I agree with you completely what you had to say regarding alcohol. I'm well aware of the vicious cycle it puts one through. Pretty soon we're drinking over the very embarassments (especially our at times verbal venom or worse yet horrendous consequences that the alcohol caused in the first place.) Because I witnessed my mom returning home after being hospitalized having had ECT intermittently throughout my life (She did not self-medicate), I guess I would rather treat my depression with a depressant (initially a stimulant) and sit in a restaurant and endlessly discuss what caused this bump in the road instead of being hospitalized. But I'm kidding myself because at 50% of my hospitalizations were due to alcoholic induced suicidal depressions. However, I work on my self-prescribed medicating constantly,