{"id":2339,"date":"2012-01-28T10:36:14","date_gmt":"2012-01-28T15:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/?p=2339"},"modified":"2012-10-22T12:29:37","modified_gmt":"2012-10-22T16:29:37","slug":"the-dark-night-and-depression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/?p=2339","title":{"rendered":"The Dark Night and Depression"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cBefore enlightenment, take Prozac and talk to your shrink.\u00a0 After enlightenment, take Prozac and talk to your shrink.\u201d
\nDr. Gerald May quoting Judith Hooper\u2019s conclusion after interviewing a collection of psychiatrists and buddhist practitioners.<\/em>\u00a0 The Dark Night of the Soul<\/a>, p 159<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

May discusses the relationship between depression and the dark night of the soul.\u00a0 They are different, but they often overlap which can be confusing to say the least.\u00a0 But it\u2019s very clear that depression needs to be addressed on the physical level (which can mean exercise and a restricted diet as well as medication) and the Dark Night on the spiritual level.<\/p>\n

For myself, I see that I have used my depression in the service of my spiritual growth.\u00a0 But that does NOT mean I can go off medication.\u00a0 When I first got on medication, I found out what normal brain chemistry was for the first time.\u00a0 I also discovered that all the issues I had been working on over and over again in therapy suddenly cleared up.\u00a0 It was like I could finally USE the insights I\u2019d gotten in therapy.\u00a0 I also noticed that, without effort, I was being friendlier to people I didn\u2019t know: checkout people at the grocery, the guys who pump gas.\u00a0 I also learned that appreciation can be done on will power, but enjoyment requires normal brain chemistry.<\/p>\n

Dr. May, a psychiatrist, says:\u00a0 \u201c… my experience is that people often experience depression and the dark night at the same time.\u00a0 To say the least, the dark night can be depressing.\u00a0 Even if most of the experience feels liberating, it still involves loss, and loss involves grief, and grief may at least temporarily become depression.\u00a0 Conversely, a primary clinical depression can become part of a dark-night experience, just as any other illness can.\u201d p156
\n\u201cI am not certain why people still think that medications can interfere with God\u2019s work in human souls.\u00a0 … one\u2019s theology would have to hold that God\u2019s grace is so weak and ineffective that a chemical compound can block it.\u201d\u00a0 p159<\/p>\n

It is however also true that addiction to alcohol or other drugs can at least weaken the individual\u2019s ability to turn toward god\u2019s grace.\u00a0 In AA you need to become clean and sober and stay that way.\u00a0 My past attempts to get off drugs have been under the illusion that I was using medication the same way my parents used alcohol.\u00a0 I recently tried again to lower my medication, mostly because the dentist told me that persistent dry mouth, one consequence of the medication, can be very bad for one\u2019s teeth. So I lowered my Imipramine dose from 175mg to 150 mg.\u00a0 I was fine for two and a half months.\u00a0 Then I saw that I wasn\u2019t bouncing back as fast, that depression was creeping up again.\u00a0 So I raised the medication two weeks ago.\u00a0 Now I\u2019m seeing that it\u2019s working. I\u2019m really pleased with yesterday\u2019s long list of things done!\u00a0 It\u2019s both a sign that I\u2019m doing better, and a morale boost that keeps me on the upward spiral.\u00a0 And that is why I have to keep taking medication \u2014 it raises the bottom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cBefore enlightenment, take Prozac and talk to your shrink.\u00a0 After enlightenment, take Prozac and talk to your shrink.\u201d Dr. Gerald May quoting Judith Hooper\u2019s conclusion after interviewing a collection of psychiatrists and buddhist practitioners.\u00a0 The Dark Night of the Soul, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-depression","category-present-day"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2339\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jennydeupree.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}