I think that anyone who has witnessed the decline of a person suffering from schizophrenia, will have little doubt that there is such a thing as mental illness. The same applies to bi-polar affective disorder.
Whilst these illnesses are currently diagnosed through interview and observation of behaviour, this will probably not always be the case as there is an underlying biological mechanism.
However, statistics quoted by the author of claims that 20% of people will suffer from a mental illness in any one year are the same as saying that 80% of people will suffer from a a physical illness in any one year. If you include every cough, cold or twinge of back pain then this would be true too.
I too have noticed the trend to pathologies what is perfectly normal human experience and behaviour. The tendency to diagnose as "depressed" and prescribe anti depressants for every one who is unhappy is just one example. However, a genuine clinical depression with psychotic features where the person may have totally lost touch with reality is most definitely mental illness.

Reality is subjective.

I have often flirted on the edges of conventional reality (Not always with the assistance of drugs), and I believe sanity is a choice. I have often chosen melancholy as I like it. For long periods of time its been in vogue for me. People could likely think I was depressed, but it's just my disposition. Happiness isn't all it's cracked up to be, it's just one emotion afterall, there are many others to explore.

I think any emotion deserves a period of excess. Excess is something I have great respect for, it's the essence of life.

I can think of nothing more luxurious than retiring to the confines of my own mind, and checking into some sort of hospital, getting off the world as it were. But I have kids now, and they would miss me. So, again, my 'sanity' is a choice. Maybe I can look forward to a very ecentric old age.

Actually that was the one thing that did hit me at the birth of my first child. That suicide was no longer an option. I had forfeited the right to self-determination. People who I have told this to give me funny looks, but it was honestly the most significant thing (among others of course) that occured to me at the time.

I toy with the idea of suicide routinely. It's just a habit. I think of all sorts of unique ways, and imagine the silence afterwards.

But it's no indication of my mental 'health'. What is healthy, what is normal? These trivial subjective things are given far too much weight in this world.

I do enjoy the irony of a society that discourages drug use for recreational purposes but encourages it at every turn for people who explore their thoughts and emotions to excess.

We have people using drugs to numb or mask emotion, who are looked down upon, but when someone enjoys their emotions and luxuriates in melancholy they push drugs down them quick smart.

I suppose it's mostly about making sure people are better company.

Who wants to be normal?

Mental illness is created when we constantly think about why we think we are feeling a particular way. The ‘job’ description of our lower mind is to constantly look for pain and problems.

The problem is, that we have been trained by our schooling systems to constantly be stuck in this part of our mind which analyzes everyone and everything. Every time we stop a sensational feeling of an emotion, we automatically begin thinking about why we think we are feeling that way.

We are only ever thinking or feeling – as soon as we stop an uncomfortable feeling sensation of resistance, back our mind goes to analyzing why we are feeling that way. People need to know how to manage their resistant emotional and sensual energy so they can instantly get out of the lower mind and start feeling sensationally connected.

Doing this one thing ends depression forever. Remember: you are only ever thinking or feeling – and you get to choose. More of my featured articles (and media connections) are available at http://nharmony.co.nz/news.htm

I have also created a Sensational Self Development free video series including titles such as:
Why You Feel Like a Square Peg in a Round Hole
Why Arguing Your Point NEVER Works!
Masculine & Feminine Energy Management
Doing This ONE Thing Will Change Your Life Forever!
...available for you to view now at: http://SensationalSelfDevelopment.com

Wishing you the best,
Jacqui

Posted by Rhys Jones, Friday, 5 August 2011 12:05:33 PM

" ... Whilst these illnesses are currently diagnosed through interview and observation of behaviour, this will probably not always be the case as there is an underlying biological mechanism. ... "

Yes, that's very true in my experience. Schizophrenia, and not that serious med scientists call it that anymore in recognition of the multiple differing underlying pathologies that appear to be involved, is very responsive to the antagonisation of D2 on the Dopamine Transporter, as well as the antagonisation of 5HT2A on the Seratonin transporter, not to mention the pleasures of agonisation of the MetaboGlutamate system, and "we" keenly await new developments in this area.

..

*Houellebecq*

Generally, a healthy brain is capable of a dynamic range of expressions and emotions. As soon as we get bogged down in the same repetitive thoughts and feelings, which can certainly be exacerbated or alternatively assisted by cognitive behaviours, then we are often indicating poor brain health and fitness.

Not sliding a regular fully formed turd can also be indicative of brain health issues.

;-)

..

There are a number of quality, legal pharmaceuticals in addition to self medicating with illicits that can help give a tweak back to a more vibrant and healthy, kick up your heels and enjoy a fuller range of life activity which whilst it can be an exhausting inquiry getting the right occasional pill to keep the individual wet web functioning optimally, like other aspects of personal health maintenance it can be very rewarding.

..

I myself got a great lift recently when I got on the

*Swisse Magnesium Citrate* and some *Nature's Own Kelp*

for magnesium

(which has been evidenced to mitigate the severity of symptoms in my condition)

and iodine supplementation. I wish I had of known about those two beauties 15 - 20 years ago. Had I known, I would have suffered far less. But alas, it was not to be.

nothing new here - see Deviance Reality and Society published in the 60s. pity that almost 50 years later we still have not learnt

For over a year I suffered from thyroid deficiency. As well as physical symptoms (dry skin and fatigue) I suffered from depression and mounting paranoia. From the moment the condition was diagnosed and I took my first supplement tablet I was in absolutely no doubt that I had had a biochemical problem which had been affecting my mind, and that I was now returning to normal.

Physical illnesses CAN be psychosomatic, so maybe mental conditions can be too; but if someone I knew was wildly irrational, inexplicably moody, or pathologically depressed I would have no hesitation in sending them off for a blood test and -- if the results were negative -- for a CAT scan. The brain is an organ like any other; and any organ can suffer physiological malfunction or damage.

Blaming mental disorders on social or political causes risks perpetuating misery for no good reason.

The problem with the Szasz/Spillane argument is not that mental illness isn't socially constructed — it is — but that it makes claims for "medical" illnesses that don't hold up, since they are socially constructed too. It is one thing to find a process in nature that is associated with what we name as an illness, another to say that process "is" the illness. It is important to understand that all definitions of illness are normative, that all sickness is deviancy.

The problem is that all medicine is dominated by a reductionist approach to disease — based in a narrow biological fundamentalism that ignores other factors in complex processes of causation, perpetuation and recovery. Instead of recognising the biological basis for illness — mental and physical — for the banal fact it is (humans are biological beings, after all, so even “problems of living” have a biological basis), medicine tries to use certain biological markers as proof that certain illnesses are "real". Szasz/Spillane merely perpetuate this philosophical error, allowing medicine to keep its crude positivist justifications unchallenged.

By falsely separating physical and mental illness, Szasz and Spillane are simply trying to effect a redefinition of current social constructions, not solving the issue of social construction itself. Thus, Spillane claims that forcible treatment only occurs in mental illness when in fact many medical illnesses are treated forcibly (or worse, with apparent but not real consent) by a paternalistic medical system, especially when patients lose capacity to give informed consent (itself never fully realized, even in those with otherwise “full” capacity).

For all the strengths of the Szasz/Spillane (libertarian) position in terms of pointing to the hypocrisies, silliness and repressive tendencies of psychiatry, it actually dislocates illness from its social context, and therefore also from social struggles over definitions and interventions in health care more generally.

Disclaimer: I'm a public hospital psychiatrist. For more on my position, see my review of Richard Bentall’s “Doctoring The Mind” here: http://web.overland.org.au/2010/11/beyond-antipsychiatry-the-politics-of-mental-illness/

Mental Illness, the next burgeoning industry bandwagon.

The major logical error with this reasoning is that it assumes that what is not physically defined does not exist. Were the author alive a few centuries ago, he could have denied the existence of many diseases on this basis.

Until the function of the human brain is fully understood, there is nothing to support such an opinion: And the widespread observation of mental illness pervading human history would suggest that there is a physical dysfunction as its basis. To think otherwise would imply either very little contact with people suffering unmanaged mental illness or delusional thinking.

you pretty much nailed it robert

but that cant stop of panel
of god-headed phyciatrists from locking you away..
or ordering that you take mind disordering drug regemes

the system goes rotten from the head down
the physical brain isnt nessisarilly..that disorded mind

""Psychiatry is..therefore,
that branch of medicine where diagnoses of 'illnesses'
are made in the absence of objective evidence:""

to wit physical damage to the 'brain'
thus.....""they are based,
not on what people have,..but on what they do and say.""'

or unable of describing
like not knowing the time/date
or who is pm...[its so easy..[too easy]
to lock away our old peoople..by asking dumb questions]!

""And if they act in ways that annoy,
upset or offend others,..*they may find themselves diagnosed as mentally ill and treated medically against their will.>>''

and their assets adminesterd by proffiteering trusteee's

""People change their behaviour with or without the intervention of psychiatrists or psychologists.""

change the peer group
or educate [civilise]..the man
his sepperation angsiaties must demisisn the true problem
[social miss fit-ism...gained from move/vidio gaming reality tranpherance]..yes i made that up

so what ya going to do
put me under 'section..XXvi?

""Such intervention is nowadays called 'treatment'
when, in some cases, it should be called 'torture'.""

look at the refugees...how are they 'coping'
under imprisonment regemes..run for private proffit?

""When these interventions produce acceptable changes in behaviour, they are called 'cures'.""

yet only one is under order to 'change'
the other thinks they are god[at hundreds of dollars an hour]

""The cure of mental illness,it is argued,
produces a state of mental health which is universally regarded as desirable.""'

so thus we get oppressive regemes
act like 'normal people do
or else..!

""But if..{PHYSICAL}..mental illness is a myth,
mental health is too.}}

for who is to deem this
or that..as being 'normal'

is simply having faith in god
a sign..[symptom of insanity?]

thus we victimise those only trtying to bring a thing
they believe to be true...[yet by the lable of madness
many dont even read their often lengthy proofs

[realise..THEY believe..it happend

how much more wrong..to make them convinced it never happend
better to redirect into a coping mechanism..

that says [shows]
normal coping skills[better egsamples]..from those who been there
but then normalised..them selves[you cant mandate free thought or freedom to act]

""Since the middle-1990s the term 'mental health literacy' has been used to describe people who endorse an illness ideology and so agree with biological psychiatrists who bemoan the public's alleged ignorance.""

absolute authority
corrupts absolutly

""Many attempts to reduce prejudice
against the 'mentally ill' have been based on the attempt to make the public think like biological psychiatrists.""

your a sicko
did you take your drugs today?

""This approach is based on the assumption*
that if you are ill..
your behaviour is beyond your control
and you cannot be held responsible for it.""

which works out cionveniantly
for those who run their lush money making system

[it wernt your fault..''herr ubermeister''
come to the mansion..we can restore you to your proper standing]

just that we now run your life for you
cause your clearly sick*

when can we accept that we each
built our own mind..from our life experiences
that some of these experiences are still primitive hangovers
that dont work anymore...

stop the name calling
and see we are all products of living..
and re-living..our life experiences

bad input
gave bad output
so stop putting the spin in

love your life
its the only one worth living

anyhow cheers rob

you
:..used genericly

A lot of mental illness in modern society is of so-called a nature only. Many experts are hood-winked by people who simply don't like discipline or don't get given what they want.
It is a very fine line indeed between that scenario & real mental illness. We must focus on the problem of exploitation of mental illness as much as on the problem of the illness.
I know of people in safe positions on $150,000.- plus/year being awarded three months stress leave yet some poor worker on less than a third of that, stressing out about the imminence of losing his job doesn't even get looked at.
All that at the whim of some incompetent mental health worker & a couldn't care less Doctor.

Spillane says “Brain illnesses are discovered, mental illnesses are invented.”

As Dr_Tad noted, this is a false separation and does not deal with the issue of the social construction of mental illness. Mental illnesses are not just ‘invented’; they are also discovered. This is usually when there is a mismatch between the functioning of the individual and the requirements of the society in which the individual lives.

In other societies and in earlier times in western societies, it seems likely that people with non-typical brain functioning were looked after by the family, work requirements were less onerous and the rules of social behaviour were more clearly defined so that it wasn’t the problem that is now.

Diagnosis of mental illness, despite all the valid criticisms of the psychiatric ‘industry’ and the DSM, is not made lightly or for social convenience, but is a response to distress - either of the sufferer or those who care for them.

The final paragraph is great though! I’d really like something that would “disguise and thus render more palatable the bitter pill of moral conflicts in human relations”.

This argument is based on a false dichotomy. If a person is "mentally ill" it matters not whether it is their brain or their mind which is diseased. The pain and the anguish and the disorientation and the trauma are the same.
Are you really arguing that those of us who are dealing with a mental illness are fooling ourselves and that all we need is to have a good hard look at ourselves?
Perhaps you might like to go a round or two with my feelings of depression which, thankfully, can be controlled using medication.

feelings of depression.
shal,
again this depends on your definition of depression. I suffer badly from fatigue & that's depressing yet none of the Doctors I consult will give me a few days off just to rest. They just look at me as if I were nuts.

good information here, but like to respond from the 'other side'...not the empowered doctor/Councillor/Psychologist but 'sufferer'...whom commonly told me that people's response to them range from condescending to obnoxious...in the same vein this response so apology to those offended by post...

Peter...how about putting some real effort into the material before pen to paper...if so you would know schizophrenics are happy people...yes...the people in their 'false'world they create are full of engaging personalities they form strong bonds with, that they cant find in the 'real' world...and manicdepressive...a strong persistent feeling, negative or positive, first forms without real world reason, then they put an action to it...so the depressive or manic stage...while the 'real' world wants to control/suppress/prevent natural responsive emotions in one way or another so causing stress...

and to the rest of you 'normal'...did you know goldstandard to mental health is 'being completely aware of the situation you are in and brains processing it and responding without overpowering this awareness'...yeah, this the biggest factor that determined which of our forefathers survived in the jungle to evolve to you...now look at the lot of you...creating your own comfortable world, and filtering out anything else that doesnt fit...so who here still believe Iraq wasnt about oil...or global warming...true democracy exists in 'democratic' countries...so you must be nuts too for believing the false reality of the media...just when we stop looking after ourselves, so get noticed...you dont...

and 'But can minds be ill? I argue that they cannot'...mate...'brain is cells communicating with neurotransmitters' which gives you the 'mind'...so normal distribution of activity statically will give you normal range...and those out of this have an abnormal state...of course 'mind' is a functional state of an organ...organ which can be 'ill'...

what we should be focusing on is how to train 'ill' to become aware of their brain activity and bring it under their control...refer to 'goldstandard' above and once there and confident to keep it stable...then dabbling with their favoured 'ill state' is fine...this ability gets screwed up by pharmaceutics...did you know that...so creates a more vulnerable person, and rich drug companies...

sam

Myth 1: Mental process is brain process. This has never been proven, and actually (due to quantisation) logically entails that the Real numbers are countable (though I am not going to attempt to write the proof of that statement here: just consider the continuity of experience and consider the amount of information and see if it is compatible with the assumption that it is countable.)

Myth 2: Brain process problems can be diagnosed by anybody other than the person whose brain it is. The brain is way to complex for that. You can guess, and selectively ignore evidence to the contrary, using clever statistical arguments to hide uncertainties, but nothing that has been deduced from brain observations has been done so with serious logical rigour (not on the scale of mathematics anyhow).

Myth 3: Psychiatrists are trained in the necessary areas of science and philosophy to actually know what they are doing and to do their job reliably. They are trained, alas, in medicine and that is the wrong area for a great number of reasons. Space and time prohibit me from going into details here, and in any case, a web forum is not the place for detailed arguments.

This is a very interesting article, and I'm sure has wide applicability to the experiences of very many people. During one of the periodic fights with the CSA that were a feature of the first 6 or 7 years post-divorce I sought help from a GP for a severe reactive depression that was quite debilitating. As those who know me can attest, the sort of negative ideation that was colouring my thinking is quite foreign to me. I'm very much solution-oriented normally. Anyway, the doctor's only response was to prescribe me a drug called citalopram, which is an SSRI and which is known to take several months to stabilise the patients neurochemistry. It's quite a strong drug, approved for the treatment of major depression.

However, after having the prescription filled, I did some research on the stuff and decided not to take it. It sat in my desk drawer for the next couple of years while I worked at beating the depression through a cognitive behavioural approach. It worked, or perhaps the depression lifted once the proximal cause was removed.

The point is, I think, that I was not "mentally ill", I was suffering a normal response to a great deal of stress that was being imposed by a Government Agency that was not acting in a properly responsible way. There is nothing unexpected in being depressed after having all your money taken from the bank on an Easter Thursday, with no food in the fridge or money to buy more. It's an entirely normal response to being placed in an intolerable situation over an extended period. One runs out of the inner resources to maintain equilibrium.

[cont]

It's not a situation in which drugs will assist, the best they can do is to make one feel less bad about going down the drain. I explained my situation to the GP, yet he didn't suggest speaking to a psychologist (I did that myself); he didn't suggest trying to resolve the problems so that the proximal cause was removed (it wouldn't have helped, the CSA was the problem and were not acting rationally); he didn't offer a voice of balance and reason at all, just a strong drug as first response.

I wonder how many people are taking such drugs merely because they're having trouble dealing with what seems like intolerable stress? I suspect it's a great number. I learnt a few weeks ago that my ex-wife is now on anti-depressants. She works for Qld Health as a Social Worker, so I guess it was inevitable.

When all one has is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

...Antiseptic correctly takes the view that an ethical and primary response of people suffering from mental illness, is the need to take personal responsibility for the direction of their life. The book referred to in the article is, “The Myth of Mental Illness”, ISBN 978-06-177122-4 (Harper Perennial edition) published in 1974; author Thomas S Szasz.

...Szasz led the charge against the Liberal establishment view of dividing all personality disorders into categories of mental illness. (Ultimately a lost cause judging by todays expanded list).
He also devoted a sizeable proportion of his career attempting to explain human actions exposing as mental illness, to human natures propensity towards game playing for reward. He desired to contract the list of mental illness to categories containing objective physical causes and eliminate those that were premised on the subjective, such as those with psychosomatic roots; schizophrenia for example.

...A great book and well worth the read by those interested in the “rorts” associated with both sides (Professionals and patients) of the modern day mental illness “industry”.

It would unwise to dismiss mental illness - people do not suicide because they feel slightly down - they are clinically depressed or perhaps have other problem. Depression is not just fatigue or tiredness as some have seemd to suggest. This shows people who have never experienced someone with depression.

Mental illness is real...for instance many soldiers come back from combat with problems that never fully go away. This trauma may not have any obvious physicial brain represetnation, but nonetheless it is real and can be quite debilitating. I could go on..

Quite frankly, the idea that mental illness is a myth is laughable. I agree that people often over-diagnose mental illness - it seems there is always a new 'illness' (ie ADD, ADHD etc) - but lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater.

The point I was making is that very often all that is needed is time and a bit of support, since a lot of what is labelled as illness is more like a temporary injury that will heal. We don't call people with bruises or broken bones ill, we call them injured and treat them very differently.

My own experience of the prescription-mad culture was some years ago, but I don't really think there's been any improvement in the way these matters are dealt with.

You also mentioned ADD/ADHD and I've previously recounted the experience I had when my boy was in grade 3. He had the misfortune to encounter a teacher who was really not very good and quite incapable of dealing with boys in any way constructively. She made a report that my son was a trouble-maker and should be assessed for ADHD. After much toing and froing it was decided that he did fit within the spectrum on behavioural grounds, but that he had some developmental inconsistencies that needed addressing. Hardly surprising when his parents divorced when he was about two. A very good teacher took him under his wing the next year and things improved out of sight. The other one took a redundancy package and retired from teaching.

Once again though, there was a clear bias toward prescription and it took some concerted opposition from both of his parents to make it happen otherwise.

There's a lot of ignorance akin to the Global Warming debate in this area i.m.o. and I hope that in a variety of ways that these discussions will continue to be thrashed out in the months and years to come.

..

In fact, as part of mandatory primary and high school training, I would include an ongoing study of things of a medical nature including but not limited too 1st Aid & "Mental Health Awareness."

..

In the first instance, and to use the example of so called schizophrenia with paranoid features, if people had any real inkling of what psychosis actual is, and how it presents to the conscious mind, along with hallucinations and all of the rest of it,

(and of course as it applies to any other "mental illness" as well)

then I wager that you would have far fewer people talking about the Devil, The Agency or their neighbors with Alien mind control technology.

..

C.ognitive B.ehavioural T.herapy - people MUST i.m.o. be made aware of the potential hazard of a mental illness, how to recognise it and what to do about it.

It is a very dangerous time when your mind goes into that altered state of consciousness which we call psychosis, where the brain indeed interprets things in a fundamentally different way from "normal," and one does not have "INSIGHT" which is more often the case than not.

..

Appropriate conventional psychiatry a.k.a. brain doping CAN be a fundamental corner stone for recovering from mental illness in my personal experience.

However, I would add, that one corner stone alone does not lead to a full recovery.

..

C.B.T. strategies

2 Neuroleptics
(CBD would be better)

Binaural Beats

Orgasm in the context of a Luving & Healthy relationship

A low stress financial security solution

Disney Land Effect

Magensium Citrate (L-Threonate would be better) & Iodine supplements

Healthy diet (heavy on the veg) + OMEGA3 + Active Daily Exercise

Flavenoids (BlueBerries, Red Wine(hmmm), Dark Chocolate(hmmm))

Bright (Blue) light
(Don't forget the sunnies)

Meditation pre-activity

Music & Language Training

Well I think this article is a very good demostration of why you should resist the temptation to publish anything until you are, say, over 26 years old.

It is very easy to read one book and be swayed by an argument which caresses your own epistemic leanings, and to suddenly conceive that you have all the answers. But as betrayed by this author's enthusiastic reproducing of the "usual suspects" - cynicism, differentiation, stigma etc etc - and the generally undergraduate tone of the writing, a balanced, reflexive understanding of the subject at hand remains elusive.

As it is the article fails to consider two fundamental questions:
- what if there *are* physical bases to the mental illnesses commonly observed in clinical practice - just that we don't have the science to identify them yet?

- even in the unlikely event that there are no physical bases to these conditions, aren't the facts that they impair the sufferer, and that they are difficult to recover from by oneself, (not to mention that the same patterns keep coming up over and over again), still enough to designate them as "illness"?

Examples like Antisceptic's are not particularly useful as in these cases you could just as easily say that "you were misdiagnosed because the doctor was incompetent and/or just wanted you to go away".

I do, needless to say, have my problems with some concepts in mental illness discourse. After all it is still a young discipline and there is much still to learn. But to dismiss mental illness as a social construction is disingenuous in the extreme, not least because it denies the reality of what millions of people suffer.

sam jam/quote..""what if there *are* physical bases
to the mental illnesses commonly observed in clinical practice""

its undenyable that much has its origonation...resulting from actual physical abuses[ie molestation/rape..or war sickness

if your refering to physio-locical...damage
[or actual physical damage...like stroke
again i think thats all being considerd

thing is most 'events'..are sparodic
often 'set off'..by a specific 'event'..or other addictive re=action[adverse reaction to booze drugs or just certain social situations]...

""just that we don't have the science to identify them yet?"'
i think science has studied and found out
most that can be attributed[physiclly]

yet cure still seems in most cases a managment issue...
the physical treatments usually in isolating
or extracting [often compounding]..the damage
and the thing being a cure is rarely found

best we learn managment teqniques
and avoidance of that specific circumstance..
that initiates..the injuroius symtomology

with most i have taklked to/with
they seem just fine..[most of the time]
but then next it is like they have lost any ability to self control
[it can really feel demonic...and this must be included in those not cured]

as the link frequently gets 'lost'
i put up the search link to a specific pdf
[30 years among the dead]..
http://www.google.com.au/search?q=30+years+amoung+the+dead+pdf&btnG=Search&hl=en&source=hp&biw=&bih=

that talks of a simple exorsism teqnique
using static electricty...

that then via a 'medium'..
convinces the haunting[phycosis]..to leave..
in those 'impossable cases'

it deserves to be further studied

but dosing them up on pills
only make them worse
[allowing in more 'lost spirits']

it could prove cost affective
but wont make the legal drug merchants rich
diet is also an important aspect

"you were misdiagnosed because the doctor
was incompetent and/or just wanted you to go away".
[or get his numbers for drug perscription up to the extra bonus zone]

""I do, needless to say, have my problems
with some concepts in mental illness discourse.
After all it is still a young discipline and there is much still to learn.""

here is the guy [see link]..who tried another way
http://www.google.com.au/url?q=http://new-birth.net/booklet/30_years_among_the_dead.PDF&sa=U&ei=kIQ_Ttr1KejSiAKFg_WXBg&ved=0CBMQFjAA&sig2=a93fr_eWd83n1jzWSg72sA&usg=AFQjCNFZG8_FS_h2bnk3qiTkavMMIygECA

yet many still suffer because of blind ignorance
and obstanite deneyal...that they could be decieved

""But to dismiss mental illness as a social construction is disingenuous in the extreme,..not least because it denies the reality of what millions of people suffer.""

we need to keep searching for a better way
solgers should transit over to 'peacetime activity'
not be killing one day..drunk in a bar the next
children molested must be repaired..not further trasumatised

...Posters here appear to accept the current confusion and proliferation in classification of mental illness: But Szaszs lesson was this:- …Fundamental false truths (that are a basic part of societies belief system, and that support economically and existentially important common practices) were religious in nature: Today they are mainly “Medical” in nature!...

...He observed also a direct correlation between the demise of religion and the increase in the …observers (Doctors) construction and definition of the behaviour of the persons he observes as medically disabled individuals needing medical treatment…

...“God is dead” arise “Mental Illness”!

This article is a waste of journalism and based on one person's opinion who doesn't have to live with the abnormal thinking as a result of uncontrollable mental health issues which affect every aspect of life.

I fought this for 29 years after being in denial from diagnosis' after an acquired serious traumatic brain injury in an auto accident. Looking back, I suffered on a daily basis with extreme rapid cycling of mood changes over which I had little or no control.

The first 7 years of that time I was self-medicating with alcohol and pot to the point of getting arrested for DUI or having accidents while driving a motor vehicle.

The following 30 years I've been continuously clean & sober from all alcohol & drugs, and 9 years ago I was so overwhelmed with the depression and not being able to function that I had to surrender to disability again.

Average people have no idea how humiliating this feels not to be able to be self-supporting with a useful occupation and being a contributing member of society. When I admit to new people that I'm disabled with a mental illness the greater percentage of them shun be like I'm contagious or may be a threat to them in some way.

This is a condensed version of a long story of suffering in my lifetime. 13 years ago after taking meds to stabilize my mood swings from a late-life diagnosis, I chose not to have any offspring because I didn't want them to suffer with the defective genes that I carry.

Can you handle the truth of what I really have to live with?

We are all of the same human condition. A greater amount of people live life dealing with short-term mental health issues and go on with their lives. Some of us get beaten down so many times that we are totally worn down from the suffering. And there are the ones that fake being ill, I because they're too lazy and self-absorbed to care to be a contributing member to their self and/or society.

The disclaimer - I've got no specific training or qualifications to comment

The opinion - I doubt that mental illness is a myth as most understand the term. Some people genuinely deal with serious issues which we can't pin down to a physical cause.

At the same time I think that a significant proportion of what's considered mental illness is really about beliefs and expectations that don't work in the world we live in. Kid's who have never had consistant boundaries struggle with self control and ADHD is a lot easier for the parents to hear than poor parenting.

Others who were overly pampered as children finding that the adult world does not pamper them in the same way feeling depressed because the world does not meet their expectations. Much easier to hear that they have depression caused by some imbalance than to hear that they
need to adjust their world view.

One of the downsides of the likely overdiagnosis of mental illness is that it trivialises the needs and experience of those genuinely suffering.

R0bert

R0bert, you beat me to it. The point I was making is that a great deal of what is called illness is simly a rsponse to a traumatic event, in the same way as a bruise or a broken bone.

Obvioulsy not all the things that ail humans are simple injuries: there are infections, persistent organic damage due to severe injuries, genetic miscodings, the list goes on.

We don't treat all physical ailments as though they are pathogenic in origin - that would be stupid. We don't even treat all self-reported symptoms as though they have an organic basis.

There are, it seems to me, 2 issues here. The first is the provision of symptomatic relief (perhaps a local anaesthetic for a toothache, perhaps an anti-emetic for stomach cramps, etc. We don't pretend that these treatments will do anything other than make the person feel a bit better and we understand the potential side-effects quite well. I think that most "treatment" for mental unease falls into this category.

Then there are the treatments designed to repair the injury or reduce the infection. For physical injury or illness we're pretty good at getting to the nub of the problems and our treatments are well targetted on the whole. For mental illness or injury there is a big black hole in this area, it seems to me. Such treatments that exist are crude and poorly targetted. Lobotomy is widely used and although it's a lot better today with modern imaging, it's still pretty hit and miss. ECT is very traumatic and mostly palliative rather than genuinely curative. Neurosurgery for traumatic injury and some illnesses amenable to surgery is becoming very good, but there seems to be no real understanding of how to help the brain regain its proper chemistry without long-term use of drugs that have highly variable effects.

Time to get psychiatry out of the pharmacy.

There's a big difference between rigorous psychiatry and popular quackery though.

Remember that many people making diagnoses of mental illnesses such as ADHD are GPs who may not have any particular expertise in the area, and who are simply applying a textbook definition to real cases without having studied the subject in depth. And i'm not sure about this but I have a hunch that such diagnoses are often influenced by concerned or embarrassed parents who just want their little one to stop climbing the walls. You'd be surprised how many GPs are simply willing to give such people a nice little prescription and send them on their way. But this misuse of diagnosis degrades the legitimacy of the illness in the eyes of many - it's just like the boy who cried wolf.

Similarly, it is easy to characterise the effects of trauma as being somehow not quite the same as a mental illness, but rather of adaptation. However once the source of trauma disappears the adaptation remains.It becomes a "maladaptation" which both impairs the person's functioning and which the person cannot recover from on their own. Again I don't know about PTSD, but certainly in people who have suffered abuse in childhood there are indications that brain physiology changes as a result.

However our understanding of all this is still developing, and as such it is important for us not to imagine that this area of study is "finished". Psychiatrists will readily acknowledge that the drugs currently available are far from perfect, and that we still have a lot to discover about the way the brain works and how it can be controlled - which is why talking therapy is sometimes more effective than drugs... again, adaptation, or physical changes in the brain, are achievable through this.

{cont}
Which brings me to "under one god" - who as far as I can understand is recommending that we explore alternative approaches to therapy. This is not altogether an unreasonable suggestion. before Freud came along we conceptualised mental illness very differently - like for example the concept demonic possession. and the treatments designed for such conditions were probably not ineffective in many cases, as they essentially amount to a form of talking therapy. It is hard to research these types of approaches to therapy due to the inherent inconsistencies between cases. But yes I agree this is another area where more research is needed.

so how are we going to 'class-ify'..mental illness
with the riots going on globally

anyhow ross and elane appeared
repeatedly arround the tower of london
in some future 'time'

yes he claimed to have traveled from 1996
to london 2011...[so clearly the guy was nuts right]

he even claimed to be the 7 th angel?
so clearly he was loco

yet the things he talked of are now happening
but heck anyone coukld guess this time of collective insanity
[ie london burning..tokio/israelsyrians rioting in the streets]
was to come..

but heck the whole thing is crazey
[its said you have to be insane to even want to live at these times]

so if you get to the 'tower'.of london..anytime soon
let us know..if you bump into a red haired nutter and his wife
telling you things[crazey things about time travel and leaders not telling the truth]

yep its just too crazey for serious contemplation

but hey he did predict it
[is it 'really happening]..thats clearly phycosis

next collective phycosis

and lets presume bits of london actually are burning
[the reason apparently..is by reason of the plan
by the powers that be..[or were]
to release 'anthrax'..lab quality
just like last time..[ring a ring a rosie..anthrax symptoms?]

but thats nuts
crazey man

not sure wether to laugh or cry
[thats a symptom..to put you on meds

i know god is real..[but not by ross's telling]
the leaders were told..given proof..
but they stayed silent

and now we each need to learn
the truth of a good god..the hard way
[religeous nutter..drug him into silence]

the looting thing
wernt that on the simpsons?
well done rupert..[lol]

at least we arnt talking about the carborn tax
but all them polies..on holidays..[whats with that]

anyhow im going in

to find out
what really happend

http://whatreallyhappened.com/

not sure what really happend to ross and elaine
likely they are in some nut house in london
where the writing on the wall 'appeared'

collective insanity
comming to your town soon
if your..not crazy yet..you soon will be

too crazy for words

OUG Says:

collective insanity
comming to your town soon
if your..not crazy yet..you soon will be

…Lets not get too carried away with the state of the world OUG; even those professing a problematic time with depression are not insane; they are simply uncomfortable. Rioting youths in London are the same “pi##ed to the eyeballs” youth that maraud the streets of Australian cities and towns any weekend: The modern day infatuation with drugs and alcohol is a root cause of insanity, not the supposed assistance package enabling self-survival in a mad world at all; drugs and alcohol are THE mad world.

People are entitled to their view but that is not to say the views of some people aren't absolute nonsense. .. That is to say that they are non-sensical, or not based on the world of the senses that can be evidenced by the scientific method.

..

To state categorically that mental illness is a social construct and that it has no basis in biology is an absolute and utter nonsense.

..

That of course is not to say that "mental illness" isn't a multi-faceted problem. It is. My last post provided a glad bag of things that I deployed to bring me back from the best part of 5 years where life was one great, big, long "psychotic episode." Verily, a patient of "clozapine" for some time,

BUT NOW

whilst admittedly far from perfect,

I am married, have a daughter, part of a tertiary education and a small internet business.

..

15 years ago I was an abandoned train wreck on skid row.

;-)

..

Oh, a healthy brain is dynamic, and capable of a range of emotions and thoughts, both "good" and "bad." A healthy brain moves dynamically in and out of different states, whereas the unhealthy brain is impaired in this regard.

..

Of course, if one chooses to overly dwell in a certain state, one can in this way impair the overall health of the organ to the extent that it cannot regain its former ability to return to a healthy equilibrium.

..

That is to say that there is something of a "push-pull/2 way street" between what could loosely be termed the psychiatric drivers on the one hand and the psychological ones on the other.

..

By way of an example, you can take a substance which will alter the psychiatric state of your conscious and thereby bring about an altered psychological state, and conversely, you can say abuse someone psychologically to the extent that you will bring about a potentially permanent change in their psychiatric state.

No, this inane p!ssing match that erupts between psychiatry and psychology is more about a squabble over the scraps from the table of the politicians then anything else.

i agree with what you wrote dreamon
but its not about scraps they debait
its about absolute control

ideally they say do it
and you do it...[the ideal russion 'man']
but if you dare think about 'it'..or refuse to serve 'it'
you get drugged into submission..or locked up..'for your own good'

the moral crimes..of govt funding mind control is beyond dispute
our emotions are tweaked and played on till we absorb 2 de hand guilt

dont dare to be 'different'
follow the in crowd right into 'the showers'

those with absolute power have transgressed all moral bounds
the mental health act...is about control

and them being allowed to determine
the bounds that deem one..'out of control'
thus now legally under their con-troll

there is no law saying we need to serve the state
or the state to bail out bankers..yet thats the game
by the clever device of a 'person'...[a corperation is a person[created under the act]...a dead fiction..that needs a living trustee..to protect their intrests..[thus of limeted liability]

the state only controls your children
by the various acts[marrage act..births act]
driving licence act,,[

for those transporting]..for income
[income is increased value..without work imput]..

so even transporting for money
isnt income to the 'driver'..working for wage
[see definition of transport/driver/income/wage]

then when you think you know it all
the world will call you crazey too

just dont sign anything
[the bible says do not make oath]

unilateral contracts..means they bind you
but as they didnt sign anything..they remain unbound

Hello *OneUnderGod* .. I missed you and *Jinny* at times in the past.

..

It is in some regards very difficult for me to speak about such things, and there is at times great reluctance and trepidation inter-mixed.

..

But, as said, with the benefit of hind sight, I could have largely resolved my personal "medical issues" within 3 months, but as it was it took the best part of 10 years.

..

Thus, it pleases me more to know that there may be some small benefit to some poppet somewhere in something that I share and that in turn for me makes for a more sustained sense of satisfaction "deep down."

(And of course, there is fertile harvest in taking something on from the views and experiences of others too.)

I like to cultivate a bit of that from time to time.

con-troll

Love it. You're still the master OUG.

Dream On!

'No, this inane p!ssing match that erupts between psychiatry and psychology is more about a squabble over the scraps from the table of the politicians then anything else.'

Na, it's about the difference between real doctors and pretend doctors, or social 'scientists'. Real doctors can give out drugs, and social workers (caring motherly types, often with a world of dysfunction in their own lives) cant and so they have to protect their market share by denigrating the 'drug pushers in the pocket of Big Pharma'.