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mkeath 's review for:
Lost Connections: Why You're Depressed and How to Find Hope
by Johann Hari
BIG disclaimer: I read the whole book with a grain of salt, because Hari is clearly influenced by his own personal experience, so I wouldn't take this to be an answer for everyone. Especially since it seems some people have benefited hugely from antidepressants.
I didn't think that Hari's "solutions" to depression were all that unexpected. Meaningful work/purpose, good community, and time in nature are all fairly obvious things that people have talked about. What was interesting to me was how Hari's description of the FDA and the sketchy process for how drugs get approved (scary!), and how we've potentially swung too far to the side of treating depression and anxiety as a physical problem totally disconnected from any of our real life experiences, and only treatable with medication. When in many cases, there is a trigger that causes the depression/anxiety. It is still true that depression is an imbalance of brain chemicals, but in many cases there are life circumstances which created the imbalance. Perhaps by telling people that they were just "born this way" makes them feel better, but it eliminates any incentive or hope for trying to get to the root cause. Just because you are genetically predisposed for something does not mean you can't work hard to solve the issue. I wonder if there is a way to remove the stigma around mental health, while still trying our best to use medication as a last resort, not the first solution.
I didn't think that Hari's "solutions" to depression were all that unexpected. Meaningful work/purpose, good community, and time in nature are all fairly obvious things that people have talked about. What was interesting to me was how Hari's description of the FDA and the sketchy process for how drugs get approved (scary!), and how we've potentially swung too far to the side of treating depression and anxiety as a physical problem totally disconnected from any of our real life experiences, and only treatable with medication. When in many cases, there is a trigger that causes the depression/anxiety. It is still true that depression is an imbalance of brain chemicals, but in many cases there are life circumstances which created the imbalance. Perhaps by telling people that they were just "born this way" makes them feel better, but it eliminates any incentive or hope for trying to get to the root cause. Just because you are genetically predisposed for something does not mean you can't work hard to solve the issue. I wonder if there is a way to remove the stigma around mental health, while still trying our best to use medication as a last resort, not the first solution.