RIP Anthony Bourdain

[Crazy Cat Lady]

Let me introduce you to another former Amazonite, formerly known as Katrina, named for the hurricane. He's from the NOLA area. He is a switch-hitter, plays right, then left. Has a plethora of socks. Doesn't much care for women and likes stalking after them with nasty little 7th-grade-girl comments like you just saw. He relishes writing soft porn for the enjoyment of fellow forum members, starring forum women who he has it in for. He loves spankings, golden showers, long walks on the beach, ball gags, and kittens. He especially enjoys discussing Toxic's "B cups" and "tight boyish ass" and "librarian glasses" and "bedroom eyes." Like Toxic, he enjoys disrupting adult discussions with petty feuds. She's happy he's here. Aren't you? lol

Ugh. I remember him.

 

[Crazy Cat Lady]

Desh...before you can treat it you have to recognize it. That's the hard part about depression. Severely depressed people can put on a public face and persona that leaves people clueless that they are seriously depressed.

This is very true.

 

[Jack]

Nothing a little girly action couldn't fix. Once I started getting laid regular again it went away. Sex is a great treatment for depression.

If that is true, I mean really true, ... I hope ThatOwlWoman can find somebody to bang her brains out. (It's pretty certain her 'hotel' >pointing towards crouch< has been vacant for quite some time)

 

[Phantasmal]

I think that had a lot to do with my background and education. I just looked at my depression as a black cloud over my head that just wouldn't go away and when I had serious feelings of alienation and abandonment, I knew that was the depression speaking and that I should ignore it.

What is horrible though is how people treat you when you are depressed. You'd think most people are compassionate and understanding. Like fuck they are. When I was depressed people fucking lined up to kick me while I was down. This is a big reason that people won't communicate to others that they suffer from depression because most peoples reaction is not to be helpful but to be purposefully cruel.

It is awful, you’re right, mental health is still a stigma, they just want you to “shake it off”

 

[christiefan915]

Sometimes it just takes time. When I was diagnosed with clinical depression I received no treatment what so ever. That was probably due to the fact that I was very aware that I was clinically depressed and that when I went to those very, very, very dark places, I didn't take it to seriously. My doctor thought I had my head wrapped around the problem pretty well and that it would just take time to heal, which it did, and he just simply told me to visit him every sixth months and if in between I had feelings of wanting to harm myself to call him promptly.

Interestingly towards the tail end of that time, after a dark period, I went on a vacation, had a lot of fun, met some pretty girls, had a great adventure and when I came back I never slipped back into any dark periods.

My suggestion is pay attention to any friend or family member who is under tremendous stress. Much of depression has no organic origins but is temporary, like mine, and is stress induced, as was mine.

My guess on Bourdain is that he was under tremendous stress and he broke.

I respect your decision to wait it out. You decided that was best for you but it's not necessarily everybody's cup of tea. I'm thinking about your suffering for almost three years. Now this is just my opinion but I'd rather take anti-depressants for a limited time while waiting it out. The thought of being under that cloud for such a long time is unbearable.

Plus, you don't know in advance how long it's going to last.

 

[christiefan915]

I'm healthily skeptical about that. Often the drugs may affectively treat the depression but you still end up trading one problem for another. It's far better to take a conservative approach to see if you can get positive results without drugs first. These days doctors will hand out anti-depressants like they are candy.

What do you think is the problem you're trading for? Antidepressants don't need to be a lifetime prescription.

 

[Mott the Hoople]

It is awful, you’re right, mental health is still a stigma, they just want you to “shake it off”

No they don't. They want to be cruel and hurt you more than you already are. I did learn one thing about that experience. Who really cares and who can be really cruel.

 

[Mott the Hoople]

I respect your decision to wait it out. You decided that was best for you but it's not necessarily everybody's cup of tea. I'm thinking about your suffering for almost three years. Now this is just my opinion but I'd rather take anti-depressants for a limited time while waiting it out. The thought of being under that cloud for such a long time is unbearable.

Plus, you don't know in advance how long it's going to last.

I probably have a far, far, far lower opinion on the efficacy of drugs in general. Most create more problems than they solve and they are far from being a panacea. The side affects and toxicity of drugs, over time, can be worse than the problem they are supposed to solve. That's a fact.

 

[Mott the Hoople]

What do you think is the problem you're trading for? Antidepressants don't need to be a lifetime prescription.

Well that should be obvious. You're trading one problem, depression, for another, the side affects of taking chemotheraputic drugs and their toxicological impact on your body. I watched the drugs prescribed to my aunt for her bipolar disorder destroy her liver and kill her and not once did her physicians ever consider not giving them to her and eventually her liver failed and she died.

It's dangerous to be naive about drugs. There is certainly a time and a place for them where they do wonders but this notion that drugs can cure any disease is a damned dangerous one. They simply cannot do that and they all have toxic properties.

 

[ThatOwlWoman]

I could not disagree with you more!!! More often than not with that approach you rob Peter to pay Paul. My advise, having suffered clinical depression, is the exact opposite. Find a good therapist or psychiatrist who is ultra-conservative about prescribing you drugs to treat depression. Self awareness of the problem and knowing when to reach out for help are far more affective than any damned drug. More often that not drugs just make the problem worse.

Your experience with depression was situational; it feels the same but is not the same as those with intrinsic clinical depression. A dear family member has fought with that since her teens. She tried talk therapy, counseling, various activities, etc. Only eventually finding the right combination of meds has allowed her to fully enjoy life.

I am very glad that yours resolved!

 

[ThatOwlWoman]

What do you think is the problem you're trading for? Antidepressants don't need to be a lifetime prescription.

That depends on the type of depression and the person's own body neurochemistry. Many people have had the type that Mott suffered through; I did after my late husband passed. I *knew* it was situational so did not seek pharmaceutical aid; eventually with time, the colors came back and life was slowly better. In my other post I mentioned the family member who has suffered from clinical depression since her teens; she is now approaching 70. She has had periods where she quit taking them and relapsed into that dark world. Probably she will take them the rest of her days, unless aging causes changes in her brain chemistry.

 

[Mott the Hoople]

Your experience with depression was situational; it feels the same but is not the same as those with intrinsic clinical depression. A dear family member has fought with that since her teens. She tried talk therapy, counseling, various activities, etc. Only eventually finding the right combination of meds has allowed her to fully enjoy life.

I am very glad that yours resolved!

Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not opposed to using drugs for depression...I'm just very conservative about using them and believe safer modalities should be tried first and only when they fail should we resort to last ditch modalities like drugs. Chemotherapuetic agents should rarely, if ever, be the first option in treatment.

 

[christiefan915]

Well that should be obvious. You're trading one problem, depression, for another, the side affects of taking chemotheraputic drugs and their toxicological impact on your body. I watched the drugs prescribed to my aunt for her bipolar disorder destroy her liver and kill her and not once did her physicians ever consider not giving them to her and eventually her liver failed and she died.

It's dangerous to be naive about drugs. There is certainly a time and a place for them where they do wonders but this notion that drugs can cure any disease is a damned dangerous one. They simply cannot do that and they all have toxic properties.

I'm sorry for your loss. And I'm criticizing a doctor who should know the side effects of medication and didn't have your aunt's liver enzymes checked regularly.

 

[ThatOwlWoman]

Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not opposed to using drugs for depression...I'm just very conservative about using them and believe safer modalities should be tried first and only when they fail should we resort to last ditch modalities like drugs. Chemotherapuetic agents should rarely, if ever, be the first option in treatment.

I absolutely agree with that.... except obviously in severe cases where the person's life is at risk, as in clear suicidal ideation with a plan. My dad had a neighbor in her 70s who suddenly become suicidally depressed. She was hospitalized, given various drug treatments, talk therapy, etc. Nothing worked. She flat out stated that as soon as she got out of the hospital, she was going to take her life. They finally gave her ECT. Three treatments and she was suddenly herself again. She said afterwards that she had no idea what happened or why the blackness came down on her like that, but was glad that the ECT helped. This was 25+ years ago when they would keep you in the mental ward for an acute thing like hers was.

 

[Jack]

Ugh. I remember him.

I think I'M going into a Depression.

Crazy Cat Lady/ThatOwlWoman ... ThatOwlWoman/Crazy Cat Lady. (shaking head) This is the WORST sock puppet I have EVER seen. Do you have NO RESPECT for the craft?
God! Sweet Jesus! Get with Yaya or that Rat Ratterson guy. Get some tips, some pointers. This is ... this is just EMBARRASSING.

 

[Mott the Hoople]

I absolutely agree with that.... except obviously in severe cases where the person's life is at risk, as in clear suicidal ideation with a plan. My dad had a neighbor in her 70s who suddenly become suicidally depressed. She was hospitalized, given various drug treatments, talk therapy, etc. Nothing worked. She flat out stated that as soon as she got out of the hospital, she was going to take her life. They finally gave her ECT. Three treatments and she was suddenly herself again. She said afterwards that she had no idea what happened or why the blackness came down on her like that, but was glad that the ECT helped. This was 25+ years ago when they would keep you in the mental ward for an acute thing like hers was.

Well certainly that sort of intervention at such an extreme is warranted but that's not how the medical field works. More often than not they're first response to someone with a situational case of stress induced depression or PTSD is to medicate them. That often does more harm than good.

In fact when I first sought help that was the first thing the physician offered. I was the one who said...."sorry...not really interested in taking meds" and his response was pretty much like this. There were three ways we could try and manage the problem. The first and most effective was therapy. Therapy however is time consuming and very expensive. The second approach was to prescribe medication which wasn't as effective and had associated toxicological side effects but wasn't nearly as expensive as therapy. The third approach was to monitor myself and my behavior and try to determine what stress would initiate my black periods and to avoid those stressers, manage stress in my life better overall and see if that helped. The Doctor said that he felt my attitude was well grounded and that I was low risk of harming myself so we agreed on the third option. I had been clinically depressed close to two years at that time but with the help I recieved on managing stress I got better very quickly and meeting the woman who is now my wife put an end to that period of my life.

You know what turned out to be the major source of stress that would cause my black periods? It was my own father of all people. I literally moved to another State to get away from his constant criticism. In fact at that time I was thinking about harming myself when a friend of mine in North Carolina said "Come down here and stay with me for a while and see if you can find work" and I did. That friend may have saved my life and I'm grateful and loyal to that friend to this day. Moving to North Carolina at that time was one of the smartest things I ever did.

 

[ThatOwlWoman]

You know what turned out to be the major source of stress that would cause my black periods? It was my own father of all people. I literally moved to another State to get away from his constant criticism. In fact at that time I was thinking about harming myself when a friend of mine in North Carolina said "Come down here and stay with me for a while and see if you can find work" and I did. That friend may have saved my life and I'm grateful and loyal to that friend to this day. Moving to North Carolina at that time was one of the smartest things I ever did.

Love a story like yours with a happy ending. Is your relationship with your dad any better now, with distance?

I applaud you for not jumping onto the pharmaceutical bandwagon first thing. You are right; physicians often prefer to throw drugs at a problem rather than consider conservative measures first. To be fair, the public demands this "instant fix" as well. My youngest has called me more than once when Lily would have a rash or ear-ache, asking if I thought she should take her to urgent care or the pediatrician for an antibiotic. She has learned to use traditional old-timey things first, *then* see the pediatrician if the ailment got worse. It only did once. One of my grand-sons as an infant got a fairly bad diaper rash; home treatments and OTC things weren't working. My daughter (oldest one) finally took him to the doctor, who decided that he had a horrible staph infection and sent them down town to Childrens Hospital! She called me crying and said that they were going to give him an IV with vancomycin in it. This is an ototoxic drug, esp. in the very young. I urged her to not allow it, and also to insist that 1) they culture the rash first to be sure what it was, and 2) put him in cloth diapers because he could just be allergic to something in the disposables. She did both things; he was discharged the next day with nothing more than a diaper rash from the Pampers. The culture came back a couple days later -- negative. He's 11 now and very healthy, but he could have been deaf.

 

[Cypress]

Shocking news this morning. World traveler and chef Anthony Bourdain committed suicide.

I’m terribly saddened. I loved his show and his conversational manner of story telling.

I could relate to Bourdain’s background as I worked in the restaurant business in high school and college and could relate to the characters he wrote about and the drug culture/outsider status of workers in that business from personal experience.

It’s a sad day today.

I am apparently so hopelessly out of touch with pop culture and television that I think I am scaring myself. I have never even heard of this guy!

 

[Mott the Hoople]

Love a story like yours with a happy ending. Is your relationship with your dad any better now, with distance?

I applaud you for not jumping onto the pharmaceutical bandwagon first thing. You are right; physicians often prefer to throw drugs at a problem rather than consider conservative measures first. To be fair, the public demands this "instant fix" as well. My youngest has called me more than once when Lily would have a rash or ear-ache, asking if I thought she should take her to urgent care or the pediatrician for an antibiotic. She has learned to use traditional old-timey things first, *then* see the pediatrician if the ailment got worse. It only did once. One of my grand-sons as an infant got a fairly bad diaper rash; home treatments and OTC things weren't working. My daughter (oldest one) finally took him to the doctor, who decided that he had a horrible staph infection and sent them down town to Childrens Hospital! She called me crying and said that they were going to give him an IV with vancomycin in it. This is an ototoxic drug, esp. in the very young. I urged her to not allow it, and also to insist that 1) they culture the rash first to be sure what it was, and 2) put him in cloth diapers because he could just be allergic to something in the disposables. She did both things; he was discharged the next day with nothing more than a diaper rash from the Pampers. The culture came back a couple days later -- negative. He's 11 now and very healthy, but he could have been deaf.

Oh my father was just being himself and I didn’t harbor any ill will when I left I just needed to get the hell away from him for a while cause he was unwittingly pushing me over the edge. I ended up moving back to Ohio five years later to be closer but at that moment in time being around a man with no filter like my father was no fun. He was mainly being a prick about my career path. He wanted me to follow his footsteps into his profession and after a year of graduate school I decided it wasn’t for me and he was extremely disappointed in that and when I went into the environmental field he thought I had fucking lost my mind. So anytime I had a set back in my career he’d let me know the environmental field was for losers.

He never let up on that till one day about 12 years ago l, after I moved back to Ohio, I was complaining about the stress at work and he gave me a ration of shit about my career was for losers and how much better off I’d be financially if I had stuck it out in his field. I was so fed up with that shit that when I completed my Masters degree while living in North Carolina that I never even told him about it. So that day after I moved back to Ohio and he gave me shit about not going into his field I pulled out a pay stub for my annual bonus that was close to his annual income. When he realized I was earning substantially more than he was...well the look on his face was priceless. The only time he gave me shit after that was when was when he expressed his disappointment in me to a friend of mine for dropping out of grad school and my friend said “What are you talking about? He finished his Masters degree ten years ago.”. Then he was pissed that I hadn’t told him. When I told him why he was really pissed. He came to his senses though and told me he had been wrong to be so critical of me and that he was really proud of me. That meant a lot to me.

 

[ThatOwlWoman]

Then he was pissed that I hadn’t told him. When I told him why he was really pissed. He came to his senses though and told me he had been wrong to be so critical of me and that he was really proud of me. That meant a lot to me.

I'm glad you got that, at least. Sometimes we parents don't know how we're hurting our kids with our comments that we think are helpful, but are perceived by them as critical and hurtful. You obviously figured out that understanding him and forgiving him really helps your own mental health. The anecdote about the pay stub is absolutely priceless... but sad too. We shouldn't value our kids for what their income is, but I guess some do. I wonder if your dad had a lot of insecurities about his own career choice and wanted you to make the same choice to kind of validate him?