I think you're missing what I'm saying, and I'm not saying something as bad as you think.
First of all, orthopedics and oncology *are* really complicated. They aren't hobbies, and there are deep unsolved problems there still. We didn't understand them well for thousands of years, and most of the real advances in medicine (as opposed to surgery) happened after WWII. Before that it was mainly well-intentioned ignorance.
I'm saying that we're still in that stage in psychiatry. That doesn't mean that mental health care is "something I detest", or a waste of time. It does mean that it's prescientific. This may well be the generation where we find a lot of answers, much like the 1940s was for medicine. Failing that, we are still kicking the television.
I do resent the implication that somehow it's the patient's fault if we don't get better. After 18 years of "proactive effort" I think I've been fairly cooperative myself. Please don't insult me by assuming that I want a "wave of a magic wand" when I have spent about as much time as you've spent living fighting this damned thing. That's really not nice. I'm a survivor, give me a little credit here.
My point -- and I urge you to read it carefully -- is that calling the current state of mental health care "medicine" or "scientific" is arrogant. We're not there yet. It's a disservice to patients to promise something that isn't there. I appreciate the efforts of mental health practitioners, and I wish them luck. But my appreciation is colored by a deep skepticism.
If you had a car that was broken for 18 years and you had to spend $200 a week minimum on a mechanic and each time you got a new mechanic you were told that the old one was incompetent and that an entirely new approach was needed, wouldn't you be feeling a little frustrated about now? Perhaps you might question if even the smartest and best-intentioned of mechanics didn't understand the problem sufficiently, and that the whole field of auto repair was in an immature state. That's where I am.
Re: TREAD SOFTLY FOR YOU TREAD ON MY DREAMS
First of all, orthopedics and oncology *are* really complicated. They aren't hobbies, and there are deep unsolved problems there still. We didn't understand them well for thousands of years, and most of the real advances in medicine (as opposed to surgery) happened after WWII. Before that it was mainly well-intentioned ignorance.
I'm saying that we're still in that stage in psychiatry. That doesn't mean that mental health care is "something I detest", or a waste of time. It does mean that it's prescientific. This may well be the generation where we find a lot of answers, much like the 1940s was for medicine. Failing that, we are still kicking the television.
I do resent the implication that somehow it's the patient's fault if we don't get better. After 18 years of "proactive effort" I think I've been fairly cooperative myself. Please don't insult me by assuming that I want a "wave of a magic wand" when I have spent about as much time as you've spent living fighting this damned thing. That's really not nice. I'm a survivor, give me a little credit here.
My point -- and I urge you to read it carefully -- is that calling the current state of mental health care "medicine" or "scientific" is arrogant. We're not there yet. It's a disservice to patients to promise something that isn't there. I appreciate the efforts of mental health practitioners, and I wish them luck. But my appreciation is colored by a deep skepticism.
If you had a car that was broken for 18 years and you had to spend $200 a week minimum on a mechanic and each time you got a new mechanic you were told that the old one was incompetent and that an entirely new approach was needed, wouldn't you be feeling a little frustrated about now? Perhaps you might question if even the smartest and best-intentioned of mechanics didn't understand the problem sufficiently, and that the whole field of auto repair was in an immature state. That's where I am.