Page 89 - summer2016

All Thumbs Book Reviews
All Thumbs Book Reviews

A Mind of Your Own Why do they cling to such an unsuccess-
by Kelly Brogan, MD, with Kristin Loberg ful approach? Brogan gives a brief, insightful
HarperCollins Publishers history. For a long time psychiatry didn’t get a
lot of respect. People have gotten very attached
There is something about upset apple carts to the idea that you aren’t doing much if you
that I find very entertaining so I enjoy a book don’t dish out drugs to solve every problem.
that upsets a few, and this one does. A Mind of When someone came up with the idea of using
Your Own talks about depression in women but I drugs to treat depression, the pharmaceutical
think much of it applies to both men and women. industry was more than happy to help with that.
One popular paradigm holds that depression is A great quote right at the beginning of chapter
caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. 1 perfectly summarizes what is going on out
Dr. Brogan scrutinized this theory and found. . . there: “The medicalization of distress obliterates
nothing. That is, no studies that support the idea meaning and creates profit.”
that depression is caused by chemical imbal- One favorite explanation for almost every-
ances in the brain, lack of serotonin or any such thing is genetics. I’ve never been real impressed
thing. If anything, higher serotonin levels in by that explanation, and Brogan isn’t either. Our
the brain cause more problems than they solve. understanding of genetics has gone through
She goes on to say that most cases of depression some profound transitions in recent years, and
are not due to any malfunction of the brain at there is no reason to believe we now have it all
all. If you understand how the pharmaceutical figured out. The Human Genome Project identi-
approach to psychiatry works then you already fied twenty-three thousand genes, which sounds
hear those apples rolling around on the floor. like a lot, but isn’t nearly enough to define the
So what is depression? It is not a disease. diversity and complexity of the human species.
It is a symptom. Your body is telling you there Brogan answers at least part of that riddle by
is something wrong, something out of balance. explaining that our human framework is occu-
There are a number of things that can trigger pied by trillions of bacteria that perform critical
depression. One is inflammation in general and functions such as digestion and immune func-
in the bowel in particular. Disruption in the tion. Each of the many species of bacteria has its
microbiome (caused by toxic chemicals, drugs, own DNA. Epigenetics is another relatively new
artificial sugar, lack of nutrients or stress) is development. In most cases, to say the cause of
often a factor. Diabetes is another trigger. an ailment is genetic is a popular way of saying.
Do anti-depression drugs work? That de- “We don’t know.”
pends on what you mean by work. If you are This book has a good list of the leading
hoping for side-effects like headache, nausea, causes of depression. Number one is drugs
insomnia, sexual dysfunction, stroke, cardiac for birth control. The author used to think of
conduction defects and increased risk of death, this as a woman’s right but her perspective has Five of the
then these drugs are great. changed a little since she became more aware of top ten
A paper published in The British Medical the side effects. Blood clots, cancer, gallstones,
Journal revealed that more than half a million high blood pressure and low libido are on the violence-
people aged sixty-five or older die in the West short list. Responsibility for birth control lands inducing
each year from psych meds. Five of the top ten primarily on the woman in this scenario. If you drugs are
violence-inducing drugs are antidepressants. really want to dig in your heels and demand that
That sounds pretty depressing to me. Continued on page 90. antidepressants.
Wise Traditions SUMMER 2016 Wise Traditions 89