Deborah Does Navel-Gazing » depression treatment

Natural Depression Treatments

Deborah — Thu, 19 May 2011 18:29:03 +0000

Recently I was looking online for some information that family member needed about whether it was safe to take melatonin when you were on an antidepressant. I was pretty sure that they should not be taken at the same time. I groaned when I saw the answer that someone had posted to this particular question on a message board. The answer was, "Melatonin is herbal, so it’s safe to take it with anything."

Aaaaghh!

Herbs are considered safe by many people, under any circumstances, because they’re natural. But natural doesn’t automatically equal harmless. Almost anything natural can be toxic if not used appropriately. Sunlight is natural, but too much of it can give you a sunburn, or skin cancer. When I was a few weeks away from my wedding, I thought that I’d make sure I didn’t come down with a cold, so I took high doses of Vitamin C every day. I won’t go into details, but suffice it to say that I spent a lot of time in the bathroom before I wised up and settled for taking a multivitamin instead.

via Natural Depression Treatments – Depression.

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Cost -Effective Depression Treatment

Deborah — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 03:14:41 +0000

It’s ironic. When you’ve lost your job or are struggling financially, as many people are these days, you need depression treatment more than ever. But depression treatment isn’t cheap, even if you have insurance. If you’re worrying about how to pay the rent or mortgage, buy food and pay the electric bill, medical treatment tends to end up way down the list of priorities.

If you have clinical depression, however, neglecting your treatment will be counterproductive. The more severe your depression, the less capable you are of managing your finances, finding ways to cut costs and looking for a job if necessary. It’s crucial that you find a way to continue treatment.

via Depression – Cost -Effective Depression Treatment.

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Don’t try to cure/heal/treat depression with a trip to your local bookstore

Deborah — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:19:44 +0000

I’m perusing the shelves of the bookstore, in the psychology section, looking for new books about depression and depression treatment. I know that I really shouldn’t be doing this, because it inevitably raises by blood pressure and puts me in danger of choking on my decaf mocha. The problem is, this activity exposes me to all the ways in which someone is trying to sell us a book that will cure/heal/or treat your depression – without doctors or drugs! Let’s see, there’s:

The Depression Cure: The 6-Step Program to Beat Depression without Drugs
Happiness is a Choice
Dealing with Depression Naturally
Healing Depression the Mind-Body Way
The Mindful Way through Depression

Let me just mention first that Happiness is a Choice has always made me froth at the mouth. I mean, seriously, maybe there are some people like beat poets and goths who think being depressed is preferable to being happy, but the rest of us disagree. We’re not choosing to be depressed, which is what the book implies, any more than someone chooses to be diabetic. I mean, come on, I was seven when I started suffering from depression. Can the author seriously think that a child of that age just was choosing to be depressed?

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Why do people resist taking antidepressants?

Deborah — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:23:49 +0000

Over the years, since I started my depression site, I’ve heard (read) many people say that they want to treat their depression “but without antidepressants.” I always think, “Why?” It’s just incomprehensible to me that some people have that knee-jerk reaction to medication.

Oddly enough, I have to include myself in this group. At least initially, I refused to take medication for my depression. Nearly twenty years ago, when I was first diagnosed with depression, I was in a pretty bad way. I had had two major depressive episodes in the past, without knowing what they were, but this third one was the worst, and so far, of the longest duration. By chance I read a book that helped me to recognize that what I was going through, and I promptly made an appointment with a doctor at the mental health clinic attached to the local hospital.

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