This is the happiness season. We are supposed to be smiling. But the economy is in a shambles and people are stressed even beyond the limits of the seasonal turmoil. Here is an article from my Sunday column that also appeared on World News Network online and France Observer.
Rita Watson: You need non-pill coping skills, too 01:00 AM EST on Sunday, December 7, 2008
TENSION DURING these tumultuous times and the expectation of holiday happiness have many people visiting family physicians and searching the Internet for mood-elevating medications. “Happiness is a priceless commodity,” says Dr. Richard Barker, director general of the Pharmaceutical Association of Great Britain. “It cannot be bought, sold, exchanged, or prescribed for that matter.”
Nonetheless, pharmaceutical companies spend over $4 billion a year on television ads, which the Annals of Family Medicine said two years ago should be banned. Direct-to-consumer advertising has an emotional appeal. The ads seem to imply that drugs can cure everything from depression, social anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorders to restless-leg syndrome. Their message: “We can be happier.”
Last week at a conference in London, a Roche pharmaceutical leader called TV advertising “a big mistake.” Recently Boston Legal featured Denny Crane suing the pharmaceutical industry because of advertising policies that he claimed precipitated his overuse of medications.
Dr. Barker points out, “While prescription drugs cannot bestow happiness they do have a place in the treatment of depression, schizophrenia, anxiety and bipolar disorders.”
Currently the optimal treatment for depression is considered to be combination prescription medication and talk therapy.
“Talk therapy!” scowled one indignant husband. “You mean where I pay someone so I can squirm while my wife does all the talking and complaining about me? Not on your life. I would rather go out drinking with my buddies.”
While women are more amenable to seeking treatment than men, this may change if the economy continues to falter. Today’s financial crisis affects 84 percent of women and 75 percent of men, according to a new American Psychological Association report. The bleak financial picture comes during a season when depression rates traditionally escalate.
Dr. James M. Ellison, associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, says, “While many seek pharmacologic remedies for holiday-related distress, pills designed for bona fide depressive disorders are unlikely to diminish pain that owes its presence to unrealistic expectations or the burden of interpersonal holiday stresses.”
Nonetheless, many pills will be popped and drinks poured over the holidays to provide a temporary happiness mask. The National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 2007, reported an increase “in nonmedical use of prescription pain relievers” by those over age 12 and under 25.
This September the National Center for Health Statistics said that in any two-week period, one in 20 Americans is depressed. However, fewer than 30 percent see a mental-health professional.
So often those who are looking for a pill to take the edge off have retreated into their own little world rather than talk with their spouse or friends. Rabbi Irwin Kula, in Yearnings: Embracing the Sacred Messiness of Life, tells us, “The more we allow ourselves to unfold, the less likely we are to unravel.” Therapists remind us that in times of extreme stress people can fall into the anger trap of accusations and recriminations or choose to become generous and supportive of each other. Perhaps coping skills are the answer. Coping skills help one to see the world from another person’s perspective.
I learned about coping skills while writing Sisterhood Betrayed and talked with developmental psychologist Dr. Myrna B. Shure, author of Thinking Parent, Thinking Child: How to Turn Your Most Challenging Everyday Problems into Solutions. Her programs for children had a surprising beneficial effect on mothers who translated parenting skills into workplace skills. Dr. Shure focuses on listening and learning rather than judging and reprimanding. For example, mothers who saw their child hitting another were quick to assume an accusing voice when they asked, “What are you doing?” She suggests kindly asking “Why are you feeling so bad?” As money worries and holiday stress collide, adults might take a page from her book.
For the holidays, Dr. Ellison emphasized that “recognizing and modifying unrealistic expectations, remembering to care adequately for one’s self, and focusing on the positive aspects of the holidays may help us toward the elusive inner happiness we seek — more so than medications.”
What is key here is focusing on the positive, which for many people might mean renewing a commitment to communication, kindness and intimacy. With that thought in mind, a minister in Grapevine, Texas, posed a challenge to the married couples in his congregation — lovemaking for seven nights in a row.
Rita Watson is a monthly contributor and daily blogger ( www.ritawatson.com) .