Re: depression

I can unfortunately identify with the feeling that you described of lacking mental stimulation. I've experienced understimulation in its milder forms, where I was sort of able to function despite going about my daily activities feeling like my mind was in a sort of fog, and I've also experienced understimulation in a much more severe form, where it became extremely difficult to form thoughts or to spend much time out of bed. I was diagnosed with a few different forms of clinical depression before the onset of my psychosis and accepted the diagnoses, but I now question whether the professionals I saw were correct in framing my understimulation (with the fatigue and other symptoms that came along with it) as a manifestation of clinical depression. The thing is that despite the disruptions in energy, sleep, and concentration that I experienced, I didn't so much feel depressed in the strictest sense of the word before the onset of my psychosis. I wasn't suicidal, had high hopes about my treatments at the time (which in retrospect didn't do any long term good), and as far as I can tell, didn't have any more negative thoughts than the average person. Now, there have been times since the onset of my psychosis in which my outlook has become quite bleak and thoughts of escaping this existence have been hard to ignore, which I think is more in line with what most people think about when they hear the word "depression" than the much more debilitating fatigue that I used to suffer from and still do suffer from to a lesser extent. So, even though depression in the strictest sense of the word isn't an alien concept to me, I don't think that it was a good word to describe the lack of stimulation that was at the heart of the illness that I began suffering from some 13-plus years ago. "Depression" might or might not be the best word to describe the lack of stimulation that you've experienced, as well. All I can say is that for me, framing my understimulation/fatigue as a form of clinical depression seemed to create a lot of confusion about what it was that I was really experiencing and didn't lead to any treatments that were helpful in the long run.

So, as I just mentioned, treating my fatigue and related symptoms as a manifestation of clinical depression did not result in long-term success. Talk therapy was helpful in the sense that I learned a lot about the way the mind works and was a little better prepared to deal with the frustration that came as I became progressively less functional, but as far as doing anything about the problem that brought me to therapy was concerned (namely, energy, and a lack of it), I can't say that it helped. To the extent that I exercised, it also didn't seem to help, although maybe part of the reason for this was that I wasn't exercising vigorously enough. I took some medications that did help me a lot in the short run, but unfortunately, the medications that gave me the boost of energy that I needed didn't produce lasting benefits. The same was also true of supplements that I tried, as long as I continued to just make educated guesses about what might help me in the same way that psychiatrists make educated guesses about what medications might benefit a patient the most.

What, you may wonder, actually has helped me? Although I think that it would be premature to describe the positive results that I've noticed so far from my current treatment regimen as a success story, I think that the turning point of my treatment so far came when I decided to visit an orthomolecular doctor. Unlike mainstream psychiatrists, the orthomolecular doctor I saw used actual tests to guide my treatment. Imagine that. I was found to have an insufficient level of vitamin D and to also have a slightly elevated level of urinary pyrroles. My first attempt at supplementing with vitamin D basically ended the way that a lot of my supplement trials ended, with a seeming loss of effectiveness after a brief response. But then I tried again with a higher dose, vowing to eventually increase my dose even higher and to stay on the vitamin for at least a few months. And with my current vitamin D trial now more than two months under way, I can say that I still seem to be responding to the vitamin D, even though my response hasn't been completely consistent and has been something short of a full remission of my symptoms. I also recently started taking vitamin B6, which is one of the treatments that's indicated for the pyrrole disorder that I was found to have, and even though it's way too early to say how the B6 is going to affect me in the long run, I seem to be noticing good things from taking the B6 with the vitamin D.

So, what's my view on the treatment of what we call depression (or what I no longer choose to call depression, at least as far as my case is concerned)? I think that the best treatment for any individual is the treatment that produces the best results. That could be medication, talk therapy, a combination of medication and talk therapy, exercise, meditation, acupuncture, dietary supplements, or some combination of the approaches that I've mentioned. Unfortunately, mainstream mental health professionals largely choose treatment strategies using a process of trial and error. Many patients undoubtedly eventually stumble upon a treatment regimen that works well for them in the long term by going through the trial and error of depression treatment, but I never did. And it still remains to be seen whether my current treatment regimen will continue to be something that I'll benefit from in the long run, but if my regimen does help me in the long run, it will be because I decided to see a doctor whose approach to treating mental illness is less steeped in the trial-and-error model that most mental health professionals tend to follow. Now, what I'm writing here is basically just a testimonial, which of course isn't scientific. And the scientific evidence to support the efficacy of orthomolecular treatments is probably weak at best, at least in general. But I stand by what I said earlier in this paragraph when I said that the best treatment for any individual is the treatment that produces the best results. And for me, at least so far, orthomolecular psychiatry seems to be winning out in the results department.

Has an affective psychosis (schizoaffective disorder) with strong symptoms of fatigue, hypersomnia, and difficulty concentrating

Taking Abilify & vitamins B3, B6, & D

Re: depression

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