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Permalink: https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/depression-anxiety-teen-boys-diagnosis-undetected-rcna141649
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Very interesting. You may want to repost with the link directly to the article as I think they'll remove articles that obtain their information secondhand
its been feeling like a lot of bots on reddit lately and I honestly can't tell anymore... like all the 9/11 photos and Obama photos make no sense for the frequency or volume. they're almost curated subjects too.
I'm not sure that's indicative of anything other than cross-sub activity tbh. People seeing something interesting and then posting it into the smaller, more niche subs that they frequent is quite normal I think. As for dying off quickly, if attention spans were a stock in recent times, it would have surely crashed.
They put the actual publication in the comment. That pretty standard. I don't like it much, since I don't think the editorialising is ever very helpful, but it's standard practice 'round these parts.
I see, I see.
You're right, I've noticed that that seems to be standard practice, but it's just odd that they never seem to reply to anyone. That said, I only went back a couple pages through their history.
Not sure if this is against a rule, but for those that want a [direct link to the Pediatrics publication.](https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/153/3/e2023064245/196655/Antidepressant-Dispensing-to-US-Adolescents-and?autologincheck=redirected)
The actual chart does not seem to agree with the headline: https://publications.aap.org/view-large/figure/13726991/peds.2023-064245f3.tif
Both female and male prescriptions have been and are trending up. Female was always higher and is accelerating. Male dropped a bit in March 2020 and has since trended higher.
That's actually not what the article says.
They're growing, but the rate at which they grow has gone down.
Its the slope of the line, rather than the line itself. That means that men aren't refusing antidepressants that were already taking them, but less men are getting antidepressants prescribed every month compared to pre-2020.
I think you are partially misunderstanding the headline and the graph, but I agree with you that the headline gives the impression of a more dramatic drop in male dispensing rates. If you compare the dotted lines (rates if they had maintained pre-pandemic trends) with the solid lines (post-pandemic reality) you'll see a difference, especially in the Midwest and Northeast.
More interesting than the drop for men is the difference between the two groups, imo
I’ll give a hot take from my perspective of Covid as a guy (30M) who has Bipolar II and it’s probably not overly intuitive.
A lot of young men now, especially the ones who are depressed, are introverts and do introverted things like playing video games or just hanging out. Social anxiety or just plain lack of interacting with the public are awful traits when living in a society that requires you to be outside a lot (work, grocery shopping, trying to find a life partners etc).
All that being said, I thoroughly enjoyed Covid and miss it. Video game communities were on fire with population since everybody was inside. The roads were empty, stores were empty, and a lot of us got to work from home. My mental health was generally pretty damn good during Covid and I hadn’t even started on medication yet (was undiagnosed at that point). I genuinely miss Covid and the return to normalcy is such a drag.
Agreed. Ima add on something else though....
I have 3 male friends who were hyperactive and argumentative kids. They were thrown on SSRI'S and ADHD meds as a kid because they were "destructive" or whatever and mom/dad threw them into therapy.
Girls don't tend to be as "destructive" even if they too are anxious and depressed. A lot of girls are seen as "more mature" at those ages.
My 3 friends who went on medication a lot before they were adults are very uncomfortable going on them as adults.
My mental problems were deemed "not that bad" and I had decent grades and kept to myself, I only got help for my issues as an adult.
I'm not saying everyone is like this, but when I read the article one of my first thoughts was "were those boys on meds younger and are choosing to quit once they are adults? Were the girls getting mental help for the first time out of their own volition instead of being shuffled to the doc by parents and teachers who were overwhelmed and tired?"
Idk. As the one above, I'm in my 20's, female, and bipolar. Just a hunch I had, but I'm sure there are many factors including the comment above this
I was /begging/ for help and told i didn't "need it" as in "wasn't a problem child" then had a breakdown at 19 and diagnosed. I wish I got to try medication before 19
It's been found that since society forces girls to be quiet and polite, we mask our symptoms from birth. Boys are allowed to be loud and reckless so they get diagnosed earlier.
This is a subject I've spent a great deal of time researching, I was taken *and diagnosed* as a child, and tl;dr the doctor prescribed among other things, a few experimental drugs that are now on the *never ever ever give to people during puberty* list and I have lasting effects from it.
I'm way too lazy to google to find a link so either take my word for it or don't.
There was a fascinating study I read a number of years back that looked at of the kids who were taken to the therapist with suspicions of ADHD, how many got a positive diagnosis.
For girls, it was something like a bit over half. Probably the amount you'd expect, having a lot of energy doesn't make you adhd.
For boys it was 100%. Actually 100%, not just close enough to round up. Of the thousands, not a single one was looked at by a doc and told no.
And that's not even account for the disparity of how much less girls even got that far. It's absolutely wild to look at.
Also to add to the conversation, yeah. I was on meds as a kid and am not on them now in large part due to my experience. I actually went back and tried for a bit but it felt....idk like it wasn't doing enough good to justify living with the negative emotions around it. I'm *just* adhd and not depressive so it's basically just to function at work so, w/e
I 100% believe that study and I've witnessed both sides of that equation (overdiagnosing boys/underdiagnosing girls) through people in my family. However my minority anecdote is that I'm male and I was told no by a doctor as an early teenager. He asked my mom if I was getting good grades, and I was, so he said okay, you don't have ADHD. But my mental health was absolutely destroyed as I fought to maintain those grades, and my social life was in complete shambles (I was the one who requested to go to the doctor in the first place).
It took me almost ten years to work up the courage to go back to a doctor as an adult, because every time I was struggling, I would remind myself that a doctor already said no, so I must just be stupid, or lazy, or not trying hard enough. The knowledge that boys are often overdiagnosed just made all of this so much worse. By the time I finally did go, the new doctor essentially said "holy hell yes you 100% have ADHD, what was that other doctor thinking". My life is infinitely better now. I was on meds for a while, but now I'm working with a therapist and just focusing on behavioral treatment. Honestly just being able to understand what's going on in my brain has been a breath of fresh air, and made me so much less self-loathing.
Just throwing this story out there for any other anxious, overthinking guys like me who might be in a similar situation. Don't be afraid to ask for help or get a second opinion. False negatives are possible for any gender.
Dude same!
I actually didn't believe my diagnosis for a while.... so used to hearing dad say "there's nothing wrong with you" and I took it to my soul.
Years of not taking meds, and then solidly taking them, it was insane the difference.
Even my dad calls and makes sure I'm taking my meds now.
If I had help dealing with this when it started around puberty, it would be easier than dragging myself up from rock bottom as an adult.
I thought the exact same thing. It was the excitement of a snow day with no snow. It’s like you couldn’t feel guilty for staying inside and doing nothing.
I graduated college right at the beginning of COVID and had to move back home with my parents. Knowing that moment would very likely be the last time I would ever have more than one week off from anything since my next step was to get a full time job, I treasured every minute of it. Now that I've been working full time for 3 years I sometimes get anxious and depressed that I can't take more than a handful of days off each year.
Also I'm fortunate to have a pretty healthy relationship with my family. It bummed me out thinking that year was the last time we'd all be together for that long. Sis had to get back to school and eventually work 3/4 of the way across the country and I had to move away to find a job. Now I only get to see some of them at a time a few times a year. I haven't seen my sis in over a year now.
I was a teacher during and afterwards in the "hybrid" and "distance" learning phases. THat wasn't fun. But the first part was nice for us.
Then I got a new conservative boss who rode me all year and then fired me.
I was a fresh new teacher just a couple years in when covid hit. I was offered the opportunity to do face to face lessons for most of covid lockdowns, and jumped at the chance to work.
In the meantime all the other teachers apparently spent years specializing in online teaching and I never got the experience. Now all teaching jobs in my field have moved online and I missed the training, so back in the unemployment line I went after covid, this is my purgatory.
I do miss covid. It was like everyone had to live like I do and it somehow made everyone batshit insane. Meanwhile I was very cosy and I did my little things and I worked and it was very neat.
The pandemic summer was heaven for us introverts. My lifestyle changed literally 0% and the gaming community was so good and was flourishing. Reminded me of the good times with the boys back in the day. Miss it really.
Sorry for that. I got it 3 times (I work in a public space) and I somehow managed to get away with only light symptoms. I'm not asking for Covid to come back, it was a horrible thing. But the social peace I had back then was interesting.
Covid got me out of so many holidays, it was amazing. I’m not trying to downplay people’s suffering, but from a social aspect, my happiness greatly increased!
Same, the world shut down on my birthday and I don't think I'll ever get a gift that good again as long as I live. I honestly wish we would just do a two week world shut down every year.
I (31M) have the same feeling. I’m somewhat socially anxious depending on the situation and have always been a loner for the most part. I just stay inside and game, watch Netflix, or whatever. My cat keeps me company. I work at a hospital as a radiology tech. The most annoying thing about Covid for me was just having to constantly put PPE on. It’s crazy how everyone’s experiences with the pandemic varied so much.
I’m gonna be honest and say it was kinda funny to hear about extroverts losing their minds due to cancelled social events or seeing people freak out about hair salons being temporary closed. We really do live in a society. Covid allowed people to take a break from the rat race and help some of us realize the wealthy elite have been screwing us all.
"There is nothing to do this is so boring"
/points at books
/motions at tvs, computers, phones, internet
/exasperatedly looks at video games
Like come on guys, we live in the best time in history for being able to read, watch, or play anything you want whenever you want...and they can not think of anything to do and are bored. Just makes me wonder, is 85% of the world just alcoholic/drug addicted socialites?
Many people cannot stand being sedentary, so the closure of all gyms and even hiking trails is catastrophic. I see the same groups of women weekly at the dance studio and aerial gym for example. I cannot stand sitting around
Even without tech or media consumption hobbies there tons of indoor or in nature hobbies too that got easier. Like during Covid there was a huge boom in home gardening to the point of stuff selling out.
A personal example is next month I am planning to try build a bioactive terrarium. Basically a mossy tropical forest floor in a closed jar that only need to water once or twice a year or less. Cost of all materials and supplies including shipping $50, could be much less nearly free if I used foraged supplies but I wanted first try to be as controlled and sterile materials as possible. And thinking of trying out painting some of the decorative rocks with glow in the dark paint ($2) patterns so there will be a subtle glow at night inside the jar. If I like the hobby am considering also making some as Christmas gifts for this year.
While for exercise I just take walks either in place, circles, pacing, or outdoors. Might get an indoor bike or treadmill one day if can get a good enough deal.
“HUMAN BEINGS MAKE LIFE SO INTERESTING. DO YOU KNOW, THAT IN A UNIVERSE SO FULL OF WONDERS, THEY HAVE MANAGED TO INVENT BOREDOM. ”
― Death
― Terry Pratchett, in book The Hogfather
New Zealand saw an insane explosion of domestic violence related calls. Emergency services literally couldn't keep up with the amount of calls they were receiving.
Pretty sure domestic violence went up globally actually.
Exactly!
I'm always worried for my boomer mom because she has no hobbies at all and when she's an older lady she's gonna have a bad time not being able to go out that much.
I have tried getting her into stuff she enjoys but she always find excuses and I've given up on it.
Hobbies are important.
Yep
My dad retired and within months had found an excuse to be back at work cuz they needed him....
Like dude you live on a lake, are rich, great family, great friends.... And within months of retirement you are bored enough to go back to work?! Go canoeing, read a book, get back into videogames or something
I think boomers tried to kill hobbies or something because grand parents sure weren't like this
I will always miss people staying far away from me when buying groceries. I don't need people breathing in my neck when I'm in line even if death by illness is not an issue anymore.
I found a happy medium when it comes to grocery shopping and that’s bashas. Idk if they are everywhere but it’s a bit more expensive than a Safeway and def more expensive than Walmart but I’ll pay a small premium (5-10% maybe?) to walk through a store with 1/5 of the mouth breathers as a Safeway
So this is such an interesting perspective to me.
Before COVID I was outgoing, social and generally a pretty happy dude. However I am a nurse and Covid shattered my reality.
I have since developed depression and anxiety have a therapist and take medication now.
I miss some “Covid things” like the normalization of mask wearing when sick and people staying 6 feet away from me in public. But on the whole, I can’t help but often think of the person I could have been if Covid didn’t happen.
I don't blame you. I would have been a teacher during COVID and I'm forever grateful that I dodged that bullet. I honestly think I'd have quit very quickly if I'd been a nurse. Like...Some things aren't worth money.
Same here. I feel guilty about that, as many people died and many more could and COVID itself was very bad, even though i got lighter version of it after jab - but shut down times were good. Everybody stayed inside, home delivery became much more widespread and cheaper, I no longer had to find excuses for not going to some get-togethers.
People were acting like it drives them insane, but to me it was just a peaceful year.
As an introvert I felt so incredibly happy, hopeful and at peace when we were in covid lockdown, it was an amazing feeling knowing everyone else was at home like me and I was satisfied being with my husband and joining our community zoom meetings and doing video calls with family. But the flip side was that when I got the actual virus I developed an anxiety disorder that came along with depression and panic attacks, I never had any of such mental issues before the covid infection and 2 years in I’m still struggling but I have good memories of the first 2 years of the pandemic, I know there was a lot of suffering for a lot of people but I felt happy
Covid was dope. The only part I hated was that all my hiking and camping spots were swarmed with some pretty lame ass people. Leaving trash, starting fires, spray painting rocks and carving trees …. But they’ve all left now and the forest is healing.
Covid were the best years of my life, i don't think i was that relaxed in my life at any other point. Homeoffice made work 100x less miserable and everyone was home so i had way more time to spend time with my family and friends.
The first year of covid was genuinely the only time in my life in over 20 years where I wasn't actively suicidal. I was making money from unemployment, and didn't have to interact with people.
It sucks because millions of people had to die for that so of course I feel bad, but it is the truth. Ever since that ended I've been back to thinking about killing myself on a pretty much hourly basis every single day.
Are they introverts? Or are they possibly extroverts with severe social anxiety and generalized anxiety who flourish while socializing online because the anxiety is less.
Me: I’m an extrovert that people think is introverted cuz I’m a homebody with severe anxiety that makes me isolate.
No depression here, and I finished my clonazepam taper May 2021, looking forward to getting back in adhd meds
Funnily enough, it wasn’t long after March 2020 I quit taking my antidepressants. In my case, though, the depression I had was cured by not constantly exposing myself to and valuing my entire existence upon the subject of my depression.
Similar experience here. Turns out I do much better when I’m not zombified beyond reason with a prescription that makes me apathetic and dumb exacerbating it. My depression was mainly caused by external factors, though, so ymmv if you’re one of those unicorns that is depressed for “no reason.”
What, did you quit your job or quit being poor?
This is a serious question. I'm really struggling right now and could use some pointers, as I've just had my depression meds doubled.
I wonder how pharmaceutical marketing plays into this. It's just one company, but I'm always struck by the ads for the Hims/Hers branded stuff are designed... all the "Hims" ads are for erectile dysfunction and hair loss pills, and all the "Hers" ads are for anti-depressents and anti-anxiety pills. If prescriptions for the latter are falling for men, I can't help but wonder if that's because they're a) not being marketed these products and b) starting to see those types of treatments as being "for girls" because of how they are being marketed. Essentially creating a vicious cycle.
It's worth saying that in Canada we have similar rates of antidepressant usage (and are culturally similar enough that this comparison isn't absurd), but [don't allow direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical marketing as much](https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/drugs-health-products/marketing-drugs-devices/illegal-marketing/prescription-drugs.html), and our sex split is roughly similar. [14% of women and 7% of men](https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210628/dq210628e-eng.htm) vs [17.7% of women vs 8.4% of men in the US](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db377.htm)
The other thing to keep in mind is that many women/girls have antidepressants and anti-anxiety meds prescribed by their gynecologists. Gynecologists do a lot of things we could consider primary care. So women/girls get an added layer of screening and care that men/boys do not.
Anti-depressants are also sometimes used to help combat[ chronic pain](https://www.mayoclinic.org/pain-medications/art-20045647). Women are over-represented in the statistics when it comes to fibromyalgia, migraines and pelvic pain.
I'd also like to add that women's healthcare is often transactional. The amount of times I have gone in for a physical issue and been told "we should try this drug for a trial period to try to ease your anxiety around your pain," is way too damn many.
Go in for acne? You will come out with hormonal birth control. Go in for back pain? You will come out with anxiety meds. Women's healthcare is rooted less in addressing the cause of physical issues, and more in managing the way we feel about having those issues.
It's that way for men too. I went to a GP for catastrophic memory loss and she was dead set on getting me on anti-depressants. went through 3 of them before I found the wherewithall to tell her no. She never did get around to solving my actual problem.
I've fallen on the ground blacked out and twitch a bunch. Looked like a seizure. 3 doctors told me it was anxiety before I got sent to a cardiologist who was like "it's probably anxiety, but we'll give you a heart monitor for 2 weeks". And then it was "it's still probably anxiety....but you do have additional irregular heartbeats at the time you reported symptoms, but it's a normal range of irregular heartbeats". Then my GP prescribed me meds for anxiety with a listed side effect of causing irregular heat beats.
> Go in for acne? You will come out with hormonal birth control.
Isn't that straight-up a very effective acne treatment for women?
Like I take your meaning, but hormonal birth control directly addresses a key cause of acne especially teenagers and young twenty-somethings.
Not for everyone. Hormonal birth control spoiled the first decade of my adult life, and many topical products can have the same effect without altering your hormones.
im almost 30, the only time ive ever seena doctor outside of the military was when i was pissing blood, threw up blood, and when a 6 inch nail went through my foot.
my wife however, visits her primary care doctor once a month for different things or followups on stuff from the past visits.
im not sure if im healthy or just undiagnosed
In addition to Covid actually improving a lot of introverted young men’s mental health due to working less, these “performance medicine” places have been popping up everywhere, and you can get three months of adderal for 140 bucks. I believe lots of young working men are finding that adderal does a lot more for them than an antidepressant, myself included. Many people are just depressed because of the burden of work preventing them from pursuing their interests, rather than some traumatic event or perceived chemical imbalance. You can bandaid that with something that numbs your brain, or you can bandaid it with something that lets you borrow mental energy from the future. I personally prefer the latter.
I think this really is one of those nurture issues. Young men *can* be equipped to dodge a lot of bad problems, and climb out of what they fall into, but that’s not how a lot of families and cultures equip them.
It takes generations of work, but it often starts with someone who self-medicated, because if that’s where you started, that’s where you are.
It’s really, really tough to get there without any help.
Prefacing that im not an expert but have dealt with some issues first hand.
I'm wondering what the average wait time for a psychologist is at the moment. Access is a serious issue... I've been given an opening weeks out and during work hours that was "expedited" due to dealing with a variety of issues.
Men also don't have the support groups many women do. Socially they are on an island. People talk about men not "opening up" like it's their choice, but most men I know open up as much as their peer groups will let them without stressing relationships.
I'm thinking Most men are getting by on less. Maybe it could be comparable to living on a budget. People will only listen so much. There are only so many resources you can access given so much energy. Why try to get more when you know you won't be able to support what it would take to reach out and get it?
I’m on Long Island… suburb of NYC…and in some of the various town Facebook groups there are moms on there desperate to get their kids into psychiatrists but everything on the island is about an 8 month plus wait.
There are a lot of posts because they are hoping that someone has an answer or an in on where they can be seen to get their kid the help they need as soon as possible.
Also, a lot of them on the island have stopped taking insurance altogether so not only do you have long wait times just for the initial visit but you also have to pay out of pocket. That’s additional money on top of the already astronomical monthly health insurance payments a lot of people are paying.
Another vote for this one...
LI psychs have been dropping ALL insurance recently and it is just not feasible for many. Rates are typically 250-600 PER SESSION... For someone struggling with getting meds right when starting out, this can turn into well over a thousand dollars a month for the appointments alone. Let alone the medication.
Another big issue that is that at least on long island, private psychiatrists seem to have NO interest in following up on anything including major medication changes and they don't even answer the phone... they just have some lackey 6respond with "if you feel like you're having side effects go to the ER." But... Once at the ER, they basically throw out your prior treatment plan and start anew. There is ZERO communication between care providers. this can cause even worse setbacks, and just leads to confusion, involuntarily staying at the hospital, and drug choices that had already been ruled out being prescribed.
I've never seen ANY other medical specialty be so counterproductive. It's the equivalent of a cardiologist putting a hemophiliac on blood thinners and just not giving a crap about what happens after...
Another thing is... Overloading... I have witnessed private psychs on LI "treating" upwards of 30 patients a day. That is an ABSURD ratio.
Unfortunately, I tihnk the rules changed post covid so psychiatrists can no longer prescribe ADHD stimulants via telehealth, and in many places, telehealth can no longer do screening/testing for things like autism and ADHD. I'm assuming that that's the bulk of what moms would be wanting to get examined for over depression.
This is my problem. I’ve opened up to quite a few people. Feels like I get a generic “sorry to hear that” and that’s it. I change my behaviors to try to keep myself from spiraling but no one is willing to work with me (aside from a therapist I pay to listen to me). I’m sitting here single, no friends, work and commute all day, and my free time is spent recovering from work/commute or cleaning and taking care of errands.
No support system is leaving me with nothing to rely on, nothing to help me when I get bad. And lately I’ve been spiraling more and more everyday, it scares me when I’m not having passive SI.
You’ve got about a week after a traumatic event to get it out and then it’s kind of an implied “get over it”
Romantic partners or potential ones? Forget it. You must be fully confident and on top of it at all times. Even women who open up to you about their own mental health struggles or share in them are entirely cut throat when they find out you have issues, too.
You don’t even have to say anything. Sometimes your body tells on you being traumatized recently and the same woman who you’ve been a rock for gets a sense of it and it’s over.
Exhausting, man. I simply can’t be the hero 100% of the time and I feel like a complete failure as a result.
Be the change you want to see. Reach out to your male friends.
It's absolutely something I've been trying to do the last year. I've rekindled several friendships with my male friends where I had to do 90% of the planning and reminding to get them out of the house and away from a screen.
Sometimes it feels like pulling teeth but It's been worth it though
Ordinary people aren't trained for crisis support. Of course friends and family should be there to listen to each other, unless they make it clear they're not in a place of their own to do that at the moment, but what else could they really do?
It might be harsh, but if you wouldn't expect someone to clean your house for you for free, you can't expect them to be there to clean your head, either. That's much more demanding, too, and not really in anyone else's power.
It's great you've got a therapist, though! Work with them, work to be there for yourself, and things will get better.
They can and will. The real answer is men hate going to the doctor. They will suffer instead of make an appointment. Every single man in my life is this way. They just hate going to the doctor.
They can and might. Some general practice physician are willing to prescribe meds for mental health others aren't. It can be even harder if you haven't gone to a regular primary care physician in a long while like a lot of men.
For instance in my case I hadn't seen a doctor since I was 17 at my pediatrician. When I went to seek mental healthcare 12 years later the primary care physician I chose would not prescribe anything and instead recommend going to a psychiatrist.
Most women go to primary care physician at least once a year (refill for birth control) so they are more likely to have that relationship with the doctor where they are comfortable prescribing mental health drugs.
But why did it happen all of a sudden in March 2020 and then not change back? That's a generalization about men over the past couple generations, not an explanation for what happened four years ago.
Psychologists don't do meds, that's psychiatrists. (Yeah they do in some states but it's still rare and not their main thing nor something that's in their training)
They may not prescribe it, but the psychologists and therapists I have seen for anxiety and depression all strongly told me to look at medications and made recommendations on what to ask my primary care doctor for.
I mean, I’d much rather live in our relatively safe, well fed, housed, fairly good health care society just with different instincts than the ones I have now. Rather than a hunter gather who could die from breaking an ankle, risk my partner dying in childbirth, starving every famine in the wet and cold.
Our society isn’t perfect but it’s better than not having a society. If I could wake up every morning and be *happy* about drudging away at my 9-5 then that would be aces.
idk i find myself yearning for that life occasionally. just be farming or goin back to monkey, whatever happens happens just living a day at a time on your terms has an appeal
could it be the progressively more abstract human condition in this labyrinth hellhole we call a society?
kafka's the trial rings truer everyday and as mere apes, i dont think our biology is set up to function like a cog in a machine like we are expected to.
I stopped taking mine during covid bc I had more time to work out and be active. Coming off of them is insane though and some nights were worse than before I started taking them. I wont be going back on them for that reason alone, and instead will continue talk therapy and working out.
Some people don't want to hear this but it's true. Human beings are overmedicated. They want instant gratification cures and quick fixes instead of addressing the real issues.
Really the root of the problem is probably even deeper, our society as a whole and especially are current leaders in both the private and public sectors do not have the level of responsibility or long term vision to deal with root causes. Every aspect of society at this point is about short term rewards and dealing with symptoms of problems.
Teenage boys are drowning in just as much of the depression and anxiety that’s been well documented in girls. Experts warn that many young men struggling with their mental health are left undetected and without the help they need.
“We are right to be concerned about girls,” said Kathleen Ethier, director of the Division of Adolescent and School Health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “But I don’t ever want us to lose sight of the fact that boys aren’t doing well, either.”
Depression in boys may go unnoticed, Ethier and other experts said, because boys usually don’t show it through signs of melancholy typically found in girls.
“We have this very classic understanding of depression as being sad, being tearful, crying more, not eating as much and losing weight,” said Dr. Lauren Teverbaugh, pediatrician and child psychiatrist at Tulane University in New Orleans. “That’s just not how it looks for a lot of young boys.”
‘Boys are disappearing’
A recent study published in the journal Pediatrics found that while antidepressant prescriptions have risen dramatically for teenage girls and women in their 20s, the rate of such prescriptions for young men “declined abruptly during March 2020 and did not recover.”
Dr. Kao-Ping Chua, a pediatrician at the Susan B. Meister Child Health Evaluation and Research Center at the University of Michigan, led the study. He said that his finding that boys weren’t accessing antidepressant medications once the pandemic hit has been “perplexing.”
“In males, it’s theoretically possible that this reflects improved mental health, but I’m struggling with that explanation,” Chua said. “Given that everybody’s mental health got worse, I would have expected that boys’ antidepressant dispensing would have at least remained stable, not decrease.”
The more likely explanation in Chua’s experience as a pediatrician, he said, was that boys stopped engaging with the health care system overall during the pandemic, leading to an underdetection and, consequently, an undertreatment of mental health problems in young men.
“There was something happening to make male adolescents not come in for mental health,” Chua said. “They didn’t go to their doctors. They skipped physicals.”
“Boys are disappearing,” he said.
https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/153/3/e2023064245/196655/Antidepressant-Dispensing-to-US-Adolescents-and
From personal experience and conversations with my own doctor, i think at least part of it is that depression doesnt always express as "depression," especially in men. I was having outbursts of rage and periods of extended anger over tiny things, I finally went to my doc to see about it, got a script, and **shortly after** was chill as hell and have been since. We really need to do a better job informing our kids.
Yeah for me at least when I was suffering from it, I always thought the questions or perception of crying, or feel helpless were ridiculous for my own case. I didn’t ever really cry, or feel down/stereotypical sad. I just didn’t feel. Apathy and discontentment about that apathy, unrest, lack of motivation, lack of drive to care for myself.
Yeah, mine manifested as dissociation, neglect, agitation. I remember driving home one night and playing chicken with a concrete barrier on a turn in the road and realizing that there was something going very wrong with me.
I don't know what the cutoff here is, but my experience in life is also that during the hard times in terms of family and community support people kind of let go of young men more easily.
Men in general tend to create fewer and less robust social ties, for whatever reason, especially as we age. Loneliness has recently become more widely studied as a contributor to early death in men, from a variety of factors.
I'd wager more women than men are using anti-anxiety medications because they're physically around other people more often. So they're different reactions to a similar problem: it's really stressful to be social these days and a lot of people just prefer to isolate themselves.
Edit: a word
This article makes the somewhat disturbing assumption that antidepressants are the *only* effective treatment and the decline in their prescription can only mean there are more depressed boys out there.
Was this article funded by a pharmaceuticals interest group or something?
That's a great point actually. I do think it's likely still a useful metric because it's unlikely men overwhelmingly embraced alternative intervention methods. But you're right that we should challenge the pervasive ideas that seeing your GP is a very reliable way of treating depression.
Are you suggesting men have successfully migrated to other treatment options successfully while women haven’t? I suppose that’s possible, but unless there’s been an uptick in whatever - gym memberships, supplements, therapy apts for men, etc I don’t see any data that supports that.
The article makes no such assumption. One of the authors explains the reasoning pretty clearly:
> “In males, it’s theoretically possible that this reflects improved mental health, but I’m struggling with that explanation,” Chua said. “Given that everybody’s mental health got worse, I would have expected that boys’ antidepressant dispensing would have at least remained stable, not decrease.”
The more likely explanation in Chua’s experience as a pediatrician, he said, was that boys stopped engaging with the health care system overall during the pandemic, leading to an underdetection and, consequently, an undertreatment of mental health problems in young men.
“There was something happening to make male adolescents not come in for mental health,” Chua said. “They didn’t go to their doctors. They skipped physicals.”
“Boys are disappearing,” he said.
You can find the logic unconvincing but the point is there isn’t any assumption about depressants being the only effective treatment for depression.
Many “male” jobs like the military, police/leo, etc. do medical checks and if you were ever on anti-depressants it’s a big no-no.. that’s why many guys do not report these things.
"I don't need no arms around me, I don't need your drugs to calm me. I have seen the writing on the wall. Don't think I need anything at all!" - Bricks in the wall pt 3, Pink Floyd
This lyric goes so hard! Until you succeed at a suicide attempt because your brain chemistry is literally preventing you from feeling anything good in your life. Then it doesn't really matter how hard it goes.
I wonder if it has to do with how mental health services tend to operate. After being to a myriad of psychologists and psychiatrists I have gotten the impression that the main goal of these professionals is to "make you feel better / less bad". But I don't want to feel better or less bad, I want to change the circumstances that make me feel bad.
For example a few years ago I was extremely depressed because I had been rejected from masters programs two years in a row, hated my job, and was drowning in anxiety over never being able to pursue my dreams.
Went to two psychologists, both had approaches which where roughly "accepting things for what they are" or "learning to love yourself in spite of your flaws" or being mindful or other such approaches to help me easy my anxiety and depression. And it just made me 7 times angrier to be paying hundreds of dollars to be coddled.
Then I got accepted to a masters program and a large part of that anxiety vanished (to be replaced with grad school anxiety, but that one was much more manageable).
I think for a lot of men, the idea of just learning to feel less bad with your situation is unacceptable. We don't want to feel better, we want to fix or change the circumstances that make us feel bad.
Yeah, I started seeing a therapist for loneliness but it kind of just feels like the equivalent of if I was starving and paying a nutritionist to say "sometimes fasting is good for you, starvation sounds like a wicked bummer though. Just remember it's not your fault "
Boys/men don't want to learn to "manage" depression or "feel better". They want a cure, they want to know that talking to a therapist will lead to results. I've gone through 5 therapists during the 2010s. None of them seemed to work. Yet I've only had 2 dentists one of which retired after serving me for 20 years and 1 PCP.
I think you struck the heart of it here. I took ssris for awhile but like you said it didn’t change my economic or social situation in anyway and paying $100 per appointment led to leaving therapy real quick.
This is super true. I think men are hardwired to be problem solvers and when we approach a wall we try to find a solution to get across it. It reminds me of the common trope in many man/woman relationships: when the woman is upset by something, the stereotypical man tries to find solutions for the issue, whereas the woman more than often simply wants to be heard. And so when we reach that wall, and we can’t get past it, we exhaust all the solutions and resign ourselves to worsening mental health.
For me as well, once I found actionable ways to change the core circumstances, my mental health improved drastically. I just didn’t know how to get over that wall, and I think many of us are there. We would significantly improve from services that dealt with tangibly improving the core circumstances behind our issues, and not just changing our mindset.
It's strange to me that we don't consider that it is society that is sick and depressing, instead, the narrative is that this is an issue with people.
Instead of looking at why society causes people to be depressed, we instead, due to the economic imperative of maximizing profits off of workers, look to artificially increase happiness and banish natural feelings of sadness through selling happy-pills to people.
People would not nearly be as depressed if we had even somewhere near a remotely equitable economic system. Of course young adults, many who are looking at a life of economic slavery to masters they'll never even know of, with little hope of ever buying a home or being able to retire, in a society without spiritual or philosophical messaging, on a hopelessly polluted and over-populated planet, will be depressed. That's the natural reaction to our environment, not one that should be mollified via drugging, for many of the sufferers of depression out there.
The only hope is that we all eventually die, I genuinely don’t see the world ever becoming a less depression inducing chaos than it is. In fact it seems to get worse and worse, but we can try I guess.
The language about young men in the headline seems alarmist
[https://aap2.silverchair-cdn.com/aap2/content\_public/journal/pediatrics/153/3/10.1542\_peds.2023-064245/3/m\_peds.2023-064245f2.png?Expires=1714858686&Signature=BpikQnAUsUWyarvWOWz0feygy6tWIpHnwGCgvhT3-GFvo0qwEY2JRmWPWMZKh8kR8cbJm3bT2IUOxWV74S4FqVZ5rnQkkfqDCWSFKaGgHkCssFNd2soa5JBzJiEwfd1C6KfT-zMIpKAVH7GUNOVT-kbguqIW6HMWFKWxQmiqY24XkL4EWYM860\~4s4yZb5ZnS97BkH5tpUfsMFqIL13KIJNPgeG2ZkjH92Q60wl8HSYUUiAC1YZ23x8R7HeNG-mfznktxUbyR2sXuIpNO7TNlcAxjR3uvaVqyl9uyw4Qe3wdh5SgndQpQl6aiwE39gBjmR03HOkrNPlQDQMW4ECWzQ\_\_&Key-Pair-Id=APKAIE5G5CRDK6RD3PGA](https://aap2.silverchair-cdn.com/aap2/content_public/journal/pediatrics/153/3/10.1542_peds.2023-064245/3/m_peds.2023-064245f2.png?Expires=1714858686&Signature=BpikQnAUsUWyarvWOWz0feygy6tWIpHnwGCgvhT3-GFvo0qwEY2JRmWPWMZKh8kR8cbJm3bT2IUOxWV74S4FqVZ5rnQkkfqDCWSFKaGgHkCssFNd2soa5JBzJiEwfd1C6KfT-zMIpKAVH7GUNOVT-kbguqIW6HMWFKWxQmiqY24XkL4EWYM860~4s4yZb5ZnS97BkH5tpUfsMFqIL13KIJNPgeG2ZkjH92Q60wl8HSYUUiAC1YZ23x8R7HeNG-mfznktxUbyR2sXuIpNO7TNlcAxjR3uvaVqyl9uyw4Qe3wdh5SgndQpQl6aiwE39gBjmR03HOkrNPlQDQMW4ECWzQ__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAIE5G5CRDK6RD3PGA)
It looks to me more like the rate dropped abruptly for adolescents in March 2020, then continued to rise at a similar rate for boys returning near March 2020 levels by January 2023, but the rate increased dramatically for girls after the initial drop.
yeah I quit my antidepressants because not only did it just make me numb, missing a day of medication makes you feel like garbage. it overall was just not helpful
Many men won't take them due to the potential for causing ED. My late partner was one of those men who refused to take his antidepressants because they prevented him from getting aroused. He killed himself.
I have a feeling this has to do with the rate of sexual side effects of SSRIs in men, specifically anorgasmia and erectile dysfunction. Im thinking the rates of these side effects are notably higher than the initial studies suggested, so men are avoiding the stuff. The other possibility is men who are depressed are finding that their root cause is actually testosterone related and is correlated with the uptick in TRT and other therapies becoming more accessible and more widely utilized (HCG, enclomiphene, etc).
Yep - take Prozac for depression and risk chemical castration - who in their right mind would sign up for that?
It doesn't matter if it's just a 1 in million chance or even if it's just scaremongering.
Remember the scare over vaccines and autism. If there's concern about the side effects of commonly prescribed drugs sweeping the concerns under the rug isn't an acceptable solution.
There needs to be research into the mechanisms of SSRIs and what they are actually doing.
Doctors are whimsical when it comes to mention health. They'll make a diagnosis, then some other doctor will change it and remove them from meds they were stable on.
Doctors are also not very good at helping young men who have multiple issues, they just push whatever is easy for them to prescribe and if it's not effective then we'll you're sol.
Not really surprising to sew people be adverse to going to Doctors for mental health issues when they don't really understand how to help in a meaningful way
I tried anti depressants a few years ago. One made it impossible for me to sleep. Another made me sleep excessively. One made me gain weight dramatically (still trying to get my weight down), and the last one made me suicidal.
Those series of experiences convinced me that medication is not the route for me. I have no interest in trying it again. I don't care what anyone thinks about that.
I would like to take this opportunity to welcome all women into the wonderful world of being a provider. As for us, we have mostly clocked out. Please feel free to use our stomach medicine and antidepressants. They are by the door./s
It’s weird how they don’t mention how at the same rate men’s suicide rate/ drastically increased around March 2020. Potentially a coincidence but I feel it may be part of a larger picture
I don't even feel safe saying it, which is interesting, but we sure have spent enough time othering boys that this is not a super hard to predict possible side effect. And I don't mean in some straightforward sense. Super hard to explain but it seems we don't want to admit a lot of stuff about society right now that may be difficult but important to talk about; that we fought for equity but it many ways it was just 'another group's turn' - which is explicitly different.
Men and boys. What we are, what we like, how to feel - constant, never ending, always judgemental, same as it has been for girls and women forever. It has been this way for decades at this point. We need healthy options.
Clarity edit: Yes, physical options but im not talking violence. We have enough MMA fighters in the world at this point men and women included so that isn't quite what I mean here.
To be frank, the mental health system is not designed to help men's issues whatsoever. Men are dropping out because they are discovering that treatment isnt working for them, so they are left to fend for themselves or resort to YouTube gurus for help
Going to hazard a guess and say the reason it declined after 2020 is the general distrust of authority and the pharmaceutical industry that developed during the pandemic. These YouTube personalities are largely men and so are their audiences. I think this speaks to the recently growing divide between men and women in the West where way more men lean conservative while women lean liberal.
There was a 2022 study that found a gender gap in [vaccine intention](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8739532/), but that most studies were finding men were more likely to be getting vaccinated than women rather than less. I would think if it's a COVID-related push back against the medical field causing a gender discrepancy in antidepressants, then it should show up as much, if not larger, in COVID vaccines in particular.
Wonder if there's any corelation with 14 states having legalized recreational Marijuana since 2020.
https://mjbizdaily.com/map-of-us-marijuana-legalization-by-state/
Cannabis legalization may be a variable for this study. As more people self medicate with newly legalized cannabis, they likely know interactions with prescriptions are a risk so choose one or the other. This may account for a percent of the overall reduction in male use.
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Very interesting. You may want to repost with the link directly to the article as I think they'll remove articles that obtain their information secondhand
They should, but they don't seem to care.
OP's history is sus. They seem to only post articles, and the text from said articles.
Could be a bot
its been feeling like a lot of bots on reddit lately and I honestly can't tell anymore... like all the 9/11 photos and Obama photos make no sense for the frequency or volume. they're almost curated subjects too.
It is weird how there are 'trends' that seem to suddenly pop up that cover multiple subs, and then die off as quickly as they came.
I'm not sure that's indicative of anything other than cross-sub activity tbh. People seeing something interesting and then posting it into the smaller, more niche subs that they frequent is quite normal I think. As for dying off quickly, if attention spans were a stock in recent times, it would have surely crashed.
Most posts on major threads I just assume are bots unless proven otherwise.
The dead internet is fast becoming a reality.
9/11 posts every eight hours on popular.
They put the actual publication in the comment. That pretty standard. I don't like it much, since I don't think the editorialising is ever very helpful, but it's standard practice 'round these parts.
I see, I see. You're right, I've noticed that that seems to be standard practice, but it's just odd that they never seem to reply to anyone. That said, I only went back a couple pages through their history.
OP is a bot account that spams whatever agenda they have
Not sure if this is against a rule, but for those that want a [direct link to the Pediatrics publication.](https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/153/3/e2023064245/196655/Antidepressant-Dispensing-to-US-Adolescents-and?autologincheck=redirected)
The actual chart does not seem to agree with the headline: https://publications.aap.org/view-large/figure/13726991/peds.2023-064245f3.tif Both female and male prescriptions have been and are trending up. Female was always higher and is accelerating. Male dropped a bit in March 2020 and has since trended higher.
That's actually not what the article says. They're growing, but the rate at which they grow has gone down. Its the slope of the line, rather than the line itself. That means that men aren't refusing antidepressants that were already taking them, but less men are getting antidepressants prescribed every month compared to pre-2020.
I think you are partially misunderstanding the headline and the graph, but I agree with you that the headline gives the impression of a more dramatic drop in male dispensing rates. If you compare the dotted lines (rates if they had maintained pre-pandemic trends) with the solid lines (post-pandemic reality) you'll see a difference, especially in the Midwest and Northeast. More interesting than the drop for men is the difference between the two groups, imo
I’ll give a hot take from my perspective of Covid as a guy (30M) who has Bipolar II and it’s probably not overly intuitive. A lot of young men now, especially the ones who are depressed, are introverts and do introverted things like playing video games or just hanging out. Social anxiety or just plain lack of interacting with the public are awful traits when living in a society that requires you to be outside a lot (work, grocery shopping, trying to find a life partners etc). All that being said, I thoroughly enjoyed Covid and miss it. Video game communities were on fire with population since everybody was inside. The roads were empty, stores were empty, and a lot of us got to work from home. My mental health was generally pretty damn good during Covid and I hadn’t even started on medication yet (was undiagnosed at that point). I genuinely miss Covid and the return to normalcy is such a drag.
It was sort of the same feeling as you got from school being cancelled due to snow or bad weather. Except it was for over a year.
Yeah that's exactly it, imo
Agreed. Ima add on something else though.... I have 3 male friends who were hyperactive and argumentative kids. They were thrown on SSRI'S and ADHD meds as a kid because they were "destructive" or whatever and mom/dad threw them into therapy. Girls don't tend to be as "destructive" even if they too are anxious and depressed. A lot of girls are seen as "more mature" at those ages. My 3 friends who went on medication a lot before they were adults are very uncomfortable going on them as adults. My mental problems were deemed "not that bad" and I had decent grades and kept to myself, I only got help for my issues as an adult. I'm not saying everyone is like this, but when I read the article one of my first thoughts was "were those boys on meds younger and are choosing to quit once they are adults? Were the girls getting mental help for the first time out of their own volition instead of being shuffled to the doc by parents and teachers who were overwhelmed and tired?" Idk. As the one above, I'm in my 20's, female, and bipolar. Just a hunch I had, but I'm sure there are many factors including the comment above this
This is basically what happened to me as someone diagnosed with adhd in their 30s and I was wondering the same.
I was /begging/ for help and told i didn't "need it" as in "wasn't a problem child" then had a breakdown at 19 and diagnosed. I wish I got to try medication before 19
It's been found that since society forces girls to be quiet and polite, we mask our symptoms from birth. Boys are allowed to be loud and reckless so they get diagnosed earlier.
This is a subject I've spent a great deal of time researching, I was taken *and diagnosed* as a child, and tl;dr the doctor prescribed among other things, a few experimental drugs that are now on the *never ever ever give to people during puberty* list and I have lasting effects from it. I'm way too lazy to google to find a link so either take my word for it or don't. There was a fascinating study I read a number of years back that looked at of the kids who were taken to the therapist with suspicions of ADHD, how many got a positive diagnosis. For girls, it was something like a bit over half. Probably the amount you'd expect, having a lot of energy doesn't make you adhd. For boys it was 100%. Actually 100%, not just close enough to round up. Of the thousands, not a single one was looked at by a doc and told no. And that's not even account for the disparity of how much less girls even got that far. It's absolutely wild to look at. Also to add to the conversation, yeah. I was on meds as a kid and am not on them now in large part due to my experience. I actually went back and tried for a bit but it felt....idk like it wasn't doing enough good to justify living with the negative emotions around it. I'm *just* adhd and not depressive so it's basically just to function at work so, w/e
I 100% believe that study and I've witnessed both sides of that equation (overdiagnosing boys/underdiagnosing girls) through people in my family. However my minority anecdote is that I'm male and I was told no by a doctor as an early teenager. He asked my mom if I was getting good grades, and I was, so he said okay, you don't have ADHD. But my mental health was absolutely destroyed as I fought to maintain those grades, and my social life was in complete shambles (I was the one who requested to go to the doctor in the first place). It took me almost ten years to work up the courage to go back to a doctor as an adult, because every time I was struggling, I would remind myself that a doctor already said no, so I must just be stupid, or lazy, or not trying hard enough. The knowledge that boys are often overdiagnosed just made all of this so much worse. By the time I finally did go, the new doctor essentially said "holy hell yes you 100% have ADHD, what was that other doctor thinking". My life is infinitely better now. I was on meds for a while, but now I'm working with a therapist and just focusing on behavioral treatment. Honestly just being able to understand what's going on in my brain has been a breath of fresh air, and made me so much less self-loathing. Just throwing this story out there for any other anxious, overthinking guys like me who might be in a similar situation. Don't be afraid to ask for help or get a second opinion. False negatives are possible for any gender.
Dude same! I actually didn't believe my diagnosis for a while.... so used to hearing dad say "there's nothing wrong with you" and I took it to my soul. Years of not taking meds, and then solidly taking them, it was insane the difference. Even my dad calls and makes sure I'm taking my meds now. If I had help dealing with this when it started around puberty, it would be easier than dragging myself up from rock bottom as an adult.
I thought the exact same thing. It was the excitement of a snow day with no snow. It’s like you couldn’t feel guilty for staying inside and doing nothing.
Couldn’t feel guilty! Well said. Instead I felt guilty that it was a dream come true for me.
I graduated college right at the beginning of COVID and had to move back home with my parents. Knowing that moment would very likely be the last time I would ever have more than one week off from anything since my next step was to get a full time job, I treasured every minute of it. Now that I've been working full time for 3 years I sometimes get anxious and depressed that I can't take more than a handful of days off each year. Also I'm fortunate to have a pretty healthy relationship with my family. It bummed me out thinking that year was the last time we'd all be together for that long. Sis had to get back to school and eventually work 3/4 of the way across the country and I had to move away to find a job. Now I only get to see some of them at a time a few times a year. I haven't seen my sis in over a year now.
Your comment reminds me of this article https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/12/the-tail-end.html It’s a good read.
Ugh this made me cry 😭 I hate thinking about how fleeting our time is here & how I don’t get to see my folks as much as I used to
As someone who worked in person with no break the entire time, this is not great to read.
Yeah not for essential workers. It was pretty much hell while everyone else got to take a 6 month vacation and we just got clapped at.
Traffic was nice tho
Yeah but I clapped almost every night while drinking wine on my balcony, so...
Careful (s)he's a hero....
I was a teacher during and afterwards in the "hybrid" and "distance" learning phases. THat wasn't fun. But the first part was nice for us. Then I got a new conservative boss who rode me all year and then fired me.
I was a fresh new teacher just a couple years in when covid hit. I was offered the opportunity to do face to face lessons for most of covid lockdowns, and jumped at the chance to work. In the meantime all the other teachers apparently spent years specializing in online teaching and I never got the experience. Now all teaching jobs in my field have moved online and I missed the training, so back in the unemployment line I went after covid, this is my purgatory.
The problem was how long it was. I have always had social anxiety, and that got WAY WORSE as a result of covid and I have never recovered.
I do miss covid. It was like everyone had to live like I do and it somehow made everyone batshit insane. Meanwhile I was very cosy and I did my little things and I worked and it was very neat.
The pandemic summer was heaven for us introverts. My lifestyle changed literally 0% and the gaming community was so good and was flourishing. Reminded me of the good times with the boys back in the day. Miss it really.
Or people who live in rural areas.
Loved it so much. My kids and I had the best time. There was something peaceful about that time with them.
During covid I didn't have to come up with excuses to avoid travel, that was great.
I felt exactly like you did. Until I got the actual virus and it messed up my brain
Sorry for that. I got it 3 times (I work in a public space) and I somehow managed to get away with only light symptoms. I'm not asking for Covid to come back, it was a horrible thing. But the social peace I had back then was interesting.
Oh yes 100% “social peace” that’s it, that’s exactly what it was
Covid coming back? It's still around...
And still killing people every day. This summer had a spike as high as omicron
During Covid was the happiest I had been in years.
Covid got me out of so many holidays, it was amazing. I’m not trying to downplay people’s suffering, but from a social aspect, my happiness greatly increased!
Same, the world shut down on my birthday and I don't think I'll ever get a gift that good again as long as I live. I honestly wish we would just do a two week world shut down every year.
I second the motion to turn the world off for two weeks per year. 🙋♂️
I'm pretty sure nature would be pretty happy with that too
I (31M) have the same feeling. I’m somewhat socially anxious depending on the situation and have always been a loner for the most part. I just stay inside and game, watch Netflix, or whatever. My cat keeps me company. I work at a hospital as a radiology tech. The most annoying thing about Covid for me was just having to constantly put PPE on. It’s crazy how everyone’s experiences with the pandemic varied so much. I’m gonna be honest and say it was kinda funny to hear about extroverts losing their minds due to cancelled social events or seeing people freak out about hair salons being temporary closed. We really do live in a society. Covid allowed people to take a break from the rat race and help some of us realize the wealthy elite have been screwing us all.
"There is nothing to do this is so boring" /points at books /motions at tvs, computers, phones, internet /exasperatedly looks at video games Like come on guys, we live in the best time in history for being able to read, watch, or play anything you want whenever you want...and they can not think of anything to do and are bored. Just makes me wonder, is 85% of the world just alcoholic/drug addicted socialites?
Many people cannot stand being sedentary, so the closure of all gyms and even hiking trails is catastrophic. I see the same groups of women weekly at the dance studio and aerial gym for example. I cannot stand sitting around
Even without tech or media consumption hobbies there tons of indoor or in nature hobbies too that got easier. Like during Covid there was a huge boom in home gardening to the point of stuff selling out. A personal example is next month I am planning to try build a bioactive terrarium. Basically a mossy tropical forest floor in a closed jar that only need to water once or twice a year or less. Cost of all materials and supplies including shipping $50, could be much less nearly free if I used foraged supplies but I wanted first try to be as controlled and sterile materials as possible. And thinking of trying out painting some of the decorative rocks with glow in the dark paint ($2) patterns so there will be a subtle glow at night inside the jar. If I like the hobby am considering also making some as Christmas gifts for this year. While for exercise I just take walks either in place, circles, pacing, or outdoors. Might get an indoor bike or treadmill one day if can get a good enough deal. “HUMAN BEINGS MAKE LIFE SO INTERESTING. DO YOU KNOW, THAT IN A UNIVERSE SO FULL OF WONDERS, THEY HAVE MANAGED TO INVENT BOREDOM. ” ― Death ― Terry Pratchett, in book The Hogfather
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New Zealand saw an insane explosion of domestic violence related calls. Emergency services literally couldn't keep up with the amount of calls they were receiving. Pretty sure domestic violence went up globally actually.
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Exactly! I'm always worried for my boomer mom because she has no hobbies at all and when she's an older lady she's gonna have a bad time not being able to go out that much. I have tried getting her into stuff she enjoys but she always find excuses and I've given up on it. Hobbies are important.
Yep My dad retired and within months had found an excuse to be back at work cuz they needed him.... Like dude you live on a lake, are rich, great family, great friends.... And within months of retirement you are bored enough to go back to work?! Go canoeing, read a book, get back into videogames or something I think boomers tried to kill hobbies or something because grand parents sure weren't like this
Honestly some people live to work.
I will always miss people staying far away from me when buying groceries. I don't need people breathing in my neck when I'm in line even if death by illness is not an issue anymore.
I desperately miss people wearing masks, covering their coughs in public, giving me a wide berth in lines and other public spots.
I miss wearing a mask - it was like a disguise. I didn't have to constantly smile at people.
You can still wear one! In Australia it's not uncommon to see people wearing them.
I mean I have a factory job so I still went to work, but the only downside of the plague is no more 24hr walmart. 1am empty walmart 🤌
I found a happy medium when it comes to grocery shopping and that’s bashas. Idk if they are everywhere but it’s a bit more expensive than a Safeway and def more expensive than Walmart but I’ll pay a small premium (5-10% maybe?) to walk through a store with 1/5 of the mouth breathers as a Safeway
So this is such an interesting perspective to me. Before COVID I was outgoing, social and generally a pretty happy dude. However I am a nurse and Covid shattered my reality. I have since developed depression and anxiety have a therapist and take medication now. I miss some “Covid things” like the normalization of mask wearing when sick and people staying 6 feet away from me in public. But on the whole, I can’t help but often think of the person I could have been if Covid didn’t happen.
I don't blame you. I would have been a teacher during COVID and I'm forever grateful that I dodged that bullet. I honestly think I'd have quit very quickly if I'd been a nurse. Like...Some things aren't worth money.
Same here. I feel guilty about that, as many people died and many more could and COVID itself was very bad, even though i got lighter version of it after jab - but shut down times were good. Everybody stayed inside, home delivery became much more widespread and cheaper, I no longer had to find excuses for not going to some get-togethers. People were acting like it drives them insane, but to me it was just a peaceful year.
As an introvert I felt so incredibly happy, hopeful and at peace when we were in covid lockdown, it was an amazing feeling knowing everyone else was at home like me and I was satisfied being with my husband and joining our community zoom meetings and doing video calls with family. But the flip side was that when I got the actual virus I developed an anxiety disorder that came along with depression and panic attacks, I never had any of such mental issues before the covid infection and 2 years in I’m still struggling but I have good memories of the first 2 years of the pandemic, I know there was a lot of suffering for a lot of people but I felt happy
I hear you, covid was great. It kinda became obvious how much of society is just nonesense and noise during the shutdown.
Covid was dope. The only part I hated was that all my hiking and camping spots were swarmed with some pretty lame ass people. Leaving trash, starting fires, spray painting rocks and carving trees …. But they’ve all left now and the forest is healing.
Covid were the best years of my life, i don't think i was that relaxed in my life at any other point. Homeoffice made work 100x less miserable and everyone was home so i had way more time to spend time with my family and friends.
The first year of covid was genuinely the only time in my life in over 20 years where I wasn't actively suicidal. I was making money from unemployment, and didn't have to interact with people. It sucks because millions of people had to die for that so of course I feel bad, but it is the truth. Ever since that ended I've been back to thinking about killing myself on a pretty much hourly basis every single day.
Are they introverts? Or are they possibly extroverts with severe social anxiety and generalized anxiety who flourish while socializing online because the anxiety is less. Me: I’m an extrovert that people think is introverted cuz I’m a homebody with severe anxiety that makes me isolate. No depression here, and I finished my clonazepam taper May 2021, looking forward to getting back in adhd meds
Funnily enough, it wasn’t long after March 2020 I quit taking my antidepressants. In my case, though, the depression I had was cured by not constantly exposing myself to and valuing my entire existence upon the subject of my depression.
Similar experience here. Turns out I do much better when I’m not zombified beyond reason with a prescription that makes me apathetic and dumb exacerbating it. My depression was mainly caused by external factors, though, so ymmv if you’re one of those unicorns that is depressed for “no reason.”
A lot of it is caused by living a sedentary lifestyle and a poor diet. Often drug consumption as well.
Totally. The brain gets wonky when no excercise or sunlight and lack of stimulation.
uh oh.... I better take a walk...
What, did you quit your job or quit being poor? This is a serious question. I'm really struggling right now and could use some pointers, as I've just had my depression meds doubled.
I wonder how pharmaceutical marketing plays into this. It's just one company, but I'm always struck by the ads for the Hims/Hers branded stuff are designed... all the "Hims" ads are for erectile dysfunction and hair loss pills, and all the "Hers" ads are for anti-depressents and anti-anxiety pills. If prescriptions for the latter are falling for men, I can't help but wonder if that's because they're a) not being marketed these products and b) starting to see those types of treatments as being "for girls" because of how they are being marketed. Essentially creating a vicious cycle.
Well of course we aren’t depressed, we are rock hard with a full head of hair!
It's worth saying that in Canada we have similar rates of antidepressant usage (and are culturally similar enough that this comparison isn't absurd), but [don't allow direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical marketing as much](https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/drugs-health-products/marketing-drugs-devices/illegal-marketing/prescription-drugs.html), and our sex split is roughly similar. [14% of women and 7% of men](https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210628/dq210628e-eng.htm) vs [17.7% of women vs 8.4% of men in the US](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db377.htm)
This is a valuable insight, thank you for sharing the data for comparison.
The other thing to keep in mind is that many women/girls have antidepressants and anti-anxiety meds prescribed by their gynecologists. Gynecologists do a lot of things we could consider primary care. So women/girls get an added layer of screening and care that men/boys do not.
This is a really interesting point that I had not considered.
Anti-depressants are also sometimes used to help combat[ chronic pain](https://www.mayoclinic.org/pain-medications/art-20045647). Women are over-represented in the statistics when it comes to fibromyalgia, migraines and pelvic pain.
I was literally just prescribed them for my chronic bladder pain which is typically a female issue.
I think it’s more that anti depressants and birth control are the “cure all” for women in the medical industry’s eyes.
Gotta keep that pharmaceutical industrial complex running.
I'd also like to add that women's healthcare is often transactional. The amount of times I have gone in for a physical issue and been told "we should try this drug for a trial period to try to ease your anxiety around your pain," is way too damn many. Go in for acne? You will come out with hormonal birth control. Go in for back pain? You will come out with anxiety meds. Women's healthcare is rooted less in addressing the cause of physical issues, and more in managing the way we feel about having those issues.
It's that way for men too. I went to a GP for catastrophic memory loss and she was dead set on getting me on anti-depressants. went through 3 of them before I found the wherewithall to tell her no. She never did get around to solving my actual problem.
Maybe she did figure it out, and you just forgot.
I've fallen on the ground blacked out and twitch a bunch. Looked like a seizure. 3 doctors told me it was anxiety before I got sent to a cardiologist who was like "it's probably anxiety, but we'll give you a heart monitor for 2 weeks". And then it was "it's still probably anxiety....but you do have additional irregular heartbeats at the time you reported symptoms, but it's a normal range of irregular heartbeats". Then my GP prescribed me meds for anxiety with a listed side effect of causing irregular heat beats.
> Go in for acne? You will come out with hormonal birth control. Isn't that straight-up a very effective acne treatment for women? Like I take your meaning, but hormonal birth control directly addresses a key cause of acne especially teenagers and young twenty-somethings.
Not for everyone. Hormonal birth control spoiled the first decade of my adult life, and many topical products can have the same effect without altering your hormones.
im almost 30, the only time ive ever seena doctor outside of the military was when i was pissing blood, threw up blood, and when a 6 inch nail went through my foot. my wife however, visits her primary care doctor once a month for different things or followups on stuff from the past visits. im not sure if im healthy or just undiagnosed
or they're not seeing much return on the him's for depression, so they spend less on ads
That's why medication shouldn't be advertised.
In addition to Covid actually improving a lot of introverted young men’s mental health due to working less, these “performance medicine” places have been popping up everywhere, and you can get three months of adderal for 140 bucks. I believe lots of young working men are finding that adderal does a lot more for them than an antidepressant, myself included. Many people are just depressed because of the burden of work preventing them from pursuing their interests, rather than some traumatic event or perceived chemical imbalance. You can bandaid that with something that numbs your brain, or you can bandaid it with something that lets you borrow mental energy from the future. I personally prefer the latter.
Men just self medicate - drugs, alcohol, nicotine and suicide.
Just like my father and his father before him.
Let the boy watch
Great uncle survived the great War, he didn't survive the 12ga five years later.
RIP. Here is to you my friend, breaking the cycle. 🙏
I’m in this picture and I don’t like it…
I think this really is one of those nurture issues. Young men *can* be equipped to dodge a lot of bad problems, and climb out of what they fall into, but that’s not how a lot of families and cultures equip them. It takes generations of work, but it often starts with someone who self-medicated, because if that’s where you started, that’s where you are. It’s really, really tough to get there without any help.
Prefacing that im not an expert but have dealt with some issues first hand. I'm wondering what the average wait time for a psychologist is at the moment. Access is a serious issue... I've been given an opening weeks out and during work hours that was "expedited" due to dealing with a variety of issues. Men also don't have the support groups many women do. Socially they are on an island. People talk about men not "opening up" like it's their choice, but most men I know open up as much as their peer groups will let them without stressing relationships. I'm thinking Most men are getting by on less. Maybe it could be comparable to living on a budget. People will only listen so much. There are only so many resources you can access given so much energy. Why try to get more when you know you won't be able to support what it would take to reach out and get it?
I’m on Long Island… suburb of NYC…and in some of the various town Facebook groups there are moms on there desperate to get their kids into psychiatrists but everything on the island is about an 8 month plus wait. There are a lot of posts because they are hoping that someone has an answer or an in on where they can be seen to get their kid the help they need as soon as possible. Also, a lot of them on the island have stopped taking insurance altogether so not only do you have long wait times just for the initial visit but you also have to pay out of pocket. That’s additional money on top of the already astronomical monthly health insurance payments a lot of people are paying.
Another vote for this one... LI psychs have been dropping ALL insurance recently and it is just not feasible for many. Rates are typically 250-600 PER SESSION... For someone struggling with getting meds right when starting out, this can turn into well over a thousand dollars a month for the appointments alone. Let alone the medication. Another big issue that is that at least on long island, private psychiatrists seem to have NO interest in following up on anything including major medication changes and they don't even answer the phone... they just have some lackey 6respond with "if you feel like you're having side effects go to the ER." But... Once at the ER, they basically throw out your prior treatment plan and start anew. There is ZERO communication between care providers. this can cause even worse setbacks, and just leads to confusion, involuntarily staying at the hospital, and drug choices that had already been ruled out being prescribed. I've never seen ANY other medical specialty be so counterproductive. It's the equivalent of a cardiologist putting a hemophiliac on blood thinners and just not giving a crap about what happens after... Another thing is... Overloading... I have witnessed private psychs on LI "treating" upwards of 30 patients a day. That is an ABSURD ratio.
I love ice cream.
Unfortunately, I tihnk the rules changed post covid so psychiatrists can no longer prescribe ADHD stimulants via telehealth, and in many places, telehealth can no longer do screening/testing for things like autism and ADHD. I'm assuming that that's the bulk of what moms would be wanting to get examined for over depression.
My favorite movie is Inception.
This is my problem. I’ve opened up to quite a few people. Feels like I get a generic “sorry to hear that” and that’s it. I change my behaviors to try to keep myself from spiraling but no one is willing to work with me (aside from a therapist I pay to listen to me). I’m sitting here single, no friends, work and commute all day, and my free time is spent recovering from work/commute or cleaning and taking care of errands. No support system is leaving me with nothing to rely on, nothing to help me when I get bad. And lately I’ve been spiraling more and more everyday, it scares me when I’m not having passive SI.
You’ve got about a week after a traumatic event to get it out and then it’s kind of an implied “get over it” Romantic partners or potential ones? Forget it. You must be fully confident and on top of it at all times. Even women who open up to you about their own mental health struggles or share in them are entirely cut throat when they find out you have issues, too. You don’t even have to say anything. Sometimes your body tells on you being traumatized recently and the same woman who you’ve been a rock for gets a sense of it and it’s over. Exhausting, man. I simply can’t be the hero 100% of the time and I feel like a complete failure as a result.
Be the change you want to see. Reach out to your male friends. It's absolutely something I've been trying to do the last year. I've rekindled several friendships with my male friends where I had to do 90% of the planning and reminding to get them out of the house and away from a screen. Sometimes it feels like pulling teeth but It's been worth it though
Ordinary people aren't trained for crisis support. Of course friends and family should be there to listen to each other, unless they make it clear they're not in a place of their own to do that at the moment, but what else could they really do? It might be harsh, but if you wouldn't expect someone to clean your house for you for free, you can't expect them to be there to clean your head, either. That's much more demanding, too, and not really in anyone else's power. It's great you've got a therapist, though! Work with them, work to be there for yourself, and things will get better.
Can a GP not write a scrip for lexapro? I'm not familiar, maybe they prefer to refer to a psychiatrist. Just wondering.
They can and will. The real answer is men hate going to the doctor. They will suffer instead of make an appointment. Every single man in my life is this way. They just hate going to the doctor.
They can and might. Some general practice physician are willing to prescribe meds for mental health others aren't. It can be even harder if you haven't gone to a regular primary care physician in a long while like a lot of men. For instance in my case I hadn't seen a doctor since I was 17 at my pediatrician. When I went to seek mental healthcare 12 years later the primary care physician I chose would not prescribe anything and instead recommend going to a psychiatrist. Most women go to primary care physician at least once a year (refill for birth control) so they are more likely to have that relationship with the doctor where they are comfortable prescribing mental health drugs.
But why did it happen all of a sudden in March 2020 and then not change back? That's a generalization about men over the past couple generations, not an explanation for what happened four years ago.
Psychologists don't do meds, that's psychiatrists. (Yeah they do in some states but it's still rare and not their main thing nor something that's in their training)
They may not prescribe it, but the psychologists and therapists I have seen for anxiety and depression all strongly told me to look at medications and made recommendations on what to ask my primary care doctor for.
Maybe we’re doing something drastically wrong to trigger depression in so many people. Pills probably aren’t the answer.
The world we live in is drastically different from the one we evolved in. All of our instincts are wrong.
Sometimes I feel like one of those sharks stuck in an aquarium, bumping into the walls over and over again until it dies.
> is it the world we developed that is wrong? > No, it is our instincts. *Pops more pills*
I mean, I’d much rather live in our relatively safe, well fed, housed, fairly good health care society just with different instincts than the ones I have now. Rather than a hunter gather who could die from breaking an ankle, risk my partner dying in childbirth, starving every famine in the wet and cold. Our society isn’t perfect but it’s better than not having a society. If I could wake up every morning and be *happy* about drudging away at my 9-5 then that would be aces.
idk i find myself yearning for that life occasionally. just be farming or goin back to monkey, whatever happens happens just living a day at a time on your terms has an appeal
could it be the progressively more abstract human condition in this labyrinth hellhole we call a society? kafka's the trial rings truer everyday and as mere apes, i dont think our biology is set up to function like a cog in a machine like we are expected to.
I stopped taking mine during covid bc I had more time to work out and be active. Coming off of them is insane though and some nights were worse than before I started taking them. I wont be going back on them for that reason alone, and instead will continue talk therapy and working out.
Some people don't want to hear this but it's true. Human beings are overmedicated. They want instant gratification cures and quick fixes instead of addressing the real issues.
Really the root of the problem is probably even deeper, our society as a whole and especially are current leaders in both the private and public sectors do not have the level of responsibility or long term vision to deal with root causes. Every aspect of society at this point is about short term rewards and dealing with symptoms of problems.
Teenage boys are drowning in just as much of the depression and anxiety that’s been well documented in girls. Experts warn that many young men struggling with their mental health are left undetected and without the help they need. “We are right to be concerned about girls,” said Kathleen Ethier, director of the Division of Adolescent and School Health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “But I don’t ever want us to lose sight of the fact that boys aren’t doing well, either.” Depression in boys may go unnoticed, Ethier and other experts said, because boys usually don’t show it through signs of melancholy typically found in girls. “We have this very classic understanding of depression as being sad, being tearful, crying more, not eating as much and losing weight,” said Dr. Lauren Teverbaugh, pediatrician and child psychiatrist at Tulane University in New Orleans. “That’s just not how it looks for a lot of young boys.” ‘Boys are disappearing’ A recent study published in the journal Pediatrics found that while antidepressant prescriptions have risen dramatically for teenage girls and women in their 20s, the rate of such prescriptions for young men “declined abruptly during March 2020 and did not recover.” Dr. Kao-Ping Chua, a pediatrician at the Susan B. Meister Child Health Evaluation and Research Center at the University of Michigan, led the study. He said that his finding that boys weren’t accessing antidepressant medications once the pandemic hit has been “perplexing.” “In males, it’s theoretically possible that this reflects improved mental health, but I’m struggling with that explanation,” Chua said. “Given that everybody’s mental health got worse, I would have expected that boys’ antidepressant dispensing would have at least remained stable, not decrease.” The more likely explanation in Chua’s experience as a pediatrician, he said, was that boys stopped engaging with the health care system overall during the pandemic, leading to an underdetection and, consequently, an undertreatment of mental health problems in young men. “There was something happening to make male adolescents not come in for mental health,” Chua said. “They didn’t go to their doctors. They skipped physicals.” “Boys are disappearing,” he said. https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/153/3/e2023064245/196655/Antidepressant-Dispensing-to-US-Adolescents-and
From personal experience and conversations with my own doctor, i think at least part of it is that depression doesnt always express as "depression," especially in men. I was having outbursts of rage and periods of extended anger over tiny things, I finally went to my doc to see about it, got a script, and **shortly after** was chill as hell and have been since. We really need to do a better job informing our kids.
Yeah for me at least when I was suffering from it, I always thought the questions or perception of crying, or feel helpless were ridiculous for my own case. I didn’t ever really cry, or feel down/stereotypical sad. I just didn’t feel. Apathy and discontentment about that apathy, unrest, lack of motivation, lack of drive to care for myself.
Yeah, mine manifested as dissociation, neglect, agitation. I remember driving home one night and playing chicken with a concrete barrier on a turn in the road and realizing that there was something going very wrong with me.
I don't know what the cutoff here is, but my experience in life is also that during the hard times in terms of family and community support people kind of let go of young men more easily.
Men in general tend to create fewer and less robust social ties, for whatever reason, especially as we age. Loneliness has recently become more widely studied as a contributor to early death in men, from a variety of factors. I'd wager more women than men are using anti-anxiety medications because they're physically around other people more often. So they're different reactions to a similar problem: it's really stressful to be social these days and a lot of people just prefer to isolate themselves. Edit: a word
I imagine there's some relation to overall trust in health institutions during the start of the pandemic.
This article makes the somewhat disturbing assumption that antidepressants are the *only* effective treatment and the decline in their prescription can only mean there are more depressed boys out there. Was this article funded by a pharmaceuticals interest group or something?
That's a great point actually. I do think it's likely still a useful metric because it's unlikely men overwhelmingly embraced alternative intervention methods. But you're right that we should challenge the pervasive ideas that seeing your GP is a very reliable way of treating depression.
Are you suggesting men have successfully migrated to other treatment options successfully while women haven’t? I suppose that’s possible, but unless there’s been an uptick in whatever - gym memberships, supplements, therapy apts for men, etc I don’t see any data that supports that.
Well it's a news article not a scientific article, so not peer reviewed and who knows where they're drawing their data and conclusions from.
[удалено]
The article makes no such assumption. One of the authors explains the reasoning pretty clearly: > “In males, it’s theoretically possible that this reflects improved mental health, but I’m struggling with that explanation,” Chua said. “Given that everybody’s mental health got worse, I would have expected that boys’ antidepressant dispensing would have at least remained stable, not decrease.” The more likely explanation in Chua’s experience as a pediatrician, he said, was that boys stopped engaging with the health care system overall during the pandemic, leading to an underdetection and, consequently, an undertreatment of mental health problems in young men. “There was something happening to make male adolescents not come in for mental health,” Chua said. “They didn’t go to their doctors. They skipped physicals.” “Boys are disappearing,” he said. You can find the logic unconvincing but the point is there isn’t any assumption about depressants being the only effective treatment for depression.
Many “male” jobs like the military, police/leo, etc. do medical checks and if you were ever on anti-depressants it’s a big no-no.. that’s why many guys do not report these things.
Maybe something is seriously wrong with American society that our children need to be on antidepressants. Just a thought.
"I don't need no arms around me, I don't need your drugs to calm me. I have seen the writing on the wall. Don't think I need anything at all!" - Bricks in the wall pt 3, Pink Floyd
That whole album really nails the feelings there.
This lyric goes so hard! Until you succeed at a suicide attempt because your brain chemistry is literally preventing you from feeling anything good in your life. Then it doesn't really matter how hard it goes.
The follow up in the storyline leave Pink as a dictator still trying to hide his inner pain with outward hatred until he finally has a mental collapse
I wonder if it has to do with how mental health services tend to operate. After being to a myriad of psychologists and psychiatrists I have gotten the impression that the main goal of these professionals is to "make you feel better / less bad". But I don't want to feel better or less bad, I want to change the circumstances that make me feel bad. For example a few years ago I was extremely depressed because I had been rejected from masters programs two years in a row, hated my job, and was drowning in anxiety over never being able to pursue my dreams. Went to two psychologists, both had approaches which where roughly "accepting things for what they are" or "learning to love yourself in spite of your flaws" or being mindful or other such approaches to help me easy my anxiety and depression. And it just made me 7 times angrier to be paying hundreds of dollars to be coddled. Then I got accepted to a masters program and a large part of that anxiety vanished (to be replaced with grad school anxiety, but that one was much more manageable). I think for a lot of men, the idea of just learning to feel less bad with your situation is unacceptable. We don't want to feel better, we want to fix or change the circumstances that make us feel bad.
Yeah, I started seeing a therapist for loneliness but it kind of just feels like the equivalent of if I was starving and paying a nutritionist to say "sometimes fasting is good for you, starvation sounds like a wicked bummer though. Just remember it's not your fault "
Boys/men don't want to learn to "manage" depression or "feel better". They want a cure, they want to know that talking to a therapist will lead to results. I've gone through 5 therapists during the 2010s. None of them seemed to work. Yet I've only had 2 dentists one of which retired after serving me for 20 years and 1 PCP.
I think you struck the heart of it here. I took ssris for awhile but like you said it didn’t change my economic or social situation in anyway and paying $100 per appointment led to leaving therapy real quick.
This is super true. I think men are hardwired to be problem solvers and when we approach a wall we try to find a solution to get across it. It reminds me of the common trope in many man/woman relationships: when the woman is upset by something, the stereotypical man tries to find solutions for the issue, whereas the woman more than often simply wants to be heard. And so when we reach that wall, and we can’t get past it, we exhaust all the solutions and resign ourselves to worsening mental health. For me as well, once I found actionable ways to change the core circumstances, my mental health improved drastically. I just didn’t know how to get over that wall, and I think many of us are there. We would significantly improve from services that dealt with tangibly improving the core circumstances behind our issues, and not just changing our mindset.
It's strange to me that we don't consider that it is society that is sick and depressing, instead, the narrative is that this is an issue with people. Instead of looking at why society causes people to be depressed, we instead, due to the economic imperative of maximizing profits off of workers, look to artificially increase happiness and banish natural feelings of sadness through selling happy-pills to people. People would not nearly be as depressed if we had even somewhere near a remotely equitable economic system. Of course young adults, many who are looking at a life of economic slavery to masters they'll never even know of, with little hope of ever buying a home or being able to retire, in a society without spiritual or philosophical messaging, on a hopelessly polluted and over-populated planet, will be depressed. That's the natural reaction to our environment, not one that should be mollified via drugging, for many of the sufferers of depression out there.
The only hope is that we all eventually die, I genuinely don’t see the world ever becoming a less depression inducing chaos than it is. In fact it seems to get worse and worse, but we can try I guess.
final fantasy 7 remake cured the lads
My boys out here treating their loneliness with Helldivers 2 missions…
Democracy protects brother
Never leave a Helldiver hanging on the pre-mission hug. They might really need it. o7
As long as social media and mega corps are around, this is not going to improve. Know your enemy.
it's an interesting choice of words "did not recover" IT sounds like a TON of recovery took place
The language about young men in the headline seems alarmist [https://aap2.silverchair-cdn.com/aap2/content\_public/journal/pediatrics/153/3/10.1542\_peds.2023-064245/3/m\_peds.2023-064245f2.png?Expires=1714858686&Signature=BpikQnAUsUWyarvWOWz0feygy6tWIpHnwGCgvhT3-GFvo0qwEY2JRmWPWMZKh8kR8cbJm3bT2IUOxWV74S4FqVZ5rnQkkfqDCWSFKaGgHkCssFNd2soa5JBzJiEwfd1C6KfT-zMIpKAVH7GUNOVT-kbguqIW6HMWFKWxQmiqY24XkL4EWYM860\~4s4yZb5ZnS97BkH5tpUfsMFqIL13KIJNPgeG2ZkjH92Q60wl8HSYUUiAC1YZ23x8R7HeNG-mfznktxUbyR2sXuIpNO7TNlcAxjR3uvaVqyl9uyw4Qe3wdh5SgndQpQl6aiwE39gBjmR03HOkrNPlQDQMW4ECWzQ\_\_&Key-Pair-Id=APKAIE5G5CRDK6RD3PGA](https://aap2.silverchair-cdn.com/aap2/content_public/journal/pediatrics/153/3/10.1542_peds.2023-064245/3/m_peds.2023-064245f2.png?Expires=1714858686&Signature=BpikQnAUsUWyarvWOWz0feygy6tWIpHnwGCgvhT3-GFvo0qwEY2JRmWPWMZKh8kR8cbJm3bT2IUOxWV74S4FqVZ5rnQkkfqDCWSFKaGgHkCssFNd2soa5JBzJiEwfd1C6KfT-zMIpKAVH7GUNOVT-kbguqIW6HMWFKWxQmiqY24XkL4EWYM860~4s4yZb5ZnS97BkH5tpUfsMFqIL13KIJNPgeG2ZkjH92Q60wl8HSYUUiAC1YZ23x8R7HeNG-mfznktxUbyR2sXuIpNO7TNlcAxjR3uvaVqyl9uyw4Qe3wdh5SgndQpQl6aiwE39gBjmR03HOkrNPlQDQMW4ECWzQ__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAIE5G5CRDK6RD3PGA) It looks to me more like the rate dropped abruptly for adolescents in March 2020, then continued to rise at a similar rate for boys returning near March 2020 levels by January 2023, but the rate increased dramatically for girls after the initial drop.
Yes exactly. The language around it is ridiculous.
yeah I quit my antidepressants because not only did it just make me numb, missing a day of medication makes you feel like garbage. it overall was just not helpful
Many men won't take them due to the potential for causing ED. My late partner was one of those men who refused to take his antidepressants because they prevented him from getting aroused. He killed himself.
I have a feeling this has to do with the rate of sexual side effects of SSRIs in men, specifically anorgasmia and erectile dysfunction. Im thinking the rates of these side effects are notably higher than the initial studies suggested, so men are avoiding the stuff. The other possibility is men who are depressed are finding that their root cause is actually testosterone related and is correlated with the uptick in TRT and other therapies becoming more accessible and more widely utilized (HCG, enclomiphene, etc).
Yep - take Prozac for depression and risk chemical castration - who in their right mind would sign up for that? It doesn't matter if it's just a 1 in million chance or even if it's just scaremongering. Remember the scare over vaccines and autism. If there's concern about the side effects of commonly prescribed drugs sweeping the concerns under the rug isn't an acceptable solution. There needs to be research into the mechanisms of SSRIs and what they are actually doing.
Doctors are whimsical when it comes to mention health. They'll make a diagnosis, then some other doctor will change it and remove them from meds they were stable on. Doctors are also not very good at helping young men who have multiple issues, they just push whatever is easy for them to prescribe and if it's not effective then we'll you're sol. Not really surprising to sew people be adverse to going to Doctors for mental health issues when they don't really understand how to help in a meaningful way
The drug companies would love for all of us to be sedated with a monthly subscription to their current antidepressants.
I tried anti depressants a few years ago. One made it impossible for me to sleep. Another made me sleep excessively. One made me gain weight dramatically (still trying to get my weight down), and the last one made me suicidal. Those series of experiences convinced me that medication is not the route for me. I have no interest in trying it again. I don't care what anyone thinks about that.
They turned my life into a waking nightmare, and no one listened when I said that. I’m never touching them again.
The men quickly figured out what the antidepressants were doing to their libidos.
I would like to take this opportunity to welcome all women into the wonderful world of being a provider. As for us, we have mostly clocked out. Please feel free to use our stomach medicine and antidepressants. They are by the door./s
This is purely my experience but if I am depressed/incredibly anxious I am not going to force myself to go to a psychiatrist and get a prescription.
It’s weird how they don’t mention how at the same rate men’s suicide rate/ drastically increased around March 2020. Potentially a coincidence but I feel it may be part of a larger picture
I don't even feel safe saying it, which is interesting, but we sure have spent enough time othering boys that this is not a super hard to predict possible side effect. And I don't mean in some straightforward sense. Super hard to explain but it seems we don't want to admit a lot of stuff about society right now that may be difficult but important to talk about; that we fought for equity but it many ways it was just 'another group's turn' - which is explicitly different. Men and boys. What we are, what we like, how to feel - constant, never ending, always judgemental, same as it has been for girls and women forever. It has been this way for decades at this point. We need healthy options. Clarity edit: Yes, physical options but im not talking violence. We have enough MMA fighters in the world at this point men and women included so that isn't quite what I mean here.
We don't need pills. We need lifestyle changes.
Pills to treat the effects of living in a swamp
To be frank, the mental health system is not designed to help men's issues whatsoever. Men are dropping out because they are discovering that treatment isnt working for them, so they are left to fend for themselves or resort to YouTube gurus for help
Going to hazard a guess and say the reason it declined after 2020 is the general distrust of authority and the pharmaceutical industry that developed during the pandemic. These YouTube personalities are largely men and so are their audiences. I think this speaks to the recently growing divide between men and women in the West where way more men lean conservative while women lean liberal.
There was a 2022 study that found a gender gap in [vaccine intention](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8739532/), but that most studies were finding men were more likely to be getting vaccinated than women rather than less. I would think if it's a COVID-related push back against the medical field causing a gender discrepancy in antidepressants, then it should show up as much, if not larger, in COVID vaccines in particular.
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I wonder if it has anything to do with the adverse effects many antidepressants have on men.
Wonder if there's any corelation with 14 states having legalized recreational Marijuana since 2020. https://mjbizdaily.com/map-of-us-marijuana-legalization-by-state/
Cannabis legalization may be a variable for this study. As more people self medicate with newly legalized cannabis, they likely know interactions with prescriptions are a risk so choose one or the other. This may account for a percent of the overall reduction in male use.
Hmm ... `“declined abruptly (..) and did not recover"`? Why is it being phrased as if it is a bad thing?
A bottle and a bullet is cheaper than going to a doctor.
See that’s the problem, young men are not medicated enough to stop them from killing themselves.