......................continued from part 1 ------------------------------------------------------- Subj: CD: perceptions re-visited Date: 17 july 1997 ------------------------------------------------------- dear cyber-siblings our newest list member asks: >Is Prozac the best thing for this sort of depression? clinical depression [cd] seems to have become my pet subject the question reminded me of something i had intended to include in my 'perceptions' post earlier this week in my reading about cd and its treatment i understand that the current professional guidelines advise that where medication is indicated as a treatmemt it should be approached much more aggressively than in the past the thinking was that cd has been chronically under-treated: not enough medication and for too short a time to be truly effective in 'blowing the clouds away' the implication was that cd is eminently treatable and beatable that its victims should not have to suffer with it needlessly due to under-treatment i believe that i can relate to this personally i felt that my anti-depressant 'wasn't working anymore' and worried about switching to something else however my doctor advised increasing the current med for a few weeks as the first strategy and i do believe it worked [witness the sudden re-emergence of the hermit!] please note that i have deliberately avoided naming meds because pd varies so much from one person to another and each of us is our own unique 'chemical stew' there are a lot of anti-depressants available it may take some experimenting to hit on the right one... janet ------------------------------------------------------- Subj: CD: perceptions of clinical depression Date: 01 august 1997 ------------------------------------------------------- hello cyber-siblings! this is in fond memory of alan bonander who left us a year ago today, a quote: ----------------------------------------------- to be depressed is not unusual but to stay depressed is unnecessary alan bonander ----------------------------------------------- this seems to be evolving into a weekly 'cyber-sibling cd series' every time i read of a cyber-sibling struggling with cd i start mulling all over again since i'm so thankful to be out of it and because my heart goes out to anyone who's stuck in it when i'm in the 'slime pit' of cd i generally cannot see my thinking as distorted when i'm out of that pit i can look back and see the distortions clearly when i'm out of the pit and if i pay close attention i can frequently see cd clearly in others it's a catch 22 for the cd sufferer if my thinking is distorted how can i evaluate my thinking? and how can i accept another's evaluation of my thinking? while discussing clinical depression [cd] with a friend recently, we came up with an interesting analogy of how the brain's chemistry malfunction can distort normal thinking into gloom and doom distortions we compared the bio-chemical imbalance of cd to having a faulty fuel gauge in my car "when you're depressed it always points to empty and it stresses you and makes you ill because even though you know when you're zipping around town that it can't always be empty yet there is that time when it will indeed be empty and thus it keeps you in a constant state of stress" i know i'm not 'imagining' anything because i can see the gauge showing 'empty' it's just that when i'm caught up in the slime pit i'm not 'spunky' enough to think the gauge is wrong instead i 'automatically' assume there must be something wrong with me: 'why do i always forget to fill up?' 'i'm gonna run outta gas and be stuck somewhere any minute and get a ticket' 'why am i always so irresponsible/lazy/etc ?' 'i'll never make it to my appointment on time' that's sort of how the negative thinking spiral goes and i believe the constant stress of this 'automatic' thought pattern contributes to the chemical imbalance resulting in a downward spiral of negativity by contrast when i'm out of the slime pit if i saw the fuel gauge showing 'empty' i would not immediately assume there was anything at all wrong with me: i would simply look at the gauge and say "what the heck, i just filled it up the other day! stupid gauge!" [or something to that effect] 2nd analogy for the mud wrestlers among us: cd is a slimey liar it's hard to grab ahold of it but once i've got it pinned down to the mat i know it's relatively easy to scrub the slime away with love from your cyber-sis ... janet ------------------------------------------------------- ps notes from december 1998: 1. ain't it grand to think of 'belfast, the conflict' as a 'was'? 2. i am still learning; this is a process, not a 'do it and you're done' deal janet paterson - 51 now /41 dx /37 onset - almonte/ontario/canada [log in to unmask]