I have been reading online articles about mental health in general and sometimes commenting on them and getting involved in discussions. This type of social interaction has helped me enormously to come to terms with my own diagnoses and misdiagnoses which started back when I was a student at Manchester University studying psychology, sociology, social anthropology and art. I had an unusual upbringing in four different Western countries, with fairly widespread travel, and fairly good education in arts and social science subjects. I believe this led me to reject a medical model theory of chemical imbalance as an explanation for my own ‘mental illnesses’, diagnosed by psychiatrists ever since my medical scientist father got me put into a psychiatric hospital even before I finished my degree courses. I was never inclined to believe the theories produced by medical scientists relating to mental health and how to achieve it. I always preferred to take a more creative, hopeful, humanistic and positive attitude which respects all people’s rights and freedoms, and I also believe in the notion of free will. The medical model of mental illness allows for few of these things, if any.
Recently, I wrote the following little comment in reply to a post on Drop the Disorder (DTD) site which encourages open debate and discussion of many issues surrounding ‘mental health’. (DTD welcomes comments from service users as well as from professionals and students in the field of mental health care). Some of the discussions are quite lively. This particular post was about the nature of depression (something which I have definitely suffered with in the past). Whether or not one labels depression as an illness requiring drug treatment or not, I have suffered from it. Especially when I was young, in my teens and twenties.
Pause -(A little while later)
I sat at home at 2.30 am listening to two men pontificating about the true nature of depression without either of them coming up with solutions or ideas about how to alleviate it. While I fully support the reality of depression as a description of the way someone feels, equally I believe that it takes holistic approaches when trying to find ways to alleviate feelings of depression, combined with changes to societal structures, hierarchies and the circumstances which might be behind it. Maybe it’s also important to think about changes to who we spend time with, what we choose to listen to on media and how we spend our spare time. Also we might want to look at what we choose to ingest, how much exercise we get, how our partners treat us, and how many hours we work under stressful conditions, as well as how much time we spend in nature. All of this could be considered as factors which may determine how depressed or how happy we are at any time in our lives. Some adjustments to these areas may make a huge difference to how depressed we are, without any need for ‘antidepressants’ or for any other psychiatric drugs.
Resorting to drinking alcohol certainly worsens depression. Depression is the description of emotions like low mood – it is not a chemical imbalance. Neither is it anything to be ashamed of and certainly it is not a sign of personal failure or medical malfunctioning. I have found it possible to overcome even the worst low mood by taking measures to overcome it myself without any doctor’s medical intervention. These are some of the things which I have found personally helpful: spending time with close friends, soaking up the sun or walking in the woods, listening to the birds, or cuddling a pet, or loving children and grandchildren – appreciating what they have brought into my life; I love to give my partner an unexpected hug, draw a picture, sing or hum along to the radio. Sometimes having a good cry all alone to cry out all the bad feelings -(hell, crying helps a lot). On other occasions telling somebody I love them and maybe getting confessions of love in return – going to the pool and swimming a few lengths, talking on the phone (not messaging or texting – talking is much more therapeutic,) joining a club, society, or educational course either in person or online, cooking healthy homemade meals and sharing them with someone close, being creative in any way. I enjoy the arts -at the theatre, concerts, cinema, museums, dance halls, and also sitting back and reading a good book of my own choosing.
All these things may help you to, to lift your depression, either if you do any one of these things individually or in combinations. I would say don’t listen to anyone who tells you to visit your doctor for your depression when the doctor is entrenched in the medical model – one which big pharma loves so much as it makes those that profit from them very rich.
If all self-help fails, then calling the Samaritans may also be very useful – their volunteers are trained to be patient, non judgemental listeners and in my experience they say just enough to help you get through what you are going through and they don’t lecture, they don’t preach and they are especially good, should you be feeling suicidal. They won’t simply call out emergency services, to get a doctor to you who might then dose you up on psychiatric drugs or get you put into a locked ward in a hospital, which some other agencies may be inclined to do. Samaritans actually encourage you to talk it out to them and they listen. Very often the act of talking and being heard is just what someone needs.
I don’t think we have evolved any differently because of ‘depression’ – evolutionary reproductive processes usually only select genes and traits in a particular life form that are advantageous to survival of that specific life form. Some genetic disease and maladaptation is therefore gradually filtered out of existence naturally over thousands of years. The fact anyone experiences depression at all means that it will have been present in our species and survived gene selection over the aeons and I think this means that it is not disadvantageous to our survival. I don’t understand how it can possibly be classified as an illness or disorder.
Many great thinkers and creative people, also great warriors and leaders were depressed – including Winston Churchill, Van Gogh, Charlie Chaplin, Alastair Campbell, Stephen Fry, Spike Milligan, and countless others. Religious leaders who have lost their faith etc.
The insistence that the medical profession makes in classifying depression as a ‘disorder’ especially one caused by a chemical imbalance only treatable with ‘antidepressants’ does not make logical sense either in evolutionary theory or more recent history. To label such an experience as pathological loses all sense of hope and fails to encourage human achievement or endeavour. If we were all go about thinking we’re disordered due to this supposed illness known as ‘depression’, then that would be very detrimental to anyone’s self-confidence and their will to overcome it. To be diagnosed with any condition, especially when told it is lifelong is depressing in itself – is it any wonder that some people told they have a brain disorder like this, lose the will to live and/or fail to continue to be productive or economically active .
Seeing depression simply as a low mood which is not permanent and which can be put to good use, to me is a far better way of looking at it. For instance, Picasso painted many beautiful pictures during his depressed Blue Period and those pictures are now worth millions – so his depression has in fact contributed enormously to our culture, and increased our prosperity. We should be thankful for people’s depression, rather than try to numb it with chemical drugs.
Below (and as the featured image for this blog) is a photo of an A3 size blue gouache painting of my first husband I made during my 20s back in the 1980’s when I was a mature student at Manchester Metropolitan University. Both my husband and I felt depressed at the time despite loving each other very much. He turned his depression into his work helping others who were less fortunate than he was, and I turned my depression into creating original art and cooking healthy meals for both of us, our friends, family , and colleagues. Despite our depressions, our marriage worked and kept us ticking over together for a good long while.
Mad in the UK hosts blogs by a diverse group of writers. The opinions expressed are the writers’ own.