Posted by SLS on December 31, 2012, at 23:56:35
In reply to Therapy and meds as a package, posted by Meltingpot on December 30, 2012, at 16:57:42
You ask great questions.
For many people, it was chronic psychosocial stress that forced the biological system into a state of dysregulation that later manifested as depression and anxiety. If those stresses (depressive pressure) remain unresolved, drug treatments might not produce long-lasting results. Psychotherapy can address those unresolved issues that may be allowing for the psychopathology to persist.
Psychotherapy might not be useful to you at all.
I like very much what Emme_V2 has to say.
For me, I asked for psychotherapy to:
1. Help me survive and not commit suicide during the periods in which the biological depression remained severe. I was helped by using coping strategies like CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) and IPT (interpersonal therapy).
2. Resolve as many psychological issues as possible in advance of finding a successful biological treatment so that I would be more responsive that treatment and give remission every chance of continuing long-term.
3. Clean up the psychological debris left in the wake of the destruction of one's psyche by chronic depressive thinking.
Depression itself is stressful to the system. The stress > depression > stress > depression cycle becomes very much entrenched into the psychobiology of someone with a chronic depressive disorder. It is a very destructive and self-reinforcing feedback loop. Depression makes people depressed.
Denise, you are extraordinarily resilient. I would not discourage you from seeking psychotherapeutic treatment, but I have no reason to believe that it is essential for you to attain remission.
- ScottSome see things as they are and ask why.
I dream of things that never were and ask why not.- George Bernard Shaw
poster:SLS
thread:1034236
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20121231/msgs/1034331.html