Counsellors and therapists

You must have read that on a label or website. In reality, most of the side effects will go away rather quickly. The reduced sex drive is more of a scare issue one as it really isn't like one doesn't want to have sex anymore. *yawn* Same for the suicide attempts. Serious side effects are so few and far between that they aren't a reason not to try meds if one needs them. To use it as an argument why the side effects would prevent true therapy is beyond ridiculous.


Talking about crap is an even more frustrating endevour and has too often lead to suicide. **** off with your naive talk sessions.

Psychiatrists aren't likely to spend oodles of time on your childhood. Psychologists are.


Yes it is. An alcoholic has no control over his/her illness - thus he is an alcoholic. Boozing too much on the weekend is obviously different, fyi. Draw up your whiney comparison with the little child, then look at the parent who has lost custody over their little child and you still think they are in control?

Here: http://www.medicinenet.com/alcohol_a...sm/article.htm


Is alcoholism a disease?

Yes, alcoholism is a disease.

Straight from Medicinenet.com


Perhaps they are in your country. Over here they want to talk about early memories and read shit into nothingness to be able to write little notes in a notebook. Then, they'll give you breathing exercises. It's actually funny when you look at it in a third person type scenario ....



I do have very serious issues with people who make meds out to be unnecessary and evil and thereby continue the view of people who have neither been to therapy nor taken any medications of those who need both or either to be 'wrong'. People who need help are having such a hard time to begin with as taking that first step often is an unsurmountable one. To ridicule any aspect of it is criminal in my mind.

Yes I have big issues with that.

Somehow that quote is a classic

In my case, it was my husband that had the problem - but if you are married and care about each other - it becomes a problem for both of you to solve.

We had spent so much time in college in a very grueling, intense engineering program and it was coming to an end. My husband started feeling that he wasn't qualified to go out in the "real world" and work as an engineer. No amount of talking that I did made any difference. I even had him talk to a few professors which didn't help either. Part of the problem was that he was a stellar student - he graduated Berkeley with honors. Starting at a new job terrified him. It finally got so bad that he was going to drop out before he actually finished his Master's degree

That's when I said - bullshit (in my nice gentle way LOL) - we need to talk to someone. I got a referral from another engineer and it didn't take very many visits actually. He finally realized that he he had never thought he could do as well as he had - and then he was afraid of not being able to live up to future expectations. I thinks it's a fear many people have when graduating in fields with a lot of liability involved. Doctors think they will kill their first patients and as engineers we are responsible for peoples lives when we design bridges and buildings. It can be quite daunting.

Now he looks back on it and laughs, but at the time it was almost paralyzing fear. The therapist was the one who helped though. I was his wife so he figured I'd say he did a good job because I loved him. The therapist was a third party with no investment in the problem and was just what was needed at the time.

She was a psychologist not a psychiatrist if that makes any difference. At no time did she prescribe drugs of any sort - despite the fact that it was Berkeley in the seventies

Kathleen

Spunky, firstly you've obviously confused as to the difference between psychologists and psychiatrists. Psychiatrists are all about psychoanalysis; going back through your early life and reliving your painful experiences to learn from them in order to help your problems in the present. Personally I think it's a crock of shit because understand why your depressed doesn't change anything and if you drepressed now, reliving all the awful things in your life isn't likely to make you any happier. They are the who use medication primarilly.

Psychologists are more concerned with focusing on the present and helping a person gain the tools necessary to get their life where they want it to be. You'll likely spend years in a psychiatrists office whil you'll likely spend weeks and months in a psychologists office. They do use medication but very sparingly, and only when obviously needed.

And nobody I know, and certainly not me, ridicules anybody for using medication, it's just a concern for a paitents well being, ie, not medicating somebody unnecessarilly and treating the cause, not the symptom.

Butters, I think you're confused. The difference between a psychologist and a psychiatrist is that a psychiatrist has a Medical Degree and a specialization in psychiatry. A psychologist either has a Master's Degree or a Doctorate of Philosophy with no medical license. They can perform research, testing, or therapy. They can not practice medicine.

Psychiatrists and psychologists vary in their methods and their philosophies. You're really doing a disservice by defining the two as you have. Either practitioner may use psychoanalysis, behavior modification, reality therapy, Christian counseling, psychometric diagnostic methods, etc. You can not say that a psychiatrist does "this" and a psychologist does "that" because methods can be vastly different between any two people.

They can prescribe medication, for sure, at least in this part of the world and I'm 99% certain in the US too.

Well obviously, but in the most basic sense psychiatrists (in a theraputic setting) focus on psychoanalysis and all that childhood stuff Spunkywho was talking about whereas psychologists use tools such as cognitive-behavioral and interpersonal psychotherapy and hypnosis (to name just a few) to treat patients.

Go with the 1% uncertainty, Butters.


California Board of Psychology Statement on Medication:

http://www.psychboard.ca.gov/medicate.htm

The policy will be the same throughout the USA because it will be dictated by the American Medical Association and the American Psychological Association.

I, personally, would NOT want to accept a prescription for medication from someone without a medical degree. But I'm crazy like that.

I have two degrees in psychology. I find your narrow views and blanket statements to be very misleading. If you love the field of psychology so much, then get your information correct. There are very different schools of thought among both psychologists and psychiatrists. Your generalizations are far too simplistic.

And, in the real world, even though a psychologist may be informed about medications, professional responsiblity and professional courtesy dictate that you do not tell a medical doctor how to do his job if you want to maintain a good working relationship with that doctor. They have the medical degree for a reason and accept referrals. They would be remiss if they did not examine the patient and come to their own conclusions for the best medical course to take. "The guy without a medical degree told me to prescribe this" would not hold up well in a malpractice lawsuit.

Thanks for the clarification, Becky.

I'd go one step further on the prescribing of meds: If they are to help with any mental 'issues', I'd like a psychiatrist to prescribe them and monitor the progress. Not just my general family practitioner.

I actually find it a bit scary that class 2 medications (like narcotic type drugs) can be prescribed after a quick diagnosis by a pediatrition to children who then might stay on that drug for the remainder of their lives. I would like to think that those type drugs (aside from the better painkillers if necessary) should be prescribed after evaluation by a psychiatrist as the patient is likely to stay on the medication for a long long time if not forever.

You say my definitions are too narrow yet I never attempted to clearly and exactly define the difference between the two, and exactly what the two do. I was attempting to simply give the briefest and most basic explanation, which I evidently did.

So lets bring this back to where it started from. Psychiatrists are as you rightly said medical doctors. They are certified and specialise in treating mental illness using the biomedical approach to mental disorders including the use of medications. They may also go through a significant amount of training to conduct psychotherapy/CBT, however psychologists and clinical psychologists specialise in the research and clinical application of these techniques. The amount of training a psychiatrist holds in providing these types of therapies varies from program to program and also differs greatly based upon region. The most common approach amoung psychiatrists is psychoanalysis.

A medical professional must evaluate the patient for any medical problems or diseases that may be the cause of the mental illness. Historically psychiatrists have been the only mental health professional with the authority to prescribe medication to treat specific types of mental illness. However, in certain regions, Physician Assistants, psychiatric nurses, and psychologists may also have the authorization to prescribe such medications. This is certainly true in the UK where I know for certain forensic psychologists can prescribe medication.

A psychologist is a scientist/clinician who studies psychology; the systematic investigation of the human behaviour and mental processes.

I have already stated that an illness such as depression is not caused by a randomly occuring chemical imbalance, rather the chemical imbalance is the expected and obvious result of the behavioural and mental processes of an individual, therefore to treat the illness with meidcation (the psychiatric approach) is simply to treat the symptoms and to use the psychological approach is to treat the problem. That doesn't mean medication isn't or shouldn't be used to treat a person who is depressing, it simply means medication in and of itself will not solve the root problem.

well the first step in quitiing is admitting youre wrong and all that shit


but still if you cant decide for yourself whatsthe point in payin some retard in tryin to make you see things diffeently

if you want to change you will

if you dont wanna change but want to fork out shit loads go and see a psychiatrist

@ butters: 1) if it's true that ANYONE ELSE BUT MD's are allowed to PRESCRIBE ANY kind of drugs (except homeopathics or OTC's- but you can hardly call this "prescribe" for it's available for everyone) in the UK then i'm really glad NOT to live there; in austria in psychiatric clinics the doctor prescribes and the nurse sometimes (illegaly) alters the dose- this is mostly justified as the nurses know the patients in 80% of the cases better than the doc. but nearly everytime this happens the nurse tells the doc.

2) psychoanalysis is not the most common form of therapy in "casual" psychiatric patients- at least not in austria; it's far too expensive and it takes far too much time. psychoanalysis has become kind of luxus for rich big-city neurotics here. and moreover: a "normal" psychiatrist is NO psychotherapist!!!! i don't know about the other countries but here psychotherapy is not included in the psychiatric curriculum- so only half of our psychiatrists have a psychotherapy degree.

3. MD's are trained to have a look at the patient from the BPS (biological, psychological, social) point of view.

4. antidepressants don't cure the root of depression but they help a lot.

@ spunky: if my child (i have none i confess ) will ever get described psychopharmaca i think it's my duty to get at least 3 different oppinions from specialists. after this the decision shouldbe easier. and you can't say "this kind of doctor is only allowed to prescribe these kinda drugs" cause we all would go bananas.... it's our responsibility to judge as best we can and in case we see that we're heading nowhere cause we can't deal with a certain illness etc. then it's our duty to send the patient to a specialist. no doc should do anything undeliberately.

@ gaz: "if you wanna change- you will" nope. at least not regarding psychiatric diseases. a guy with an acute psychosis doesn't choose to do what he's doing, a guy with a bipolar affection doesn't choose to be happy or sad, a guy with schizophrenia doesn't just say that he sees virgin mary or little red riding hood cause he wants to get attention. there's no other way for them. and they're not sick bastards- they're real ill persons; and when you see only one depressive in a bed being prepared for an ECT (electroconvulsive therapy) then you'll realise that this guy is not just "in a bad mood". they're ill and they need professional treatment- be it from a MD, psychologist, or whatever.