Is psychiatry a science?

[guanophore]

I supposed you don't know the causes.

THere are many factors involved in bipolar disorder. I know many of them.

  I'm not angry,

I apologize if I misunderstood. Your posts come across angry because accusing others is an angry thing to do. Satan is the “accuser” and when we fall into that blame game he loves to drag us into negativity.

I think if you took Jesus to a psychiatry “doctor” he would find many, so many mental illnesses.

I have no doubt.

But that alone should serve to alleviate your frustration. You know that psychiatry is not perfect.

 He Jesus got angry sometimes but this is NOT about me or you(ad hominem) this about TRUTH and If I get angry I calm down I don't need drugs and I don't have a bipolar disorder It was my example

Some people do need medication to calm down. Most of them need it because they have never learned how to calm themselves down. I am glad you don’t have bipolar disorder, but you still don’t seem to understand the objective criteria that are used for a diagnosis. Maybe some day you will be able to calm down enough to study these?

Glaucoma and retinal detachment are physical problems, not mental disorders. Totally different. Not even close to a good comparison.

Actually it is a perfect comparison. They are conditions that are diagnosed after an exam (like mental disorders) that do not have any kind of blood or other lab tests.

Robin Williams committed suicide. What good were all the drugs they gave him?

That was a hard blow. I miss him!

We will never know about the medications. I am not sure what he took, if anything, but I do know he had a long and productive career, which is what most people with mental illnesses can have with appropriate treatment.

I think that you and I agree that medicines are not enough, and that souls need healing of other kinds also. Perhaps he was lacking the faith that you have, which seems to keep you going.

 you think? In fact psychiatrists don't know the mental illness causes, a big deal.They just have theories

It is true there are many theories, and more than one can sufficiently explain the evidence. We know a lot more about the brain and mental illness than we did 50 years ago, or even 35, and more discoveries are being made from the research.

Can you trust doctor who doesn’t know what causes any mental illness? they’re blind.

You sound like you have trust issues with psychiatrists, and your statements sound like you are hurt/angry.

A person who cares and is trying to help is better than none, and even groping around in the dark to try to find relief for a person is better than locking them up somewhere. You seem to have assigned malicious motives to psychiatrists for not knowing everything you want them to know.

I don’t deny mental illnesses I reject psychiatry because it isn’t science it pretend to be one.

I guess it is a personal problem. I will pray for you.

I used to think that happiness came from God/Jesus but now I see that we say to unhappy people that they need drugs not Jesus, evangelicals put Jesus first and they allow to Holy Spirit doing His work. I love science, a good one.:console:

You sound very confused.

What you think is just what you think. What evidence do you have? A doctor can look into a person’s eyes and see a detached retina or glaucoma - can a doctor look into a person’s eyes and see mental illness? I don’t think so.

In a manner of speaking, yes!

"The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. 23"But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!…Matthew 6:15

 

[guanophore]

Congrats! However I am not entirely sure I like the implicit suggestion of being a Luddite.

I am afraid you lost me there.

My loved ones are not guinea pigs to be told that the medications may have unwanted side effects.

The law requires that persons be given information about the side effects so that people can make an informed choice. All this info is available for free on the web and at the pharmacy. People who don’t want to risk the side effects don’t have to fill their prescription, or if they fill it, don’t have to take it.

And from what I have seen, that is an understatement. A good part of science is about updating your information and theories based on new empirical evidence. And that is what I am doing.

 

[CatholicSheila]

What’s your point? there are some transgenders who might say to you that they’re happy and they will say to you the transgender transition got it right for them.

My point? You said psychiatry ‘never’ works. Anyone who knew me 6 years ago and knows me today will tell you that it ‘worked’ for me. The difference between then and now are amazing. 6 years ago I was declared (by the government) that I was disabled and unable to work and it wasn’t just because my doctor said so. My doctor stated what my diagnosis was but I still had to (or rather the people in my life had to) demonstrate that I was incapable of work. Now, after years of therapy, I am holding down a full time job and have for 4 years. I can interact with people (I was almost non-verbal at my worst) Non-functional to contributing member of society. How can you dismiss that? If that isn’t proof that psychiatry can get it right, then what is?

You’ve set this up so you cannot be proven wrong. The moment someone shows they have been helped with a psychiatric illness you claim they can’t be trusted… just because you say so. You don’t want a conversation. You just want to rant.

second I think people who support Psychiatry are ignoring importan questions: Is yes or not mental illness caused by chemical unbalance?

Perhaps you should find out more about psychiatry and different mental illnesses before you start discussing it. I have already mentioned my primary diagnosis is Borderline Personality Disorder (or at least I mentioned Dialectical behaviour therapy which is the treatment for Borderline). Is Borderline caused by a chemical imbalance? No it’s not. That’s why it can not be treated by medication. Medication can be used to help minimise some symptoms of it, but it can not be used to treat the cause in any way shape or form. The only remotely successful treatment is therapy. Rather intensive therapy for best results.

I will also dispute that doctors never know what causes mental illness. My doctors can tell me what caused my borderline. That’s rather easy actually.

They need Jesus much more than drugs and psychiatrists. You are on the right track.

I find this incredibly offensive. Perhaps I am reading too much into it, but to me you are insinuating that those who have mental illness either a) don’t have any relationship with Jesus at all or b) do not have a strong enough relationship with Jesus. If they did, then they wouldn’t have mental health issues.

I have a God who heals. Sometimes he uses Doctors. I’d go so far as to say that when it comes to medical problems (and mental illness is in the medical field) that he primarily uses doctors to work his miracles. As Papa Francis said a few years back “God doesn’t have a magic wand”.

I’m curious, would you suggest to someone that has a cut in their leg that they just ‘need more Jesus’ and not a doctor?

And I’m still waiting your response to my earlier posts. Very enlightening that you’ve chosen to ignore it.

 

[CatholicSheila]

Thanks for your posts Sheila you are an inspiration.

On of the ways to identify bigotry/prejudice is when a person is unable to take into account the experience and testimony of others. Letting in that information would force one to shift one’s attitude, so it must be discounted somehow.

Thank you for your kind words.

It doesn’t appear that either jaimelopez or Christine777 have any real interest in discussing or learning about how psychiatry actually works. Thanks to the good work of a few (yourself included) I can hope that if anyone who is struggling reads this thread that there has been enough put forward that they are not influenced to dismiss all psychiatry as those two would wish.

I cannot really express how much it has helped me. I’m not that good with words and the change is so enormous. My doctors call me their ‘miracle patient’. My doctors were Gods answer to my parents prayers.

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Thank you for your kind words.

It doesn’t appear that either jaimelopez or Christine777 have any real interest in discussing or learning about how psychiatry actually works. Thanks to the good work of a few (yourself included) I can hope that if anyone who is struggling reads this thread that there has been enough put forward that they are not influenced to dismiss all psychiatry as those two would wish.

I cannot really express how much it has helped me. I’m not that good with words and the change is so enormous. My doctors call me their ‘miracle patient’. My doctors were Gods answer to my parents prayers.

I have a degree in psychology. Good for you if they helped you. I wonder why they call you a miracle patient. They must not help very many other patients.

 

[guanophore]

Thank you for your kind words.

It doesn’t appear that either jaimelopez or Christine777 have any real interest in discussing or learning about how psychiatry actually works. Thanks to the good work of a few (yourself included) I can hope that if anyone who is struggling reads this thread that there has been enough put forward that they are not influenced to dismiss all psychiatry as those two would wish.

I cannot really express how much it has helped me. I’m not that good with words and the change is so enormous. My doctors call me their ‘miracle patient’. My doctors were Gods answer to my parents prayers.

I have a degree in psychology. Good for you if they helped you. I wonder why they call you a miracle patient. They must not help very many other patients.

Sheila, this is an example of what I was saying about discounting the experiences of others. It is a method of blocking communication (as you correctly noted, a discussion is not being sought).

In this example there are three elements 1) a claim of expertise on the subject 2) discounting the providers 3) discounting the success of the recipient.

Denigrating the persons providing the services and denigrating the testimony of the one who benefitted are both ways of discounting the validity of another point of view.

From personal experience, you might recognize this as a common occurrance in persons with personality disorders.

It is also a frequently used defense used by addicts to avoid taking responsibility for managing their addictions.

 

[In_His_Grace]

Thank you for your kind words.

It doesn’t appear that either jaimelopez or Christine777 have any real interest in discussing or learning about how psychiatry actually works. Thanks to the good work of a few (yourself included) I can hope that if anyone who is struggling reads this thread that there has been enough put forward that they are not influenced to dismiss all psychiatry as those two would wish.

I cannot really express how much it has helped me. I’m not that good with words and the change is so enormous. My doctors call me their ‘miracle patient’. My doctors were Gods answer to my parents prayers.

God bless you.

 

[Ben_Quincy]

Thread Warning:

Be charitable and discuss the topic, not each other.

 

[Fauken]

Just to clarify some misuse of the word theory, just because something is a theory does not necessarily mean it’s untrue. From Merriam Webster:

plural the·o·ries
1
: the analysis of a set of facts in their relation to one another
2
: abstract thought : speculation
3
: the general or abstract principles of a body of fact, a science, or an art
4
a : a belief, policy, or procedure proposed or followed as the basis of action
b : an ideal or hypothetical set of facts, principles, or circumstances —often used in the phrase in theory <in theory, we have always advocated freedom for all>
5
: a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena
6
a : a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation
b : an unproved assumption : conjecture
c : a body of theorems presenting a concise systematic view of a subject

I doubt anyone here would question the theories of gravity and general/special relativity, as examples, on the basis that they are theories and are “unproven.”