years ago? aren't you only like 21? that's rather messed up that the ward would just dump pills on teenagers though i can't say i'm that surprised. aren't there stipulations about giving those medications to people over and under certain ages?

either way, it's not addressing any sort of root issue and only dealing with the surface symptoms, i'm talking in general again. there's no easy answer or course of action to finding personal peace (which for me, is 'the' cure for the majority of depression). it obviously doesn't apply to chemical imbalances in the brain, but how much of that is due to an actual natural imbalance and how much of it is due to drug use and/or abuse in attempts to control the behavior.

as harsh as this will seem the question needs to be asked of anyone who claims to have depression - do they actually want to get better? or do they just want everyone to notice how depressed they are? yeah, it might make me seem cold and heartless (i am) but ultimately i think that issue needs to be addressed first and foremost before anything worthwhile can progress. if someone wants to get better then they need to figure out if it's an emotional or physical issue and seek the appropriate treatment. pills will never fix an emotional issue no matter what a 'doctor' tells you - they're just people who spent WAY longer in school than the rest of us after all...

at the same time, wanting attention isn't bad or unnatural either, it's all about balance.

From a biological point of view, I'm quite sure there are people who have something "wrong" with their physiology and who become sick from that. However, I believe that quite often, a proper diet such as one without sugars, milk products and corn starches along with daily excercise may help a lot. Either way, there will be people who just don't function normally.

Not defending medication as the solution, but one reason for medicating is that it's sometimes quite hard to work with people and for example counsel them in their emotional life when they are sick. Medication may lift someone out of their sickness long enough for them to reflect on themselves and recognise what they need to change in their lives. So, yes - sometimes it is merely treating the symptoms, but that can be an important step to recovery as well.

agreed, i guess i was a little short in my own comment. of course treating the symptom is a valid part of overcoming the issue, but it has to be recognized as a part of the solution and not the entirety of the solution. that's my beef with a lot of what i see when i look out at the world.

It was 2007, which seems a long time ago to me. They do that all the time there, you don't really get much help in our psych wards here until you get transferred to a bigger, more long term residence. When I was in the first time, they also took me off another of my meds and put me on antidepressants (which didn't do **** for me). I was diagnosed with bipolar when I was just newly in my teens, but I was never told much about what it was or what I would expect. My parents never believed that anything was wrong with me and I was faking it for attention, so of course they couldn't be expected to take an interest in my treatment. When I was 19, my condition really started to show itself, a boyfriend of mine noticed and finally was the only one outside of shrinks I'd see for a handful of times to believe there was something not working in my brain. So he gave me a push to get medicated properly. I'd already taken a step to get one medication, his push helped me to get another. It's true though, you can't fully push someone to get help, they have to want it. Nowadays I'm pretty stable. Mr dave, you had an excellent point about "balance", I believe exactly the same thing. If I were happy all the time, I'd be much more worried than if I have some ****ty days, some just okay ones, and good ones.

glad to hear this, i was worried you might take my comments the wrong way.

it's unfortunate that your parents thought you were faking but it's a reflection of the attitude a lot of people end up getting in regards to mental illness especially with the way it's pushed in the mainstream. it makes no sense in the 90s it was all about depression, then it was all about being bipolar, then it was all about being ADD, now it's all about being on the autistic spectrum.

there's obviously no denying that it legitimately happens to some people. unfortunately pride is a b1tch and a lot of parents don't like owning up to the fact that their offspring is broken beyond their control or ability to handle. sometimes it's really not their fault, but that doesn't stop them from being stigmatized by their peers and public either. activism and awareness tried to make things better but then it became a 'look at me' thing.

from the emotional perspective i think the majority of depression stems from a breakdown of a traditional family structure and social roles. i'm NOT saying women should go back to the kitchen, not at all, but parents need to maintain a more active role in their children's lives than just being the big one who pays the bills. on top of that people need to stop worrying about possible sexist connotations towards education too. getting girls to take a cooking class in high school isn't sexist, it's teaching them a valuable life skill. i've seen a 21 year old go through a grocery store trying to buy supplies for a week, she had a box of cereal, a pack of frozen fish, and some milk. completely and thoroughly clueless on how to take care of herself, and she honestly thought she was independent and capable of living on her own before that fateful day in the grocery store, and she wondered why she had problems with anxiety...

If someone has a genetic predisposition toward developing severe depression, certain environmental triggers are probably involved, stress being one of them. For example, child abuse and the loss or death of a parent when a child is young are known to relate to the development of clinical depression. All About Depression: Causes.

But I'm not sure a lack of a traditional family structure is a major cause of depression. Has there been a breakdown of a traditional family structure and social roles? Depending on how those are defined, this may actually be a good thing. Do parents really pay less attention to kids now than they did in the past? Are you meaning mostly the stress on children caused by divorce? Or the stress of living with parents who are at each other's throats a lot?

I have seen no evidence that schools fail to teach girls...and boys...how to take care of themselves. All children in our public school system have to take a cooking/nutrition class. A box of cereal, frozen fish, and some milk could actually be a fairly nutritious daily meal, depending on the types selected.

Here at our grocery stores I'm more likely to see 21-year-old men buying cases of beer and bags of chips. Now THAT depresses me, but they seem okay with it. :rolleyes:

i don't see how any of situation is less crappy for the kids involved. when both parents are working full time jobs who watches the kids? is it wrong to notice a parallel in the increase in hyperactivity and anxiety with an increase in both parents working full time jobs? it's not that they don't want to pay attention it's that most only seem to provide indirect attention, and for young children that's probably not the easiest thing to interpret. it also seems kids are seen and treated like a biological investment or accessory rather than a future independent individual.

like i said i'm not saying women should go back to the kitchen. not at all. traditional roles and structure was not the best choice of words.

as for young people not being able to take care of themselves, i saw it all over the place in the dorm i lived in during college. for every young adult who actually knew how to cook a meal on a stove there were 10 who had no ability to do anything but hit buttons on the microwave. incidentally from talking to those students, every one of us who knew how to take care of ourselves had stricter upbringings and learned those skills from a parent who gave a damn about raising an independent person rather than raising the child to tell them how awesome they were for giving everything they wanted and none of what they needed.

i'm not 100% how it is now here in Canada anymore, but when i went through the system there was still a very sexist slant to elective courses like cooking and home ec. nothing was mandatory either.

you're right those 3 items in my example might make a decent daily meal (if vegetables didn't actually count for anything) but when those are the only dots you're able to connect when you think you're able to take care of yourself there's a problem. buying a case of beer and some bags of chips sounds like a normal purchase for game night or pre-bar action, now if it's the middle of the afternoon and they're telling you 'alright i've got my groceries for the week' then it's a whole other matter.


*edit*
i'm going to step out of this conversation now, i can't keep going without getting into stuff that doesn't really need to be in this thread. if you or anyone else wants to keep this going hit me up with a PM.

*thumbs up*

They still have home ec class? I wish I would have had it, I would have owned that class :(

I don't know if they still have mandatory home-ec class in middle school, Paloma, but back in MY ancient day, we had a mandatory sewing class and a mandatory cooking class. The cooking class was pretty depressing, looking back at it (and trying to relate this post to depression), because the vegetarian in me cringes now at what they had us make.

For example, we had a whole section on jello, and lucky me, I got put in a group that had to make...tuna fish jello. Yes. I will repeat that. Tuna fish jello! It still boggles my mind that anyone ever thought of combining tuna and jello, and thought that this dubious cooking skill should be passed on to the next generation.

However, I did also learn (1) to wash eggs before use, which is good advice, IF I ATE EGGS, and (2) to turn pot handles IN toward the stove so you can't knock the pots off. That really is very good advice that I use to this day.

And if you give me an orange, I can cut it into a little basket with a handle, hollow it out, and fill it with fruit cocktail. Thank you, oh midwestern home-ec class, for teaching me the important life skill of turning fruit into baskets!

Now...back to depression and suicide...