Posted by Racer on March 8, 2004, at 0:36:23
In reply to Males on psychobabble psychology, posted by Apperceptor on March 7, 2004, at 21:40:08
Hm... That fits with the article that I was reading when I posted my question about BPD dx above. The article itself was called The Politics of Hysteria, and was about the history of multiple personality disorder. One of the points made was that MPD was a 'disorder' of North American females, generally those who had been receiving desultory treatment for other disorders for an average of seven years, without a lot of attention to their broader social context, until they finally saw a doctor who was then diagnosing MPD. (Highest correlating factor in being dx-ed MPD, of course, is seeing a doctor who has diagnosed others with it.) Some of the other points in the article seemed as though they could be equally true of BPD, and then I read somewhere in the DSM description that it was "generally a disorder of females." That always worries me, when I see that.
I do think what noa posted above, about doctors using the dx to distance themselves from challenging patients, and help relieve their own anxiety about being challenged, makes a lot of sense. One doctor I saw said something offhand once, about wondering if I had another dx he was missing because I wasn't responding as he had expected to the first drug he tried me on. (Once the dosage was doubled, I did respond to it. Maybe one size does not fit all?) That struck me, because I'd already had several major depressive episodes, had responded well to older antidepressants at higher than average dosages, and no one had ever suggested that there could be anything beyond depression going on. You'd think, after 15 years of struggling with major depression, some other doctor might have noticed if something else had been going on, right?
Then again, I distrust doctors in general these days, so a lot of that can be chalked up to general suspiciousness on my part.
Good points, though, and I'm glad you posted it. It would be interesting to see if any other men are here to answer it.
poster:Racer
thread:321831
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20040303/msgs/321897.html