Anyone had this? They said I was a really great candidate for it because I respond so poorly to medication.
I go in for my next monthly injection on December 5th and i’m considering opting in for it.
At first I said noooooo way. I don’t want to end up a vegatable. But i’m at the end of the road here with hopelessness thinking I gotta spend rest of my life on meds that don’t work.
I had three done in a week. Nothing but a minor headache afterwards.
Oof lol. Well thanks for your input cause i’m really considering at the moment.
I’ve literally had dozens of ECT treatments when I lived in Florida. I think they helped me at the time and I only experienced a few headaches and a little memory loss. It’s nothing like the movies…they put an IV in and sedate you with anesthesia and give you a muscle relaxer so you’re not flopping around. I actually kind of liked when they put me to sleep.
They did it at the old hospital I worked at. From what I saw 9/10 people it did not help, just made them lose chunks of memory and turn into confused zombies temporarily. They also were desperate to find patients to do it because it makes a LOT of money, and so would literally try to get anyone to sign up to do it even if we thought the patient was a terrible candidate.
That being said the 1/10 people it was effective for it really made a massive difference in them. Those people would come in so depressed they wouldn’t talk and leave totally normal and content. So I’m not saying it’s not worth trying, if you’ve already tried everything else. Clearly for some people it works fantastically. Just not most.
I had 11 treatments. It had a minor effect on my depression, and a big impact on my short term memory - i can’t remember anything of those two weeks, they are gone, but it had no effect on my overall memory and no long term side effects.
It was the meaning i should have one treatment monthly after that, but i thought that the effect wasn’t good enough for that (i hate being anesthetized)
I love that part too. It was always over so fast. I got insomnia so I was like please put me to sleep lol.
I have a friend that swears it cured her post having a baby depression “just like that”.
Sounds like they erased your memory/self awareness
No I had a little short term memory loss but it came back.
I had a series of treatments because I was depressed when I was first hospitalised for sz. I think they usually give it for depression following sz episode but I could be wrong. It had a really obvious short term effect like jolting my brain out of a rut but it seemed temporary to me. It didn’t change the fact I had lost my job and was newly diagnosed as mentally ill. They did discharge me after though.
I’ve seen ect do a lot of good before. It’s not guaranteed that all treatments will end like this, but I saw it completely turn one guy around. I wondered if it had affected his intelligence, though. He was “writing a novel”, and when I read it, the “novel” was barely coherent. I think he had a college degree, so I knew he had to be able to write better in order to get his degree. It was probably just for a short time that this guy’s intelligence faded. I think he recovered his full intelligence.
I had greater than 40 sessions of ECT. The doctors were pleased with the results. Yeah.
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