geez shamus....
Candy To A Jehovahs Witness: Anti - Depressants.
by shamus100 56 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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purplesofa
reniaa,
I think if you went to meetings and socialized with Witnesses you would see that many are taking AD. I was shocked to find that in all the congregations I went to. My closest friends were taking them and I did not even know. I took them until a year out of the org, and have not taken them for over two years now, and I feel great, I don't feel the need for them any longer.
For those witnesses that are lurking, you can read so many threads about witnesses on AD, or even if they are not taking them they feel depressed. Constant sacrifice, stressful schedules, pending doom always right around the corner, lack trust within the congregation amongst brothers and sisters, the list goes on.............. hell, even reniaa won't use the WT literature or bible when she defends the organization!!!
purps
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purplesofa
oops shamus,
I did not read your post until after I entered mine.
sorry
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The-Borg
Alcohol was another big problem I saw many many times.
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reniaa
thx shamus I'm glad you admit this is just opinion based thread and there are no actual facts to back depression being anymore prevalent in witnesses than any other organisation religious or not.
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shamus100
No worries, purplesofa.
Come kiss the monkey now.
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purplesofa
http://www.seanet.com/~raines/mental.html
The Rylander Study
Swedish psychiatrist Dr. Rylander investigated a sample of conscientious objectors imprisoned in Sweden. Of the 135 randomly selected cases, fully 126 were Witnesses. Of these 126, Rylander diagnosed 51 as neurotic, 42 psychotic, 32 as mentally retarded, and 5 as brain-damaged (some overlap exists because some cases were in two or more categories).[7] Diagnosis was made solely on the basis of behavior that was clearly pathological, such as irrational paranoia or severe long term depression, and not behavior that resulted from following Watchtower doctrine as non-social involvement with the non-Witnesses. Rylander also concluded from the subjects' medical records and his interviews that their pathological state was not uncommonly evident before conversion, but that the Watchtower's' influence was often detrimental to mental health, sometimes severely so.
About four percent of the eligible armed service Swedish population were judged psychologically "unfit" for military services. The corresponding figure for Witnesses was twenty-one percent, or a rate five times greater. This was very close to the same ratio found by Spencer [8] whose diagnosis of "psychotic" or "neurotic" was made on the basis of mental hospital admission screening. Few of the cases in Rylander's study were marginal Witnesses, and most were actively involved in the Watchtower. Rylander concluded that many of those he studied lacked an education, job skills, emotional stability, and quality social relations. Unsatisfactory employment records often existed because of psychological deficiencies, lack of ability or immaturity. Rylander found that Witnesses committed "...a relatively large number of small crimes and other misdemeanors which generally resulted only in a fine...three [Witnesses] have been imprisoned for stealing or harboring of stolen property, and 36 have been fined for various offenses (traffic violations, drunkenness, unlawful selling of alcohol, poaching, unlawful entering, etc.)" [9]
Neurotic symptoms commonly found in his sample included "feelings of discomfort, general anxiety, poor sleep habits, times of brooding over what they see as the meaninglessness of life, the wrongs they have suffered and the mistakes they have made." [10] Rylander noted that the Watchtower doctrine helped some adherents to explain "all of their problems in life, and has given them a satisfaction and calmness which has brought a measure of stability to their lives." [11]
He also concluded that individual Witnesses tended to be burdened with a variety of serious concerns and often joined the sect in an effort to solve their many problems. Although the results of this study are not fully applicable to today's situation, many of his conclusions are still largely true. [12] A major difference between his sample and today is that the Witnesses are now more middle-class and less socially rejected. Many Witnesses, though, especially those living in developing nations, still experience many of the same problems that Rylander reported.
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purplesofa
sorry I cannot highlight
I arrived at the hospital in the evening. They put me on a drip to try to clear the drugs out of my system. They contacted an Elder who came the next morning, who later brought my wife. Because I had tried to commit suicide I was “sectioned” and sent to a psychiatric hospital. There I was diagnosed as having “acute clinical depression” and according to the doctors probably had it for a number of years but suppressed it and it came to a head in the breakdown I had. Also they said depression seems to be common amongst Jehovah’s Witnesses, I was the third or fourth one they had had that year. For a small group of people the ratio was quite high for depression.
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purplesofa
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/life-after-jehovahs-witnesses-website-offers-help-to-followers-who-lose-their-faith-821603.html
Life after Jehovah's Witnesses: website offers help to followers who lose their faith
By Emily Dugan
Tuesday, 6 May 2008
It was only when Rachel Underhill was lying in a hospital bed, haemorrhaging, that she first realised the way of the Watchtower might not be for her.
She had just given birth to twins via an emergency Caesarean section. As a Jehovah's Witness she was subject to the whim of the church elders, and they made their feelings about a blood transfusion quite clear. As she was wheeled into the operating theatre, one of them pushed a form under her nose and said "sign here".
Ms Underhill, 32, from Brighton, East Sussex, was lucky enough to survive her ordeal without a transfusion, but the idea that her religion was encouraging her to risk her life was a defining moment.
She recalled: "I remember the anaesthetist coming in and saying, 'Do you realise you are going to die? Do you realise you will leave your children motherless?'"
When, years later, Ms Underhill finally escaped her religion, she launched a website to help former Jehovah's Witnesses rebuild their lives after leaving the faith.
For those who manage to sever ties with the Jehovah's Witnesses, life can be very isolated. Followers are controlled by strict laws that mean even the most everyday experiences, such as celebrating birthdays and Christmas or going out with friends, are completely alien to them.
On top of trying to navigate a world the sect has deliberately sheltered them from, many find themselves ostracised from friends and family who are still involved. "When I first came out of the religion I went from having this great support network to having nothing," says Ms Underhill. "All my friends, family and people from the church didn't want to know me." The site she created, called exJW-Reunited.co.uk, is now a year old and has recently started to offer Britain's first ever live online counselling service for ex-Jehovah's Witnesses.
Once a week, Lisa Magdalena, a qualified counsellor who ran away from the sect aged 16, is online to answer questions and provide support to anyone in the process of leaving – from finding new friends and a place to live, to dealing with the hurt and guilt of being cut off from family.
"Witnesses are taught never to seek help, which is why I'm so passionate about this website," says Ms Magdalena. " There are really high rates of suicide and depression among people that leave, and I want to be able to help people to get their lives back on track."
Ms Magdalena, 38, has seen first-hand the tragedy that the religion's extreme code can wreak on families. In the 1970s, when she was just two years old, her father, Keith Playford, died. He had continually refused blood transfusions that would have saved his life after a simple dental procedure to remove teeth went wrong. Just before he died, doctors made legal history by forcing him to receive blood, to no avail.
When Ms Magdalena ran away, she says she lost her family and friends and ended up homeless. "I had nowhere to live and no job; I was living on the streets for three weeks and I felt suicidal," she says.
"Lisa has been there and done it, so people won't have to explain anything to her," says Ms Underhill, who found that traditional counselling did not help. The strange and little-understood details of life as a Jehovah's Witness made it difficult to explain the pressures she had been under. "The counsellor just couldn't understand what I'd been through. I spent six of the eight sessions just explaining what the religion was about, and the way it worked."
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reniaa
purple sofa
you do realise that rylander study was completely debunked years ago as complete rubbish? 1946 study of conscientious objectors in prison after they were severely handled by the authorities yeah they were not a happy bunch :S...I had truly forgotten about that old chestnut.
Reniaa