S.A.D. Disorders😢

There are many today that depend upon medications or some substances to affect more than just their physical functioning. Moods and attitudes seem to be the problem area people are looking to impact more, thus this is really an attempt to control the mind and emotions. I have been thinking about this even more after a harder winter than many expected and more discussion about a said psychological condition known as Seasonal Affective Disorder. Playing off the S.A.D. abbreviation, I am writing today about this often sad subject of diagnosed mental Disorders and the typical treatment for them. Greater mental health is indeed more possible than many believe, simply through proper cognitive teaching and emotional encouragement. I have addressed this in various ways before, especially since my sad and unfortunate mental health Disorder labels due to my “zealous faith” (that faith being one of the explanations written from my Comprehensive Psychological Evaluation). Are you happy or sad? Are you impacted by these Sad Disorder labels?

Mental health has been even more of a national discussion since the 01-08-11 Tucson Tragedy. The shooter, Jared Loughner, is said and assumed by most to have some sort of mental Disorder or derangement. The amazing recovery of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot point blank in the head, brings another interesting aspect to understanding mental health. I do not have room to get into the broader discussion here, though I have blogged about mental health before (e.g. my 05-04-08 Blog, “Plain Talk about Mental Illness,” also found on p. 369 of my book). In this article, I want to focus more on the sad reality of all these Disorder labels and what comes from that.

According to what acts as the Psychological Bible—the DSM-1V-TR (Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel of Mental Disorders-volume 4-Text Revision, published in 2000)–there are 297 mental health Disorders (this “official” number may change with the 2013 DSM-5 edition). 297 labels to show what may be wrong! Now, I am not saying here that there is no such thing as a serious mental illness that can be categorized and treated with certain effective therapy and even some medications. The DSM editions offer no real solutions, in contrast to the Word from GOD—the Holy Bible. There is no regimen of treatment for any of these categorized Disorders in the DSM-IV-TR. That is left up to the individual psychologist or psychiatrist according to their preferred psychological theory and practice. There are only all those labels (e.g. the S.A.D. Disorder) that effectively discourage and even trap you into excusing your feelings and being controlled by psychiatrists and their prescribed substances (or even controlled by others and their choice substances). Sadly, there is an evolutionary humanism that dominates many fields of knowledge today and does so particularly in psychology. That being so, the main solutions that many psychologists offer are limited to only one or possibly two aspects of the human being—the mental/emotional and the physical.

Not properly dealing with the spiritual aspect of human beings and how we relate to our Creator, leaves psychology inept at solving many of the problems manifest today. Many problems are only masked with medications or often even exacerbated. I saw this first hand from my inside interactions and experiences in the system. I also saw how my practically addressing the spiritual with fellow patients led to much better and happy responses and more healing. It is quite sad that the best many psychologists do today is to diagnose errant thinking as some DSM Disorder (said to be genetic or chemical somehow) and then offer the powerful medications that come with various side effects (just note the long lists of warnings coming with those medicine commercials!).

There is a real, Sad Disorder, as I have explained before and even in my last article (“Human Profiling”), impacting each of us! The only way to overcome the real, Sad Disorder, having begun at The Fall, is to find healing in the Creator who became our Savior! HE has left us His Word to give us encouragements and all things that pertain to life and godliness (see 2 Peter 1:3). When you find healing and encouragements there, you find that many sad Disorders simply go away! 😃