Manic-depressive illness

What Hacker News says

1. RegardsyjcJun 2018
   There's a theory that creatives are much more sensitive (which is why they are so good at their work) and thus more vulnerable to crazy highs and lows.

   One book on the subject is, Touched with Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament.

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2. tokenadultMay 2013
   This article was a weird read for someone like me who meets regularly with psychologists from a scientifically oriented research department of psychology (at the University of Minnesota). The conclusion of the article begins,

   "In conclusion, the depression observed in children with high potential would seem to be characterized by narcissistic vulnerability associated with genuine traumatophilia,"

   and the old-fashioned terminology like "narcissistic" and the use of outmoded (and never validated) projective tests of personality (like the Rorschach) shows the article is far out of the mainstream of current psychology. I was wondering how such an old-fashioned article could come from 2012, so I focused my attention on the academic affiliations of the authors (not from major centers for the study of high IQ or of depression) and the journal of publication (not a top journal in this field).

   There is a huge prior literature on associations between high IQ and mood disorders, with much of that literature summarized in the authoritative textbook by Goodwin and Jamison.

   http://www.amazon.com/Manic-Depressive-Illness-Disorders-Rec...

   As a parent of four high-IQ children myself, painfully aware of how toxic the United States school system can be for such children,

   http://learninfreedom.org/age_grading_bad.html

   I first of all sought local friendship networks of other parents who understand such children. We have been homeschoolers throughout our children's childhoods, and that seems to have provided our children with some extra scope for creativity and added resilience for facing personal challenges (including two international moves during the childhoods of our three oldest children). Through association with the Davidson Institute for Talent Development Young Scholars program,

   http://www.davidsongifted.org/youngscholars/

   we have learned about--and have shared--resources with other parents about building optimism in children. I especially like Martin E. P. Seligman's book The Optimistic Child

   http://www.amazon.com/Optimistic-Child-Safeguard-Depression-...

   as a framework for children to learn how to reality-check their own thinking and not to be depressed by setbacks in life.

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3. mikecaneApr 2013
   >>>I'd like to imagine that most artists are relatively well-adjusted.

   Keep imagining. But great ones aren't. Go read:

   Touched with Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament by Kay Redfield Jamison http://www.amazon.com/Touched-With-Fire-ebook/dp/B001D1YCM2

   The Outsider by Colin Wilson http://www.amazon.com/The-Outsider-Colin-Wilson/dp/087477206...

   The Price of Greatness: Resolving the Creativity and Madness Controversy by Arnold M. Ludwig http://www.amazon.com/The-Price-Greatness-Creativity-Controv...

   EDIT to add: Why Jobs stood out is because the closest equivalent to what he was is a film director. But business is not set up to hand out accolades like Hollywood does. So instead of everyone learning who did what in Apple -- as with film we find out about sound editors, foley artists, etc, etc. -- we just get the face of Jobs.

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4. tokenadultMay 2011
   As, apparently, do most psychiatric drugs in the long run.

   I have to disagree with this statement and ask you to provide better sources than just the result of some Google search. The evidence gathered with citations to peer-reviewed literature in one of the definitive medical textbooks on the issue,

   http://www.amazon.com/Manic-Depressive-Illness-Disorders-Rec...

   strongly suggests that lithium for bipolar mood disorders has long term benefit. (That's based both on the decades of human use of lithium in some countries and on the basis of animal studies followed up by necropsies of brain tissue.)

   Apparently we are all in agreement that "self-medication" with alcohol is a very bad idea. But prescribed medication under supervision by a medical doctor can be a very good idea indeed.

   After edit: Thanks for the mention of the interesting book in your reply. I read some of the reviews, and found this useful interview

   http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2010/04/27/interview_whit...

   with the author, who has a balanced point of view:

   "Q: So do you think psychiatric drugs should be used at all?

   A: I think they should be used in a selective, cautious manner. . . . I think we should look at programs that are getting very good results. This is what I love about Keropudas Hospital’s program in Finland. They have 20 years of great results treating newly psychotic patients. They see if patients can get better without the use of meds, and if they can’t, then they try them. It’s a best-use model, not a no-use or anti-med model."

   After one more edit, an interesting review of the book mentioned in the reply to first version of this post:

   http://carlatpsychiatry.blogspot.com/2011/01/anatomy-of-epid...

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5. tokenadultMay 2009
   But we know how to build antidepressants which work on everyone.

   It took me a while in my offline personal life for the very evident counterexample to come to mind. In fact, it is well known that human mood can go wrong in two ways: by being too low (depression) but also by being too high (mania). To date, there isn't any medication that reliably raises the mood of individuals in normal mood states without subjecting some of those individuals to severe risk of psychotic mania. Anyone proposing policy reform as to this issue should be aware of this fact. Here are some reading references for HN participants who would like to know more about the medical research on mood disorders:

   Depression: Causes and Treatment, 2nd Edition

   http://www.amazon.com/Depression-Treatment-Aaron-T-Beck/dp/0...

   (a very recent book, by the inventor of cognitive therapy)

   or

   http://www.amazon.com/Manic-Depressive-Illness-Disorders-Rec...

   (a very authoritative textbook with extensive references to primary research literature).

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6. aledenJun 2017
   A well-known psychiatrist with bipolar disorder, Kay Jamison, published a book titled "Touched with Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament". In her own words:

   "The main purpose of this book is to make a literary, biographical, and scientific argument for a compelling association, not to say actual overlap, between two temperaments- the artistic and the manic-depressive- and their relationship to the rhythms and cycles, or temperament, of the natural world. The emphasis will be on understanding the relationship between moods and imagination, the nature of moods- their variety, their contrary and opposition qualities, their flux, their extremes (causing, in some individuals, occasional episodes of 'madness')- and the importance of moods in igniting thought, changing perceptions, creating chaos, forcing order upon that chaos, and enabling transformation." (5)

   Some of the persons mentioned: Byron, Tennyson, Melville, William and Henry James, Schumann, Coleridge, van Gogh, Hemingway, Virginia Wolf. I think she presents a compelling argument that extreme fluctuations in mood, when coupled with an enforced rational thinking process results in more interesting creative output. Granted, their lives may still suck.

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