases, and would make it possible for the SSRIs to actually work in others. Anyone having trouble regulating their meds should be given nutritional counseling to get their Omega-3/6 ratios back to optimum.
Thanks for the tip, Angela. Though I knew about the Omega 3/6 imbalance, I didn’t know about the impact on mental health. I’d love to hear stories from people who have taken on depression and gotten off meds. I know a few people who’ve had success with SAM-e and then others who haven’t. I also know that thyroid levels play a significant role. People can easily have their thyroid levels checked by conventional blood work.
The fact that psychiatrists don’t typically send their patients for blood work at the get-go boggles my mind, because if you are having some sort of hormone imbalance and nutritional deficiency…hello! Working on that would make a huge difference.
It is sad. Recently, antidepressants were found to be no better than placebo (http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/news/20080227/antidepressants-no-better-than-placebo). When you account for the side effects and the fact that these drugs are some of the most prescribed in our nation, we need to reconsider our options. Unfortunately, meditation is not something you can “sell” to someone. The concept of Lifestyle Medicine requires a great deal of health coaching and case managing than it is simply recommending one drug over another. This takes time, and the reimbursement-driven industry just does not incentivize this approach. (For instance Medicaid reimburses some ~32-33 for an hour of nutritional counseling, if they reimburse at all, Most insurances do not reimburse at all…and expenses from Health savings accounts require it to be centered on Diabetes or Weight loss)…