Posted by Bob (not Dr.) on September 7, 1999, at 12:54:54
In reply to Re: Depression and Relationships, posted by Roo on September 7, 1999, at 10:38:42
Actually, I think I took to my girlfriend so
quickly *because* she was a clinician-in-training.
I was terrified of the prospect of dating someone
who wouldn't be able to understand what I was
going through. As it turns out, she's quite human,
too (as I should have suspected!), and has her own
wants and needs which biases her as they do
everyone. The fact that she has some theory to
back up her biases actually causes some friction.
She's coming from a pure Freudian perspective
while I was trained as a researcher in a much more
"scientific" approach to theories of mind, self,
and social environment.On the handicap thing: I've had kinda the opposite
reaction, Roo. Being a good son from an Irish
working class family, I always blamed my troubles
on character defects that were (somehow) completely
within my power to change if I only would show the
will. Only very recently, practically two years
after I started on meds, did I come to realize
that not all, but perhaps the basis of my ills
were in my biology and not my character. Reading
Kay Jamison's "An Unquiet Mind" provided some
confirmation for me. She talks in her foreword, I
think, about being tired of hiding and lying about
who she is. So, seeing this as a "handicap" has
instead been somewhat liberating for me. I now
have this "make no apologies, take no prisoners"
attitude about my condition, and while I'm not
out there flaunting it ;^), I have also (actually,
for several years now) made a point of talking
about my depression quite matter-of-factly to
friends and co-workers whenever it comes up. Doing
so may have saved at least one life -- my older
brother's. He was even more hung up than me about
whose fault things were and not seeking treatment,
but he just recently hit a really low spot and
rather than doing something rash, he gave me a
call about what he should do to get help. (btw--I
talk about things this way because I feel that as
a psychologist, forget that I'm not a clinician, I
feel I have a professional responsibility to
demystify depression and 'mental illness' as much
as I can.) I guess the short of what I'm trying to
say is that by calling "depression" a "handicap",
there are two attributions you can make to that
causal relationship. You can see the handicap as
something internal to you and uncontrollable, which
probably evokes a sense of shame. On the other
hand, you can see it as external (since it is out
of the mind's realm of influence) and uncontrollable,
which is more likely to evoke a sense of anger.And that's what I've been fighting the last five
months or so ... being angry at something I've
been "stuck" with, trying to find someone or
something I can pin the blame on so that it could
do some good. grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr....re: meds. Been there, done most of them (like a
few others on Babble, I've noticed). Still doing
them -- zoloft, nortriptyline, and klonapin ...
plus lipitor, since the zoloft has made my
cholesterol jump about 80 points (to go with about
30 pounds I don't need!). Someday soon, I hope to
post something on my web page that sorta morphs
a chart of the meds I've been on to sheet music
for the Who's "The Real Me."
poster:Bob (not Dr.)
thread:11168
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/19990829/msgs/11180.html