The right antidepressant at the right dosage does not blunt emotions. Emotional blunting is a side-effect that means that you're on the wrong drug, or the wrong dosage. It's something that must be mentioned to a clinician -- it means that whatever you're on isn't working.
In general, I think that most people with clinical depression need a combination of three things: drugs, talk therapy, and behavior modification. I believe that the drugs have to come first, and once those are stable, you can go on to the other things.
I think that talk therapy won't work if there is clinical depression in the way, and that that is probably as much of a bar as incompetent therapists. That said, there ARE a lot of incompetent therapists -- but there are also some competent ones. You just have to be willing to go through a lot of ones who AREN'T a match before you find one who is. If after two or three sessions, nothing useful is happening, it's time to find someone else.
Family background fucks people up tons, too. But, personally, I think that long-lasting, chronic depression coming from being fucked up by family can be treated the same way as the sort that I have. I don't KNOW that, of course. But I think that, basically, being fucked up by family physicially breaks your brain, and that it then needs the drugs to survive.
I suppose I could also speculate that fucked-up families are ones where the parents have broken brains themselves, and they go ahead and genetically pass those along to their children, along with the fucked-up-ness itself.
So -- my suggestions are to find a COMPETENT doctor or other clinician -- RN, prescribing physician's assistant, whatever -- who is specifically trained in depression and wants to attack it with every weapon in the arsenal -- talk therapy, behavior modification, drugs, vitamins, exercise, Tibetian chanting, balancing your four humors -- EVERYTHING -- and will keep trying different things until they find what works for you.
To KNOW that this isn't your fault, any more than a clubfoot or color-blindness would be your fault. And to not give up.
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Date: 2008-02-06 08:52 pm (UTC)In general, I think that most people with clinical depression need a combination of three things: drugs, talk therapy, and behavior modification. I believe that the drugs have to come first, and once those are stable, you can go on to the other things.
I think that talk therapy won't work if there is clinical depression in the way, and that that is probably as much of a bar as incompetent therapists. That said, there ARE a lot of incompetent therapists -- but there are also some competent ones. You just have to be willing to go through a lot of ones who AREN'T a match before you find one who is. If after two or three sessions, nothing useful is happening, it's time to find someone else.
Family background fucks people up tons, too. But, personally, I think that long-lasting, chronic depression coming from being fucked up by family can be treated the same way as the sort that I have. I don't KNOW that, of course. But I think that, basically, being fucked up by family physicially breaks your brain, and that it then needs the drugs to survive.
I suppose I could also speculate that fucked-up families are ones where the parents have broken brains themselves, and they go ahead and genetically pass those along to their children, along with the fucked-up-ness itself.
So -- my suggestions are to find a COMPETENT doctor or other clinician -- RN, prescribing physician's assistant, whatever -- who is specifically trained in depression and wants to attack it with every weapon in the arsenal -- talk therapy, behavior modification, drugs, vitamins, exercise, Tibetian chanting, balancing your four humors -- EVERYTHING -- and will keep trying different things until they find what works for you.
To KNOW that this isn't your fault, any more than a clubfoot or color-blindness would be your fault. And to not give up.