By Phil Bate PhD
In the past treatment of depression was done by many different types of talk therapy by psychologists. There are over 250 psychotherapy “techniques”, and NONE of them have been proven to work any better than any other
By Phil Bate PhD
In the past treatment of depression was done by many different types of talk therapy by psychologists. There are over 250 psychotherapy “techniques”, and NONE of them have been proven to work any better than any other.
But, the fact remains that very few depressed patients were ever “cured” by talk type psychotherapy. As a matter of fact, it has been shown in several studies that talking to a sympathetic friend, even a bartender, or almost anyone who will listen is about as good as talking to a clinician (at $100 up per hour).
The APA has neatly classified several different types of depression (manic, bipolar, unipolar, post-partum, grief, etc – mostly for the purposes of legally making them covered by health insurance.) Psychiatrists would seem to have somewhat of an advantage here. They have the battery of drugs that “seem” to help depressed persons at least get thru life without too many suicides from depression. Here’s another fact. Nobody ever got depressed because of poor toilet training as a child.
Freud had a lot of good ideas, but this wasn’t one of them. There’s been a lot written about stress causing depression, and stress is a component (as poor toilet training may be). But, it doesn’t CAUSE depression directly. So, just what does cause depression? The Orthomolecular Theory and my experience in taught me that there were three basic causes of depression. Clearing up these “stresses” cleared up the patient’s ability to withstand the normal stress of everyday living as well as the heavy stresses put on some at times. These three basic causes are:
* Mineral Toxicity (perhaps 10-15%)
* Nutritional Deficiency (perhaps 15-20%
* Allergies and Other Stress Factors (perhaps 75-85%)
The following is pretty brief, and my book “The Health Revolution” has much more information and actual case studies of many different types of depression and anxiety, etc. It also describes the actual therapy I used in each case, and how it worked. This book may be found at: http://Alternate-Health.com/health.html
Mineral Toxicity There are several minerals that may cause depression (at toxic levels) directly. These include toxic levels of mercury, copper, lead, and others. (In the case of copper, medium toxic levels of copper can cause depression, and higher levels may cause schizophrenia.) Lead is still a problem, but becoming less likely due to removing it from gasoline and paint. I even had one patient with arsenic causing depression.
As mentioned above, almost every kind of stress causes the body to use up various vitamins and minerals faster. This means that when you are under unusual stress, you should be taking more vitamins.
Allergies and Stress
Now we come to the real meat. Allergy! Or, more precisely, both allergies and/or food/chemical sensitivities. To allergists, they are two separate problems, and until recently, few MD allergists even considered food sensitivity at all. Both allergy and sensitivity can cause all the same symptoms/disease as the other. Ranging from schizophrenia and depression to hyperactivity and bedwetting, arthritis and skin itching. The list of potential symptoms of allergy and/or sensitivity is as long as your arm.. It surprises many people that most of the “brain problems” of depression, ADD/ADHD, schizophrenia, epilepsy, etc can be, and often are caused by allergy and/or sensitivity.
Talk about stress. Either allergy or sensitivity