Mental Health

[Weiing]

Quick question regarding that article from PLoS, as I'm not too familiar with FDA testings.
Are all studies in that meta-analysis just medication/placebo only? Did they control for other variables, such as therapy or other treatments the participants in the study might have been involved in?

[BerenTebogo]

Lots of flaming going on in here...

To contribute, I have pretty heavy OCD and it's affected me since I was a child. I have really annoying ticks that I have to work really hard to stop myself from doing, not gonna get in-depth but if you know what OCD is you know how ticks can consume you. Marijuana helps to alleviate my thoughts and lets me relax, it's not some bs placebo prescribed by the government and it 100% does help me. Marijuana can be used for medicinal purposes? No way...

I had "ADD" as a child but my mom saw through that bs the doctors tried to feed her and refused to give me ritalin, I was just a hyper kid. I really despise that people will throw any over-the-counter med at a problem and think it'll be perfectly fine. I mean, fuck, if you watch commercials for prescribed meds all the side-effects sound nearly (if not worse) as bad as the symptom itself...

You just admitted to self-diagnosing and self-medicating with Marijuana while flippantly and irrationally disregarding a potentially real diagnosis on the basis of your mom seeing through the doctors' "bs".

I mean, hey, I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying you sound absofuckinglutely retarded.

[BerenTebogo]

Quick question regarding that article from PLoS, as I'm not too familiar with FDA testings.
Are all studies in that meta-analysis just medication/placebo only? Did they control for other variables, such as therapy or other treatments the participants in the study might have been involved in?

My understanding is that medication + placebo only = shit we can put on a label.

Medication + therapy1 / medication + therapy2 / placebo + therapy1 / placebo + therapy2 = does this shit actually work.

Obviously the different studies are not conducted by the same institutions. Again, it's just my understanding of it, if someone knows better please step in.

[Weiing]

You just admitted to self-diagnosing and self-medicating with Marijuana while flippantly and irrationally disregarding a potentially real diagnosis on the basis of your mom seeing through the doctors' "bs".

I mean, hey, I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying you sound absofuckinglutely retarded.

yeah. Reading his post put up a red flag for me with self-medication. If you've been properly diagnosed, shouldn't you have a therapist or something to help you overcome the anxiety and your obsessive and compulsive behavior you do to alleviate that anxiety?

edit:
Thanks Sath for clearing that up. Sorry, it's difficult for me to think strictly in terms of using meds and people conducting research to show what the med does (in order to sell it) rather than what is the optimum way to treat people.

[Tellahh]

You just admitted to self-diagnosing and self-medicating with Marijuana while flippantly and irrationally disregarding a potentially real diagnosis on the basis of your mom seeing through the doctors' "bs".

I mean, hey, I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying you sound absofuckinglutely retarded.

Who the fuck said I self-diagnosed my OCD? I've been to doctors and they've said the same thing, even my father has OCD and it's completely obvious I have it. I don't self medicate with Marijuana either, I smoke it because I like to get high.. but it does help.. more then other meds I've taken at least. I've even seen therapists and yeah they helped but it's mostly internal conflicts with OCD.

[Byrthnoth]

Quick question regarding that article from PLoS, as I'm not too familiar with FDA testings.
Are all studies in that meta-analysis just medication/placebo only? Did they control for other variables, such as therapy or other treatments the participants in the study might have been involved in?

I'm not sure, but I doubt it. Those are things that probably should have been controlled for in the initial studies. I know that the author refined his methods for that article partially in response to criticism of his earlier article ("The Emperor's new drugs").

Edit: I should say that when I started reading these papers I immediately thought of the people who are constantly out to prove Global Warming isn't happening. It had many of the same characteristics. A small group of rabid-seeming scientists publishing a lot of meta-analysis. That said, unlike the anti-global warming people, I haven't found anyone really opposing this guy. His topic is, admittedly, unpopular. There's no funding to be had or money to be made in proving that medicine doesn't work.
However, random other people in his field seem generally in agreement that statistics is against any strong effectiveness of antidepressants. Some have even gone as far as to suggest that 100% of the effect of antidepressants is Placebo, and that statistical differences are caused by an "unblinding" phenomenon, where patients are tipped off that they were given the real medicine due to side-effects and thus are happier with / believe harder in their success and pump up the placebo effect.

[BerenTebogo]

Who the fuck said I self-diagnosed my OCD? I've been to doctors and they've said the same thing, even my father has OCD and it's completely obvious I have it. I don't self medicate with Marijuana either, I smoke it because I like to get high.. but it does help.. more then other meds I've taken at least. I've even seen therapists and yeah they helped but it's mostly internal conflicts with OCD.

Can we just take this post, frame it, put it up on the OP and just put a big border all around it that flashes: This is exactly what is wrong with our understanding of mental health today?

"I like weed" "I don't like OCD meds" "Weed works best!" "OCD meds don't work "

Could really just end the topic on that. Pats on the back all around for re-verifying confirmation bias and placebo effect in the same topic?

[Weiing]

Who the fuck said I self-diagnosed my OCD? I've been to doctors and they've said the same thing, even my father has OCD and it's completely obvious I have it. I don't self medicate with Marijuana either, I smoke it because I like to get high.. but it does help.. more then other meds I've taken at least. I've even seen therapists and yeah they helped but it's mostly internal conflicts with OCD.

Apparently you haven't been to good therapists if they haven't helped you with your anxiety that stem from your internal issues that bring about your obsessive compulsive behavior. You like using marijuana because you like to get high? and because you like the fact that it temporarily relieves whatever anxiety issues you have? It may make you feel good and you might like it, but it's still self-medication.

@Byrth
Even if those spurious variables were controlled in the initial studies, they should have been at least mentioned in the meta-analysis.

But it's ok, I guess research on medicine in order for the companies to sell that medication is different from the research I typically read and is drastically different from my field.

[OWS_Tonx]

A woman I know was addicted to meth during her pregnancy. Thankfully her kid isn't too messed up, but he has pretty bad adhd. She told me the docs give him small doses of meth or some chemical or someshit in it that calms him when ever they check up every so often. I honestly don't know how much of it is true, but she doesn't lie as far as I know. Makes the marijuana guy seem a little more real, it may relax him more than the meds.

[Tellahh]

Can we just take this post, frame it, put it up on the OP and just put a big border all around it that flashes: This is exactly what is wrong with our understanding of mental health today?

"I like weed" "I don't like OCD meds" "Weed works best!" "OCD meds don't work "

Could really just end the topic on that. Pats on the back all around for re-verifying confirmation bias and placebo effect in the same topic?

Jeeze you're an asshole, I knew it was a mistake to reply to you. So your first point was that I didn't know wtf I'm talking about, but now that I reiterated you now assault my own intelligence or that I can even analyze myself. God forbid people have their own opinions aside from yours.

Inb4 some more "I'm right, you're wrong" rants.

[BerenTebogo]

A woman I know was addicted to meth during her pregnancy. Thankfully her kid isn't too messed up, but he has pretty bad adhd. She told me the docs give him small doses of meth or some chemical or someshit in it that calms him when ever they check up every so often. I honestly don't know how much of it is true, but she doesn't lie as far as I know. Makes the marijuana guy seem a little more real, it may relax him more than the meds.

Ritalin, Adderal, Dexatrin, etc are methamphetamine drugs. They are not, in any way, related to crystal meth. Bitch is dumb.

Jeeze you're an asshole, I knew it was a mistake to reply to you. So your first point was that I didn't know wtf I'm talking about, but now that I reiterated you now assault my own intelligence or that I can even analyze myself. God forbid people have their own opinions aside from yours.

Doctor diagnosed me with brain cancer, but I just drank this Pepsi and man, it felt fucking good. I think I'll just keep drinking this Pepsi because it makes me feel way better than Chemotherapy does. S'aaaaaaalright.

[Byrthnoth]

A woman I know was addicted to meth during her pregnancy. Thankfully her kid isn't too messed up, but he has pretty bad adhd. She told me the docs give him small doses of meth or some chemical or someshit in it that calms him when ever they check up every so often. I honestly don't know how much of it is true, but she doesn't lie as far as I know. Makes the marijuana guy seem a little more real, it may relax him more than the meds.

She might be a little confused. They have to give meth or heroin addicted babies maintenance doses while post-birth to alleviate withdrawal. I don't know what the long-term strategy for meth baby treatment is, but it's probably not still meth if he's an older child.

[Effluo]

I love my Prozac!!

People don't like me without my prozac...

[OWS_Tonx]

She might be a little confused. They have to give meth or heroin addicted babies maintenance doses while post-birth to alleviate withdrawal. I don't know what the long-term strategy for meth baby treatment is, but it's probably not still meth if he's an older child.

The kid is about 8 I think. She told me this was before, I don't know how long ago or if it still happens. I'm just saying marijuana guy does make sense. Not saying marijuana makes his OCD any better, but if it kinda relieves it for the time it's whatever.

[BerenTebogo]

The kid is about 8 I think. She told me this was before, I don't know how long ago or if it still happens. I'm just saying marijuana guy does make sense. Not saying marijuana makes his OCD any better, but if it kinda relieves it for the time it's whatever.

Of course weed relaxes him, lol. That's the entire reason people pay money to smoke it. Not claiming that it doesn't help just admiring the vast stupidity of the situation.

Basically, cocaine is the world's best ADHD drug. If you legitimately had ADHD, cocaine will help you more than Adderall or Ritalin will. Does that mean that everyone should spurn sound medical advice in favor of doing a few lines? No, it's fucking stupid and illegal.

Heroin is a fantastic painkiller. Alcohol is a fantastic treatment for the manic side of manic-depressive disorder. On and on and on.

I hate that I have to spell out why self-medicating with illegal, unregulated, and potentially horribly unsafe narcotics is fucking stupid.

[Tellahh]

I'm still wondering where I said weed 100% cures me. I said it "helps"... "HELPS"... more so then other prescriptions I've taken. You're now jumping at outrageous analogies to try and prove me wrong even further. OCD to cancer? Smoking weed to shooting smack?

Could you possibly try any harder?

[OWS_Tonx]

I kind of agree with both of you. Weed isn't no where near coke or heroine. Self medication is dangerous, I'm not saying that it isn't. And I do doubt that marijuana helps more than the meds, weed just mellows you out more than them

[Weiing]

I don't know where he even said that weed cures your OCD.

Yes, marijuana may help with it...but it's still self-medication however you want to look at it. How? You even say it's better than the prescriptions you've taken. I'm assuming they were mainly anti-anxiety drugs? However, it's still self-medication and it can still be dangerous and ineffective in actually mediating your obsessive compulsive behavior if you aren't being consistently regulated. Perhaps the meds you were on before were ineffective because of the lack of the other, more important, component with OCD: therapy in conjunction with your doctors not really monitoring/regulating your medication intake.

Like I said before--perhaps find a better therapist that will actually help you. Perhaps CBT?

[BerenTebogo]

I'm still wondering where I said weed 100% cures me. I said it "helps"... "HELPS"... more so then other prescriptions I've taken. You're now jumping at outrageous analogies to try and prove me wrong even further. OCD to cancer? Smoking weed to shooting smack?

Could you possibly try any harder?

Doctor diagnosed me with brain cancer, but I just drank this Pepsi and man, it felt fucking good. I think I'll just keep drinking this Pepsi because it makes me feel way better than Chemotherapy does. S'aaaaaaalright.

You self-medicate with illegal narcotics and are a fucking idiot who lacks reading comprehension skills.

I wonder if the two are related?

[zoobernut]

Doctor diagnosed me with brain cancer, but I just drank this Pepsi and man, it felt fucking good. I think I'll just keep drinking this Pepsi because it makes me feel way better than Chemotherapy does. S'aaaaaaalright.

Sath I completely agree with where you are coming from and I agree self medicating isn't a smart path to go down. But I don't think this is a fair analogy because you are comparing a terminal illness with a disorder (or however you want to categorize it) that is not life threatening in the immediate sense and any sort of treatment is there to make life easier and more comfortable.

And often times there isn't one set drug for treating a mental disorder and the doctors will ask you try one and see how it makes you feel and if you don't like it they will keep prescribing different ones until you find one that you like and works for you.