Since it's been making the rounds...

[enigmaticblues]

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I feel the need for full disclosure here, because mental health stigma is A Thing and People Are Jerks About It. We talked about this a lot in my counseling courses. I went to Denver Seminary for my MA in counseling, and there were plenty of M.Divs (basically pastors-in-training) who believed that prayer, bible reading, and maybe some quality talks

Comments

[lynnenne]

AMEN.

[dancingdragon3]

Thank you for sharing your story with us. You have massive hugs for being here and an awesome person with all you've struggled with.

It means a lot to hear others say things that sound familiar to me. Thanks for passing this along :-)

[enigmaticblues]

Aw, thanks.

[rebcake]

For real.

I listen to the BBC all day, and they had a story recently about some encouraging results for people whose depression hasn't responded to existing drug therapies in a very small study in Britain. They gave them psilocybin - the active ingredient in magic mushrooms - and had the subjects experience an in-clinic trip, supervised at all times. It's very intensive and expensive and time-consuming in terms of personnel, but the subjects are depression-free after one treatment, which is amazing. They will have to do lots more work, of course, but I kept thinking that maybe we would be better off if we'd had friendly neighborhood shamans in our healthcare system all this time. The brain is a weird place.

[trepkos]

Wow. But that does make me wonder - is everyone who's taken magic mushrooms depression-free?

[rebcake]

Who knows? The researchers said that it was really difficult getting clinical grade product, but that they needed to know exactly what they were giving people and at what strength. It's a lot more hit-or-miss in the "wild".

[singinglark]

No. Tried them in college, had some interesting experiences, but my chronic depression is still with me. There may be a temporary effect, since it wasn't bad in college, but one treatment=cured! is just not true.

[trepkos]

It's brilliant that you found something that works.

[enigmaticblues]

It really is.

[draconin]

I'm glad you found a combination that worked for you, although I'm sure the process was not pleasant. I get very angry at the whole homeopathic "medicine" scam and similar ideas. It annoys me immensely that pharmacists (drug stores) in Australia are allowed to sell homeopathic medicines as if they are real.

If you've not seen it already you may get a laugh (perhaps hollow) over this comedy sketch of a Homeopathic A&E Dept.
https://youtu.be/HMGIbOGu8q0

[enigmaticblues]

If going the all natural route works for someone, more power to them, but I get really frustrated with people who force that opinion on others. (See the last comment thread on this post.)