Depression is a Choice edition by Arline Curtiss Religion Spirituality eBooks
Download As PDF : Depression is a Choice edition by Arline Curtiss Religion Spirituality eBooks 
A Board-Certified Cognitive Behavioral therapist details her own journey out of manic-depression. This book shows you how to think about depression in a different way both philosophically and neuroscientifically. The pain of depression lies in the very gears of our thinking process. Depression is only in the subcortex, never in the neocortex. When we know how our brain works, how the process of pain perception works, we can use simple mind exercises to short-circuit the pain of depression by disconnection the message that we are depressed from one part of the brain to the other. We can take advantage of the neuroplasticity of the brain in order to forge new get-out-depression neural patterns to replace the old depressive ones.
Depression is a Choice edition by Arline Curtiss Religion Spirituality eBooks
I agree with many of Curtiss's opinions: that the use of antidepressants to obtain "designer personalities" (my quotes)is spiralling out of control in this country; that pharmaceutical companies take advantage of a gullible public to sell these drugs; that we want our shortcomings, failures and bad habits to be termed "diseases" so as to absolve us from making hard choices; that, in our glorification of individuality, we have lost a sense of community that fosters mental health. There are other valid ideas in these pages. It's good, too, that in one short paragraph, the author allows that short-term drug therapy should not be denied to persons who are genuinely suicidal or otherwise in the clutches of an severe episode of depression.However, I found the book fearfully repetitive, and mainly for this reason I give it a low rating. After the first five chapters or so, the reader could skip to the final chapter and not miss much. Also, I was not particularly interested in the author's many personal life vignettes or her repeated criticism of her brother who does use on-going drug therapy to control his manic-depression. (This last just seemed to me to be an attempt to publicly justify her position in a long-standing family dispute.)
I do think the book is useful to depression sufferers who haven't stopped to consider common-sense, drug-free approaches to their problem. And Curtiss includes abundant, uplifting quotations from ancient sages and other historical figures. Anyone who is amenable to taking the advice of those who have gone before will appreciate these little gems of wisdom.
My recommendation would be to request this book at the public library--or, if you just have to have a copy, buy it second-hand.
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Depression is a Choice edition by Arline Curtiss Religion Spirituality eBooks Reviews
Warning If you are a person with bipolar disorder or depression and are currently in a very sensitive, unbalanced state, then I would NOT read this book. If you are feeling healthy, I still wouldn't bother reading it. Unfortunately, I already did, and now I'm feeling worse than I did before.
One of the many things that bothers me about this book is that the author does not even make an attempt to be fair and balanced in her views. She draws conclusions about things that she admits she knows very little or nothing about, for example; psychiatric medication. She dismisses them as being "happy pills" which is both completely unprofessional and simply uninformed. This is not wise when you are dealing with a subject so complex and of grave importance...especially to the sufferers of depression and manic depression themselves.
I want to be fair, because some might find material of value in this book. The problem is that it takes so much energy to seperate it from all the anti-psychiatry dogma, endless references to philosophers, abusively harsh judgements of people who are living in great pain, that, in the end, I don't think it is really worth the effort to read. An editor should have stripped away all the caustic negativity, rants and raves, and slimmed the volume down to about 100 pages or less.
With all due respect to the author, because I have bipolar disorder myself, I question whether she really has her illness under control. Waking up each morning in a state of utter despair does not sound to me like someone has found satisfactory treatment.
It also greatly bothers me that it is implied that mentally ill people don't use their will enough to better themselves. While this may sometimes be true, it is also often true that these people are exerting truly heroic willpower each day simply to stay alive. To call them "wimps" really does not help anyone. When one is in the depths of a manic, depressive, or mixed state, there is little willpower left.
While her descriptions of severe depression are more or less convincing, her descriptions of mania are a walk in the park compared to what I have experienced and what many people I know have experienced. Someone who is in a state of acute psychosis will not be helped much by repeating a prase such as "green frog." I also question the assertion that the mind can only think one thought at a time. If you beleive this, then you do not understand psychosis.
Re Thomas Szazs, and others that call mental illness an unreality...they are taking an armchair approach to psychiatry. As when watching a football game, it is very easy to criticise from afar when you are not the one getting your bones broken by 300 lb defensive players. Anyone who has first hand experience with severe mental illness knows that it is all too real. The cause is irrelevant. The fact is people suffer, people die, often unecessarily. Being insensitive to their suffering only makes the problem worse. Judging a person who takes medication, when you don't understant their life...is just ignorance.
Thomas Szazs calls mental illness a "metaphorical illness"...which makes him a "pretend" psychiatrist, since, from what I gather, he did not actually treat any patients. He was primarily a "philosopher," who really wasn't interested in working directly with the mentally ill patients.
If my review seems to be rambling, ranting and raving, then don't read this book...it is even worse. I think the author is coming out with a second book, and it will be interesting to see if she makes any changes.
Back in 2005, I was severely depressed. I had suffered with occasional bouts of depression and social anxiety for about 15 years. I had tried therapy, but my insurance would only pay for 10 sessions and my therapist wasn't much help. I tried anti-depressants, including (not at the same time) Paxil, Effexor, and Lexapro, but the side effects (insomnia, disconnected feeling, lack of concentration, etc.) weren't worth the mild benefit I was getting.
By 2005, I was at my wits end. The depression was clouding my judgment and I was no longer thinking rationally. I quit my job of 5 years with nothing lined up. I had saved enough money to get by for several months, but I had no plan and no goal. I was just desperate for help and didn't know where to turn. I went to the library and started looking at the psychology and self-help section. Something about the title caught my attention. Depression Is a Choice? I found a chair in a secluded corner of the library and started reading. As I read, something clicked. "Yes! This is what I've been looking for!", I thought. I read half the book before leaving the library, then checked it out and read the other half the next day. I liked it so much that I eventually bought my own copy, along with Curtiss' follow-up book "Brainswitching Out of Depression", on .
Since reading these books, I have only had brief episodes of depression. When I start to feel depressed, I just come back to these strategies and soon the cloud of depression has lifted.
I want to address two things
1) The title. Curtiss isn't saying that people intentionally choose to be depressed. That would be a stupid assertion. She is saying that people often either don't realize that we have a choice to think something other than negative, depressive thoughts or they haven't been shown how to think differently. That is what this book and, especially the exercises in her follow-up book "Brainswitching Out of Depression" aim to accomplish to teach you how to stop thinking negative thoughts.
2) Using prescription drugs to combat depression. I neither condone nor condemn the use of anti-depressants. They weren't the right solution for me, but others may get more help from them. Personally, I view them as a treatment, not a cure. I'm not a doctor, so I'm not going to say that nobody needs to use SSRIs or drugs to control depression, but I think a vast number of people could read this book or similar books and control their depression without resorting to drugs.
I agree with many of Curtiss's opinions that the use of antidepressants to obtain "designer personalities" (my quotes)is spiralling out of control in this country; that pharmaceutical companies take advantage of a gullible public to sell these drugs; that we want our shortcomings, failures and bad habits to be termed "diseases" so as to absolve us from making hard choices; that, in our glorification of individuality, we have lost a sense of community that fosters mental health. There are other valid ideas in these pages. It's good, too, that in one short paragraph, the author allows that short-term drug therapy should not be denied to persons who are genuinely suicidal or otherwise in the clutches of an severe episode of depression.
However, I found the book fearfully repetitive, and mainly for this reason I give it a low rating. After the first five chapters or so, the reader could skip to the final chapter and not miss much. Also, I was not particularly interested in the author's many personal life vignettes or her repeated criticism of her brother who does use on-going drug therapy to control his manic-depression. (This last just seemed to me to be an attempt to publicly justify her position in a long-standing family dispute.)
I do think the book is useful to depression sufferers who haven't stopped to consider common-sense, drug-free approaches to their problem. And Curtiss includes abundant, uplifting quotations from ancient sages and other historical figures. Anyone who is amenable to taking the advice of those who have gone before will appreciate these little gems of wisdom.
My recommendation would be to request this book at the public library--or, if you just have to have a copy, buy it second-hand.
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