Anyone else entirely overwhelmed by the state of the planet?

@daveshaw I am 76, and I feel the same way you do. I never imagined this would be the state of our country. I hope your son has gotten through his mental health crisis, and we will end our country's crisis on November 5.

I am so happy to get your reply and I also hate to cook. My wife who was a gourmet cook passed away and truth be told my new partner tries but I was spoiled.
I was expecting quite a bit of hate mail.
My wife is not doing well and in this case we are dealing with genetics. My mother was depressed her whole life and self medicated with alcohol. You can imagine how that turned out.
What is happening to my son is breaking my heart. He is a loving father of two boys with a wife that adores him. He graduated from college with honors and they graduated from law school.
He didn’t like practicing law and applied to be a diplomat which he has been doing for quite a few years.
He was taking a very small dose of Lexapro and I think it just stopped working. He had a nervous breakdown which they now call a mental health crisis. Long story short he couldn’t function in a job he could previously do in his slip. They shipped him from Malaysia to DC where he is in a program. He is now taking Zoloft which as you probably know takes 6-8 weeks to start working.
I pray every day that he will get better.
My frustration comes from reading the Mayo Clinic site where people are always trying to get off their medications. My medications saved my life and my hope is they save his.
I worry about our country and like you I am hoping for a miracle November 3rd.
Let’s keep our fingers crossed 🤞

@daveshaw I should have proof read what I typed. Oh well.
Good luck to you and everyone out there that suffers from this terrible disease. That is what it is plain and simple. Thank goodness the stigma is lifting and people can now get the help they so desperately need.

@daveshaw Dave, we share more than I would have thought. My late husband of 40 years was a superb cook and baker, so I never had to cook once we married. He not only was great at it, but he loved doing it. The only reason I used that moniker here is because three years after he died, I received diagnoses of type 2 diabetes and chronic kidney disease, both of which require special diets. And, it's difficult for people to understand what a problem that is for me, because although I am used to eating wonderful meals, I have no interest in menu planning and cooking. However, since I need to eat that way now, I'm trying to change, which isn't easy.

In terms of your son, I am so very sorry. Actually, I have suffered from depression--on and off--since I was a frosh at college in 1968. It's a long story, but at some point I had two episodes annually, which lasted ten days each, and they didn't affect my working life. When I was 43, I received a diagnosis, and started taking different medications, none of which, but Zoloft, were effective, and the entire thing was a nightmare. But, it was decades ago, and I don't remember the particulars.

Finally, thirty years ago, a psychiatrist prescribed Adderall, which gets me out of bed in the morning, but isn't an antidepressant, and Lexapro if my mood gets worse. I've taken it on and off for years, and take 5 mg. in the morning with the Adderall, when I awaken.

Getting off medications was never a big deal, for me because they weren't very effective. But, I always titrated down under the supervision of a psychiatrist. And, I have read that some medications stop working for people. In my case, they always started working more quickly than 6-8 weeks. But, in retrospect, there never seemed to be a lot of thought about why they prescribed what they did.

Dave, obviously I don't know what you son's situation is, and what kind of program he's in. If you want to share more, you can send me a private message if you'd prefer, or let it go at this. It's up to you. FYI...I don't check this site every day, but I'll try to respond as soon as I read it.

I never was hospitalized, and I don't know what a "nervous breakdown" or "mental health crisis," means these days. It's also not clear whether the current political situation would have added to his stress. In the old days, psychiatrists offered therapy when a person was on medication. Nowadays, it seems like they mostly just prescribe medication. I imagine it's also important, whether he had symptoms before his breakdown, and just wasn't able to get help, or didn't feel comfortable asking for it, because of his job.

For some people, talk therapy is effective. For others, it may not be. What I do know is how incredibly awful it feels, when a person is depressed, and just feels worse and worse, and can't get the help they need. He just needs to know that he is not alone. In his darkest hours, he also needs to know that he will get better, and you need to know that as well. There are many different options that he and you may or may not be aware of. But, sometimes, nothing seems to work, until the medication kicks in, and then everything changes.

Take care!
Susan

@hatetocook So pleasant hearing back from you. My wife died from complications caused by her type 2 diabetes. My son actually gave her a kidney when hers were failing. Unfortunately her diabetes was something she ignored and even after the kidney transplant she continued making bad life choices.
As I said I inherited my depression from my mother and had some dark times until I finally got it under control.
Being in commission sales my whole career didn’t help but I was good at it and it provided me with a good income.
Retirement agrees with me and I have been fortunate.
I only hope the same for my son. He is brilliant and didn’t deserve this disease.
I can only hope medication helps him like it helped me.
You are right that psychiatrist used to be totally different when I was going through this and I had a great one. Now they just prescribe medication without really getting to know their patients.
I get up every morning hoping he is getting better because no one wants a child to die before they do.
You sound like a delightful person.
Only the best to you. You sound like you had a great marriage.

I am out here and you are not alone. Just be lucky there are drugs you can take to help you overcome this terrible disease.
SSRI’s have changed my life and at 75 I have my depression under control.
You can as well.
Good luck to you. At least you don’t have to live in America at this time in history. Hopefully things will turn around with our elections coming up soon.

@daveshaw Thanks Dave. I am enjoying our exchange as well. And, you sound like a warm and loving father...two qualities my late husband (Yes, I had a wonderful marriage) and father shared, which I couldn't have lived without. I was loved unconditionally by my parents and my husband, and I truly feel I blessed.

I was hoping that given my experience with depression, there is some information I could share, which would be helpful. I evidently didn't understand your comment about your mother's depression. I thought you wrote that your son had it in his DNA. I didn't realize that you had it as well, and have been able to manage it with drugs and a wonderful psychiatrist.

Your son sounds like a very special person. It's extraordinary that he would donate his kidney to his mother.

Even if he is is suicidal (I know you didn't write that he is, but it would be the only reason I can think of that you're so worried about his death in the hospital, I'm hoping he is getting the care he needs, and you feel he is safe there. I can only assume that his wife and your two grandsons have returned, and she is overseeing all of this.

I wish you, your son, and both of your family's my very best wishes. Given that my medication hasn't worked nearly as well as yours has, I know that it's like to spiral downward. But when you are loved as much as I have been, and I am sure he has been too, I know that I was always able to find a reason to hang on. And, then when the medication kicks in...it's difficult to believe that things were were ever that bleak.

Dave, stay in touch, and let me know how things are going. I'm sending viral hugs to all of you!
Susan

@hatetocook I have enjoyed our exchange as well. My mother had severe depression all of her life but medicated with alcohol and my father enabled her behavior. It made for a rough childhood.
Unfortunately I inherited my mother’s depression and my son inherited it from me.
He is hanging in there waiting for his medication to kick in. He is upping the dosage and hopefully it will start to work. Anyone that doesn’t believe SSRI’s don’t work for depression hasn’t never really suffered from it.
I have stayed with Zoloft,Buspar and Wellbutrin along with Clonazepam and as my Primary Care Physician says at age 75 if it is not broke don’t fix it.
I expected a lot of negative feedback because of my strong belief in SSRI’s and my use of Clonazepam. I have been taking Clonazepam for over thirty years and have never increased my dosage. Yes it is addictive and hard to stop taking but there are a lot of things that are addictive and hard to stop taking.
I wish you well.

@daveshaw Hi Dave, I just spent hours writing you a lengthy response and lost it. I'll get back to you tomorrow.

@daveshaw Hi Dave. I reread what you wrote, and yes, your childhood sounds tough. You had to deal with a situation that one hopes most children don’t. You wrote that “unfortunately, you inherited your mother’s depression and your son inherited it from you.”

I truly understand why you feel that way, but there is nothing you can do about it now. While I didn’t inherit my depression from my mother, I still have it, and my son has inherited it from me. And, I feel a lot of guilt about that, but I was the best mother I knew how to be, and both your son and mine inherited other things in our DNA.

You were able to find a good psychiatrist for yourself, who recommended drugs that worked, and he hopefully helped you manage your condition. You achieved financial success in your career, whether you liked it or not, and that is a real achievement. It enabled you to provide a stable financial environment in which your son grew up. It’s clear how much you love him, and I’m assuming he knows that.

I’m fairly sure, we both made mistakes; all parents do. Hopefully we did the best we could at the time. And, if we didn't, we can't change the past, but we can change the present. At this stage in our lives, our children are adults, and are responsible for their own lives, unless they allow us to help.

You said your son is an attorney, but he chose not to practice, and pursued another career, which I’m assuming he has enjoyed. He’s married to a woman who dearly loves him, and I would guess he feels the same way. You wrote that they have two sons, whom I am assuming they adore. For most people, life doesn’t get better than that.

I want to say outright: "It’s not your fault that your son had a “mental health crisis.” He lived across the world, and he and your daughter-in-law had to know what was going on, and must have decided how to deal with it. Sometimes, we make a plan that doesn’t work. Other times, we try and cope with a difficult situation by ourselves, when we needed to ask for help. Whatever happened, I’m assuming it was their decision, not yours.

You seem to be concerned about people’s reaction to the medication you took, but since it worked for you, I don’t think you have to defend it. Those of us who have experienced severe depressions, did what we needed to do to survive. It worked for you: It didn’t work for me, so I spent decades researching other options, and trying outside of the box solutions, many of which also didn’t work. But, I never stopped trying, and neither did you.

If you need to know, what kind of help he’s getting in the hospital, it depends on where he is, which is an issue that can be fixed.

While I don’t know about it from personal experience, my research suggests that if he is suicidal (and I don’t know if that’s the case), there is supposed to be a “continuous line of sight.” It could range from staff checking of him physically every 15 minutes, to having a staff member sit in the room with him 24/7 (known as “one-to-one observation.)

But, in order to get that kind of help, they’d have to know he’s having those kind of thoughts. I was concerned when you wrote that “he is upping his medication.” We both know that isn’t something you decide for yourself. He should be in a hospital in which he has an excellent team of doctors and staff members taking care of him.

Because, during a “breakdown” or mental health crisis, the purpose of the staff, is to “hold the line for him,” if he can’t do it for himself. They are supposed to keep him physically safe while his brain chemistry stabilizes, whether that takes a few weeks for the Zoloft to kick in or they have to “pivot to rapid-acting treatments.”

Independent of how "brilliant he is," we both know he shouldn't be making these decisions himself. And, he shouldn't be sitting and waiting for the medication to kick it, without having of team of people who are evaluating him, determining how he is feeling, and what they can do to improve his situation. If it was my son, I’d want to insure that’s the kind of help he's getting. If he's not, then you need to decide what to do about it.

Dave, given how little I know, that's my advice. I don't have the personality to beat around the bush. I also am well aware that at the worst moments of a depressive episode, your son needs the best medical help that he and you can afford.