Mental Illness - Physiological or Mental in Origin

[altar]

Hi, this topic has surfaced in a number of issues here and has a personal interest for me esp. in recent years.
The purpose of this thread is twofold: 1. Provide studies and research indicating that mental illness, especially depression, has a physical basis, or the contrary.
2. Individuals' (your own or someone else's) rationale for this viewpoint or the contrary one.
And a third topic might be personal experience which is relevant and helps to form your view in one way or the other.

An interesting distinction might be that between psychosis and pathology, and whether these are interrelated. The reason for this is that many psychological/mental problems are pathological in nature (having to do with thought and habit patterns that lead to impractical or even insane behavior). This, it seems to me, is rather clearly not biological in basis. Psychosis I think has more to do with beliefs a person holds (they are God, so and so is trying to kill them, etc., and flagrant hallucinations and their misinterpretation. Nor do I see a physiological basis for this, it seems natural for me to "presuppose" that these things come from the mind. The former psychosis I described of false beliefs I think can be linked to pathology in which case it too would seem to lack physiological basis. This still leaves hallucinations. And there is also anxiety, fear, hostility, anger, denial, confusion, and lethargy or weakness.
If someone can add to this list it would be appreciated, and I am sure someone will add lowness or depression, which however might be said to be a combination of the above symptoms.
So, I'm curious and skeptical about why something that is called mental illness and seems to be mental in nature is now being said to have a physiological basis.
There is one thing I do not wish to see in this thread, and that is appeals to authority. If you wish to mention and include what someone else has said or argued or studied, that is fine, just no "I think it because so and so or this group said it."
Lastly, good luck and I hope this thread doesn't get out of hand!

[Monkey Mind]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-whitaker/anatomy-of-an-epidemic-co_b_555572.html

[Annapurna]

Altar, I have read tons of books on this.

Since they are in German, they are of little use to anybody here and since I am busy with something, just a few thoughts which may help you to google some things:

"We are what we eat"

And our brain and central nervous system need certain substances so that the data transmission works smoothly and the cells are well nourished like that of a plant that thrives, because it has proper conditions and nourishments.

We work and function in quite similar ways.

We need the right location to "grow", ( a friendly climate, with enough sun, water, etc. )

But we also need enough nutrients, loving attention, care, protection, support, and so forth.

The brain needs for instance "brainfood", or instance enough B vitamins.

A lack of those can cause weird illnesses of the nervous systems, such as Beriberi.

Beriberi

Minerals are important as well, and metals, and just basically everything we take in and consist of.

If certain metals are in an imbalance with others, like too much copper, and too little of another, you can feel completely crazy, and you can even end up locked up, because you are acting like a schizophrenic.

In one book by a PHD, I read, that a lot of people in our mental wards only have imbalances of substances in the brain and body, and if they get corrected, they are no longer "crazy" or abnorm.

It can for instance happen that somebody has an intoxication with a certain metal, and it messes up the whole chemistry in the hormonal circles and the reactions in the nervous system...

A blood test would not show any toxic results, because the body always tries to maintain the blood in a perfect status.

However, you you can get this information from the hair,- as the body seeks to store poison in parts of the body that leave the body, and are not so important as blood.

Imagine somebody is getting poisoned with arsenic, slowly...in small dosages, then it could be hard after a while to prove it in a blood-test, that he was given arsenic.

However, in a hair test, you could prove exactly since when it was applied, since we know how fast hair grows.

This German doctor was so famous that John F. Kennedy consulted him.

Now, what you can do is get your hair tested,-- here, most pharmacies offer this and send it to specialized labs, and also recommend therapists who can work with this.

I can, for instance.

I once had a lady who was a nervous wreck since years. She felt like going nuts all the time, utterly desperate and depressed, anxious and what not.

She went from one therapist to the next, to no avail.

I finally tried the hairtest with her, which showed that she was suffering from a massive intoxication with manganese.

The laboratorium gave possible sources for an intoxication:

welding.

When I read this to her, she said:

"Stop..... welding???"

"Yes...?"

"My husband always welds right to my organic veggies..sparks flying into the veggie beds ...!!"


She was given remedies to detox, and I have heard from her only once or twice since:

To thank me because she was recovering.

Altar, I recommend to all mental patients that they get their hair tested, (about 100 Euros here) and to start taking the following medication at once, before specific medication can be taken:

Supplement Vitamin C, at least 500 mg a day, this will detox certain stuff.

Supplement Vitamin B complex, as this will nourish the cells in the central nerve system and have a somewhat calming effect.

B Vitamins dock to the same receptors as 'Valium' et alii, and it is assumed that receptors that are 'saturated' with vitamins don't get irritated as easily (nervous).

All medication will be totally harmless, this is chemical knowledge put into action, working with natural antagonists, for instance.

So that said, people who have certain deficiencies might react with nervosity, anxiety, depression, irritability, psychosis etc, when all they would need is a healthy diet and some supplements for a while, instead of psychopharmaka...

Scary thought....

PS: Another thought:

Substance ab/users usually have home made problems, that are the price for "enjoying mental cruising".

Some people just can't handle LSD, cannabis and so forth too well...sorry.