Posted by Toby on August 6, 1998, at 14:12:43
In reply to Re: Help , posted by Dana on July 28, 1998, at 15:48:14
Why aren't you seeing your psychiatrist anymore? Is your family doctor prescribing the antidepressant now? If not, you need to hook up with the psychiatrist again -- DO NOT go off the Prozac and give up. If your shrink isn't listening, you need to talk about that with him/her, and if you still aren't being heard, get a referral to another doctor. If your relationship is OK with your psychiatrist, you need to stay in treatment, talk about the symptoms you are having, side effects from the Prozac (did the weight gain come with the depression or with the Prozac) and decide if the Prozac was initially helpful and just quit, or if it was never helpful. There are many medications for depression that some people tolerate better than others and some people need more than one medication to get better. If anybody in your family has depression and got better with a particular medication, that medication may also help you (these things run in families). Don't worry about depression being because you are "weak" or anything, because depression is a physical illness based on chemical disorders of seotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine just like diabetes is a chemical disorder of insulin. Also, get into psychotherapy (talk therapy) because many studies show that depression and those chemical disorders actually improve even without medications if a person changes the way he thinks, reacts and behaves (psychotherapy isn't just talking about the Oedipal complex). Keep trying to beat it and you will.
poster:Toby
thread:32
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/19990501/msgs/251.html