The patients were randomly assigned to a combination of sertraline, an anti-depressant, and either omega-3s or a corn oil placebo. After 10 weeks, there was “absolutely no difference” in depression remission rates between the 59 patients taking omega-3s and the 56 patients taking the placebo, said Robert M. Carney, lead author of the study, which appeared in the Oct. 21 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

“It was very disappointing,” he said.

The trial was launched because patients with heart disease are at greater risk of dying if they are depressed, Dr. Carney said. Depressed patients are known to have low levels of omega-3s, which are a risk factor for heart disease, as well.

Now, with any study, there are multitudinous caveats. It’s a small sample. They had lower levels of omega-3s to begin with. Perhaps there were other factors (i.e., physical illness) that superseded the treatment of depression, yadda yadda.

And there has been other research to suggest omega-3s are useful for depression. USA Today broke down a different study in 2007:

The omega-3 fatty acid in some fish may be a “brain food” that helps ward off depression because it increases gray matter in three areas that tend to be smaller in people who have serious depression, a study suggests today.
The increase could help explain why past studies have found that the omega-3 acid DHA reduces symptoms of depression. The richest sources of DHA are fatty fish and fish-oil capsules.

Researchers gave magnetic resonance imaging tests to 55 adults. Participants also reported everything they ate for 24 hours on two randomly selected days, says study leader Sarah Conklin, a neuroscientist at University of Pittsburgh Medical School. She’ll report her findings at the American Psychosomatic Society meeting in Budapest.

The more DHA a person consumed, the more gray matter there was in three areas of the brain linked to mood: the amygdala, the hippocampus and the cingulate, Conklin says. Seriously depressed people tend to have less gray matter in these areas, she says.

For every yes in research, there’s a no. It’s really frustrating for people looking for answers. That’s why it’s best to just go with your gut: Try what feels right and if it works for you, great. If it doesn’t work for you, move on to something else. But remember: There is no magic bullet — oily or otherwise.

Madigan: They didn’t flatter you with that lighting.

David Oaks: You’re looking so handsome! I had no idea. Your eyebrows are very sexy. (I’m completely sincere.)

“But critics worry …” That’s journalism-speak for “We don’t have any specific sources who say this, but we’ll generalize it so we have reason to focus on …”

… violence. That’s what they’re focusing on. Why am I not surprised?

So of all the things they could talk about related to Mad Pride — and related to mental health — this is what they’ve come up with: criminals and violent crime. Ugh. TV is so predictable and depressing.

Okay, so now we’re telling the story of a kid with hallucinations and delusions (the CIA, yadda yadda) who KILLS HIS MOTHER? Does the average American viewer understand how fucking rare this kind of thing is? That it’s not the necessary result of deciding not to take meds?

On to the withdrawal story: Clearly, the program wasn’t looking for a success story. This poor woman who decided to do the show so they could feed off her misery — I knew that’s what they wanted. Is she doing the withdrawal in conjunction with a doctor? Who the hell knows? The show doesn’t tell you. It hardly tells you her name. And …

Oh! There it is again: “Critics worry … ” (that she’s going to be “a time bomb” without her meds). Who are these critics worrying about this girl? Frank Rich? David Denby? I’d love to know.

“Violence is unpredictable with or without drugs.” Brilliant script.

Blurry homeless images. Madigan cello-ing. … This show is so bad, it’s like a joke. I guess it all goes back to what producer Ia Robinson told me, when we discussed my being on the show: She doesn’t have any friends or family who have mental problems, so the whole topic was like “walking on the moon.” Yes, that’s the phrase she used. The show should’ve been blasted out to Mars.

Except Joey P. He’s delightful and a voice of reason.

Love,

Liz

The New York Times ran an article about Ricky Williams that I think was really well-done. It talks about his struggle with marijuana addiction, which compromised his career in the NFL, but more than that, it portrays his psychic battles and explores the way his mind works. It’s a much more nuanced piece than the type we normally see about sports stars; but equally important, it examines the life of the mind in a way that doesn’t pathologize. Ricky Williams is just Ricky Williams, an interesting, layered human being. I wish people were more often written about this way, especially people with “troubles.”

Ricky Williams Is Hoping to Heal Others, and His Image

We’ll all miss Steven so much, and I’ll say more about that later. For now, I’m wishing the best to all family and friends who are hurting. That’s what Steven really cared about in the end, though he was very passionately annoyed by knitting, as well.

Steven was often told he was anti-American. I loved his passion, and he cracked us the fuck up every day. This video was part of a series he did for PW called Steven Wells’ America, in which he took sacred cows and basically grilled them for dinner. Below, he reflects on the religiosity of an America that voted for Bush a second time (Steven was a staunch atheist). Toward the end he smiles a bit, so you know that he knows he’s being ridiculous. And that’s part of what was so cute about Steven — he’d rant, but then laugh at himself.

There’s a new Christian therapy group for men facilitated by John G. Taylor (pictured) forming that I read about on Craigslist. I have no idea if it’s good or silly or what, but I like the idea of alternative coping strategies, and I like some of the topics the group will address:

Wk 3: What is Domestic Violence?

Week 4: How to have a conversation with your mate?

Week 5 & 6: The Bible and your anger

Week 8: How build trust in relationships

Week 9: Techniques to control your anger

Week 15: When does an affair begin?

Week 16: How do we deal with our partners being more accomplished?

Week 18: How to deal with being sexually abused or being a perpetrator

Week 19: What is takes to be a responsible father

Week 20: How do you treat females are you abusive?

You should know there’s a $15 “investment” per group meeting. Also, at the end of the list of topics, the notice says: “God needs for his Sons to be prepared for warfare!” Which is odd, right? Still, here’s the info:

Meeting every 2nd & 4th Thursday)
6 -7:30pm
at
Christian Talk Therapy
2449 Golf Rd, Ste. 3, Philadelphia, PA
www.ChristianTalkTherapy.com
rsvp to 215-931-3070 or johng.taylor@yahoo.com

And I seriously think there’s something wrong with me that not only did I see The Hangover, and not only did I laugh when I saw it, but I kind of fell in love with Philly native Bradley Cooper. Dear god, I need help.

Today I found a double whammy: an article about the recession and resultant depression, which is not only concordant in terms of themes, but also rhymes. The major mental health charity organization in Britain, Mind, released a study that says that men are more prone than women to recession-related blues. Yet men are less likely to tell someone about it and get help. From BBC.com:

Paul Farmer, chief executive at Mind, said: “The recession is clearly having a detrimental impact on the nation’s mental health, but men in particular are struggling with the emotional impact.

“Being a breadwinner is something that is still crucial to the male psyche so if a man loses his job he loses a large part of his identity putting his mental wellbeing in jeopardy.

“The problem is that too many men wrongly believe that admitting mental distress makes them weak and this kind of self stigma can cost lives.”

Stephen Fry, our beloved, is supporting Mind’s campaign to educate men. One thing that’s notably different in Britain: the admirable insistence on therapy. Peter Cooper, of the British Psychological Society, was quoted as saying: “The type of help that men need includes psychotherapy but what they are also desperate for is pragmatic practical help.”

No mention of meds. Jolly well done.

Men ’suffering recession blues’

On HuffPost Karen Leland, author of Time Management in an Instant, interviewed a fitness instructor for tips on how to get people to get around the key obstacle of not having enough time to exercise. I was so excited; now I would have the key to solving the problem! Here’s the result of the interview:

Q: What is one way you help your clients get around the time obstacle?

A: By far, the easiest way to get around the time obstacle is to make your exercise the first thing you do each day. Pencil it in and schedule which mornings (i.e. Monday, Wednesday and Friday) you are going to workout. Then you need to schedule everything else around it – dropping off the kids, your hobbies etc.

Q: But what if mornings don’t work?

A: If you just can’t make mornings work, find a way to schedule it at other times. Plan for a trainer to come to your house, ride your bike to work, take a walk at lunchtime, sign up for a group exercise class in the afternoon or end of the day. The next time you take the kids to swim class, don’t just watch them take their lessons, use this as your time to workout. The time part is more manageable if you put down exactly when you are going to exercise.

Wait, that didn’t help me at all. Shit. But maybe it helps you, so voila! Now you have answers.

Not so with Effexor. I don’t even have to wonder if I’ve taken it; my body alerts me quite readily. I get really dizzy and spacey, and if I let it go till the next day, I’m essentially dysfunctional — half-asleep, half just an idiot. I’ve heard plenty of anecdotal stuff about “brain zaps,” and I’ve never had a problem with that. Just vertigo, mostly. But it’s enough discomfort that I can’t be without it. I feel like it controls me too much. It reminds me of my addiction days.

So, though I thought it helped me a couple years ago, I think I’ll move on. And if I get too depressed, I’ll just eat more candy. Um, yeah.

A&E explores the world of individuals suffering from extreme anxiety disorders, including Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Panic Disorder and Hoarding, and tells the stories of their struggles to overcome them in the new original nonfiction series “Obsessed.” The eleven episode, one-hour series debuts Monday, May 25 at 10pm ET/PT following the season premiere of the Emmy-nominated “Intervention.”

“The series sheds a light on the vast world of anxiety disorders, while offering those who suffer from these debilitating afflictions a path to recovery,” said Robert Sharenow, Senior Vice President, Nonfiction and Alternative Programming, A&E Network and BIO. “Like ‘Intervention,’ Obsessed takes an honest and unflinching look at a difficult subject, programming that has come to resonate with our viewers and that underscores the essence of our brand.”

The essence of our brand? That makes me feel icky.

Of course, the cases are very extreme, or it wouldn’t be fun:

In the series opener, Helen, a single mother of three is tormented every day by her OCD as it’s making her life a nightmare. Her anxiety was spiked when her father died in a car accident. She has extreme panic attacks while driving and she obsessively puts on her father’s bloody clothes from that fatal night. Through Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, (CBT) widely described as the most effective treatment for OCD, Helen must face her fears and try to come to terms with her father’s death and her inability to drive. Meanwhile, Scott is a germaphobe who doesn’t keep a trashcan in his house, doesn’t have any pictures on the wall, washes his hands 50 times a day and sleeps on the sofa because it takes him too long to make his bed in the morning. His OCD has caused him to be desperately alone and he must face his fears through CBT in hopes that he can have a successful relationship.

So let me amend my header, here: Coming Soon to a TV Screen Near You: People Who Are Just a Skosh Stranger Than You Could Ever Be.

Don’t answer that. I got an email from Maiken Scott, behavioral health reporter for WHYY, the PBS affiliate in Philly. She wrote:

Last year, I met with Dr. John O’Reardon, a U Penn scientist who invited me to cover a new treatment for severe depression as it develops and undergoes scientific testing. This approach is called DBS, or Deep Brain Stimulation. It is already being used successfully in the treatment of symptoms associated with Parkinson’s Disease. Dr. O’Reardon is passionate about helping people with treatment-resistant depression, and he cares deeply about his patients. Yesterday, I was in the OR at Pennsylvania Hospital, and watched the procedure. I had previously met with the patient. Her name is Tara, she is 50 and has suffered with depression for almost 40 years – we spoke at length before her surgery. I have started to file stories and we’re covering this as it develops both on air and on the web. I plan to follow her for the rest of the year, as she recovers and as scientists learn whether this treatment will bring her relief.

Sounds very interesting to me, and Maiken is a really good reporter. Check it out here.

Let’s keep adding more tips.

Right now I’m perseverating on the work of David Maialetti, staff photographer for the Daily News. I wonder, when everyone talks about the DN folding, what will happen to talented people like Maialetti.

If you’re looking for something to do, check out Maialetti’s blog and the audio slideshows on the right-hand nav. They’re awesome. I aspire to his skill, also in evidence on Philly.com’s slideshow of opening night for the Phillies.

I look at stuff like this to calm me down when I’m stressed. The world is large and beautiful, I say to myself, and full of possibility. No one thing should get me down.

There’s an interesting piece over at The Huffington Post today, which talks about waterboarding’s secret history as a “treatment” for the insane in the 1800s. As it turns out, much of what we know about the practice in those days centers around a Philly businessman of the day named Ebenezer Haskell, who worked in Old City and was institutionalized numerous times.

And here’s an excerpt from Dan Agin’s HuffPo entry:

There are many sources that document conditions in 19th century insane asylums, but one passage in Haskell’s little book about a specific treatment is revealing. In 1867, they called it the spread-eagle cure, but these days we call it water-boarding. Ebenezer Haskell tells us the term “spread-eagle cure” was common in his time in “all asylums and prisons.” Note the conflating of asylums and prisons. More than seventy years after Benjamin Rush pushed through reforms to have mental patients kept in more humane conditions, asylums were essentially still prisons for the insane. Recall that Haskell, after each of his escapes from the Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane, was “arrested” and returned to the asylum.

The spread-eagle cure, common in 1867, reveals a few things about public attitudes towards madness. The “cure” was no cure at all, simply a procedure applied to terrorize patients–especially when they were disorderly. The patient was stripped naked, thrown on the floor on his back, and then his arms and legs each gripped by one of a team of four men. The patient’s limbs were stretched out to keep him immobilized. A fifth man, a “doctor” (more often an orderly), would then stand on a chair or table at the head of the patient and pour a series of buckets of cold water on the patient’s face until the patient nearly drowned. After the treatment, the patient was returned to his dungeon supposedly “cured” of all disease, including lunacy.

According to Haskell, the shock of the treatment often caused the death of the patient. Haskell points out (five generations before our own current familiarity with this procedure) that if a steady stream of water seven or eight feet in height falls down directly on the face of a patient, the water will have the same effect as if the patient was held under water the same number of feet for the same time, since no one can breathe when water is falling directly on the nose and mouth. “It is a shock to the nervous system,” Haskell says. He knew it, the other patients knew it, and the people who managed the asylum knew it. In 19th century American asylums and prisons, they all knew the spread-eagle cure as essentially a method of terrorizing lunatics.

Proud Moments: Philly Once Led The Charge To Waterboard The Mentally Ill

How It Was: Terror and Water-Boarding the Insane in Philadelphia

Sen. Margaret Dayton, R-Orem, and several supporters say they are not against the animals, which have a soothing affect on owners who may suffer from emotional or psychological difficulties.

But Dayton says the law needs to be rewritten to differentiate between those animals and service animals such as guide dogs, which have unique training and certification that therapeutic animals may not.

“If you have a note from a marriage counselor that says you need to have a cat with you because you’re so stressed not having a companion — that meets the [current] requirement,” Dayton said.
…
For Chyrisse Haydon of Clearfield, an 8-year-old Chihuahua-poodle mix named Gizzmo soothes her anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, which she suffers as a result of her experiences during the war in Rhodesia decades ago.

“If I don’t have him with me, I don’t leave my house,” she said.

But critics complained Tuesday about the lack of specifics on shots and training and the vagueness of the law.

At Brigham Young University, the University Accessibility Center receives about one therapy animal request per month, and most are approved.

“So long as a mental health practitioner says it would be helpful, we’re pretty much bound by that,” said director Michael Brooks.

It’s an interesting debate with all kinds of serious implications, yet I found two passages very personally meaningful:

1. “Legislators had laughed on hearing that one college student asked to bring his sugar glider, an animal that looks like a flying squirrel, to campus.”

Okay, hello? They don’t look like flying squirrels! You’re talking about my Champ, Buster and Rosie, so watch it. Does this sweet face, peeking out from a robe, look like a menacing flying squirrel? Please.

2. “Most of the requests involve dogs and cats, although hamsters have joined the list.” And what’s wrong with that? Here’s a photo of my hamster, Popcorn, thinking: Can I come with you to work? Please?