Would you now see a psychologist?

M-Cameron said:

2 things:

1) psychology IS a pseudo-science....now i dont mean to put down psychology(i study it informally myself).....but the fact is, you cannot accurately call it a science, as there are no real 'facts', nothing is set in stone, and experiments are not repeatable with accuracy...in chemistry, component A + component B always equals Component C.....in psychology, what may be classified a mental illness today, may be perfectly normal in 100 years ( look at homosexuality)

2) not wanting to turn this into a religious debate......but even though you are an atheist, there is no reason you cannot seek religious council. good advice is good advice, regardless of whether it comes from a priest, rabbi, monk, ect. just be honest with them and youll find most are pretty accepting of people of a different belief from their own.

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I see your point on the religious counsel thing... I just meant if I was going through a trauma its not like I could "find strength in the lord" (which, I understand, can help many people and I am not bashing it) or some such thing.

I have an inherent distrust of any person who tries to get inside my head to understand my thinking. In my experience, none of them care about actually helping the patient and more about some ulterior motive. In this case finding someone broken to report. In the past 6 years I have been instructed to see over 15 mental health professionals. All of them poked and prodded to try and find something to scribble down on their notepad. They never got an inch from me. Never will.

Isn't it like synchronized swimming with no real way to be scored?

I went to one once, after one session with me he quit the profession. Medical professionals are always the hardest ones to treat. =)

There is a big difference between psychologist and psychiatrist. It's a psychiatrist that diagnoses and treats mental illness while a psychologist is a researcher. A psychiatrist can prescribe drugs; almost always a psychologist can't. I looked up the terms and below is a comparison. I added the almost always as two states now permit psychologist to prescribe drugs.

http://psychology.about.com/od/psychotherapy/f/psychvspsych.htm

chuck

tl;dr a psychiatrist has an MD, a psychologist has a Ph.D.

Iffy and spotty at best, All my clients in either lines of work, "when I had the beauty salon chain" were shrinks, More than 80% were divorced, getting high, or hsving wife swapping sessions with other shrinks.
Sometimes when you have too much money, you think you have a problem. These guys make you feel better by lightening your wallett.

Nope.

The anti-mental health provider stand that many take on this board saddens me. Being "people", MHP's are going to be a mixed group of variable "quality" just like any other. I hope the view is mostly a generational one

Edit: With regard to the OP's question, I don't know if it would deter me or not, but I know it will deter plenty, so I stand against it (along with many MHP's) for that reason. Well intended and poorly conceived

valnar said:

Simply put, with even minor mental health issues being a factor that can exclude you from purchasing a firearm (eg. such as temporary bout of depression, like from a divorce), would you purposely stay away from a psychologist or psychiatrist these days?

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A system like this has been tried in Finland for almost two years now and it has proven to be a total disaster. While you're not required to disclose the ownership of firearms to medical professionals, they're required by law to report ANYONE who displays even the slightest symptoms of behavior that might lead to violence.

Including mild depression.

Doctors, especially psychologists and psychiatrists hate the law, they get in trouble and can even lose their license if they fail to report. Undeniable fact that a patient's behavior can't be predicted without an extensive diagnosis has been ignored by the legislators, doctors are ENCOURAGED to report anyone, even on a whim, and the whole system has become a joke. All prescriptions of certain drugs are monitored, including muscle relaxants - personally I outright refused to have Oxycontin and Temazepan prescriptions a few years ago (for pain and sleeping aid, I got burned pretty badly); it was much easier to bite your lip and endure the pain than to get yourself in a national database of strong painkiller and psychoactive medicated gun owners.

Interestingly enough, I'm a hypnotherapist / master hypnotist and at the moment exempt from any obligation of reporting my clients, but currently there's some legislative pressure to include all clinically qualified professionals under the same requirement. This is getting worse all the time; no-one in their right mind is going to fail to report people who clearly are violent, but the legislation wants to remove the case by case discretion.

I would have to say it depends on the situation, over reaction and allowing law makers and beuracrats catagorize dangerous and non dangerous mental conditions does worry me, however at the same time I have seen otherwise normal seeming adults suddenly develop seemingly serious mental problems, some that can been treated either through management couseling or through medicaction, sometimes it may even be caused by medication they are taking. As an example about 10 years ago my now wife was prescribed a medication used to treat a common chronic condition (I don't remember exactly what, may be blood pressure, or similar, nothing related to mental health, depression, etc.), after being on this medication for less than a week she became extremely emtional, cryinging for no reason, etc., she called the doctor the prescribed the medication, he insisted the crying was not a side effect, thankfully she ignored him, stopped taking it and within 24 -48 hours the uncontrollable crying was gone. I can just imagine the mental health circus that could have resulted if she had not associated the crying with the new medication.

Years ago my employer sent us to see the "shrink" every year.About three years into it, the Doc had a nervous breakdown and they stopped sending us at that point.

True story......

Well, first @ M-Cameron, psychology is NOT a pseudoscience. If you care to further disagree then we will have words. One does not have to deal in absolute tangible facts in order to have a science. You are underestimating the extent to which even the hard sciences are based on theory.

Second, would I see a psychologist if it affected my 2nd Amendment rights? No. I AM a psychologist and I don't think we have any right to determine contingencies of a person's rights.

NOTHING in 50+ years that my wife, a good pastor or two, a good dog or lap cat, and good friends have not been able to help me through. I think the MHP game is a crutch most, not all...of the time, much like over prescribed pain killers and ADD meds. I've worked 2 psychologist suicides btw...

Now..the time I smashed most of my teeth out in a wreck and broke my jaw I NEEDED those Percosets...for a mere two days. Sucked it up the next few months.

The fact is you will go on a list. You won't know who sees that list, or what may come of it. unless you are really a mentally ill person, you should stay off it.
Doctors protocall for anyone who is in pain management is to see a shrink, after 6 months of pain, "because you must be depressed by then", as told to me by a pain management doctor many years ago.
She just said because you have to be depressed.
This is the kind of nonsense that can lead a person who may not realize that they are being manipulated to go be a list.
Being in pain and being depressed are 2 different things. Many people have severe medical problems that require various treatment, but are not depressed.
In FL if you get a prescription for a pain medication, as you check out, it asks if you would like to see a psych. "that's just strange", you need to accept or decline prior to paying. This is another scheme to invade your privacy, it has nothing to do with your tooth ache, or back problem, just an excuse to further pry into your personell life. And Obamacare
I just laugh, and hope people see this for what it is, an invasion of privacy.

Well, first @ M-Cameron, psychology is NOT a pseudoscience. If you care to further disagree then we will have words. One does not have to deal in absolute tangible facts in order to have a science. You are underestimating the extent to which even the hard sciences are based on theory.

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Even physics has gone from the Newtonian model to Einstein's relativity, to quantum mechanics, and now strange theories such as string theory or quantum loop gravity. Each new model has changed the way we viewed the universe... but that does not mean physics is a pseudoscience, or that Newton was a hack.

Let's just call 'em a mental health professional... There are so many shades of gray with the profession. Psychologist, Psychiatrist, Therapist, LCSW, LMFT, LPCC...etc...etc...

With the current insanity, the only way I would see one is if I'd paid with Ca$h and not any kind of health insurance or government subsidized program. It's so easy for someone to be suffering a short-term bout of S.A.D or life issues (divorce, death, illness) to be labeled as unstable. To easy for a mental health professional to do a knee-jerk and report nothing as something.

gym said:

The fact is you will go on a list. You won't know who sees that list, or what may come of it. unless you are really a mentally ill person, you should stay off it.
Doctors protocall for anyone who is in pain management is to see a shrink, after 6 months of pain, "because you must be depressed by then", as told to me by a pain management doctor many years ago.
She just said because you have to be depressed.
This is the kind of nonsense that can lead a person who may not realize that they are being manipulated to go be a list.
Being in pain and being depressed are 2 different things. Many people have severe medical problems that require various treatment, but are not depressed.
In FL if you get a prescription for a pain medication, as you check out, it asks if you would like to see a psych. "that's just strange", you need to accept or decline prior to paying. This is another scheme to invade your privacy, it has nothing to do with your tooth ache, or back problem, just an excuse to further pry into your personell life. And Obamacare
I just laugh, and hope people see this for what it is, an invasion of privacy.

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1) Chronic pain is a significant risk factor for depression

2) Chronic pain has a significant mental component to it, whether we're talking about pain and a comorbid psychiatric disorder or not. Psychotherapy has been demonstrated to have reasonable efficacy in chronic pain management, and it comes without the sequelae of narcotics (or any medication for that disorder) which generally are not even indicated in chronic non-malignant pain regardless.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304395998002553

If (when, really) I find myself in chronic pain that I have difficulty managing, I will be pursuing psychotherapy

Well, first @ M-Cameron, psychology is NOT a pseudoscience. If you care to further disagree then we will have words. One does not have to deal in absolute tangible facts in order to have a science. You are underestimating the extent to which even the hard sciences are based on theory.

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Shame that all of the big players in real scientific fields disagree with you. Hell, they even got upset at Computer Science and want it to be considered a subset of engineering rather than science, and therefore change its name from Computer Science to Computer Engineering or Software Engineering.

I would not willingly go to any kind of psych doctor. I would not even go to the counselor at my church.

Every time I fill out a questionaire at a Dr's office there is a "are you depressed" line. Well... "NO" ! I'm as happy as any one person could be.

Mark

Well, first @ M-Cameron, psychology is NOT a pseudoscience. If you care to further disagree then we will have words. One does not have to deal in absolute tangible facts in order to have a science. You are underestimating the extent to which even the hard sciences are based on theory.

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dont think for an instant i am trying to discredit Psychology.....im not trying to insinuate that psychology is a bunch of tom-foolery hippy mumbo-jumbo....i genuinely feel it is a very important area of study( like i said, i study it myself) and for the most part doesnt get the respect it deserves.

that being said, one would have a hard time classifying it as a "science".......its really more of an "art of interpretation that utilizes scientific principals".


take for instance chemistry......we know water consists of 2 Hydrogen atoms and 1 Oxygen atom.....if you took a sample of water to any chem lab in the world you would get that same answer.


what about a person with some mental illness.....you could take them to 10 different doctors and get 10 different possible diagnoses......there are guidelines, but there are no hard fast rules for what symptoms equate to what mental illness.

now i suppose one could make the argument that medical technology has not yet currently advanced far enough for doctors to be able to make accurate diagnoses....and that would be a fair argument. perhaps in 20 years, medical technology will advance far enough to allow us to more accurately map the brain, decode DNA, and be able to find specific markers only prevalent in those with a certain mental illness.....

so perhaps i misspoke earlier....a more accurate statement would be that for the time being, psychology is a pseudo-science.

Are you NUTS?

Agreed. Mental health reforms should be done in such a way that safe people recieving treament or those who have effectively been diagnosed and treated should not have their rights stripped.

And once you're on a list, effective treatment should get you off of it.

I will never give my money to a fruitcake. I would much rather take advice from elders who have worked their knuckles into the ground because they suffer from a case of strong back and most likely suffer from strong character and lessons learned from experience. I have found strong guidance from men like this when troubled times have occurred in my life. Most of those men were Christians even though I usually refer to myself as an agnostic theist.

Fruitquacks most likely have very little real personal experience of the troubles they try to help others with and most of the ones I have known seemed to suffer from weird personality traits that made them look out of touch with reality. It is kinda like the broke buddy who always has financial advice for others.

So no, fruitquacks will get none of my attention and especially not now.