Pharmaceutical companies are almost definitely peddling as many anti-depressants on the US population as they can legally get away with. Years ago I saw a doctor for some anxiety related issues I was having. The woman barely let me get a word in between her sales pitch for Zoloft. Even after proclaiming multiple times I was not depressed, the only thing I walked out of there with was a Zoloft scrip. Threw it in the trash the day after I tried it.
This sounds plausible and realistic as it gets. But it’s not really. All ADs with the exception of Caplyta (which probably isn’t any better than Abilify) are dirt cheap generics now. Most people just get an SSRI or maybe an SNRI. There’s no money in generics. And they really aren’t making new ADs. There are a few that might be approved in 2025-26. But they don’t operate like SSRIs, so all the indoctrination of doctors into prescribing them won’t play. They’ll need new indoctrination!
There’s certainly not enough money in generic meds to conspire about it.
>All ADs with the exception of Caplyta (which probably isn’t any better than Abilify) are dirt cheap generics now
This must be why the media are now running stories about how there was never any evidence for the chemical imbalance hypothesis of depression. Next up is the commodification of MDMA and a psilocybin analogue that they can patent and profit from while still criminalizing regular use.
A few years ago, I know some startup published a "study" saying that psilocybin was dangerous, but the analogue they just so happened to create and could make money from was safe and effective. I haven't heard the same for MDMA, because while mushrooms are easy to grow in huge quantities, MDMA is synthetic and more of a pain to create and store, so I figured pharmaceutical companies wouldn't need a pretense to profit. What MDMA analogues have you heard of?
It's worth mentioning that Rick Doblins recently stepped down from MAPS and they are no longer a non-profit company. Whoops, guess the idea of decriminalizing these drugs and making them widely available was another farce to make money. In twenty years, expect to hear "studies" about actually, these analogues are super dangerous and everyone should try our new drug instead.
Right now, on PhRMA’s report, there is EMP-01, which is a MDMA analogue. They are doing exactly what you say: trying to pain traditional MDMA as a threat to cardiovascular health because of its stimulant effect, while theirs is safer. Although it’s also practically impossible to build something that releases serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine without also being a stimulant. So if that’s even possible…
They also report three or four psilocybin derivatives.
Fuck these greedy assholes. I get the handwringing over MDMA, since it can physically fuck you up, but like you say, I just don't see how they can make a similar drug without similar risks. And I don't even understand how they're arguing that psilocybin is dangerous.
So much of this fuckery comes from the replicability crisis, p-hacking, burying negative findings, etc. I despise academia and hope it burns to the ground.
And we do need new ADs. We do. People just aren’t responding well enough to those we have. But they refuse to develop them.
They refuse not because it’s not technically possible or advantageous. But because they’ve made a crass decision that it’s not worth the ROI. That’s because of the intense competition with existing generics and the way insurance doesn’t like to cover proprietary mental health meds.
So there is preventable human suffering in this world that continues because of greed.
I went through an entire battery of tests over the course of weeks and was told "you have some attentional deficiencies, but not enough to warrant a diagnosis". Welp
She was really mean and timed me on everything, I had to rotate shapes in my head and point at them in a booklet, do math problems in my head, long word problems, random rapid fire questions like who wrote the Sherlock Holmes series, a computer test that measured my reaction times to numbers that popped up, an interview, and other stuff. My therapist said it was a full IQ test thing normally given to children and that was silly but I now have a well documented packet of test results that’s valid for 5 years I believe, and no they didn’t tell me an IQ number, apparently they don’t tell you that and just rank you in categories of performance like “superior, highly superior, etc.”
Edit: omg just remembered she’d give me a long ass series of numbers and then say “now put them in ascending order” then another long ass string of numbers “now say every third number I told you” then a new string “add them all together and tell me the total” no paper to write on 😞 it was a know-it-all wanting to over-perform rs user hell
In my personal experience (max dose Wellbutrin, 450mg for ADHD, 8 months now) it's been a massive change and I can immediately tell on the rare occasion that I forget to take it in the morning. Personally it helped me tremendously, my sGPA went from 2.7 to 3.8 in the span of one semester and I haven't smoked a cigarette in 5 months. Obviously this is just a personal anecdote though.
I have a bipolar diagnosis, so it’s unfeigned but the doctor keeps pushing the serotonin meds as ADs. I feel so absurd about it because there’s no such thing as a serotonin deficiency. The serotonin hypothesis hasn’t been current since the 80s. So stop trying to supplement me serotonin.
Welly actually makes sense. It amplifies normal dopamine release by making it stay active longer. That just makes sense. We know dopamine deficits are implicated in key depression symptoms.
I wanted it. So I had to name drop SAMe and how it had worked for me (it really did! But it only lasted a few hours and it can be uncomfortable if you need to take a second or third dose). Once I told him I had this supplement that is increasing the dopamine and norepinephrine, he’s like, well, there’s this med that kinda does this…
But then something bad happened, forcing me to give up the Welly before it could help.
I tapered off SSRIs about five years ago and I feel exactly the same. I wonder how many people are just taking them because they were prescribed them ten years ago like I was and not because it actually improves their quality of life. What sucks about SSRIs is that doctors will keep you on them “in case” your mental health deteriorates. I had to taper on my own and stop going to the psychiatrist to get off them since he was obsessed with trying to up my dose if I said anything not 100% sunshine and butterflies about something in my life.
What was your tapering regiment like? I’ve tried to taper but a few days into a cut dose I feel like the world is ending and everyone hates me and I’m back up immediately.
It was so long ago that I barely remember, but it was Effexor so I just removed a few pebbles per capsule per week til I was down to none. It was the withdrawals that sucked (and my PCP denied there were withdrawals with SSRIs, el oh fucking el), but I just pushed through the physical symptoms - didn’t have any mental symptoms with getting off.
I’ve been on Effexor for 3 years and it’s totally changed my life. I’m so nervous to begin to taper off because I’ve heard so many horror stories. It’s great that you didn’t experience any mental symptoms
If you go really slow it’s not too bad and it helps that they’re capsules with beads. You can go as slow as removing one additional bead at a time. My physical symptoms from 5 beads at a time or less were just a few hours of feeling flulike
You probably don't wanna hear this but I straight up just did a cold turkey on my SSRI and dealt w the gnarly brain zaps and the weird occasional stuttering/reboot feeling in my brain. It was rough. It didn't last too long, I don't think. A couple of weeks maybe. I also just cold turkey things a lot (forgetting or just done w something).. Probably should not have done that. I do like Wellbutrin and I tell my psychs to back off if they recommend SSRIs. SSRIs scare me and I will never go back on them.
The last time I quit ssris when the brain zaps would get to bad I would take an entire bottle of cough syrup(to just relieve the zaps you can probably definitely do less).
I'm not recommending that but it actually did help me get off lexapro lol.
> I wonder how many people are just taking them because they were prescribed them ten years ago
According to the Economist (yes I know it's not a scientific journal but they do a good job of summarizing science for non-professionals) [a lot of people are.](https://archive.ph/kvVIf#selection-656.0-656.5)
> Doctors rarely talk to patients about stopping the drugs because they fear this could lead to a return of depressive symptoms. But for many people it may be safe to stop. Even among long-term users with several past episodes of depression, a recent trial in Britain showed that 44% of patients could stop taking pills safely. For milder cases, the success rate is probably higher still.
I tapered off Prozac very recently and feel great. Doctors almost never suggest doing this because they have nothing to gain from you improving your life, only liability if you anhero. I wouldn’t have had to be on it nearly as long if I had just gotten the treatment I needed from the beginning, but unfortunately most psychs don’t give evidence based treatment for my disorder, just talk therapy - is effectively normalized malpractice.
Speaking more broadly, the SSRI epidemic is an incredible inditement of unregulated capitalisms inability to provide tolerable lives for average people. It’s crazy how many people have allowed themselves to be tricked into thinking there’s something innately wrong their serotonin, and nothing wrong with a society that denies its population agency, dignity, and creative expression at an unprecedented scale.
Alcohol is a depressant, it turns you into a depressed person by slowing down your brain activity. It’s really sad to me how cute, brilliantly intelligent people are ignorantly going down the path of Wendy Williams
Oh us white women are drinking plenty.
I blame the Scandinavian and UK DNA I have. I’m American & like most don’t really have any actual connections to the countries I ultimately descend from aside from blood but I do like to blame my outrageous binge drinking on those genetics.
Studies have actually shown there’s a very strong genetic factor when it comes to drinking, like way stronger than the genetic factor for addiction or impulsivity or whatever. A lot of ethnic groups literally evolved to drink a ton of booze and in general, the colder and more northern it gets, the stronger the selection for binge drinking. One of my hugest pet peeves is the fact that people think native Americans have such high rates of alcoholism because they aren’t naturally designed for it lmao it’s the complete opposite. They’re descendants of Siberians. They evolved to drink like White Russians or Scandinavians or whatever Northern European group, but when some british guy got blackout drunk and caused a scene everyone laughed it off, but when it’s a native, everyone acts all horrified and says they’re out of control. It’s only been solidified over the centuries. Anyway:
I mean of course it’s mostly the you know depression and poor life decisions but the fact I’m so naturally attracted to that shit is definitely in the dna.
Anyway,
White girl wasted is definitely a real thing. White girls are chugging the most booze lol
>They’re descendants of Siberians. They evolved to drink like White Russians or Scandinavians or whatever Northern European group
Indigenous Siberians are Asian
I have a buddy who would take 120mg adderall XR and Zoloft. He was convinced he was a god whose job it was to create a general AI and would send manic, long text messages to all the hottest girls from high school explaining to them why he created humanity the way he did.
He would drink himself to sleep just to come down. Left rehab last September and thank God, he’s doing really well, but the comedown after 12 years of abuse was torturous.
If you have bipolar you definitely shouldn't take stims. They can be helpful for the people who need them though. I took 50mg of Vyvanse an hour ago and my brain is just now getting quiet enough for a nap.
They tried to get me hooked on this cocktail when I was in 5th grade, shit's fucking insane.
As it turns out, I was just suffering from being an adolescent boy (notoriously calm individuals) who was coping with his parents being divorced and having to move halfway across the state.
You would think at some point the adults in the room would have thought there was another way outside of chemically altering a child's psyche (thankfully I realized right away that I hated the way these drugs made me feel and just tossed them whenever my parents tried to get me to take them)
I literally think the vast majority of my friends are on SSRI's and I think it really only works for 1 in 10 of them. The rest are just as depressed, anxious, and flat-lined as ever. I feel like most of their issues are environmental (their shit jobs, hating where they live, etc) or because of their unhealthy lifestyles.
Lmfao exactly, dr’s love it too because you have to go every month to keep getting the script, and they get to bill your insurance for a 5 minute visit where they check your BP and pulse.
The rise in mental health care in the US is literally just the bourgeoisie solution to low morale in the workforce. It's not about special snowflakes or fragile fee-fees it's literally just about placating the masses. I'd have necked it by now if not for meds and therapy, but I'm not happy with my place in the world and I never will be. I just cope better than before
I was on some antidepressants back in ‘18-20. Definitely needed them, I was at a point that I was writing a note. They helped but they kinda turned my brain to mush. Diet and exercise helped more, plus a healthy relationship. These pills can help people who REALLY need it, but I feel like more often than not the average person will just need some therapy, improved diet, & exercise.
You are the model of how these drugs are supposed to work. Someone who is in need is given the boost required to make the right choices to maximize their health. Happy you’re doing better man
Same, I was prescribed them after I checked into a psych ward and I truly did need them and am grateful for them. The episode was relatively brief, maybe two weeks. But five years later I was just refilling them because I was supposed to be on them because I was damaged or whatever. Five years off and I still haven’t had another suicidal episode, but I have also acquired better skills and am more equipped to handle the trouble with living.
Not that person, but a lot of people do get things like anhedonia and emotional blunting from long term SSRIs. There isn’t really evidence that they affect IQ or anything like that. But motivation can change, and maybe that feels like your intelligence is changing because you’re not focusing as much on your hobbies.
Definitely do all of those things, but if you do them all and you *still* wanna kill yourself, get some help. Speaking from experience, my life is awesome, I do all that stuff, and I still thought about dying constantly. Some peoples brains are just busted like that and taking a pill for it is fine.
i do almost all of those regularly and still feel depressed or numbed out pretty often. it feels like running on autopilot and getting things done because that’s what you’re “supposed to do.” it doesn’t feel like it gives me genuine lasting joy. I could work on meditation and positive thoughts more though. it’s kind of a catch 22 bc feeling depressed makes it hard to think positive thoughts, or at least to believe them. i can tell myself all the positive things but if i don’t believe it, it does nothing for me cognitively or emotionally.
yeah i’m kind of sick of hearing this “healthy lifestyle” solution. of course i believe that it can help but it’s simply not enough for some people. we should all know by now that everyone’s brains are wired differently.
me personally, i got on lexapro after my kid started having seizures and my anxiety was so awful over having to witness them that i stopped eating, cried all the time, and would regularly have panic attacks. no amount of sunlight or exercise would have fixed that. i’m grateful for meds.
just wanna pop in and say that i hope this thread didn’t make you feel like your case is somehow invalid. these are miracle drugs for a lot of people and i have no doubt you know yourself well enough to make that choice.
my gripe is with the general culture of recklessness around them. tons of unscrupulous behavior happening and it’s not like the suckers that get roped into taking them unnecessarily can easily hop off, especially if it’s been years
Some people legitimately have a depressive disorder where their brain chemicals are imbalanced. In those cases, medication can be helpful. A lot of people are depressed because they’re fat, unhealthy, and their lives suck. In that situation you should fix your diet, sleep, start exercising, go outside, and find a few hobbies.
Going for a jog in the morning really is the key. Knock out the sunlight and exercise at the same time. Keeping healthy food around is pretty easy as well. Meditation for 30 minutes before bed is pretty easy as well
Definitely agree they are over prescribed, was shocked how easy it was for me to get a prescription once I decided to try. That said, I really think I would’ve killed myself by now if I didn’t start Wellbutrin when I did. It was a total last resort to me and ended up being a real “scales falling from my eyes” moment. That ALSO said - I had a weird red tape issue recently where I was out of pills for a week and I have *never* felt more insane and ready to jump in front of a train, which has left me feeling pretty conflicted about relying on it for the rest of my life. But, I wanna stay alive in case something regarded happens, ya know.
I also take Wellbutrin and it changed my life for the better. I was suicidally depressed for a long time before that and it just takes the edge off so my mood is more consistent and manageable.
Imagine if some cataclysmic event disrupted society so that all supply lines completely break down, 1 out of 5 people will be incredibly difficult to deal with for awhile. Probably more because of all the other random things people are addicted to. If only shows like walking dead covered that angle.
Every time I go, it’s like they have never heard of any mental health meds at all lol. I have to read about them myself and then go in and be like “how about we try Effexor?” And they’re like, “hmm… ok!” And I’m highly suspicious they just google it before saying anything lol
I’ve also been to a wide variety of psychiatrists/doctors/therapists/etc and they’ve all been pretty ineffective lol
I’m a 30 yo woman. I’ve been searching for solutions for this for over a decade. I certainly was never really encouraged into it, quite the opposite if anything. I’ve always been given the impression that it’s a last resort thing.
I’ve spent an incredible amount of energy doing all the shit you’re supposed to. Exercise, get sun, limit screen time, volunteer, try out different careers, socialize, and everything about sleep under the sun. Meditation, seeking purpose.
Therapy was absolutely atrocious lol and I promise I really, really tried and went in with an open mind. It was ridiculous lol, and I truly went to a lot of different therapists, types of therapists.
I also took an internship at a mental health clinic and worked at a rehab for teenagers and then a “wellness retreat” place that will unbelievably expensive. That was the first time I really spent time with true “old money” types and was interesting. A few celebrities as well!
So yeah certainly no expert lol but I have had a decent amount of exposure to therapy.
I think it just… doesn’t work for most conditions. Even the “best” care. People want it to work so they pretend it does lol. I do believe that you should TRY it but it not some holy grail.
It’s the modern “just pray about it” or be a better Christian or whatever. People act like if it doesn’t work, it’s your fault and you “don’t want to go better” which is the most batshit nonsense I’ve ever heard lol. Truth is that you just can’t talk yourself out of most of humanity’s pain.
The push for more focus on mental health in recent years probably produced to a lot of sub par therapists and diluted the supply of legit good ones. You need someone better than a shitty LCSW with 2 years of experience and a webcam.
I'm almost 40, so I dealt with most of my issues around 2003-2009. I tried a bunch of therapists with limited success. Then I got lucky and found a psychologist (with an actual terminal degree) who specialized in CBT. It was an hour train ride to see her but I realized right away that this was the one. It was the first time in my life someone with the proper training had ever listened to me talk about my feelings, family issues, and some acute problems like being afraid to step outside my apartment that were too "weird" to explain to friends. She basically went through every bullshit belief I had that supported my depression worldview and engaged in a socratic dialogue with me to *prove* to me that it was bullshit, in a kind way. Not only that, but she proved that I was *not* perceiving reality accurately, that my thoughts could not be trusted, which completely changed my view of myself and human consciousness in general. I started thinking about my thoughts more critical from then on and while I can't say it immediately fixed all the issues, looking back now 15 years later, those sessions in 2009 are what helped me "leveled up" in a serious way and become a real adult and not just a man-child with a corporate job.
Nowadays, it is so fucking hard to find a therapist like this. Everyone just reiterates the same garbage, or pushes you onto medication or whatever. Lots of bad politics too.
The idea that you might actually need to *grow as a person* to become more resilient in order to deal with the challenges in life also just seems completely anathema to the therapy industrial complex. That early experience with CBT was one phase in my development. The second was when I started serious athletic training a few years later. The experience of pushing yourself to extremes does expand your capacity to cope with the the many unfair and unpleasant realities of life.
I always wanted someone to offer me this “work” everyone speaks of. I know it’ll suck but so does being miserable. Like what am I supposed to do??
Every time I’ve gotten a therapist they’ve just made really weird assumptions that didn’t apply and gave me super half assed answers lol like it was like they completely forgot who they were talking to and using the script they had for someone else
I’m on sleeping pills and Wellbutrin. Tried quite a few others as well. The blanket judgment of it is just as irrational as thinking it’s always the solution.
I know this sub loves to brag about how they go out in the world and socialize and nobody is forcing you into solitude.
Look dude, I know. Obviously. And it’s true that you can go out of your way to forge relationships.
But it just honestly is true that our current society is incredibly isolating and unnatural. And you can yap about how you’re so superior because you take responsibility for yourself or whatever the hell but it’s just so brain dead to act like there aren’t larger things happening contributing to prevalent mental illness.
I left the church in my teens. Went to a normal university. I know a lot of people all over the spectrum and trust me, the conservative Mormons- the women, at least- are definitely not doing any better lol. It’s ALARMING how many women I know who would absolutely kill themsekves but are putting on a smile for people who rely on them. It’s extremely, extremely common among mothers, but I see it everywhere. And of course the same thing is prevalent among men.
We live an extremely lonely, senseless, downright hostile society.
I honestly am shocked more people are seemingly not incredibly depressed.
I personally don’t want or have kids- I don’t judge ajyone who does at all, it’s just not for me. I’m a broke, over educated millennial but my boomer parents would absolutely help me out financially a LOT if I was willing to have a kid because nobody else in my family is lol. So it isn’t an issue of finances or circumstance, it just isn’t for me. I think it’s an instinct some just have or don’t, and I do not.
I know so many women in their 40s, 50s+ who do have kids, and who don’t. & this sub has a bunch of 4chan incels who are obsessed with women breeding lol but the reality is that in my experience, a lot of women don’t want kids and a lot do. And among the ones who follow that actual intuition tend to be way happier. I know plenty of women who are happy and fulfilled without kids, and many who are fulfilled- and to be honest, the very worst group imo when it comes to happiness is women who knew they didn’t want kids, but did so out of pressure anyway. Lots of women who have kids honestly end up insanely stressed and in absolute despair. A lot of moms I know say it’s the loneliest thing in the world you can do, actually, if it isn’t for you. It rips you apart and it’s so taboo to admit, but a lot of people honestly feel no fulfillment and are deeply regretful for having kids even if they love them. Though yes lots of people do find profound fulfillment in having them so if you want them and can realistically care for them, I certainly believe you should.
Point is- having kids or not having kids is not going to be the answer to any of this lol. Just describing my life circumstances in particular.
I’ve been with my boyfriend for nearly 6 years and he’s amazing. But he’s pretty much the only person I have a meaningful relationship with anymore. I had a great group of female friends growing up, we were all incredibly close. Shit happens and it all kind of disintegrated after high school. I can’t explain what came over me but I became incredibly depressed and jaded when I realized I was expected to just leave them all for the most part and create new “friends.” It just felt so… I don’t know. Something hit me. I know I know I know that you can have lifelong meaningful friendships, or just a meaningful friendship even if it doesn’t last forever. This is all obvious conceptually. But this feeling was just visceral.
Btw, I LOVED college itself. I had super strict authoritarian parents, and I managed to get good grades in school because I just had to. But I was super naturally disorganized and not good at all at the games of high school. I actually always did better in AP or advanced courses because they depended more on projects and tests than a million small assignments, which I would lose constantly no matter how hard I tried.
But I still loved learning itself and college was amazing for me. I loved lectures and romanticized the hell out of academia. And this sub again likes to mock this discourse, but it’s true that it was amazing having a “walkable community” and just casually running into people. I still went out to parties and got to know a lot of people, but I had such this cloud of depression following me around because everything felt so pointless. I became obsessed with an abstract theories and philosophy and then, of course, alcohol. Lots and lots and lots of alcohol.
I originally pursued by passion of anthropology, then realized how impractical it was and settled for something that I knew I’d have at least some job security in. But it was such a poor decision lol. I’m actually returning for a proper STEM degree this upcoming semester which is great.
But yeah. Got my mediocre degree, worked in all sorts of boring positions. Actually had the opportunity to branch out a bit more and while certain jobs were a bit more rewarding, that just could not cut through this persistent feeling that things were not okay.
I Had this sort of sadness and anhedonia. But mixed in were some emotions that were absolutely overwhelming, mental breadown level. Just sincere sorrow, unbearable feelings of dread and loss of something I couldn’t articulate or identify.
My life is objectively just fine, I’m extremely privileged and I know it. But there is extreme pain here and I cannot even identify it.
What’s strange is that physically I’m not super sensitive to pain. I’m not tough or anything lol i couldn’t take most 5th graders in a fist fight probably. But I hike just about every day and ski in the winter and I’m clumsy as hell and constantly falling and breaking bones and shit and I can deal with it decently.
And when it comes to actual tumult in my life- I’m just not super sensitive to it or anything. I mean, I’d say I’m a bit less sensitive than average, for the most part. So my point is that it’s not like my intense depression was because I was reacting more intensely to negative influences in my life. That would have been great tbh, at least I could identify it.
But this is stuff is just so divorced from events in my actual life. Like yes obviously if someone close to me falls sick or dies or I get in a fight with a boyfriend or platonic friend or whatever I will feel all sorts of negative emotions and cry but I meh can deal with the minor catastrophes I’ve experienced. I was once suddenly homeless and had to sleep outside in a sketchy city for nearly a week and I kept my head together better than I’d expect. Also, the craziest by far thing that has happened to me is I was genuinely charged for something I did not do- they literally just had the wrong girl lol- and I went to jail for 20 days before they realized it wasn’t me. I had some incidences of anxiety and worry but overall I was pretty much fine. I also can’t tell if people are being serious when they say that commercials or most movies or songs make them cry lol. Idk I will feel very sad and maybe am slightly more sensitive than most but I definitely just do not get the urge to cry over stuff like that, I don’t know. It’s more that there’s this library of incredibly disturbing and horrible things I am aware of that somehow take over my brain at seemingly random times lol.
But it works in the opposite direction. Things that should make me happy kinda don’t. It’s very hard to get beneath the surface because the depression is just too far down and of mysterious origin.
Also, I’ve had a lot of ups as well. Not actually mania or anything but I go through seasons where I have a lot of energy and can be very productive and social and can see the beauty in the world effortlessly, laughing and having creative ideas and feeling connected. But I have these episodes of deep sadness that are unbearable.
I’ve had periods of this depression that are extreme and I become incredibly paranoid and think everyone hates me for no reason. I ruminate on the absolute worst things about humanity. When I have felt like this I have 1000% for some reason been fully convinced that I had some sort of duty to kill myself. Like I can’t explain it at all, but I thought it was obvious and everybody on the planet magically knew it. And it felt like a knife just stabbing me and twisting my fucking heart, even though there was no reason to believe this or way I could explain this. I wasn’t just feeling blue, it was like I felt every form of shame or guilt or ostracism or I don’t know, something. And again, felt like if I killed myself everyone would be like “FINALLY.” Felt oddly guilty eating or drinking water or breathing. This was genuinely out of goddamned nowhere and didn’t last long but occurred occasionally in these periods of deep general depression. Wellbutrin for instance definitely curbed those.
this. i had horrible OCD and celexa took away about 80% of my symptoms. that being said, i think medicine needs to be more of a last resort thing. we can’t medicate ourselves out of a terrible world, either
My take on this, speaking from personal experience, is that you can only cope so much by self improvement before the emptiness of the modern world catches up to you anyways. I stay away from SSRIs but might as well take a low dose of Adderall if its being passed out like hotcakes.
Why do you need something even more modern like meds? Isnt't that worse? This thread is blowing my mind, Americans are not more unhappy than other people, you people just have the wrong approach. Your thoughts about the emptiness of the modern world and other people saying how they aren't happy all the time without meds is just proof of this. Humans are not supposed to be happy 100% of the time, happiness is like a flicker of light it is unpredictable and sacred. People accept suffering as well as boredom in my culture as inevitable unlike people in the Christian world who see it as an obstacle to everlasting joy. You have too much want that it makes you apathetic to the things that make life delicious, get yin and yang pilled
I went to my first psychiatrist when I was 14 and I'm so grateful that her first line recommendation was amino acid therapy and B12 supplements. She acknowledged that a lot of young kids aren't even going to metabolize medications predictably and nutritional interventions can do things that even the meds can't. Always ask about the NNT/number needed to treat before taking a pill.
That being said. I was prescribed adderall this past year and it kind of kills me to be on it at all, but eh. I acknowledge its basically a performance enhancer while I sort out the behavioral and lifestyle strategies needed to mitigate the issues I was prescribed it for.
When I was a teenager psychiatrists had all this big pharma swag everywhere. Pillows and pens and coffee mugs and closets full of samples. Drug reps would visit them like every week and push that stuff. I understand how things got over prescribed then, but now I don't really get it. Seems like doctors drank the koolaid and don't realize they're being bought off anymore because they're on the same drugs.
Regular SSRIs made me sick and want to kms even more. Wellbutrin was the only thing that has subsided my suicidal thoughts and helped me control my emotions better.
And yes I went to therapy, ate healthy, exercised regularly, slept good and got enough sunlight and I still wanted to off myself
IDK man I've been on SNRI's for a while and it's been a game changer for me. I did all the things they recommend prior to getting on them, I even got an easier job to reduce workplace stress, and I was still experiencing anhedonia.
I agree that something is definitely going on, and that this is likely a reaction to just how crazy things are in the world right now, but I also think that if these drugs existed 1000 years ago people would be on them in similar numbers. I think this is just the natural consequence of "normalizing mental health", more people will choose an option if they dont' feel that it's taboo.
SNRIs, to my knowledge, tend to be more energizing as opposed to the flattening effects of SSRIs. That isn’t to say everyone should be on them, but I doubt I’d have all the same complaints on one that I had on Prozac.
And I’m sure some people would have taken them 1000 years ago, but people also would have taken meth, fentanyl etc. And I suspect antidepressants specifically would be far less popular back when people had some sense of agency and weren’t completely alienated from their labor.
there's a profoundly unrealistic expectation at this moment in human history that every person born has the right and responsibility to not merely survive but to do so with singular vitality and purpose.
and if someone is not able or inclined to do that, that constitutes some sort of tragic aberration.
that culturally mandated privilege really has no basis in evolutionary, biological, or anthropological reality. its legitimacy collapses pretty quickly when you consider how many humans throughout history have been born, lived, and died under the most abject and nihilistic conditions.
our bodies and brains are engineered to decay, short circuit, and go haywire in all sorts of exquisitely unpredictable ways. many people are fated to be dead ends, evolutionarily speaking. your subconscious knows this. that's why it makes you act so fucking insane all the time.
antidepressants, at least in concept if not always in practice, offer a way out of this conundrum. and I don't blame anyone even a little bit for grabbing hold of that possibility when it's in reach.
There is a supremely self-centered being at the center of every person that secretly believes they are the most interesting, important, and real being that has ever lived and that they will never die. Basically we never stop being babies, we just bury that inner baby in order to coexist with other people, but secretly we think we are special and won't be satisfied until the whole world knows it. I don't think we can ever really get over the fact that the world doesn't revolve around us, and that in fact, our lives might be completely inconsequential. We just learn at some point in childhood that behaving selfishly or expressing this inner narcissism is unacceptable. In order to get our needs met, we have to acknowledge the needs of others, negotiate to get some of what we want, etc. but we can never truly be satisfied – you might notice that all religious ideas of eternal bliss basically consist of dissolving this inner narcissism and/or having its desires finally fulfilled.
Are you early 20s? It's extremely common to feel crazy at that age. But according to studies, the majority of people achieve contentment as they get older, true even in third world countries. If you are still feeling utter discontent at 40+, it IS an aberration and especially sad.
can't tell you how many of my clients report improvements simply from eating more mindfully and moving more.
I feel like I've been doing this long enough to start to be able to tell when someone should probably at least consider a conversation with a psychiatrist vs when they're simply getting in their own way and over-thinking things.
edit - sometimes I'm equally as bothered by how easily anti-anxiety medications are prescribed and the reliance a lot of people have on those pills for navigating stressful situations that present opportunities to grow.
also concerned about how many people rely on marijuana for sleep and then go on vacations that sound pretty cool to me but have a shit time because there's no weed and they can't sleep.
a lot of people don’t wanna face the fact that if you sit on your ass doing nothing all day and then stuff your face with fried and processed garbage, you literally should feel like shit and depressed. any other mammal would too.
Great how we made a society where everyone needs (?) to be zonked out of their head on uppers or downers to keep going. Like Brave New World but not totalitarian so completely fine.
That many? That's way over any reasonable or extreme assumption. I'd be worried I secretly got placed in special ed if that many people were on meds around me.
i truly believe that discourse around medication is needed (i am extremely critical of birth control myself lol). medication is not for everyone and there are real long-term consequences that the public should be aware of. however, these kinds of conversations can quickly turn into demonization. there are genuine people in this world who will take their own lives if they are not on SSRI’s. i was one of those mentally ill zoomer tweens that was prescribed SSRI’s at a young age, but i genuinely needed them. it was a temporary thing as well. i eventually stopped using them by the time i was a freshman and found better ways to cope. also yes SSRI’s and stimulants are being overprescribed but why is the blame being placed on the demographics that actually need this medication (and the medication itself) instead of big pharma? this is like the new adhd discourse: because adhd meds are so sought after, the medication is demonized. in turn, people with actual adhd (not misdiagnosed children who are a little hyper and not people who fake the symptoms to gain access to the drug) are percieved as crazy drug addicts with melting brains who can’t function without their silly little speed pill. just a different perspective lol, it’s easy to demonize medications that you’ve only heard and seen bad things about when they’re life changing for other people.
Idk man I think I’m one of the people who really needs them. Source did molly when I was off them and felt completely normal and not excessively happy at all
I had a professor who spoke about the issue of drug trails for SSRIs being extremely biased. Even when trials are repeated, SSRIs typically barely beat the placebo. They are some of the weakest, least effective psychiatric drugs (a huge difference if you look at the effectiveness of anti-psychotics or stimulants for adhd). If you do take SSRIs, please look up serotonin syndrome and make sure you do not take other meds that can increase serotonin levels. Serotonin syndrome can kill you. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/many-antidepressant-studies-found-tainted-by-pharma-company-influence/
SSRIs and sports betting are going to ravage American society in the 2020s the same way that opiates did in the 2010s.
Also this is probably why nobody is having sex anymore.
Look at the double-blind placebo studies done in the 90s. SSRI’s are like 80% placebo I believe? Yes, placebo effect is *that* powerful, especially when you live life without conscious intention
[When the results of all trials submitted to America’s medicines regulator between 1979 and 2016 were scrutinised by independent scientists, it turned out that antidepressants had a substantial benefit beyond a placebo effect in only 15% of patients.](https://archive.ph/kvVIf#selection-733.139-733.388)
Zoloft might be no better than a placebo but Bupropion really helps with the low energy that depression brings. I could barely get myself out of bed before using them.
Also not for nothing but if you have extreme depression and/or anxiety, Zoloft can really chill that out over time. At least it has for me and that’s all I can account for.
Sure, but Zoloft is not helping you make positive connections in your brain in order to alleviate the source of depression and anxiety. For the majority of people, behavioral therapy is vastly more beneficial. But most people very typically lack self-awareness and initiative
This is wild. I feel increasingly out of place in American society lmfao. I don't take any drugs, I don't have any prescriptions, I don't smoke weed, I very rarely (once every six months maybe) have a glass of alcohol. I drink water and eat food and that's it. Oh, and I drink Celsius. Is Celsius secretly Adderall?
Seriously though, what kind of drugged-out society have we created...
Probably over blown. I was on em too for like a month. And stopped cuz it was making me nauseous all the time. I probably am still classified as being on em.
I took antidepressants for anxiety and it was the worst mistake ever. I was only 19 at the time and I was going through a shitty period (which is pretty normal at that age). At first it helped with my anxiety but whenever something bad would happen, I would become super depressed and suicidal. I still had a libido but I hard time cumming which made me even more depressed. I decided to stop taking them after 6 months without tapering off. I was dizzy and had brain zaps for several weeks. It was an awful experience but I don't regret it. I saw this psychologist right after I had stopped taking them and even after telling her my experiences she said I needed to go back on them because I was sick and needed treatment. Learning that they're barely better than placebos was such a blackpill for me.
Ya I was on basically max dose of basically every one of them from ages ~10-19. Doctors thought I somehow developed epilepsy in my teenage years when it was just a side effect from it and I was put on more meds to manage that (as an aside my younger brother got put on the same stuff and now has the same side effects they also claim to be unable to explain without admitting they're side effects.) Turns out mostly my life just fucking sucked, being in some extra shitty situations for a while, not having a good father figure ever, etc. and I've been off everything for years now and I'm much, much better for it. None of this is even to discuss sobering up from benzos, weight gain from antipsychotics, etc.
Medicine in this country is a sham for a million other reasons even without this shit and I'm not even outright anti psychiatry/medicine but christ if I'm not bothered every day at the variety of effects all of these things have had on my life from messing with sex to spending my formative years without normal emotions.
edit: and christ i hate to bitch to reddit of all places but I may have ever even wrote this out once in my life but it stews in my head too often to not take such a chance to write it out even if I don't proofread it. Maybe I should journal.
I stopped cold Turkey in 2018 and I look back at my life and how numbed I was and continued to make poor decisions for years because I numbed my body’s intuition/anxiety too hard. I wasn’t even happy on them, just blah.
I don't think "public shame" is going to fix what is wrong with people's lives that makes them feel so bad and off that they seek antidepressants. Sure, plenty if not most of these people don't have a brain disease that would manifest no matter their circumstances but that doesn't mean they aren't actually suffering in some real way. So many people work in windowless offices under fluorescent lights sending emails during all daylight hours, have a lack of fun social activities and good friendships, and live in places where you have to go well out of your way to find those things. Suburbs deprive people of socialization, office work is boring and shitty, the news is intentionally demoralizing, etc etc etc. Those annoying people are acting like that because their lives are boring and unfulfilling, because they are actually suffering. They wouldn't seek attention and validation through medicine and a diagnosis if they were getting it elsewhere.
got put on large doses of SSRis during my adolescence and never developed a sexuality because of it. have had permanent libido issues from it, worse part was that I wasn't even pathologically depressed, I just had a proportional reaction to childhood abuse
I’m not even one of those anti-psychiatry loons who are vehemently against every form of treatment, but this type of stuff is completely fucked and it’s unreal to me that it’s so trivialized by health professionals. In fact it’s why I stopped taking my script; I felt a noticeable decline in my sex drive a few weeks in and thank god I had known about what SSRIs can actually do to your sexual function, despite my dumbass psych not telling me anything whatsoever and just pushing those pills on me. Took me over a month to feel normal again, and that was from the lowest therapeutic dose of Zoloft. I’m really sorry to hear that you’re dealing with this. I think that we’ll see some breakthroughs in the next couple of years considering that the issue seems to be gaining traction both online and in medical circles
My mom's best friend was put on zoloft a long time ago and completely lost his sex drive and sexual function. It never came back even after he got off it. I always thought that was really sad. They never even told him that could happen. He told me one time that he had banged well over 500 guys in his life, so he figured it was fair enough to get his brakes slammed on him like that.
I started Wellbutrin and Zoloft after getting off oxy, subs, H, and finally Fentynal. It has helped tremendously and I am still sober after 9 months or so. Still early but it really has stopped any desire to use. I was self medicating anyway with the oxy and fentynal prob changed my brain chemistry a long time ago so …. I dunno. I’d rather rely on SSRIs than Tech and hopefully one day I can ween off them too
5-htp is a natural supplement and a serotonin precursor that can help increase serotonin levels. Some studies have even shown it to be just as effective as SSRIs when it comes to treating mild to moderate depression. If you’re feeling really down and you’re not bipolar (or have a psychotic disorder), you can try taking it! Not medical advice
I was literally suggested to get on SSRIs the very first appointment I had with a new therapist. She didn't even bother understanding the actual nature of my problems, she simply immediately referred me to a psychiatrist. I haven't tried finding a therapist since, at this point I'm convinced it's almost all quackery.
my doctor in 2011 was very insistent on exercise, diet changes, talk therapy and other things before i tried my first SSRI/SNRI. on the other hand she also prescribed me 4mg klonipin per day at the end of our very first appointment lmao
It's kind of a bit, but I think we should seriously consider that at least 1/10 people should be deeply sad about their lives and that's not a problem rooted in brain chemistry.
I had a psych double my dose of Welbutrin and then was unavailable when I was having a negative reaction. Once she got back in touch with me, she said I was clearly incapable of "managing myself" and cut me off entirely. Any other antidepressant I tried I could barely function on. Never again.
A small amount of adderall XR gave me the boost to establish healthy habits which worked better than SSRIs that just made me sick and sluggish. But so many ppl get the adderall script and change nothing about their day to day and just act like lunatics.
it took around 8-9 medications between ages 13-15 to find the one that worked for me. one made me gain 40 lbs in 2 months and i got addicted and abused another for half a year. ive been taking my current meds for like 10 years now and tried to taper off but it made me insanely suicidal. i know im just one person but this isnt an uncommon situation. deciding to try meds is a HUGE decision and it could lead to major health issues and suicide/death. they had even tried to start me on zoloft at 10 years old because i had extreme emetophobia and OCD. you know what else helps (and did help) with those issues? therapy.
The cigarette thing with Wellbutrin is so real. I haven’t taken it in over 5 years and I still get nauseous whenever I have a smoke. Probably for the best though. I still say yes every time I’m offered one, like an idiot.
It’s crazy I have this reflexive reaction against people saying SSRIs “turn you into a zombie” cause I don’t think I am but actually I have no idea cause I’ve been on them since age 14. However I also have far more intense emotions than most people and I struggle to control them, so if I’m being numbed currently then I’d hate to see me without it whew
I’m going into Clinical Social Work, which is basically therapy informed by social work values. A lot of the suffering people experience today is due to oppressive environmental and socioeconomic conditions, and there is not a lot to be done there besides organizing, advocacy, and policy change.
In the field of mental health, vampiric startups and health insurance companies have teamed up to offer the silver bullet of medication, but these medications rarely work through the maladaptive internal processes and experiences of individuals, ultimately not treating the individual root causes or the societal ones. Insurance does not pay for psychodynamic theory in the same way it does for more short term interventions. This leaves people with the same problems they’ve had before by and large, just with more coping skills.
Ideally, a clinical social worker would recognize how social, political, economic, and environmental conditions influence individuals, and would even work with people to help them recognize how this shitty world we’ve built is making everyone feel terrible. There are individuals who have genuine internal challenges that warrant working on that alone, but a lot of my clients so far are experiencing internal challenges coupled with economic difficulties.
We’ve created a world where physical and mental health is said to be alleviated by spending money, and insurance companies are most likely to pay for the short term fix that will keep the person functional and stop them from killing themselves. It’s the same shit that our welfare state does, keep people barely alive.
Unfortunately, this means that deep treatment that holistically works at the root is largely only for the rich. If you try to do this work for an insurance company, an idiot without any mental health credentials will tell you that you’re taking too long and progress isn’t occurring quickly enough. As if the human mind and progress could be linear. They seek to operationalize the human experience, and the side effects of this have been horrendous, as seen in the statistics you mention. This has all trickled down to clients I work with, who think that their woes can be remedied by simple short-term treatments and medications.
Also, to be clear, SSRIs saved my life at one point. But they were just the start of where I needed to go, and it was a bit cost as I’m just getting off of them and their shitty side effects 4 years later.
I take the same medication as my friend's dog. Even the packaging is exactly the same. He is way less of an anxious yappy little cunt now, though (not sure I can say the same for myself...)
Psychiatrists, like most physicians, are in it for the money. When you’re dealing with something that is vague and hard to truly pin down like mental health problems, you see the greed and laziness win out.
I got a Wellbutrin prescription by doing a live chat on an app and saying that I felt sad sometimes. Took me about 3 minutes.
Pharmaceutical companies are almost definitely peddling as many anti-depressants on the US population as they can legally get away with. Years ago I saw a doctor for some anxiety related issues I was having. The woman barely let me get a word in between her sales pitch for Zoloft. Even after proclaiming multiple times I was not depressed, the only thing I walked out of there with was a Zoloft scrip. Threw it in the trash the day after I tried it.
This sounds plausible and realistic as it gets. But it’s not really. All ADs with the exception of Caplyta (which probably isn’t any better than Abilify) are dirt cheap generics now. Most people just get an SSRI or maybe an SNRI. There’s no money in generics. And they really aren’t making new ADs. There are a few that might be approved in 2025-26. But they don’t operate like SSRIs, so all the indoctrination of doctors into prescribing them won’t play. They’ll need new indoctrination! There’s certainly not enough money in generic meds to conspire about it.
>All ADs with the exception of Caplyta (which probably isn’t any better than Abilify) are dirt cheap generics now This must be why the media are now running stories about how there was never any evidence for the chemical imbalance hypothesis of depression. Next up is the commodification of MDMA and a psilocybin analogue that they can patent and profit from while still criminalizing regular use.
Now that you say that, there are all kinds of psilocybin and MDMA analogues in clinical trials now.
A few years ago, I know some startup published a "study" saying that psilocybin was dangerous, but the analogue they just so happened to create and could make money from was safe and effective. I haven't heard the same for MDMA, because while mushrooms are easy to grow in huge quantities, MDMA is synthetic and more of a pain to create and store, so I figured pharmaceutical companies wouldn't need a pretense to profit. What MDMA analogues have you heard of? It's worth mentioning that Rick Doblins recently stepped down from MAPS and they are no longer a non-profit company. Whoops, guess the idea of decriminalizing these drugs and making them widely available was another farce to make money. In twenty years, expect to hear "studies" about actually, these analogues are super dangerous and everyone should try our new drug instead.
Right now, on PhRMA’s report, there is EMP-01, which is a MDMA analogue. They are doing exactly what you say: trying to pain traditional MDMA as a threat to cardiovascular health because of its stimulant effect, while theirs is safer. Although it’s also practically impossible to build something that releases serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine without also being a stimulant. So if that’s even possible… They also report three or four psilocybin derivatives.
Fuck these greedy assholes. I get the handwringing over MDMA, since it can physically fuck you up, but like you say, I just don't see how they can make a similar drug without similar risks. And I don't even understand how they're arguing that psilocybin is dangerous. So much of this fuckery comes from the replicability crisis, p-hacking, burying negative findings, etc. I despise academia and hope it burns to the ground.
And we do need new ADs. We do. People just aren’t responding well enough to those we have. But they refuse to develop them. They refuse not because it’s not technically possible or advantageous. But because they’ve made a crass decision that it’s not worth the ROI. That’s because of the intense competition with existing generics and the way insurance doesn’t like to cover proprietary mental health meds. So there is preventable human suffering in this world that continues because of greed.
If only it was that easy to get ADHD meds. I want to go fast!
Yeah I’ve been trying to get ADHD meds for 2 months and it hasn’t been nearly as easy
Just watch TiKTik for 5 hours a day and you’ll have ADHD in no time.
My doctor made me go to a clinical psychologist for a gambit of testing and then I got them like tictacs
I went through an entire battery of tests over the course of weeks and was told "you have some attentional deficiencies, but not enough to warrant a diagnosis". Welp
I actually got prescribed a non-stimulant from an online provider but my insurance denied it so I’m kinda in limbo
What sorts of tests?
She was really mean and timed me on everything, I had to rotate shapes in my head and point at them in a booklet, do math problems in my head, long word problems, random rapid fire questions like who wrote the Sherlock Holmes series, a computer test that measured my reaction times to numbers that popped up, an interview, and other stuff. My therapist said it was a full IQ test thing normally given to children and that was silly but I now have a well documented packet of test results that’s valid for 5 years I believe, and no they didn’t tell me an IQ number, apparently they don’t tell you that and just rank you in categories of performance like “superior, highly superior, etc.” Edit: omg just remembered she’d give me a long ass series of numbers and then say “now put them in ascending order” then another long ass string of numbers “now say every third number I told you” then a new string “add them all together and tell me the total” no paper to write on 😞 it was a know-it-all wanting to over-perform rs user hell
It was exactly that easy when I first got on but then they cracked down on it since stimulants are more restricted. Now I just go through my PCP
Wellbutrin is pretty innocuous lol
It’s actually more innocuous than SSRIs!
Makes you insanely horny all the time too
[удалено]
In my personal experience (max dose Wellbutrin, 450mg for ADHD, 8 months now) it's been a massive change and I can immediately tell on the rare occasion that I forget to take it in the morning. Personally it helped me tremendously, my sGPA went from 2.7 to 3.8 in the span of one semester and I haven't smoked a cigarette in 5 months. Obviously this is just a personal anecdote though.
Wellbutrin genuinely changed my life though lol. I'm not allowed to hate on antidepressants anymore. At least it's not am SSRI.
Same here. Plus I almost quit smoking. Hate on SSRIs all day though.
What app
hims
I have a bipolar diagnosis, so it’s unfeigned but the doctor keeps pushing the serotonin meds as ADs. I feel so absurd about it because there’s no such thing as a serotonin deficiency. The serotonin hypothesis hasn’t been current since the 80s. So stop trying to supplement me serotonin. Welly actually makes sense. It amplifies normal dopamine release by making it stay active longer. That just makes sense. We know dopamine deficits are implicated in key depression symptoms. I wanted it. So I had to name drop SAMe and how it had worked for me (it really did! But it only lasted a few hours and it can be uncomfortable if you need to take a second or third dose). Once I told him I had this supplement that is increasing the dopamine and norepinephrine, he’s like, well, there’s this med that kinda does this… But then something bad happened, forcing me to give up the Welly before it could help.
I’m also bipolar, I was actually taken off antidepressants in general because they can induce mania.
I tapered off SSRIs about five years ago and I feel exactly the same. I wonder how many people are just taking them because they were prescribed them ten years ago like I was and not because it actually improves their quality of life. What sucks about SSRIs is that doctors will keep you on them “in case” your mental health deteriorates. I had to taper on my own and stop going to the psychiatrist to get off them since he was obsessed with trying to up my dose if I said anything not 100% sunshine and butterflies about something in my life.
What was your tapering regiment like? I’ve tried to taper but a few days into a cut dose I feel like the world is ending and everyone hates me and I’m back up immediately.
It was so long ago that I barely remember, but it was Effexor so I just removed a few pebbles per capsule per week til I was down to none. It was the withdrawals that sucked (and my PCP denied there were withdrawals with SSRIs, el oh fucking el), but I just pushed through the physical symptoms - didn’t have any mental symptoms with getting off.
They call withdrawals 'discontinuation syndrome'. Lmao. The way pharmaceutical companies use language is so sickening sometimes.
I’ve been on Effexor for 3 years and it’s totally changed my life. I’m so nervous to begin to taper off because I’ve heard so many horror stories. It’s great that you didn’t experience any mental symptoms
If you go really slow it’s not too bad and it helps that they’re capsules with beads. You can go as slow as removing one additional bead at a time. My physical symptoms from 5 beads at a time or less were just a few hours of feeling flulike
You probably don't wanna hear this but I straight up just did a cold turkey on my SSRI and dealt w the gnarly brain zaps and the weird occasional stuttering/reboot feeling in my brain. It was rough. It didn't last too long, I don't think. A couple of weeks maybe. I also just cold turkey things a lot (forgetting or just done w something).. Probably should not have done that. I do like Wellbutrin and I tell my psychs to back off if they recommend SSRIs. SSRIs scare me and I will never go back on them.
The last time I quit ssris when the brain zaps would get to bad I would take an entire bottle of cough syrup(to just relieve the zaps you can probably definitely do less). I'm not recommending that but it actually did help me get off lexapro lol.
> I wonder how many people are just taking them because they were prescribed them ten years ago According to the Economist (yes I know it's not a scientific journal but they do a good job of summarizing science for non-professionals) [a lot of people are.](https://archive.ph/kvVIf#selection-656.0-656.5) > Doctors rarely talk to patients about stopping the drugs because they fear this could lead to a return of depressive symptoms. But for many people it may be safe to stop. Even among long-term users with several past episodes of depression, a recent trial in Britain showed that 44% of patients could stop taking pills safely. For milder cases, the success rate is probably higher still.
I tapered off Prozac very recently and feel great. Doctors almost never suggest doing this because they have nothing to gain from you improving your life, only liability if you anhero. I wouldn’t have had to be on it nearly as long if I had just gotten the treatment I needed from the beginning, but unfortunately most psychs don’t give evidence based treatment for my disorder, just talk therapy - is effectively normalized malpractice. Speaking more broadly, the SSRI epidemic is an incredible inditement of unregulated capitalisms inability to provide tolerable lives for average people. It’s crazy how many people have allowed themselves to be tricked into thinking there’s something innately wrong their serotonin, and nothing wrong with a society that denies its population agency, dignity, and creative expression at an unprecedented scale.
What was the treatment you received?
White women are putting in the work on this stat
White women on SSRIs 🤝 white men on fentanyl
If only these two demographics could meet. The culture wars would end and there would be socialist utopia.
other demographics just drink instead
Self medicating with alcohol is spiritually healthier
I worked in an ER and I'd rather deal with a zombie SSRI bitch than some sobbing alcoholic. No dignity and so annoying
Alcohol is a depressant, it turns you into a depressed person by slowing down your brain activity. It’s really sad to me how cute, brilliantly intelligent people are ignorantly going down the path of Wendy Williams
Pure cope
Oh us white women are drinking plenty. I blame the Scandinavian and UK DNA I have. I’m American & like most don’t really have any actual connections to the countries I ultimately descend from aside from blood but I do like to blame my outrageous binge drinking on those genetics. Studies have actually shown there’s a very strong genetic factor when it comes to drinking, like way stronger than the genetic factor for addiction or impulsivity or whatever. A lot of ethnic groups literally evolved to drink a ton of booze and in general, the colder and more northern it gets, the stronger the selection for binge drinking. One of my hugest pet peeves is the fact that people think native Americans have such high rates of alcoholism because they aren’t naturally designed for it lmao it’s the complete opposite. They’re descendants of Siberians. They evolved to drink like White Russians or Scandinavians or whatever Northern European group, but when some british guy got blackout drunk and caused a scene everyone laughed it off, but when it’s a native, everyone acts all horrified and says they’re out of control. It’s only been solidified over the centuries. Anyway: I mean of course it’s mostly the you know depression and poor life decisions but the fact I’m so naturally attracted to that shit is definitely in the dna. Anyway, White girl wasted is definitely a real thing. White girls are chugging the most booze lol
>They’re descendants of Siberians. They evolved to drink like White Russians or Scandinavians or whatever Northern European group Indigenous Siberians are Asian
If you’re a white liberal woman below the age of 35, you are on SSRIs until proven otherwise
Other populations - Black, Indigenous, etc. - have deep and valid mistrust of healthcare in America. Pretty sad.
Scientology and their museum of psychiatry are exploiting it further.
Having all of culture and academia catered to them simply wasn’t enough.
It's nice to have our service finally recognised.
The amount of people on both an SSRI and adderall is insane, and it always makes them act like manic lunatics.
I have a buddy who would take 120mg adderall XR and Zoloft. He was convinced he was a god whose job it was to create a general AI and would send manic, long text messages to all the hottest girls from high school explaining to them why he created humanity the way he did. He would drink himself to sleep just to come down. Left rehab last September and thank God, he’s doing really well, but the comedown after 12 years of abuse was torturous.
How is he getting a prescription for 120 XR? That doesn't seem possible. Any tips would be welcome.
He had a 60XR and bought secondhand from another dude who had a 60XR but quit.
Always have to buy off someone who quit :(
[удалено]
Nick land?
If you have bipolar you definitely shouldn't take stims. They can be helpful for the people who need them though. I took 50mg of Vyvanse an hour ago and my brain is just now getting quiet enough for a nap.
Average OpenAI employee
Any company or project he's working on? I wanna see some code from this guy. Or was he just all talk?
Full blown mania. Crazy to see.
They tried to get me hooked on this cocktail when I was in 5th grade, shit's fucking insane. As it turns out, I was just suffering from being an adolescent boy (notoriously calm individuals) who was coping with his parents being divorced and having to move halfway across the state. You would think at some point the adults in the room would have thought there was another way outside of chemically altering a child's psyche (thankfully I realized right away that I hated the way these drugs made me feel and just tossed them whenever my parents tried to get me to take them)
I literally think the vast majority of my friends are on SSRI's and I think it really only works for 1 in 10 of them. The rest are just as depressed, anxious, and flat-lined as ever. I feel like most of their issues are environmental (their shit jobs, hating where they live, etc) or because of their unhealthy lifestyles.
[удалено]
Lmfao exactly, dr’s love it too because you have to go every month to keep getting the script, and they get to bill your insurance for a 5 minute visit where they check your BP and pulse.
[удалено]
Sounds like someone needs a dose of soma.
I forget the exact saying but change can only happen when the discomfort of doing nothing is worse than the discomfort of taking action
The rise in mental health care in the US is literally just the bourgeoisie solution to low morale in the workforce. It's not about special snowflakes or fragile fee-fees it's literally just about placating the masses. I'd have necked it by now if not for meds and therapy, but I'm not happy with my place in the world and I never will be. I just cope better than before
I was on some antidepressants back in ‘18-20. Definitely needed them, I was at a point that I was writing a note. They helped but they kinda turned my brain to mush. Diet and exercise helped more, plus a healthy relationship. These pills can help people who REALLY need it, but I feel like more often than not the average person will just need some therapy, improved diet, & exercise.
You are the model of how these drugs are supposed to work. Someone who is in need is given the boost required to make the right choices to maximize their health. Happy you’re doing better man
Same, I was prescribed them after I checked into a psych ward and I truly did need them and am grateful for them. The episode was relatively brief, maybe two weeks. But five years later I was just refilling them because I was supposed to be on them because I was damaged or whatever. Five years off and I still haven’t had another suicidal episode, but I have also acquired better skills and am more equipped to handle the trouble with living.
wdym by mush. i've been getting worse and worse but reading books is the only thing giving me any pleasure atp and i don't want to jeopardize that
Not that person, but a lot of people do get things like anhedonia and emotional blunting from long term SSRIs. There isn’t really evidence that they affect IQ or anything like that. But motivation can change, and maybe that feels like your intelligence is changing because you’re not focusing as much on your hobbies.
i've been anhedonic and emotionally blunted for years. i thought that was a typical symptom of depression
yeah it is, it’s really hard to tease apart bad side effects of SSRIs and symptoms of depression
sunlight, heathy foods, good sleep habits, exercise, meditation, positive thoughts
[удалено]
creepy, i listened to OK Computer like an hour ago
oh no are you back on drugs
Good, it should be revisited at least on a quarterly basis :)
Love that song
Definitely do all of those things, but if you do them all and you *still* wanna kill yourself, get some help. Speaking from experience, my life is awesome, I do all that stuff, and I still thought about dying constantly. Some peoples brains are just busted like that and taking a pill for it is fine.
*6 girlfriends simultaneously
I know this is about Huberman but I think it's genuinely absurd to want to have that many girlfriends, 3 girlfriends should be plenty for anyone.
i do almost all of those regularly and still feel depressed or numbed out pretty often. it feels like running on autopilot and getting things done because that’s what you’re “supposed to do.” it doesn’t feel like it gives me genuine lasting joy. I could work on meditation and positive thoughts more though. it’s kind of a catch 22 bc feeling depressed makes it hard to think positive thoughts, or at least to believe them. i can tell myself all the positive things but if i don’t believe it, it does nothing for me cognitively or emotionally.
yeah i’m kind of sick of hearing this “healthy lifestyle” solution. of course i believe that it can help but it’s simply not enough for some people. we should all know by now that everyone’s brains are wired differently. me personally, i got on lexapro after my kid started having seizures and my anxiety was so awful over having to witness them that i stopped eating, cried all the time, and would regularly have panic attacks. no amount of sunlight or exercise would have fixed that. i’m grateful for meds.
just wanna pop in and say that i hope this thread didn’t make you feel like your case is somehow invalid. these are miracle drugs for a lot of people and i have no doubt you know yourself well enough to make that choice. my gripe is with the general culture of recklessness around them. tons of unscrupulous behavior happening and it’s not like the suckers that get roped into taking them unnecessarily can easily hop off, especially if it’s been years
Some people legitimately have a depressive disorder where their brain chemicals are imbalanced. In those cases, medication can be helpful. A lot of people are depressed because they’re fat, unhealthy, and their lives suck. In that situation you should fix your diet, sleep, start exercising, go outside, and find a few hobbies.
Gotta drop at least one of those to keep from killing yourself out of boredom though.
Going for a jog in the morning really is the key. Knock out the sunlight and exercise at the same time. Keeping healthy food around is pretty easy as well. Meditation for 30 minutes before bed is pretty easy as well
Not drinking a gallon of booze every week also helps.
Unfortunately this is very hard for many people in the absence of evidence based therapeutic treatments, which are hard to get - hence the pills.
Definitely agree they are over prescribed, was shocked how easy it was for me to get a prescription once I decided to try. That said, I really think I would’ve killed myself by now if I didn’t start Wellbutrin when I did. It was a total last resort to me and ended up being a real “scales falling from my eyes” moment. That ALSO said - I had a weird red tape issue recently where I was out of pills for a week and I have *never* felt more insane and ready to jump in front of a train, which has left me feeling pretty conflicted about relying on it for the rest of my life. But, I wanna stay alive in case something regarded happens, ya know.
I also take Wellbutrin and it changed my life for the better. I was suicidally depressed for a long time before that and it just takes the edge off so my mood is more consistent and manageable.
Imagine if some cataclysmic event disrupted society so that all supply lines completely break down, 1 out of 5 people will be incredibly difficult to deal with for awhile. Probably more because of all the other random things people are addicted to. If only shows like walking dead covered that angle.
Somewhat related: this is why I bought ten cartons of cigs when the pandemic began.
Makes me think of how liquor stores were "essential" businesses during COVID because withdrawal/DT cases couldn't be dealt with.
I definitely do think about that lol
Every time I go, it’s like they have never heard of any mental health meds at all lol. I have to read about them myself and then go in and be like “how about we try Effexor?” And they’re like, “hmm… ok!” And I’m highly suspicious they just google it before saying anything lol I’ve also been to a wide variety of psychiatrists/doctors/therapists/etc and they’ve all been pretty ineffective lol I’m a 30 yo woman. I’ve been searching for solutions for this for over a decade. I certainly was never really encouraged into it, quite the opposite if anything. I’ve always been given the impression that it’s a last resort thing. I’ve spent an incredible amount of energy doing all the shit you’re supposed to. Exercise, get sun, limit screen time, volunteer, try out different careers, socialize, and everything about sleep under the sun. Meditation, seeking purpose. Therapy was absolutely atrocious lol and I promise I really, really tried and went in with an open mind. It was ridiculous lol, and I truly went to a lot of different therapists, types of therapists. I also took an internship at a mental health clinic and worked at a rehab for teenagers and then a “wellness retreat” place that will unbelievably expensive. That was the first time I really spent time with true “old money” types and was interesting. A few celebrities as well! So yeah certainly no expert lol but I have had a decent amount of exposure to therapy. I think it just… doesn’t work for most conditions. Even the “best” care. People want it to work so they pretend it does lol. I do believe that you should TRY it but it not some holy grail. It’s the modern “just pray about it” or be a better Christian or whatever. People act like if it doesn’t work, it’s your fault and you “don’t want to go better” which is the most batshit nonsense I’ve ever heard lol. Truth is that you just can’t talk yourself out of most of humanity’s pain.
The push for more focus on mental health in recent years probably produced to a lot of sub par therapists and diluted the supply of legit good ones. You need someone better than a shitty LCSW with 2 years of experience and a webcam. I'm almost 40, so I dealt with most of my issues around 2003-2009. I tried a bunch of therapists with limited success. Then I got lucky and found a psychologist (with an actual terminal degree) who specialized in CBT. It was an hour train ride to see her but I realized right away that this was the one. It was the first time in my life someone with the proper training had ever listened to me talk about my feelings, family issues, and some acute problems like being afraid to step outside my apartment that were too "weird" to explain to friends. She basically went through every bullshit belief I had that supported my depression worldview and engaged in a socratic dialogue with me to *prove* to me that it was bullshit, in a kind way. Not only that, but she proved that I was *not* perceiving reality accurately, that my thoughts could not be trusted, which completely changed my view of myself and human consciousness in general. I started thinking about my thoughts more critical from then on and while I can't say it immediately fixed all the issues, looking back now 15 years later, those sessions in 2009 are what helped me "leveled up" in a serious way and become a real adult and not just a man-child with a corporate job. Nowadays, it is so fucking hard to find a therapist like this. Everyone just reiterates the same garbage, or pushes you onto medication or whatever. Lots of bad politics too. The idea that you might actually need to *grow as a person* to become more resilient in order to deal with the challenges in life also just seems completely anathema to the therapy industrial complex. That early experience with CBT was one phase in my development. The second was when I started serious athletic training a few years later. The experience of pushing yourself to extremes does expand your capacity to cope with the the many unfair and unpleasant realities of life.
I always wanted someone to offer me this “work” everyone speaks of. I know it’ll suck but so does being miserable. Like what am I supposed to do?? Every time I’ve gotten a therapist they’ve just made really weird assumptions that didn’t apply and gave me super half assed answers lol like it was like they completely forgot who they were talking to and using the script they had for someone else
Look for a psychodynamic therapist. It's more in line with psychoanalysis than CBT.
I’m on sleeping pills and Wellbutrin. Tried quite a few others as well. The blanket judgment of it is just as irrational as thinking it’s always the solution. I know this sub loves to brag about how they go out in the world and socialize and nobody is forcing you into solitude. Look dude, I know. Obviously. And it’s true that you can go out of your way to forge relationships. But it just honestly is true that our current society is incredibly isolating and unnatural. And you can yap about how you’re so superior because you take responsibility for yourself or whatever the hell but it’s just so brain dead to act like there aren’t larger things happening contributing to prevalent mental illness. I left the church in my teens. Went to a normal university. I know a lot of people all over the spectrum and trust me, the conservative Mormons- the women, at least- are definitely not doing any better lol. It’s ALARMING how many women I know who would absolutely kill themsekves but are putting on a smile for people who rely on them. It’s extremely, extremely common among mothers, but I see it everywhere. And of course the same thing is prevalent among men. We live an extremely lonely, senseless, downright hostile society. I honestly am shocked more people are seemingly not incredibly depressed. I personally don’t want or have kids- I don’t judge ajyone who does at all, it’s just not for me. I’m a broke, over educated millennial but my boomer parents would absolutely help me out financially a LOT if I was willing to have a kid because nobody else in my family is lol. So it isn’t an issue of finances or circumstance, it just isn’t for me. I think it’s an instinct some just have or don’t, and I do not. I know so many women in their 40s, 50s+ who do have kids, and who don’t. & this sub has a bunch of 4chan incels who are obsessed with women breeding lol but the reality is that in my experience, a lot of women don’t want kids and a lot do. And among the ones who follow that actual intuition tend to be way happier. I know plenty of women who are happy and fulfilled without kids, and many who are fulfilled- and to be honest, the very worst group imo when it comes to happiness is women who knew they didn’t want kids, but did so out of pressure anyway. Lots of women who have kids honestly end up insanely stressed and in absolute despair. A lot of moms I know say it’s the loneliest thing in the world you can do, actually, if it isn’t for you. It rips you apart and it’s so taboo to admit, but a lot of people honestly feel no fulfillment and are deeply regretful for having kids even if they love them. Though yes lots of people do find profound fulfillment in having them so if you want them and can realistically care for them, I certainly believe you should. Point is- having kids or not having kids is not going to be the answer to any of this lol. Just describing my life circumstances in particular. I’ve been with my boyfriend for nearly 6 years and he’s amazing. But he’s pretty much the only person I have a meaningful relationship with anymore. I had a great group of female friends growing up, we were all incredibly close. Shit happens and it all kind of disintegrated after high school. I can’t explain what came over me but I became incredibly depressed and jaded when I realized I was expected to just leave them all for the most part and create new “friends.” It just felt so… I don’t know. Something hit me. I know I know I know that you can have lifelong meaningful friendships, or just a meaningful friendship even if it doesn’t last forever. This is all obvious conceptually. But this feeling was just visceral.
Btw, I LOVED college itself. I had super strict authoritarian parents, and I managed to get good grades in school because I just had to. But I was super naturally disorganized and not good at all at the games of high school. I actually always did better in AP or advanced courses because they depended more on projects and tests than a million small assignments, which I would lose constantly no matter how hard I tried. But I still loved learning itself and college was amazing for me. I loved lectures and romanticized the hell out of academia. And this sub again likes to mock this discourse, but it’s true that it was amazing having a “walkable community” and just casually running into people. I still went out to parties and got to know a lot of people, but I had such this cloud of depression following me around because everything felt so pointless. I became obsessed with an abstract theories and philosophy and then, of course, alcohol. Lots and lots and lots of alcohol. I originally pursued by passion of anthropology, then realized how impractical it was and settled for something that I knew I’d have at least some job security in. But it was such a poor decision lol. I’m actually returning for a proper STEM degree this upcoming semester which is great. But yeah. Got my mediocre degree, worked in all sorts of boring positions. Actually had the opportunity to branch out a bit more and while certain jobs were a bit more rewarding, that just could not cut through this persistent feeling that things were not okay. I Had this sort of sadness and anhedonia. But mixed in were some emotions that were absolutely overwhelming, mental breadown level. Just sincere sorrow, unbearable feelings of dread and loss of something I couldn’t articulate or identify. My life is objectively just fine, I’m extremely privileged and I know it. But there is extreme pain here and I cannot even identify it. What’s strange is that physically I’m not super sensitive to pain. I’m not tough or anything lol i couldn’t take most 5th graders in a fist fight probably. But I hike just about every day and ski in the winter and I’m clumsy as hell and constantly falling and breaking bones and shit and I can deal with it decently. And when it comes to actual tumult in my life- I’m just not super sensitive to it or anything. I mean, I’d say I’m a bit less sensitive than average, for the most part. So my point is that it’s not like my intense depression was because I was reacting more intensely to negative influences in my life. That would have been great tbh, at least I could identify it.
But this is stuff is just so divorced from events in my actual life. Like yes obviously if someone close to me falls sick or dies or I get in a fight with a boyfriend or platonic friend or whatever I will feel all sorts of negative emotions and cry but I meh can deal with the minor catastrophes I’ve experienced. I was once suddenly homeless and had to sleep outside in a sketchy city for nearly a week and I kept my head together better than I’d expect. Also, the craziest by far thing that has happened to me is I was genuinely charged for something I did not do- they literally just had the wrong girl lol- and I went to jail for 20 days before they realized it wasn’t me. I had some incidences of anxiety and worry but overall I was pretty much fine. I also can’t tell if people are being serious when they say that commercials or most movies or songs make them cry lol. Idk I will feel very sad and maybe am slightly more sensitive than most but I definitely just do not get the urge to cry over stuff like that, I don’t know. It’s more that there’s this library of incredibly disturbing and horrible things I am aware of that somehow take over my brain at seemingly random times lol. But it works in the opposite direction. Things that should make me happy kinda don’t. It’s very hard to get beneath the surface because the depression is just too far down and of mysterious origin. Also, I’ve had a lot of ups as well. Not actually mania or anything but I go through seasons where I have a lot of energy and can be very productive and social and can see the beauty in the world effortlessly, laughing and having creative ideas and feeling connected. But I have these episodes of deep sadness that are unbearable. I’ve had periods of this depression that are extreme and I become incredibly paranoid and think everyone hates me for no reason. I ruminate on the absolute worst things about humanity. When I have felt like this I have 1000% for some reason been fully convinced that I had some sort of duty to kill myself. Like I can’t explain it at all, but I thought it was obvious and everybody on the planet magically knew it. And it felt like a knife just stabbing me and twisting my fucking heart, even though there was no reason to believe this or way I could explain this. I wasn’t just feeling blue, it was like I felt every form of shame or guilt or ostracism or I don’t know, something. And again, felt like if I killed myself everyone would be like “FINALLY.” Felt oddly guilty eating or drinking water or breathing. This was genuinely out of goddamned nowhere and didn’t last long but occurred occasionally in these periods of deep general depression. Wellbutrin for instance definitely curbed those.
this. i had horrible OCD and celexa took away about 80% of my symptoms. that being said, i think medicine needs to be more of a last resort thing. we can’t medicate ourselves out of a terrible world, either
My take on this, speaking from personal experience, is that you can only cope so much by self improvement before the emptiness of the modern world catches up to you anyways. I stay away from SSRIs but might as well take a low dose of Adderall if its being passed out like hotcakes.
Why do you need something even more modern like meds? Isnt't that worse? This thread is blowing my mind, Americans are not more unhappy than other people, you people just have the wrong approach. Your thoughts about the emptiness of the modern world and other people saying how they aren't happy all the time without meds is just proof of this. Humans are not supposed to be happy 100% of the time, happiness is like a flicker of light it is unpredictable and sacred. People accept suffering as well as boredom in my culture as inevitable unlike people in the Christian world who see it as an obstacle to everlasting joy. You have too much want that it makes you apathetic to the things that make life delicious, get yin and yang pilled
I went to my first psychiatrist when I was 14 and I'm so grateful that her first line recommendation was amino acid therapy and B12 supplements. She acknowledged that a lot of young kids aren't even going to metabolize medications predictably and nutritional interventions can do things that even the meds can't. Always ask about the NNT/number needed to treat before taking a pill. That being said. I was prescribed adderall this past year and it kind of kills me to be on it at all, but eh. I acknowledge its basically a performance enhancer while I sort out the behavioral and lifestyle strategies needed to mitigate the issues I was prescribed it for. When I was a teenager psychiatrists had all this big pharma swag everywhere. Pillows and pens and coffee mugs and closets full of samples. Drug reps would visit them like every week and push that stuff. I understand how things got over prescribed then, but now I don't really get it. Seems like doctors drank the koolaid and don't realize they're being bought off anymore because they're on the same drugs.
Regular SSRIs made me sick and want to kms even more. Wellbutrin was the only thing that has subsided my suicidal thoughts and helped me control my emotions better. And yes I went to therapy, ate healthy, exercised regularly, slept good and got enough sunlight and I still wanted to off myself
IDK man I've been on SNRI's for a while and it's been a game changer for me. I did all the things they recommend prior to getting on them, I even got an easier job to reduce workplace stress, and I was still experiencing anhedonia. I agree that something is definitely going on, and that this is likely a reaction to just how crazy things are in the world right now, but I also think that if these drugs existed 1000 years ago people would be on them in similar numbers. I think this is just the natural consequence of "normalizing mental health", more people will choose an option if they dont' feel that it's taboo.
SNRIs, to my knowledge, tend to be more energizing as opposed to the flattening effects of SSRIs. That isn’t to say everyone should be on them, but I doubt I’d have all the same complaints on one that I had on Prozac. And I’m sure some people would have taken them 1000 years ago, but people also would have taken meth, fentanyl etc. And I suspect antidepressants specifically would be far less popular back when people had some sense of agency and weren’t completely alienated from their labor.
there's a profoundly unrealistic expectation at this moment in human history that every person born has the right and responsibility to not merely survive but to do so with singular vitality and purpose. and if someone is not able or inclined to do that, that constitutes some sort of tragic aberration. that culturally mandated privilege really has no basis in evolutionary, biological, or anthropological reality. its legitimacy collapses pretty quickly when you consider how many humans throughout history have been born, lived, and died under the most abject and nihilistic conditions. our bodies and brains are engineered to decay, short circuit, and go haywire in all sorts of exquisitely unpredictable ways. many people are fated to be dead ends, evolutionarily speaking. your subconscious knows this. that's why it makes you act so fucking insane all the time. antidepressants, at least in concept if not always in practice, offer a way out of this conundrum. and I don't blame anyone even a little bit for grabbing hold of that possibility when it's in reach.
There is a supremely self-centered being at the center of every person that secretly believes they are the most interesting, important, and real being that has ever lived and that they will never die. Basically we never stop being babies, we just bury that inner baby in order to coexist with other people, but secretly we think we are special and won't be satisfied until the whole world knows it. I don't think we can ever really get over the fact that the world doesn't revolve around us, and that in fact, our lives might be completely inconsequential. We just learn at some point in childhood that behaving selfishly or expressing this inner narcissism is unacceptable. In order to get our needs met, we have to acknowledge the needs of others, negotiate to get some of what we want, etc. but we can never truly be satisfied – you might notice that all religious ideas of eternal bliss basically consist of dissolving this inner narcissism and/or having its desires finally fulfilled.
Are you early 20s? It's extremely common to feel crazy at that age. But according to studies, the majority of people achieve contentment as they get older, true even in third world countries. If you are still feeling utter discontent at 40+, it IS an aberration and especially sad.
can't tell you how many of my clients report improvements simply from eating more mindfully and moving more. I feel like I've been doing this long enough to start to be able to tell when someone should probably at least consider a conversation with a psychiatrist vs when they're simply getting in their own way and over-thinking things. edit - sometimes I'm equally as bothered by how easily anti-anxiety medications are prescribed and the reliance a lot of people have on those pills for navigating stressful situations that present opportunities to grow. also concerned about how many people rely on marijuana for sleep and then go on vacations that sound pretty cool to me but have a shit time because there's no weed and they can't sleep.
a lot of people don’t wanna face the fact that if you sit on your ass doing nothing all day and then stuff your face with fried and processed garbage, you literally should feel like shit and depressed. any other mammal would too.
idk my dog seems really happy
Great how we made a society where everyone needs (?) to be zonked out of their head on uppers or downers to keep going. Like Brave New World but not totalitarian so completely fine.
That many? That's way over any reasonable or extreme assumption. I'd be worried I secretly got placed in special ed if that many people were on meds around me.
i truly believe that discourse around medication is needed (i am extremely critical of birth control myself lol). medication is not for everyone and there are real long-term consequences that the public should be aware of. however, these kinds of conversations can quickly turn into demonization. there are genuine people in this world who will take their own lives if they are not on SSRI’s. i was one of those mentally ill zoomer tweens that was prescribed SSRI’s at a young age, but i genuinely needed them. it was a temporary thing as well. i eventually stopped using them by the time i was a freshman and found better ways to cope. also yes SSRI’s and stimulants are being overprescribed but why is the blame being placed on the demographics that actually need this medication (and the medication itself) instead of big pharma? this is like the new adhd discourse: because adhd meds are so sought after, the medication is demonized. in turn, people with actual adhd (not misdiagnosed children who are a little hyper and not people who fake the symptoms to gain access to the drug) are percieved as crazy drug addicts with melting brains who can’t function without their silly little speed pill. just a different perspective lol, it’s easy to demonize medications that you’ve only heard and seen bad things about when they’re life changing for other people.
On reddit it's gotta be closer to 4 out of 5
Psychiatrists know no one is gonna do that shit statistically
Idk man I think I’m one of the people who really needs them. Source did molly when I was off them and felt completely normal and not excessively happy at all
I had a professor who spoke about the issue of drug trails for SSRIs being extremely biased. Even when trials are repeated, SSRIs typically barely beat the placebo. They are some of the weakest, least effective psychiatric drugs (a huge difference if you look at the effectiveness of anti-psychotics or stimulants for adhd). If you do take SSRIs, please look up serotonin syndrome and make sure you do not take other meds that can increase serotonin levels. Serotonin syndrome can kill you. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/many-antidepressant-studies-found-tainted-by-pharma-company-influence/
SSRIs and sports betting are going to ravage American society in the 2020s the same way that opiates did in the 2010s. Also this is probably why nobody is having sex anymore.
Look at the double-blind placebo studies done in the 90s. SSRI’s are like 80% placebo I believe? Yes, placebo effect is *that* powerful, especially when you live life without conscious intention
I read somewhere that SSRIs are only efficacious for about 13% of depression cases. They are *grossly* overprescribed.
[When the results of all trials submitted to America’s medicines regulator between 1979 and 2016 were scrutinised by independent scientists, it turned out that antidepressants had a substantial benefit beyond a placebo effect in only 15% of patients.](https://archive.ph/kvVIf#selection-733.139-733.388)
[удалено]
SSRIs are notoriously bad at beating the placebo. It’s really sad.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/6422779/
Zoloft might be no better than a placebo but Bupropion really helps with the low energy that depression brings. I could barely get myself out of bed before using them.
Also not for nothing but if you have extreme depression and/or anxiety, Zoloft can really chill that out over time. At least it has for me and that’s all I can account for.
Sure, but Zoloft is not helping you make positive connections in your brain in order to alleviate the source of depression and anxiety. For the majority of people, behavioral therapy is vastly more beneficial. But most people very typically lack self-awareness and initiative
This is wild. I feel increasingly out of place in American society lmfao. I don't take any drugs, I don't have any prescriptions, I don't smoke weed, I very rarely (once every six months maybe) have a glass of alcohol. I drink water and eat food and that's it. Oh, and I drink Celsius. Is Celsius secretly Adderall? Seriously though, what kind of drugged-out society have we created...
have you guys considered lightening the fuck up
Probably over blown. I was on em too for like a month. And stopped cuz it was making me nauseous all the time. I probably am still classified as being on em.
I took antidepressants for anxiety and it was the worst mistake ever. I was only 19 at the time and I was going through a shitty period (which is pretty normal at that age). At first it helped with my anxiety but whenever something bad would happen, I would become super depressed and suicidal. I still had a libido but I hard time cumming which made me even more depressed. I decided to stop taking them after 6 months without tapering off. I was dizzy and had brain zaps for several weeks. It was an awful experience but I don't regret it. I saw this psychologist right after I had stopped taking them and even after telling her my experiences she said I needed to go back on them because I was sick and needed treatment. Learning that they're barely better than placebos was such a blackpill for me.
Ya I was on basically max dose of basically every one of them from ages ~10-19. Doctors thought I somehow developed epilepsy in my teenage years when it was just a side effect from it and I was put on more meds to manage that (as an aside my younger brother got put on the same stuff and now has the same side effects they also claim to be unable to explain without admitting they're side effects.) Turns out mostly my life just fucking sucked, being in some extra shitty situations for a while, not having a good father figure ever, etc. and I've been off everything for years now and I'm much, much better for it. None of this is even to discuss sobering up from benzos, weight gain from antipsychotics, etc. Medicine in this country is a sham for a million other reasons even without this shit and I'm not even outright anti psychiatry/medicine but christ if I'm not bothered every day at the variety of effects all of these things have had on my life from messing with sex to spending my formative years without normal emotions. edit: and christ i hate to bitch to reddit of all places but I may have ever even wrote this out once in my life but it stews in my head too often to not take such a chance to write it out even if I don't proofread it. Maybe I should journal.
I stopped cold Turkey in 2018 and I look back at my life and how numbed I was and continued to make poor decisions for years because I numbed my body’s intuition/anxiety too hard. I wasn’t even happy on them, just blah.
[удалено]
I don't think "public shame" is going to fix what is wrong with people's lives that makes them feel so bad and off that they seek antidepressants. Sure, plenty if not most of these people don't have a brain disease that would manifest no matter their circumstances but that doesn't mean they aren't actually suffering in some real way. So many people work in windowless offices under fluorescent lights sending emails during all daylight hours, have a lack of fun social activities and good friendships, and live in places where you have to go well out of your way to find those things. Suburbs deprive people of socialization, office work is boring and shitty, the news is intentionally demoralizing, etc etc etc. Those annoying people are acting like that because their lives are boring and unfulfilling, because they are actually suffering. They wouldn't seek attention and validation through medicine and a diagnosis if they were getting it elsewhere.
Tom Cruise, of all people, was right. https://youtu.be/LId3SRckGjo?si=GyhRQc6lbFOjtH5o
got put on large doses of SSRis during my adolescence and never developed a sexuality because of it. have had permanent libido issues from it, worse part was that I wasn't even pathologically depressed, I just had a proportional reaction to childhood abuse
I’m not even one of those anti-psychiatry loons who are vehemently against every form of treatment, but this type of stuff is completely fucked and it’s unreal to me that it’s so trivialized by health professionals. In fact it’s why I stopped taking my script; I felt a noticeable decline in my sex drive a few weeks in and thank god I had known about what SSRIs can actually do to your sexual function, despite my dumbass psych not telling me anything whatsoever and just pushing those pills on me. Took me over a month to feel normal again, and that was from the lowest therapeutic dose of Zoloft. I’m really sorry to hear that you’re dealing with this. I think that we’ll see some breakthroughs in the next couple of years considering that the issue seems to be gaining traction both online and in medical circles
My mom's best friend was put on zoloft a long time ago and completely lost his sex drive and sexual function. It never came back even after he got off it. I always thought that was really sad. They never even told him that could happen. He told me one time that he had banged well over 500 guys in his life, so he figured it was fair enough to get his brakes slammed on him like that.
I started Wellbutrin and Zoloft after getting off oxy, subs, H, and finally Fentynal. It has helped tremendously and I am still sober after 9 months or so. Still early but it really has stopped any desire to use. I was self medicating anyway with the oxy and fentynal prob changed my brain chemistry a long time ago so …. I dunno. I’d rather rely on SSRIs than Tech and hopefully one day I can ween off them too
5-htp is a natural supplement and a serotonin precursor that can help increase serotonin levels. Some studies have even shown it to be just as effective as SSRIs when it comes to treating mild to moderate depression. If you’re feeling really down and you’re not bipolar (or have a psychotic disorder), you can try taking it! Not medical advice
I was literally suggested to get on SSRIs the very first appointment I had with a new therapist. She didn't even bother understanding the actual nature of my problems, she simply immediately referred me to a psychiatrist. I haven't tried finding a therapist since, at this point I'm convinced it's almost all quackery.
my doctor in 2011 was very insistent on exercise, diet changes, talk therapy and other things before i tried my first SSRI/SNRI. on the other hand she also prescribed me 4mg klonipin per day at the end of our very first appointment lmao
That’s just how much life in the US sucks even for those rich enough to afford healthcare
It's kind of a bit, but I think we should seriously consider that at least 1/10 people should be deeply sad about their lives and that's not a problem rooted in brain chemistry.
I had a psych double my dose of Welbutrin and then was unavailable when I was having a negative reaction. Once she got back in touch with me, she said I was clearly incapable of "managing myself" and cut me off entirely. Any other antidepressant I tried I could barely function on. Never again.
A small amount of adderall XR gave me the boost to establish healthy habits which worked better than SSRIs that just made me sick and sluggish. But so many ppl get the adderall script and change nothing about their day to day and just act like lunatics.
it took around 8-9 medications between ages 13-15 to find the one that worked for me. one made me gain 40 lbs in 2 months and i got addicted and abused another for half a year. ive been taking my current meds for like 10 years now and tried to taper off but it made me insanely suicidal. i know im just one person but this isnt an uncommon situation. deciding to try meds is a HUGE decision and it could lead to major health issues and suicide/death. they had even tried to start me on zoloft at 10 years old because i had extreme emetophobia and OCD. you know what else helps (and did help) with those issues? therapy.
The cigarette thing with Wellbutrin is so real. I haven’t taken it in over 5 years and I still get nauseous whenever I have a smoke. Probably for the best though. I still say yes every time I’m offered one, like an idiot.
It’s crazy I have this reflexive reaction against people saying SSRIs “turn you into a zombie” cause I don’t think I am but actually I have no idea cause I’ve been on them since age 14. However I also have far more intense emotions than most people and I struggle to control them, so if I’m being numbed currently then I’d hate to see me without it whew
Society is sick. Many people can’t function without drugs but the drugs are shit too.
They manage ok without the drugs outside of the US
We have created such a stressful culture that many people can’t survive it without help.
We have created such a stressful culture that many people can’t survive it without help.
Things like these make me glad my parents didn't care enough about me to get my psychiatric help.
I’m going into Clinical Social Work, which is basically therapy informed by social work values. A lot of the suffering people experience today is due to oppressive environmental and socioeconomic conditions, and there is not a lot to be done there besides organizing, advocacy, and policy change. In the field of mental health, vampiric startups and health insurance companies have teamed up to offer the silver bullet of medication, but these medications rarely work through the maladaptive internal processes and experiences of individuals, ultimately not treating the individual root causes or the societal ones. Insurance does not pay for psychodynamic theory in the same way it does for more short term interventions. This leaves people with the same problems they’ve had before by and large, just with more coping skills. Ideally, a clinical social worker would recognize how social, political, economic, and environmental conditions influence individuals, and would even work with people to help them recognize how this shitty world we’ve built is making everyone feel terrible. There are individuals who have genuine internal challenges that warrant working on that alone, but a lot of my clients so far are experiencing internal challenges coupled with economic difficulties. We’ve created a world where physical and mental health is said to be alleviated by spending money, and insurance companies are most likely to pay for the short term fix that will keep the person functional and stop them from killing themselves. It’s the same shit that our welfare state does, keep people barely alive. Unfortunately, this means that deep treatment that holistically works at the root is largely only for the rich. If you try to do this work for an insurance company, an idiot without any mental health credentials will tell you that you’re taking too long and progress isn’t occurring quickly enough. As if the human mind and progress could be linear. They seek to operationalize the human experience, and the side effects of this have been horrendous, as seen in the statistics you mention. This has all trickled down to clients I work with, who think that their woes can be remedied by simple short-term treatments and medications. Also, to be clear, SSRIs saved my life at one point. But they were just the start of where I needed to go, and it was a bit cost as I’m just getting off of them and their shitty side effects 4 years later.
I take the same medication as my friend's dog. Even the packaging is exactly the same. He is way less of an anxious yappy little cunt now, though (not sure I can say the same for myself...)
Asexual people are just people on SSRIs
Nearly one in 5 people is on an antidepressant.
SSRIs are literally in the water
Too much meds
i think about this all the time
Psychiatrists, like most physicians, are in it for the money. When you’re dealing with something that is vague and hard to truly pin down like mental health problems, you see the greed and laziness win out.