I have just read again that depression is a result of internal anger and it makes me feel so sad that I never knew this before and than no one in the MH profession ever told me.

[JustFab]

As a lot of you know I have had PND and AND and have been on ADs for many years but am being weaned off them slowly. I had the realisation that I didn't need them and what my difficulties actually were. If what I said in my title is the case, why is this never talked about and explored instead of people just being given drugs?

OMG OandL ............it doesn't feel like a survival technique!! Mind I have often wondered about other cultures and how people cope with depression. When I hear of thousands of people in war torn countries I think to myself that they must get depression/anxiety, but assume they just have to get on with it. I watched a TV programme recently about a very small tribe of people still living in a rain forest (forget where) and have no contact with other humans and again I wonder IF these people get depression.

You are obviously very knowledgeable about this topic and far more intelligent than me because I honestly couldn't really understand those wikipedia things you sent links for and yet I know I am not unintelligent, maybe I just didn't want to try to understand for some unknown reason.

Ah well I know we shouldn't withdraw into ourselves but on bad days I do retreat to my "cave" for part of the day. Sometimes it's necessary as if my grandchildren are here I don't want them seeing me "in a heap" - one of them asked me the other day why I had to go to bed when I had a migraine (that's the excuse that we use) mind it was ironical because I used to suffer from migraine and did have to lie in a dark room.

Would be interested in any more theories!

I had fourteen months of analytical therapy (combined with anti-d's) and it worked wanders for me. But I suspect a lot of my depression stemmed from the huge amounts of emotional invalidation I received from my parents as a child and adolescent. So having someone turn around and say 'your feelings do matter and yes, that was a reasonable thing to feel upset/angry/emotional about' was an important part of healing for me.
I have been massively better since I finished this therapy. If you get a bad therapist, of course it won't help. I guess there needs to be a way of finding/seeing reveiws about someone before you go. Also like anything in life, there is no gaurantee that you and whoever you see in the first place will gel.
I was very lucky with mine.

I don't believe there is a clear cut divide between mental illness and physical illness. We are not robots and all of us have an emotional/ spirtual dimension. I think our physical and mental are very much intertwined.

For example extreme stress can cause cancer. A cancer patient with depression is less relient to treatment. I think there are lot of conditions like ME where there is a both a physical and pychological component.

I would be interest to know why mental illness has increased so much in the last 50 years. My own pet theory is that the church was very efffective at supporting people with mental illness, so such people did not need to go to the doctor 50 years ago. I think the break down of communities makes life harder.

I thought the increase was mainly to do with 2 things.

Wider diagnosis, awareness an unerstanding of illness
Loss of stiff upper lip attitude.

But really agree that break down of communities is the biggest thing, coupled with rushing lifestyles we lead. Isn't there some research somewhere that shows the Amish don't suffer depression, and some tribe in Africa, where all the community help each other, and depression is unknown?