Anybody accept and reject they have a mood disorder?

I do this every day. I often think that there's nothing wrong with me and that it's all in my head. Does anyone else get this? Like, as if I can find the solution or try harder, I won't feel like this anymore. But I've felt like this for ten years now. It's crazy to not accept as an illness but somewhere inside I just don't. The thing is I believe that there is almost always a cause somewhere in our minds that is not chemical. I don't buy into mood disorders being one hundred percent genetic or due to chemical imbalance. When I take prozac I feel happier, but my depression is still there. It's just like it has less power. So how can this be a chemical imbalance? There has to be something underneath causing this. I'm rambling... just so tired of it all..

Chemical imbalance is a myth developed my drug companies to sell antidepressants because their drugs affect neurotransmitters. While claims that depressed people have lower serotonin in general are probably provably true, that in no way speaks to cause and effects or even usefulness of changing the serotonin levels.

States of mind affect your physical body. If you think there's a good reason for your depression that is caused by society or life or something, then there probably is.

Most recent theories around mental illness is that they're auto-immune diseases.

Acinorev wrote:Most recent theories around mental illness is that they're auto-immune diseases.

That's very interesting. Would you be willing to back that up with a source? (By source I understand published medical articles)

RachaeyH, what you are describing is one of the symptoms of depression. Lowered self-esteem combined with automatic negative thoughts. It is what kept me from getting proper treatment for my depression for a year -- I would go between "I am feeling terrible and have no energy to lift my finger" to "see? it's all gone, you just imagine it, stop pretending you're unwell, you're just lazy".

If you still feel depressive symptoms on Prozac, please discuss that with your psychiatrist. It may be that either Prozac is not the right medication for you or your dosage is too low. But also some thoughts may have become so automatic that they are a habit rather than symptom by now (see this thread *TW* bipolar/topic159930.html )

Finally, unipolar depression is best treated with therapy. While antidepressants will get you out of the "this is terrible" state, they won't change your thought patterns. I can very much recommend talking therapy, it's been truly life-changing for me.

Greetings!

http://jnnp.bmj.com/content/84/9/e1.33.short
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/ar ... 8802002994
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/ar ... 9514002856
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... ated=false
http://link.springer.com/article/10.100 ... 014-0887-z
http://cpx.sagepub.com/content/early/20 ... 3.abstract

I'm trying to find an entire book that was entirely accessible online, but I will probably have to go home and search my history to find the link again.

Thanks for the links, would love to read the book!

(Sorry for a thread hijack RachaeyH)

Oliveira wrote:

Acinorev wrote:Most recent theories around mental illness is that they're auto-immune diseases.

That's very interesting. Would you be willing to back that up with a source? (By source I understand published medical articles)

Finally, unipolar depression is best treated with therapy. While antidepressants will get you out of the "this is terrible" state, they won't change your thought patterns. I can very much recommend talking therapy, it's been truly life-changing for me.

Greetings!

Thanks for your posts and no problem for the hijack It is very confusing. I read a fantastic book by Elyn Saks about her struggle with schizophrenia. Even when she was having fully-fledged delusions she still thought she wasn't really ill. I don't know whether in part this is because nobody else can see or understand your illness, it isn't validated from the outside like an injury or bodily disease. But it is very tiring thinking that if you do so-and-so differently, you won't feel this way anymore. Ive been going through this thought process for about ten years now. I will ask my doctor to budge up the prozac dosage. I've had two rounds of therapy and it was kind of useful at the time but didn't have any lasting impact. It helped me more with anxiety and definitely with eating problems that I had previously, so it was definitely worthwhile!

I don't know what my diagnosis should be. I don't feel depressed in the exact way that I read about, although I tick many of the boxes. I am energetic and frustrated and I do think I experience hypomanic states. But I don't know.. I just don't know. My friends tell me there's nothing wrong with me and that I think I'm worse than I am. Im starting a masters degree in psychoanalysis in September so hopefully I will learn more about myself and depressive positions in general through that.