Can you find happyness without medications?

[Anna]

Nothing worked better for me than being strict with my nutrition and doing sports. And I really mean it. I'm a PERFECTLY NORMAL happy cat.

You are so right!!! There is NOTHING better than physical exercise. It's usually the last thing you feel like doing, but nothing beats it. I always felt a thousand times better after going to my African drumming class, which was both physical and social. Then I started going to yoga and African dance classes too and I have never looked back. The minute I feel even a little down these days, I head straight outside for a brisk walk, roll out my yoga mat, throw some music on and dance or head down to the allotment and do a bit of digging. (Allotments are plots of land given out by the council to people who want to grow their own veg, for those who don't know!)

Eating the right stuff is so important too, I completely agree. But it's such an individual thing. I crave lemons and eat at least 1 a day, I either pour lemon juice over salad, add it to sauces or drink it with boiled water. I need dark green leafy veg, and I tend to have a lot of hot chillies. I cannot eat any dairy and I have to limit anything with white flour in, but meat, fish and olive oil all seem to be good for me personally. Everyone's bodies are so different. Figuring out what works for you and sticking with it can make such a big difference to how you feel.

 

[gregory]

Oh yes - my psychiatrist was delighted when I started swimming every day, because exercise stimulates the production of all those feel-good hormones !

But in the end - unless it is something like bi-polar and you will need permanent meds - the key is to feel OK enough ON them to sort out what made you need them so you won't need them again. Mine isn't exactly situational; they labelled it endogenous it is a chemical imbalance in me which is triggered to dump me in the dumps by certain things, and now that I can see it coming before it kicks in, I know how to stamp on the triggers ! But no-one can really advise on that stuff from a distance - it is totally individual. The time I ended up in hospital and was almost sectioned, it was caused by - both my daughters graduating, and one daughter getting engaged - and I was delighted, so it wasn't an OH GOD THE WRONG MAN thing ! Go figure...

 

[Richard]

Exercise gets the endorphins going, and that can relieve clinical depression. The problem is that often the last thing a depressed person would do is go outside and exercise. Medications may help in getting to this first step. If one is able to get physical enough to stimulate the endorphins, then the depression is not as serious as it could be. Will power to do something just doesn't function when one is in a serious depressive condition.

Depressed people are suffering a very real mental condition, but the ups and downs of life do not in themselves constituate a basis for clinical depression, which may be treatable with medication. If the condition is merely due to something like a disappointing love affair or a failed marriage, then antidepressant drugs will have limited effect.

I lost someone near and dear to me because they bacame clinically depressed from using Prednisone to control asthma. This was back in the 1980s, when the effect of Prednisone on the chemistry of the brain was not completely understood, nor were there drugs known to conterract the resulting depression.

I, myself, took antidepressants when my professional life took a temporary downturn, and it did little, if any, good.

 

[gregory]

Exercise gets the endorphins going, and that can relieve clinical depression. The problem is that often the last thing a depressed person would do is go outside and exercise. Medications may help in getting to this first step. If one is able to get physical enough to stimulate the endorphins, then the depression is not as serious as it could be. Will power to do something just doesn't function when one is in a serious depressive condition.

Depressed people are suffering a very real mental condition, but the ups and downs of life do not in themselves constituate a basis for clinical depression, which may be treatable with medication. If the condition is merely due to something like a disappointing love affair or a failed marriage, then antidepressant drugs will have limited effect.

I lost someone near and dear to me because they bacame clinically depressed from using Prednisone to control asthma. This was back in the 1980s, when the effect of Prednisone on the chemistry of the brain was not completely understood, nor were there drugs known to conterract the resulting depression.

I, myself, took antidepressants when my professional life took a temporary downturn, and it did little, if any, good.

Clinical depression CAN be kicked in by the vagaries of life. (and BTW I was already ON the meds when I took up the swimming. )

Temporary meds worked for me. But working on actually changing things worked more permanently - but is BLOODY hard work.

 

[danieljuk]

Medication makes it easier to live with the symptoms but doesn't solve the problems.

Medication and many psychological methods I have tried, have made me worse. I really believe in the right path for each person and so don't feel bad if one medication or treatment method doesn't help you. I have sadly been made to feel guilt when medical people's methods have not worked. Now I believe in moving on and trying something else!

Now I do treat naturally. It's not going brilliantly. Diet and Exercise is so important. I recommend reading every book about your issues that you can. Education is a really important thing! Also search forums and blog posts and see what works for other people. You don't have to medicate, there is other options! It's an experimental process for everyone. Make a list of things that make you feel better, refer back to it when you need

 

[SunChariot]

Heh I plan to go over other threads I made for self help and stuff, but does medication really help or can you find happyness without it? Truthfully I never found a medication yet that have been the best for me(Okay I only have been on 3 different kinds but one stopped working after a few months, the last one lasted 4 years). Part of me is like, why? Medication won't bring me a boyfriend, it won't bring me money, it won't bring me a new home to live in, etc. I know they can help you cope a little bit even my therapist said that but how have that kind of stuff helped you? Did you ever have medication how did it help you, and were you able to go on without it?

Also know how people say it will be okay? Are they just SAYING that or is it really true? Also I will admit I HATE it when I tell my dad I am not happy about something and he says get over it or let it go. I have no idea what that means lol. It makes me mad though XD It's like "Dude, you don't get it".

Part of me wants to get back on medication (I haven't been on for couple of weeks,(I couldn't take it for a few days due to stomach flu and when I tried to get back on when I was totally feeling fine, I felt nausated (that was the 4th medicine but I only been on that for couple of weeks). What i have noticed though, the higher dosage I go up, the worst it won't won't for me. (Does it mean my depression is just mild and not bad I guess?)

You can definitely be happy without medication. I have never had medication for that purpose.

The way I learnt it, ALL feelings that we have are the direct result of the thoughts we had right before them. We can learn more and more to choose and embrace the kinds of thoughts that make us happy and to choose to not have or turn off the ones that don't.

Part of it for me is my belief in the Divine. I do believe we are part of something much greater, and that there are no coincidences and that we are being guided at all times towards the best outcome. Sometimes we try to fight that, but it he don't and go with the flow we get there and have faith in life, we get there much faster.

Also a gratitude log helps, writing down 10 of so things you are grateful for in your life, either before bed or first thing in the morning. That helps to keep your focus on that, on the warn happy things. It really is just a matter of the thoughts you choose to have.And you can get better and better at choosing the ones that make you happy, And challenging the ones that don't. You get to see over time that the ones that make you happy are much closer to the truth of the matter than the ones that don't, if you really look openly and honestlyi at it. And just knowing that changes a lot.

Everything will always ultimately be ok. No uncomfortable thing in life can last forever. Life is movement and change. And what we can't change we can change how we look at it and see the good side. Since nothing is all bad, there is a good side to anything. And your lives are guided to work out in the best ways for us, in my belief system. Nothing can happen to us that is ultimately not in our best interest. This is not always easy to see at the time, but years later we can look back and see why it was for the best.

Yes you are right, Medication cannot bring you a boyfriend, and it cannot bring you money. But the point of happiness is not to acquire things that you think you want. The point of it, imo, is to learn that you don't need these things to be happy, To accept that you don;t have then or need them to be happy and that you love your life just as it is.

Money does NOT bring happiness, which is why you see so many depressed movie stars, They could likely have any bf they chose and still they are not happy. Happiness comes from the inside of you, It is not the result of what you have or what you don't. Happiness is a state of mind, not a reaction to what you have. No one can create yoru state of mind but you. You HAVE that power to make your state of mind into whatever you want. You just have put in a bit of work.

Sorry but that almost made me laugh how you tell your Dad that you are not happy with something and he tells you to get over it or to let it go. Of course that is not helpful. If you knew how to do that you would have already. The reason it made me laugh is that it reminds me of my mother. In all the years I was growing up living with her, and after, I never saw her have a common cold. Never a cold of a flu ever. I had never seen anyone else not have one. I kept asking her HOW she was able todo that. And she would say that "I don't get colds because I don't go for that! I never knew what to make of that, but it was so completley not useful it made me laugh. As if all you have to is "not go for" being ill and you never will be again.

This is not medical advice of course. And I have never had pills to make me happier, but I have been on tranquillzers at a number of different times in my life. And that also is medication to change your moods. And I found they did not help me as much as learning to change my thoughts.

It was my thoughts that were making me stressed, the thoughts that I alone was choosing. And no matter how much medication I had, it did not change my thoughts adn if I chose scary thoughts I was going to get nervous. All the medication did was make me a bit into a zombie, My thoughts came slower, but when they can they came in the same form and I stressed myeslf with them.

I am much better with that now. And yes, I truly believe you can learn to change the way you are thinking, and that changes all the rest,. When you choose better more accurate thoughts, you become calmer and calmer and happier and happier. And yes, the thoughts that we think that make us unhappy are next to never true. I have it on very good authority, that those kinds of thoughts are always untrue, distorted in some way. When we are thinking that way, we are not seeing clearly or seeing things as they actually are. That and that the worst thing we can imagine almost NEVER happens.

For what its worth, what has worked best for me with the stress (Ive had some hard experiences in my life too and 2 nervous breakdowns) is cogitive therapy. That was the one thing that is curing me. I tried a number of things first that did not make a dent in it really. It does work well for depression too.

Babs

 

[SunChariot]

I have sadly been made to feel guilt when medical people's methods have not worked. Now I believe in moving on and trying something else!

That is SO wrong. Not every method is right for eveyone. And medical people treating this kind of thing should think only of what is right for the patient and helpful to them. And to keep their egos out of it. I guess as you can say a good Tarot reader would also do.

For them to make you feel guilty, they are reacting to their own egos. They don't want to feel like a failure so it can't be their fault so it must be yours. That is so inappropriate.

I once had someone treating me get furious at me because he told me all patients fell in love with their therapists and then he asked me didn't I love him. I was a bit shocked by the question as it sounded so egotistical. But I honestly said no and he got really furious. Also inappropriate.

I've had a lot of differnt types of treatment before I found the one who truly is helping me now. Now things are so much better, and he really is amazing in his field. I told him when I frist came that no one had been able to help me before. And he said that there are all different kinds of treatments and not all work for everyone. I just hadn't found teh right one yet. It was like I had a headache and I came to the doctor and he gave me cough syrup. It was a well known medication, but not the right one for me or for what I had.

When you find the right one for you, then it works. And hey he was right. he was a little miracle worker. But the fault is not in you, it's that the treatment they were giving you was not the right one for you, And making you feel guilty was not needed, helpful or even ethical really.

Babs

 

[re-pete-a]

I wonder if the odd weather of late is also in need of examination on the couch. Perhaps it's a reflection of the unsettled times and your really in tune better than you think..


Letting Go as advised by your pop isn't that easy to do and I can understand your confusions related to it.

To let something go, requires that you let it be exactly what it is, without preferences .



A problem is simply that ...A problem... Now throw in your opinions , your preferences, your should be's, etc and it's now grown to be something that it 's not.

LET IT GO( without input) and one can become untangled again.

Your Pop is just your Pop...until,,, it becomes complicated by other input.

 

[re-pete-a]

I've just learnt that the magnetic flux of the earth is moving...scientifically accepted. I think they said somewhere near Brazil...It's apparently upsetting planes and navagational equiptment.

If that be so,,, then it's not a great leap in logic to assume that the magnetic flux is affecting the minds of some. Especially those that are sensitive in the first place.

Interesting huh.

 

[CelestialHorse]

You are so right!!! There is NOTHING better than physical exercise. It's usually the last thing you feel like doing, but nothing beats it. I always felt a thousand times better after going to my African drumming class, which was both physical and social. Then I started going to yoga and African dance classes too and I have never looked back. The minute I feel even a little down these days, I head straight outside for a brisk walk, roll out my yoga mat, throw some music on and dance or head down to the allotment and do a bit of digging. (Allotments are plots of land given out by the council to people who want to grow their own veg, for those who don't know!)

Eating the right stuff is so important too, I completely agree. But it's such an individual thing. I crave lemons and eat at least 1 a day, I either pour lemon juice over salad, add it to sauces or drink it with boiled water. I need dark green leafy veg, and I tend to have a lot of hot chillies. I cannot eat any dairy and I have to limit anything with white flour in, but meat, fish and olive oil all seem to be good for me personally. Everyone's bodies are so different. Figuring out what works for you and sticking with it can make such a big difference to how you feel.

Exercising does seem to help me Thankfully I got an exercise bike! I ordered a yoga for scoliosis dvd which should help my back more! Yays! (Scoliosis is when the spine curves into like a C or S shape). I do love going for walks. Kinda hard though with mother nature being a jerk and making it cold >.> Thankfully it will be warmer next week! YAYS!

Yeah, hard to say what helps. Usually if I drink too much caffeine, it gets to my head makes me feel more irritated :/ so i try to stay away from that plus it bothers my stomach after awhile and gives me headaches. Chocolate is nice but it makes my face break out >.> I do hear fish and yogurts, etc are good for the mind I do love both (not together though lol).