Lived Experience Forum

[Frederick]

Imagine you’ve got a choice. You can be not depressed with a particular medication, but you’ll become obese, you’ll have muscular problems, it will be a nightmare to wake up in the morning and even stay awake while driving. You’ll have less energy, a bit slower mentally, and sometimes you’ll forget the names of very familiar people.

Alternatively, you can take the medication, tolerate these side effects, and be reasonably happy.

I’d still go with option B but I’m interested to hear what people think.

[Frederick]

Sorry I meant option B is be depressed and miserable but not have the aforementioned side effects.

[Phoenix_Rising]

Hi @Frederick,

It's nice to meet you. 

I use medication very sparingly because I don't feel it would be helpful to complicate my life with adverse side-effects. For example, I used to take an antidepressant which really helped with the depression, but it made me ridiculously hungry all the time. The hunger made me miserable and it seemed counter-productive to me to take an antidepressant that made me miserable. Hence I stopped taking it. 

I guess this is a very individual thing. It would very much depend on how helpful the medication was vs how aversive the side-effects were. However, for me personally, I will always take a minimalist approach to medication. 

[girl99]

@Frederick

It is a tricky question as I think most of us would do nearly anything to not feel depressed! 

However, I've given it some thought, and I personally would rather be off medicine and depressed, than on medicine and obese, fall asleep all the time (possibly crash my car) and forget important things.

Those side effects sound too harsh to me and I think becoming obese and forgetting things might in the end make me feel very depressed anyway.  

I guess maybe the trick is to find something that helps you feel better overall in your total health - both mental and physical health are linked.   Perhaps the secret lies in trying other things like hobbies, friendships, other therapies besides just medication.   But I am a bit similar to the views held by @Phoenix_Rising and I prefer non-medical options too, if possible.

I haven't yet found anything that has worked for me though to get rid of the terrible depression, but it would be great if they invented some 'happy pills' with little side effects!

[Eden1919]

Well coming from someone who has had both I preferred the option B! To me my med side effects are not worth it at all I gained a lot of weight like I am talking a heap and that made me super depressed more than before and I got all these other side effects as well and it was just awful well it still is awful because now a court is forcing me to take these meds to further make my life not worth it so thanks government for once again ruining everything anyway rant over I choose option B all the way!

[Frederick]

Thanks @Eden1919. I was desperate to get well from depression because it was starting to ruin my life. But now I may have pre diabetes because of one of the meds, so it’s a big price to pay 😥