[WildRose]

I sure think it is, if it's regular and you're doing an activity you enjoy. It's excellent both for preventing low mood and for dealing with adversity day-to-day. I started running at 15 to lose weight, and I've never stopped being active. Now I take long walks, swim, do some gym workouts, lots of gardening, canoeing whenever I can - I especially love that. Anything outdoors, any time of year, especially in the sunshine. I wish I had a cure for those nasty "age" spots, though, that come with sun exposure. Oh, well, I'm not about to give up the sunshine for vanity! I could talk oodles about the benefits of exercise, but I'll spare y'all.

[Graeme]

Tracking the American Epidemic of Mental Illness

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')s a main component of the Psychopharmaceutical Industrial Complex, the so-called "patient advocacy" organizations have become the leading force behind the American epidemic of mental illness over the past two decades.

Drug makers, and their foundations, funnel millions of dollars to these non-profits every year. In return, the leaders recruit their members as foot soldiers to carry out the latest marketing campaigns and to provide a fire-wall so that no money trail can be tracked back to the drug companies.

The psychiatric front groups form a gigantic pyramid and once pharmaceutical money enters the system through a major organization, it gets channeled into a huge spider-web that weaves through many groups, making it nearly impossible to keep track of where it came from or where it all went. Often, when the grant reports of the drug companies list a large donation to one organization, the annual reports of the other groups will show smaller gifts from that same organization.

The "charity" groups are exempt from income tax and the "contributions" funneled through them are tax deductible. The money is used for disease mongering campaigns to both market disorders and pressure public health care programs and private insurers to pay for expensive treatments.


The drug makers rely on the front groups to do their bidding any time profits are threatened. For instance, if the FDA is considering adding a black box warning about a deadly side effect to a drug's label, which may result in a drop in sales, representatives of front groups will show up at the FDA advisory panel hearings to testify against adding the warning.

They will also lobby FDA panels whenever there is a chance to increase profits, such as enlarging the drug customer base. In June 2009, the Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee was set to meet to evaluate AstraZeneca’s Seroquel, Pfizer’s Geodon and Eli Lilly’s Zyprexa for use with 13 to 17 year-olds diagnosed with schizophrenia, and 10 to 17 year-olds diagnosed with pediatric bipolar disorder.

On June 8, 2009, nine front groups issued a joint statement urging the panel to vote to approve all three drugs for kids. The groups signing the letter included the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, American Psychiatric Association, Child and Adolescent Bipolar Foundation, Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder, Families for Depression Awareness, Mental Health America, National Alliance on Mental Illness, and the National Council for Community Behavioral Healthcare.


For several years, with Iowa's Republican Senator, Charles Grassley, leading the charge, the US Senate Finance Committee has been investigating pharmaceutical industry funding, as it relates to marketing practices, involving Continuing Medical Education, consulting arrangements, publications in medical journals, the non-profit professional and patient advocacy organizations, and the conflicts of interest among academics who receive federal funding from the National Institutes of Health through research grants to major universities.

The Committee oversees spending in public health care programs, such as Medicaid and Medicare, for coverage of more than 100 million Americans, including mental health treatment and prescription drugs.

The "drug industry's most powerful means of boosting the bottom line is funding research, which allows companies to control, or at least influence, a great deal of what gets published in the medical journals, effectively turning supposedly objective science into a marketing tool," Shannon Brownlee explained in an April, 2004, Washington Monthly report titled, "Doctors Without Borders."

"By penetrating the wall that once existed around academic researchers," she says, "drug companies have gained access to the "thought leaders" in medicine, the big names whose good opinion of an idea or a product carries enormous weight with other physicians."

"Companies target academic KOLs, or Key Opinion Leaders, in the lexicon of marketing, and woo them with invitations to sit on scientific advisory committees, or to serve as members of speakers' bureaus, which offer hefty fees for lending their prestige to a company and touting its products at scientific meetings and continuing medical education conferences," she reports.

Grassley's investigations at major universities turned up more conflicted academics in the field of psychiatry than in any other specialty. His chief investigator, Paul Thacker, developed a system where he would request conflict-of-interest records on psychiatrists from their universities and simultaneously ask drug companies to provide reports on what they paid the same researchers.

[dukey]

STOP THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX, DRUGS IS THE ONLY POSSIBLE ANSWER TO DEPRESSION

[Ayoob]

Exercise is at least as effective as the most effective medications.

Consider using weight bearing exercises as they increase feelings of well-being better than aerobic exercise.

Ayoob, RN

[garry1212]

Yeah, exercise is really a best solution to lift your mood. Doing various types of exercises has the power to change your bad mood to good mood. I myself do Yoga everyday and believe me it feels awesome after doing it. You feel at peace and calm.

[Roy]

2 years later: 30 lbs lighter (225 --> 195) still exercising regularly.

I work at a very depressing job with a bunch of corporatists and highly religious Evangelicals, in a company that exploits Chinese workers and it's American workers like there is no tomorrow. Side note: this company's 'benefit' package includes no mental health benefits whatsoever. Another unique characteristic compared to every other job I've had.

They abuse the crap out of their employees. The CYA culture there is so prevalent and everyone is scared to death of getting fired. Passive-aggressive and me first F**k you at that company. Been looking for 6 months now, but jobs in my field appear to be practically non-existent in this area. Since I don't want to move (this area is IMO ideal for post collapse survival or close to it), so I'm in a very tough situation.

My workplace is the most toxic and depressing environment where I've ever worked. I've been offsetting the 40+ hr weeks of toxicity by working my ass off in the gym and eating healthy non-processed foods for the most part. Not to mention homestead work on the weekends (chickens, garden, firewood splitting, home and car maintenance etc).

And my go-out-to-lunch-everyday, Fox News watching, overweight, God fearing Baptist, soda-drinking colleagues think I'm weird.

When an entire culture is as screwed up as that, being weird compared to the majority is a good thing.

Depressed? Sure if I start looking at the big picture too much, or if I spend too much time talking to colleagues.

Workouts give a nice endorphin buzz that helps me cope with the idiocy, ignorance, myopia, and full frontal greed I have to put up with for most of my waking hours. Also being able to vent like this on the internet helps too.

Exercise is good. Do it!

[vision-master]

Exercise & Cannabis............

Cannabis Receptors and the “Runner’s High”
Maybe it isn't endorphins after all.


What do long-distance running and marijuana smoking have in common? Quite possibly, more than you’d think. A growing body of research suggests that the runner’s high and the cannabis high are more similar than previously imagined.

In 2004, the British Journal of Sports Medicine ran a research review, “Endocannabinoids and exercise,” which seriously disputed the “endorphin hypothesis” assumed to be behind the runner’s high. To begin with, other studies have shown that exercise activates the endocannabinoid system.

http://addiction-dirkh.blogspot.com/201 ... -high.html

[SeaGypsy]

Vision, the cannabinoid science you touch on is pretty well established; but the vast majority of papers on the naturally occurring ones in the brain speak to their relatively focused effect by comparison. Ganga is likely not safe for any kind of acute depression, even though the key effect is based on our natural neurochemistry, simply because it's action is too general and variable across the central nervous system. I believe that long term low to moderate ganga users suffer less acute depressive episodes when compared to the average in most developed countries. Brisk walk in the sunshine/ bowl of soup by the open fire, a nice cuddle...

[vision-master]

Natures anti-inflammatory medicine.........

After that long hard workout, hit the water for an ice bath and then light up........

Why Cannabis Stems Inflammation
ScienceDaily (July 20, 2008) — Cannabis has long been accredited with anti-inflammatory properties. ETH Zurich researchers, however, have now discovered that it is not only the familiar psychoactive substances that are responsible for this; a compound we take in every day in vegetable nutriment also plays a significant role.

The hemp plant contains over 450 different substances, only three of which are responsible for its intoxicating effect. They activate the two receptors in the body CB1 and CB2. Whilst the CB1 receptor in the central nervous system influences perception, the CB2 receptor in the tissue plays a crucial role in inhibiting inflammation. If the receptor is activated, the cell releases fewer pro-inflammatory signal substances, or cytokines. The scientists have now discovered that the substance beta-carophyllene, which composes between 12 and 35 percent of the cannabis plant’s essential oil, activates the CB2 receptor selectively.



http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 222549.htm

[vision-master]

Be Careful with that Axe, Eugene

Stress Kills By Increasing Inflammation

Long-term, chronic stress is just plain bad for your health, but a new study probes into the question of why. Researchers in the US found that stress reduces the body's ability to regulate inflammation, which in turn bumps your chances of getting sick.

http://www.newsmaxhealth.com/health_sto ... 43811.html

[vision-master]

This is my last sport......... unless I plan to use a walker some day.

[AgentR11]

Bah, day hiking on developed or well traveled trails...

Ya need to grab an 80lb pack, head to the mountains in the dead of winter and yell, "Gaea! I'm coming, kill me if you can!" (a conceit, but a fun one)

Course the nanny state will probably remove that opportunity before I escape the age of midlife responsibility, but one can always hope that our Wilderness Areas will remain wild, and not "wild, but only for the anointed members of the honorable lefty environmental lobby."

[vision-master]

I already have later stage Lyme, sure don't need anymore bush wacking trails.....

[Ferretlover]

The best ? No. But, a complete change of environment and a happy pill or two will go a long way.

[AgentR11]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vision-master', 'I') already have later stage Lyme, sure don't need anymore bush wacking trails.....

[vision-master]

I ski then.......... lsol

[AgentR11]

Last time I went skiing I did something bad...
You see; there was this tall white ramp to the left, it went up and up, and the slope went down and down.
Agent said... How hard can that be...
Agent failed to check grey hair count.
Agent flew, and went splat.
Agent flew, and went splat.
Agent flew, and went splat.
Agent flew, and ...err... crunch.

Agent then said, I believe in self-rescue.
Two hours later, orthopods at aid station laugh at Agent and play games dislocating and relocating his knee.

I don't think I want to ski anymore.

[WildRose]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', 'L')ast time I went skiing I did something bad...
You see; there was this tall white ramp to the left, it went up and up, and the slope went down and down.
Agent said... How hard can that be...
Agent failed to check grey hair count.
Agent flew, and went splat.
Agent flew, and went splat.
Agent flew, and went splat.
Agent flew, and ...err... crunch.

Agent then said, I believe in self-rescue.
Two hours later, orthopods at aid station laugh at Agent and play games dislocating and relocating his knee.

I don't think I want to ski anymore.

[dorlomin]

'Depression' is not one illness or has one cure. It is a wide array of complex problems that may be neuro-chemical or behavioural. There is no single cure.

But exersize is pretty great for many people who have various 'disorders' that can be counted as depression. In some ways it works as something like a CBT series, you set yourself goals, adapt your behaviour to meet the goals and you physically improve and can also get the mental boost of the brain chemestry. It can help people regain a sense of control over their lives and if your slimmer you are generally more confident.

But if you are have PTSD or are genuinely bipolar, you really still need serious professional help and probibly an amount of medication.

[Graeme]

Dor, Agree to some extent. This British clinical study generally supports what you are saying:

Exercise 'no help for depression', research suggests

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'P')rof John Campbell, from the Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry, which also took part in the study, said: "Many patients suffering from depression would prefer not to have to take traditional anti-depressant medication, preferring instead to consider alternative non-drug based forms of therapy.

"Exercise and activity appeared to offer promise as one such treatment, but this carefully designed research study has shown that exercise does not appear to be effective in treating depression."

But he added that GPs were often faced with patients with a number of health problems for whom encouraging an active lifestyle might be of overall benefit.

"The message of this study of course is not that exercise isn't good for you, exercise is very good for you, but it's not good for treating people with what was actually quite severe depression.

"That buzz we all get from moderate intensity of exercise is certainly acknowleged but it's not sustained and it's not appropriate for treating people with depression."