Posted by madeline on March 19, 2007, at 5:03:03
In reply to Marijuana triggered my dysthymia, posted by don1000 on March 18, 2007, at 0:02:45
Welcome to Babble Don!
You know, I just attended a grand rounds seminar given by the head of psychiatry/neurology at the university where I work.
It was entitled "Einstein's theory and the brain" To make a long story short, the crux of the lecture was that Everything in the brain is relative - entirely context based.
A sober person's brain will interpret things one way, while a person on LSD (for example) will perceive things entirely differently. Once the LSD is gone, the perception goes back to "normal"
Sometimes, however, the shift in perception becomes permanent. Depression, he noted, was the typical case. At first, there is a stimulus to the brain to become depressed, in some people when this stimulus is removed and processed, the brain snaps back to the "normal" state.
In others, the brain "appears" to snap back, but the context of the brain is forever altered. Another stimulus - no matter how innocuous - sends the brain right back into depression.
I also think that this explains why people experience worsening depression through their life and why we often feel as though depression just "comes on" for no apparent reason. Our brains just keep getting a signal to fall into depression.
I think it is entirely resonable that single joint could have completely changed the context of your brain and predisposed you to depression.
You are not the first person I have run across that has experienced this after a single experince with drugs. I also think some presciption drugs do this as well.
Maddie
poster:madeline
thread:741899
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20070305/msgs/742073.html