JANE'S MENTAL HEALTH SOURCE PAGE

Barbara’s article on emotional invalidation has a lot of details to help you recognize emotional invalidation and the many forms it comes in. What I’d like to see is a follow-up article addressing ways to respond within yourself and to the other person when you know you are facing emotional invalidation.

GrrlScientist was recent sent an article on Creating a Mouse Model of Bipolar Disorder to study the manic phase of bipolar disorder. GrrlScientist gave a good background of the biology of bipolar disorder and potential research directions in this area. What’s important to note is that the mouse system did not cycle between mania and depression the way humans do. This underscores the limitations of studying an illness that is often a manifestation of a complex, whole system by 1) picking apart its individual components and 2) using a different system, albeit a whole animal system. One of the limitations of modern medicine has been our fixation on “targeting” specifics, which makes sense on one level, but also means we may often miss unforeseen long term side effects.

Deb described what depression feels like to her. She made an interesting analogy of depression as a visiting “friend.” Recently I heard someone use a similar analogy with fear. What I’m wondering is whether Deb’s lapses of depression may be due to stopping medication after feeling better, but the brain chemistry is still in the process of adjusting. I’m purely speculating here, and Deb’s doctor may understand better why these relapses may happen. However, to use an antibiotics analogy, once you feel better, you still want to take the full course of antibiotics to prevent relapse – which also is accompanied by the real risk of increasing antibiotic resistance as you inadvertently select for bacteria that were stronger than those that were quickly killed during the early rounds of antibiotics. When I was on meds, I was determined to stick with it at least a full year, even after I was feeling better, and in spite of the myriad of side effects I was experiencing, because I wanted to give my system long enough time to fully adjust. On the other hand, this did not prevent a relapse a few years later, although it could be possible that the year long course of medication may have helped delay the onset of a relapse in my case.

Mercurial Scribe found out that generic and brand-name drugs are sometimes not the same, at least for her. I know that generics can be a significant cost savings for people, and that generics do have the same “bioavailable” active ingredient. However, what Mercurial Scribe described may be due to the formulation differences that potentially can have a different effect from individual to individual. She has found that for her at least, to get the same effect as 200 mg of the branded drug, she would need to take 300 mg of the generic drug, which would reduce the cost benefit rather quickly over time. What I’d recommend especially for psychotropic medications is that if you have found a medication that worked well for you, I’d stick with the exact formulation and brand if possible. If cost becomes an issue, see if you can do a “trial dose” with generics, but keep handy your branded medications, and make sure your doctor keeps a close eye on you during the trial dose. If you feel like you’re become symptomatic, you and your doctor can manage it immediately and you would not be left without your original brands.

Dr. JC noted The Mental Health Parity Bill of 2007. One of the major implications of this bill is to treat mental illness at the same level as a physical illness, therefore helping to destigmatize mental illness for patients. Furthermore, this means mental health professionals can be reimbursed for the appropriate, sometimes long term treatment of mental illness, instead of playing “scoring games” with insurance companies and trying to manage mental illness like a bout of bronchitis.

Alvaro’s Brain Exercise FAQs talks about the importance of brain exercise and can be useful for both healthy and “under the weather” brains.

Vahid wants you to stop worrying. I enjoyed this because I understood the experience of chronic worrying. Over the years I learned that if you’re one of those people who wake up in the middle of the night with a start and can’t go back to sleep because you worry, you may be procrastinating during the day, at least that’s the case for me. In the quiet of the night when the daytime distractions are gone, all the things I procrastinated from doing bubble up to the surface. There are also other types of worries – things that “could” happen to you or constantly replaying worst case scenarios. For these types of worries, I remind myself that worrying hasn’t been proven to make things better, and I might as well expend with futilities. It takes effort, but eventually I could convince myself that this is true, and my worries cease.

Madeline wrote an article to answer questions about why you may consider going to a Psychologist. She asked a good question: why should you go to a psychologist instead of reading self help books or going to seminars (like for positive thinking)? Well, for me, I found that self-help books or programs don’t work for people who don’t know how to help themselves, not because they’re not motivated or lazy (I was extremely motivated!), but because their mind perception is warped. It’s like being blind and trying to figure out what color looks like. While medications worked for me, I found that my bond with my therapist “Dr. M” was very important in my healing process. In many ways, I see her as a “helper” sent to guide me along my journey out of the depression abyss. Moreover, when I had a relapse years after completing medication therapy and became intolerant to most psych meds, I relied on cognitive psychotherapy and had good results.

Thank you all for submitting to this edition of the carnival. Share your personal stories to my next edition of carnival of depression, bipolar disorder, and mental health journeys here. Please remember that even though I may not be able to include all entries, I do personally visit and read each submission, and very much appreciate you taking the time to share your stories and insight.

Until Next Time!