http://mindhacks.com/2006/04/13/newsci-head-electricity-and-myth-of-mood-drugs/ Neuroscience and psychology tricks to find out what's going on inside your brain. Thu, 09 Feb 2012 02:40:03 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ http://mindhacks.com/2006/04/13/newsci-head-electricity-and-myth-of-mood-drugs/#comment-8005 Thu, 13 Apr 2006 18:59:21 +0000 http://mindhacksblog.wordpress.com/2006/04/13/newsci-head-electricity-and-myth-of-mood-drugs/#comment-8005 As someone with bipolar disorder who was treated for depression for many years, I think there does need to be more awareness of the disorder and that it is different from depression, which generally, our culture doesn’t get. Bipolar manias are acceptable, even desirable when they translate to workaholism and greater consumerist behavior and such. Depression seems unacceptable to a society where everyone is supposed to feel good all the time, it seems.
Zyprexa is not, to me, a treatment for bipolar disorder. It is a treatment for manic brain activity. I take it occassionally, but rarely these days. Lamictal is my mood stabilizer of choice, since it keeps me level with zero side effects. It is a widely unrecognized treatment, and I initially had to talk my shrink into prescribing it, since at that time it wasn’t approved for bipolar.
The real lack of awareness seems to be about what these drugs do and that they work differently for different people. And yes, some people do need life-long treatment, others short term treatment. We all seem to have different brain chemistry that responds differently.
Awareness for different conditions is a good thing, pushing particular drugs and solutions is not. I think the whole system is out of whack, and until the drug companies are reined in a bit from these advertisements, they are creating more problems than they solve.

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