depression

  On 3/18/2018 at 8:37 PM, kattin2 said:

Wondering if this post will reach those of you who have struggled with and learned to manage your depression. I need to find a new psychologist and this causes me a lot of anxiety - I'm sure several of you, like me, have bad memories of mental health workers who were not the right fit for you. For anyone who has a strategy for weeding out the  riff raff and finding the right kind of care for you, I'd love to hear your suggestions.

my perspective is that it may well depend on your level of insight - i find many are geared towards dealing with people currently in the grips of something distressing which is causing prolonged periods of depression, and they provide relief from that distress. for me, although anxious and depressed (at quite low levels, but chronic enough to be complicating) i understand and have continued to do stuff because my depression started at a time where i couldn't avoid activities preventing me from finding space to consider everything. i personally find someone who will have a conversation much more preferable, as they'll clarify my ideas or provide new ones that add to my ability to know what i am managing and how i might go about it. the lack of dialogue from most, i find only frustrating.

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:24 AM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

sorry to go off topic but, what's this new Vienna meme?

it's the birthplace of psychologicals.

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:24 AM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

sorry to go off topic but, what's this new Vienna meme?

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:47 AM, usagi said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:24 AM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

sorry to go off topic but, what's this new Vienna meme?

 

it's the birthplace of psychologicals.

 

yeah i dont get it either because vienna is indeed the birthplace of psychology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freud

He's been roundly discredited as a hack now though, right?

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:09 PM, Kavinsky said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:24 AM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

sorry to go off topic but, what's this new Vienna meme?

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:47 AM, usagi said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:24 AM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

sorry to go off topic but, what's this new Vienna meme?

 

it's the birthplace of psychologicals.

 

yeah i dont get it either because vienna is indeed the birthplace of psychology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freud

 

You mean psychoanalysis.

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:13 PM, hello spiral said:

He's been roundly discredited as a hack now though, right?

well without him there would be no modern psychoanalysis as we know it and you would properly get a lobotomy for mental problems but of course over the last 100 years there has been some progressions in this field, new interpretations and so on.

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:39 PM, Kavinsky said:

well without him there would be no modern psychoanalysis as we know it and you would properly get a lobotomy for mental problems but of course over the last 100 years there has been some progressions in this field, new interpretations and so on.

that's like saying that if the guy who invented chairs didn't invent chairs we would all be sitting on the ground...

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:50 PM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:39 PM, Kavinsky said:

well without him there would be no modern psychoanalysis as we know it and you would properly get a lobotomy for mental problems but of course over the last 100 years there has been some progressions in this field, new interpretations and so on.

that's like saying that if the guy who invented chairs didn't invent chairs we would all be sitting on the ground...

 

 

i think the human mind is a bit more complex then chairs

obviously you don't know shit about chairs.

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:59 PM, Kavinsky said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:50 PM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:39 PM, Kavinsky said:

well without him there would be no modern psychoanalysis as we know it and you would properly get a lobotomy for mental problems but of course over the last 100 years there has been some progressions in this field, new interpretations and so on.

that's like saying that if the guy who invented chairs didn't invent chairs we would all be sitting on the ground...

 

 

i think the human mind is a bit more complex then chairs

 

then chairs what? what comes before chairs?

  On 3/19/2018 at 4:03 PM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:59 PM, Kavinsky said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:50 PM, THIS IS MICHAEL JACKSON said:

 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:39 PM, Kavinsky said:

well without him there would be no modern psychoanalysis as we know it and you would properly get a lobotomy for mental problems but of course over the last 100 years there has been some progressions in this field, new interpretations and so on.

that's like saying that if the guy who invented chairs didn't invent chairs we would all be sitting on the ground...

 

 

i think the human mind is a bit more complex then chairs

 

then chairs what? what comes before chairs?

 

sitting on the ground obvs tbqh afaik iirc byob bbc 

Vienna gets props for all those lush pastries, mein gott, also Dzihan & Kamien plus peak-era Kruder & Dorfmeister

but pastries folks, the kind Jung boshed at Vienna's Cafe Griensteidl

fyi, this is Jung after Viennese pastries

  On 3/19/2018 at 12:23 AM, usagi said:

define a "bad" experience. it's important to calibrate your expectations so you don't set yourself up for disappointment and then churn from one therapist to another and eventually get worn down and more depressed about not getting help. they're not wizards, most of the work still falls to you.

 

  On 3/18/2018 at 11:54 PM, Kavinsky said:

well there are different possibilities but to be honest i dont have bad expierience with mental health workers maybe because i live in Vienna which is the birthplace of psychology and a very social orientied city too.

 

lol

Hey, yes I'm aware of that Kavinsky - willing and able to do the work with the right kind of support. An example of a bad experience is sitting in a waiting room for 3 hours to end up talking to a psychiatrist who immediately tries to change your medication without having a respectful dialogue about your medical history. Another bad experience would be your family encouraging you as a teenager to go see their friend who is a therapist, who already thinks they know everything about you and you can't accomplish anything because an ethical line has clearly been breached and there's no actual confidentiality afterall. 

  On 3/19/2018 at 12:52 AM, cwmbrancity said:

if you're in the US its a convoluted labyrinth accessing affordable health care in & of itself, i dont envy you

 

would this approach offer specifics that might overlap with your diagnosis (assuming you've been given one)?

 

https://www.google.co.uk/search?source=hp&ei=4fmuWt7kKs3SsAflj4_oBA&q=dbt+therapy&oq=dbt+&gs_l=psy-ab.1.0.0l10.688.1858.0.4126.5.4.0.0.0.0.96.300.4.4.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..1.4.296.0..0i131k1j0i3k1.0.1PtwFKBZJQE

 

another route is via mental health advocacy services or maybe contact NAMI, i only know about the latter through an ex-hex, but they're non-judgemental, thorough & might be able to support you in finding someone local to you - the US is a big fuckin land mass after all

 

https://www.nami.org/

Thanks cwmbrancity - I'm glad you pointed me back to CBT. Some of my friends have had success with it, and yes it does relate to my diagnosis. I appreciate the link, too. 

  On 3/19/2018 at 3:02 AM, xox said:

 

  On 3/18/2018 at 8:37 PM, kattin2 said:

Wondering if this post will reach those of you who have struggled with and learned to manage your depression. I need to find a new psychologist and this causes me a lot of anxiety - I'm sure several of you, like me, have bad memories of mental health workers who were not the right fit for you. For anyone who has a strategy for weeding out the  riff raff and finding the right kind of care for you, I'd love to hear your suggestions.

 

 

no psychiatrists in the us?

 

Obviously you didn't read my post.

  On 3/19/2018 at 7:36 AM, goDel said:

 

  On 3/18/2018 at 8:37 PM, kattin2 said:

Wondering if this post will reach those of you who have struggled with and learned to manage your depression. I need to find a new psychologist and this causes me a lot of anxiety - I'm sure several of you, like me, have bad memories of mental health workers who were not the right fit for you. For anyone who has a strategy for weeding out the  riff raff and finding the right kind of care for you, I'd love to hear your suggestions.

You should ask people around you where you live. It's a people thing. There's no process besides talking to people. Or asking psychologists for their advice (read: ask them about finding a suitable therapist, instead of managing your depression). In any case, your best off asking people in the area you live.

 

Apart from this, I can't help you, I'm afraid. I do have experience with mental workers though. And not all of them good. So I can relate to the importance of your question. I was between 13-16 at the time, so basically dependent on what others decided for me. At that age I certainly didn't have any idea what a right fit would be. Or even the importance of it. So all I can tell you, is that it can realy help if you at least have an idea about what that right fitting therapist would look like.

 

It's nice to have a bit of validation re: bad experiences - thanks for that, goDel. I've asked for a referral a few times now, and either the therapist I was referred to wasn't taking new patients or the referring psychologist/psychiatrist was too busy to give me much help. BUT, you are right - talking to others in the area about this is important. It's just like asking your friends about any other doctor they go to... assuming you have friends who don't stigmatize mental illness. Happily, I have good friends.

  On 3/19/2018 at 8:29 AM, logboy said:

 

  On 3/18/2018 at 8:37 PM, kattin2 said:

Wondering if this post will reach those of you who have struggled with and learned to manage your depression. I need to find a new psychologist and this causes me a lot of anxiety - I'm sure several of you, like me, have bad memories of mental health workers who were not the right fit for you. For anyone who has a strategy for weeding out the  riff raff and finding the right kind of care for you, I'd love to hear your suggestions.

 

 

my perspective is that it may well depend on your level of insight - i find many are geared towards dealing with people currently in the grips of something distressing which is causing prolonged periods of depression, and they provide relief from that distress. for me, although anxious and depressed (at quite low levels, but chronic enough to be complicating) i understand and have continued to do stuff because my depression started at a time where i couldn't avoid activities preventing me from finding space to consider everything. i personally find someone who will have a conversation much more preferable, as they'll clarify my ideas or provide new ones that add to my ability to know what i am managing and how i might go about it. the lack of dialogue from most, i find only frustrating.

 

totally with you there, logboy. I hate feeling like I am in the driver's seat the whole time - dialogue is important to me. Feeling like I'm under observation has always felt creepy to me. The lack of dialogue can also happen when a therapist is unfamiliar with alternative lifestyles - they're so blown away by how different you are from them it takes them awhile to understand where you're coming from. Anyway, thanks for sharing.

- see a psychologist, not a psychiatrist

- keep it well out of the family and out of your friend circle, make it a strictly professional relationship

- don't get hung up on one particular strategy (CBT) or other, let the psych guide you

- have an ongoing conversation with your psych about whether their recommendations are working for you or not

- be aware there is always a lot of legwork to do following from your discussions, which nobody but yourself can do

  On 3/20/2018 at 12:40 AM, usagi said:

- see a psychologist, not a psychiatrist

- keep it well out of the family and out of your friend circle, make it a strictly professional relationship

- don't get hung up on one particular strategy (CBT) or other, let the psych guide you

- have an ongoing conversation with your psych about whether their recommendations are working for you or not

- be aware there is always a lot of legwork to do following from your discussions, which nobody but yourself can do

Yes, I know all of this. Some of us need both a psychologist and a psychiatrist, so we have to seek out both. I was stating experiences I have had over the years (since you asked) and have since learned from, as well as thanking those who had offered advice. Quite frankly, if you had led with this list of items instead of attacking my very real experiences, I think I wouldn't feel irritated right now. This is all good advice for anyone new to seeking therapy. 

  On 3/20/2018 at 12:40 AM, usagi said:

- see a psychologist, not a psychiatrist

why not a psychiatrist? i ask cause in my country (and most of others eu countries) psychologists are not trained to diagnose and cure mental disorders, and depression is a mental and medical disorder. they can practice psychotherapy tho if they're trained for at least 4 yrs for a pcyhotherapist (like cbt, psychoanalysis, group analysis, gestalt, or similar schools of psychotherapy) which is not included in their regular 5 yrs long education/college

^ psychiatrists diagnose and medicate, psychologists have more of an ongoing conversation with you to tease out problems and better resolve longstanding hardwired emotional issyues. the emphasis in Australia is much more on psychologists.

edit: to better answer your question, most of the psychologists I've seen are trained in the psychotherapy stuff - I wasn't aware you could be a psychologist without it

  On 3/20/2018 at 1:33 AM, kattin2 said:

 

  On 3/20/2018 at 12:40 AM, usagi said:

- see a psychologist, not a psychiatrist

- keep it well out of the family and out of your friend circle, make it a strictly professional relationship

- don't get hung up on one particular strategy (CBT) or other, let the psych guide you

- have an ongoing conversation with your psych about whether their recommendations are working for you or not

- be aware there is always a lot of legwork to do following from your discussions, which nobody but yourself can do

Yes, I know all of this. Some of us need both a psychologist and a psychiatrist, so we have to seek out both. I was stating experiences I have had over the years (since you asked) and have since learned from, as well as thanking those who had offered advice. Quite frankly, if you had led with this list of items instead of attacking my very real experiences, I think I wouldn't feel irritated right now. This is all good advice for anyone new to seeking therapy. 

 

what did I attack and how exactly? in the absence of knowing how long you'd been seeking help and what kind of experiences you'd had, since you didn't declare this stuff up front in your initial post, I emphasised the need to control your expectations to ensure that you didn't have an unhelpful experience which you would write off as "bad". furthermore I asked you to define "bad", since there is a considerable amount of responsibility on your part as the patient to ensure you don't have what you might consider a "bad" experience.

I learnt this stuff on my own going into therapy and not having been prepared for it beforehand made therapy harder, so what you're calling an attack is basic diligence to me.

^ psychiatrists in australia must be very different to ours overhere. ours diagnose, medicate and do at least so called suportive psychotherapy (medical doctors + 5 yrs of residency in psychiatry + upto 3 yrs of psychotherapy). those that have 4 yrs or more of education in psychotherapy alone (at least 500 hrs of pt training + own p.therapy, some have 1000 hrs) do the proper psychotherapy in a given well known pt technique).

but ive met psychiatrists from different parts of world with 2 yrs of residency and self proclaimed pschotherapists with 3-6 months of pt training (50 hrs). in my country a lot of ppl has been 'doing a psychotherapy' for decades, without the proper training, but that's illegal now.

p.s. if you really have depression any kind of talk about your issyues is not enough. best results give meds + proper psychotherapy + chage in life style. if you dont need meds it's not an episode of depression, or it could be but a very mild one, that can pass without meds. google ICD10, F32.0

p.s.s. in my country psychologists deal with healthy people, as a rule, but a lot of them do all kinds of quazi-psychotherapy.

clinical psychologists (subspecialization for psychologiests) work in hospitals, usually testing inward and outward patients. testing, nothing more.

that's fair enough, I'm not disparaging psychiatrists, just pointing out that they're not the people to go to in some situations.

I insisted on trying to solve my problems without meds for the first 3-4 years, and I was making some headway but I had a bad episode one year and my psychologist finally said we should try them as a last resort. been on them since. talking is, of course, not enough to solve problems, it's the 'homework' you get from the sessions which you're responsible to undertake yourself that is tha deal 4 real.

real talk usagi, i've been kinda ignoring the homework to a certain extent ( i could do better). this was my third visit today. i'm going to get my head in it better because these sessions aren't cheap and i don't want to waste my / dr's time.

I'm pretty bad at it myself but yeah, you're just paying someone to listen to you otherwise.

my experience has been the other way round, 1/4 of the value comes from talking about it and 3/4 from gritting my teeth and just pushing myself to do stuff I should do instead of running away from. long term emotional growth has only come from the latter for me. I never found real catharsis in talking. may just be me, idk.

also I tend to get into circular arguments with my psych a lot because I just don't see things the way they do and can't bring myself to, my feelings are too entrenched. I think that's why CBT was taken off the list for me and my psych tried dialectical behaviour therapy instead.

  On 3/20/2018 at 2:30 AM, usagi said:

^ psychiatrists diagnose and medicate, psychologists have more of an ongoing conversation with you to tease out problems and better resolve longstanding hardwired emotional issyues. the emphasis in Australia is much more on psychologists.

 

edit: to better answer your question, most of the psychologists I've seen are trained in the psychotherapy stuff - I wasn't aware you could be a psychologist without it

 

  On 3/20/2018 at 1:33 AM, kattin2 said:

 

  On 3/20/2018 at 12:40 AM, usagi said:

- see a psychologist, not a psychiatrist

- keep it well out of the family and out of your friend circle, make it a strictly professional relationship

- don't get hung up on one particular strategy (CBT) or other, let the psych guide you

- have an ongoing conversation with your psych about whether their recommendations are working for you or not

- be aware there is always a lot of legwork to do following from your discussions, which nobody but yourself can do

Yes, I know all of this. Some of us need both a psychologist and a psychiatrist, so we have to seek out both. I was stating experiences I have had over the years (since you asked) and have since learned from, as well as thanking those who had offered advice. Quite frankly, if you had led with this list of items instead of attacking my very real experiences, I think I wouldn't feel irritated right now. This is all good advice for anyone new to seeking therapy. 

 

 

what did I attack and how exactly? in the absence of knowing how long you'd been seeking help and what kind of experiences you'd had, since you didn't declare this stuff up front in your initial post, I emphasised the need to control your expectations to ensure that you didn't have an unhelpful experience which you would write off as "bad". furthermore I asked you to define "bad", since there is a considerable amount of responsibility on your part as the patient to ensure you don't have what you might consider a "bad" experience.

 

I learnt this stuff on my own going into therapy and not having been prepared for it beforehand made therapy harder, so what you're calling an attack is basic diligence to me.

Hey, I definitely misread your tone and apologize.  I suppose I found your initial response unhelpful because I read it as you jumping to conclusions about me while calling into question my experiences. Of course, I know I tend to be extremely defensive about accepting advice regarding my mental health... which of course is ridiculous since I was the one asking in the first place. At any rate, I genuinely am grateful for the responses to my query and sorry we got off on the wrong foot.

no problem.

I think you've inadvertently touched on something that could derail any future endeavours to seek help through therapy, which is that you might be defensive and/or combative about taking advice and having your conceptions challenged. again, this is something that tripped me up initially as well. a psych can't change your mind for you, and while you might be able through a lengthy and arduous series of repeat conversations to slowly soften and accept alternate ideas or worldviews, it works much better if you accept beforehand that the onus is on you to prepare yourself to change your mindset now.

  On 3/21/2018 at 12:13 AM, usagi said:

no problem.

 

I think you've inadvertently touched on something that could derail any future endeavours to seek help through therapy, which is that you might be defensive and/or combative about taking advice and having your conceptions challenged. again, this is something that tripped me up initially as well. a psych can't change your mind for you, and while you might be able through a lengthy and arduous series of repeat conversations to slowly soften and accept alternate ideas or worldviews, it works much better if you accept beforehand that the onus is on you to prepare yourself to change your mindset now.

of course, that's the point of spending time and money on therapy. i definitely think there are some practitioners that offer a better fit for certain individuals than others though. different exercises/methods for different brains. it's nice to find someone well versed in a nice range so he/she/they can best offer the help you need, though it's not always the first one you try.