depression, to me anyway, has afforded me the ability to empathize and sympathize. to connect with others who are struggling and to realize there is pain, caused much by man him/herself, out there.
it has also given me the ability to appreciate the beauty of the world, even that which may seem naked to the "normal person's" eyes. it affords me the ability, at times, to just stop... stop and take stock and slow down and rest. it has humbled me and it has opened my eyes and enlarged my heart... though it darn near kills me every single time it comes to visit.
the trade off is the pain. the ever searing emotional and mental pain that it causes because while it has given me these abilities - this awareness of that surrounding me and those within it - it renders me, most often, helpless and hopeless that I'm not able to assist or enjoy fully that awareness
see, i feel more deeply and more intensly that which plagues man... especially that which hurts or is unfair or is traumatic... so, the tradeoff is that the pain the darkness brings me from the weight of it, so frighteningly comes near to killing me each time
the other side... brings me air, light, laughter, sparkle, logic, creativity, be childlike in wonderment, music, the ability and energy to actually do and feel and be... until it threatens to throw me off the hamster wheel and splatter me against the hamster trail glass... that is it's tradeoff
anxiety... let me think.. makes me think out all the possibilities of a situation, see every conceivable angle and corner, think ahead rather than behind, prepare myself for something coming that may not actually come but you don't know that at the time, makes me diligent about researching and inquiring, causes me to be more cautious in parking lots and parking garages and well... traffic
trade off is; it paralyzes me with fear of doing the wrong thing, screwing up, exposing myself to the light and to others for judgment, ability to fully function at work and to use my intelligence and confidence cause me don't have any... just kinda keeps me paralyzed in my dark corner shivering and covering my eyes
I can see how mild to moderate depression and anxiety might lead to a wiser, longer but more difficult and pained life... And there are quite a few suggestions of links between creativity (artistic and otherwise) and mania (although that might not be an evolutionary strength).
Would it be possible that these attributes could come with less pain and problems!
Dr. Nesse's research thrills me! It confirms my belief that our disorder really is not a mental disorder per se, but that is primarily a physiological disorder that happens to affect the workings of our brains -- and has a good reason behind it. This is the way I have viewed it for a little over a year now. The benefit? It has developed in me the motivation to control the symptoms of when anxiety gets -- how did you put it, John? -- something to the effect of way out of control in the modern world? It was several years ago that I realized that anxiety played a key role in depression. Later on, I came across a quote that I paraphrased as follows:
stress is a physical or emotional tension;
anxiety refers to the experience or state of fear and uncertainty;
therefore,
stress can cause anxiety;
OR,
chronic anxiety can be stressful (and yield physical tension that leads to other health concerns).
The two may feed off each other.
(Unfortunately, I neither noted, nor can I remember now, the source of the information from which I made this paraphrase.)
My conclusion was that I needed to learn how to non-medically manage the stressors in my life which come from all sources in my life -- my thinking, my family, my finances, etc. After a while, I recognized the physiological base of stress as being the initiator of both my depressions and my manias. Some of the stressors, such as the deaths of my parents, can not be prevented. Others, I have more control over, whether it be to eliminate a person/activity from my life or to change my own attitude toward someone/something. The benefit? I have been able to reduce my meds to just a pediatric dose of Abilify and 20 mg of Lexapro. The trade offs? I will never be off meds completely; I will never not have bipolar disorder. The outcome? For the very first time in my life, I am comfortable in my own skin -- warts and all, as they say.
I love the evo-bio perspective, examining as it does "selective advantage" and "trade-offs." However, I'd like to think that some of what we see are epi-genetic changes that are triggered by changes we've made to the environment (both macro and, more geographically specifically where we're reared/live) and genetic disadvantages that have not been culled from the pool because old threats are not current threats. Your examples of depression, or of manic-depression, may be legit in that the predator that would have culled the majority of us from the gene pool no longer exists, and institutions do exist that buttress our participation in the gene pool. Which would explain incidence rates that may be on the increase (in addition to all the hype about pharma and medicine delivery as for-profit industries needing greater market share). The evo-bio arguments are a bit awkward, anyway, at times, since they should be applied at the population level, not the individual level. Thus, a small proportion with depression in a population without depression, as a rule, may be useful if that periodically symptomatic sub-group slowed down migration, or served as an easy food source for predators. However, it may have been that the proportion of any early population that demonstrated symptoms of depression was within expected random parameters of genetic mutation, until recently when we ceased being culled and have become a larger proportion of the pop than is "healthy" for the pop. So, evo-bio explanations are where I'd go, too, for my answers, but I think we don't come close to having good answers yet. BTW, Nesse's stuff is fantastic; I have a huge file folder (digital) of his articles.
Well said! But evolution is today too, right? To be a bipolar is in a way - in my experience - an extreme way of understanding the limits of life, to cross these boarders, to see what is over the next hill. And that is what brings art and science on. If we can cross this urge to seek with a high morality, we can really make it far.
The downside is to find a way to use what we find, in normal society. After we've found it, we often destroy it or throw it away. We believe we've found the key to the whole mystery of the universe, or we think that what we got is completly worthless. It's eiteher - or. And that is very tiresome.
Very interesting, but it's a shame our evolutionary process has not figured out a way to weed bipolar out, as it is clearly not needed in anyone's life, mine included. In fact, I have to say, your article made me a little angry- that I have to suffer in 2010 because it was better for my ancestors around 700,000 BCE? It's crap, and I'm currently not depressed or manic, I'm on my horrible meds, dealing with the side effects. Focus on a cure, let us that suffer horribly from this outlandish and punishing disease find peace, who cares what happened in 700,000 BCE. That is the advice I would give a researcher, and while I know sometimes you have to look to the past to figure out the present, I believe there is enough information out there that scientists can forget about the oh so distant past and focus on a future for us, one without this pain.
krychick
this is such an interesting way to look at the roots of mental health "disorders" and see how originally they developed from survival instincts.
people vary - and there are a zillion ways to deal with mental health challenges. i think it's important to remember that these challenges are very real and also need compassionate attention - from both healthcare providers and those directly suffering (including family members and patients).
It's true, it is interesting, and I should note that I hadn't had coffee yet before posting that reply. It is just that I, along with many others here I am sure, are tired of it. I mean, don't you ever get to a place where you just look at the pills and say, how many more? What happens if this one stops working? What if I can't manage my job, my family? I mean these are all very real concerns. While I think it is interesting to look to the roots of 'mental illness' I also think it is very important to focus on the future, one where people suffering can look forward to a day when they are not slaves to the medication, when they don't have to worry that a manic episode will destroy their lives, when they can really experience happiness and life to the fullest without the cloud of this disease hanging over. It's not to say that I have not experienced happiness in my life, it is to say that it saddens me in a way I am unable to express, how Bipolar has effectted my life. That's all. The article was interesting, I just want to find a cure.
:) krychick
I think this is an interesting standpoint, and I can see its advantages, but this is if macroevolution is your worldview. It is not the case with me. I am a Creationist; maybe an Intelligent Designer. I understand that this makes me about as looney to some people as those who viewed the world as flat when it was proven to be round.
I am open-minded enough, however, to see this as potential, especially because I have not ever seen it presented from this perspective. However, I still have to do some filtering from a Christian/Creationist/Intelligent
Design worldview. I hope in the future this forum will have threads doing the same.
The big question is: why are these genes (for mental illness) still in the gene pool? We've only been civilized for 5000 years, but we've been around for 100,000 years as a species and maybe 7 million years as a hominid. So, these disorders, which seem genetically wired into our system, have undoubtedly served the survival purposes that this article addresses. For schizophrenia, there is a hypothesis proposed by the late David Horrobin (The Madness of Adam and Eve), that when we underwent a major modification of our brains perhaps 60,000-70,000 years ago, the kind of wiring that was installed enabled us to do a lot of creative things (to create art, tools etc.), and yet this kind of structuring also made us more vulnerable to schizophrenia. There's the trade off. I think, given this trade-off that we'd be better off using a diversity model to describe mental illnesses rather than a disease model. Neurodiversity is a term being used by the autism community to describe their need to be seen as different, not disabled. I explore these kind of trade-offs in autism, ADHD, dyslexia, depression, bipolar, anxiety disorders, and more in my new book (out this week): Neurodiversity: Discovering the Extraordinary Gifts of Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia, and Other Brain Differences.
Great discussion. I was amazed to take several days off and return to find 12 thoughtful comments here. I would be the last to contend that evolutionary biology offers us all the answers, but it sure as heck gets us asking interesting questions. No doubt, we'll be carrying this conversation forward in future pieces. :)
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I love this idea, seeing the potential positives - or at least the positive realities which might be behind these conditions. Seeing these conditions as far more dynamic and organic than most health care professionals today would. I suffered from OCD and after a long time suffering it (years), recognised it in the end as more a symptom of other stresses in my life, that it wasn't a disease in its own right and wasn't the original 'thing' to worry about, it was more a culmination of me getting more and more worked up and scared silly that if I did even one more little thing wrong, my whole world would fall apart. This manifested in washing of hands repeatedly and re-checking things over and over when I knew it wasn't necessary, all the usual signs of OCD when you KNOW it makes no sense but you can't stop. But as soon as I recognised in my own mind where it was coming from and that it was a symptom of other stuff, I was able to finally beat it. I then knew that the actions of the OCD (washing hands for instance) had no connection to why it was happening in the first place (letting bad influences/people into my life and then feeling like I had no say in it for instance thereby causing my life to spiral into chaos) and this also helped. I also suffered depression and slight mania, I always took this that I was an overly analytical person in an overly stupid and senseless world, I was looking for answers where there were often none and dealing with people who didn't care nearly as much as I did. I just overloaded through caring too much and 'knowing' too much of life's ins and outs and developed depression and imbalances. Again, it is connected to me and the way I see the world and not something I can really erase. Nor something I really should anyway. Schizophrenia could be linked to being so overly 'tuned-in' to the energy of life that you pick up absolutely anything and everything coming to your brain and have trouble coping with it. They all have their reasons and it's never as easy as 'take this and you'll be fine'. Good article.