Mother says Bipolar can be prayed away

If, indeed, it were possible to pray away bipolar, it would probably would not matter who has been praying. Right? So if is possible to pray it away, and you are still sick, and you are already 52, so your mother has had plenty of time to pray and pray, that means that your mother has been doing a lousy job at praying. So it is her fault. I hope she realizes that.

Emmet Fox (a well-known writer on meditation) says that prayer is as effective as
psychotherapy. (Or rather, he says that there isn't any benefit that psychotherapy
offers that prayer isn't more effective at accomplishing.)

I don't know about that one, frankly. I know that prayer is effective if it is approached in the right way. But that's another subject altogether.

As for Bipolar illness, there are many things that we can do to make the illness better if we become pro-active in our care.

i believe god gave me it too for a reason. nother Dx though

welll

at least your mom didnt take you to get an exorcism eh

yea but i do believe in prayer. not that it could take it away (which like i said i believe god gave me this for a reason) but i also dont really believe in the medical "science" for helping this bullcrap.

ok some people dont believe prayer will work but think medicine is works. sure theres scientific proof that a medicine can help someone. but when theres also overwhelming evidence that it may not - plus that everyone is different - plus that you might have to keep trying diff ones - PLUS that if one DOES work it may have a chance of wearing off after awhile -
- all that stuff together and people STILL knock prayer (or anything spiritual or religious someone believes) ?

a few words in the name of spirituality (or religion YOUR preference) isnt going to hurt as bad as the side effects of these chemicals.

spirituality is not really synonymous with religion.

No, it won't hurt this way.

Still, there are potential issues:

1) waste of time - if it does not help, and you keep praying, you will be wasting time. Just as if you go see doctors and they are not helping, you are wasting time. If you are refilling prescriptions, and the medications are not helping, you are wasting time. If you pay for the medications, you are also wasting money. If you have government-funded medications, you are still wasting time - in the best case scenario, in which the medications are not helping, but are not giving bad side effects, either.

So there is always the issue of time, and ultimately, on the most general and high level, life is about how you use your time and time is a finite resource/

2) waste of effort and getting exasperated - if you keep praying and it does not help, you will get frustrated and exasperated. Since so many people pray, it is reasonable to conclude that prayers are not very effective, because otherwise the prevalence of bipolar in the non-prayers would have been way higher than in prayers. I do not think anybody has studied it formally, but just from the forum, many people have bipolar and pray and are still symptomatic. Just as many people take medications and are symptomatic. So neither tool seems to work great.

3) feelings of guilt - probably the most important potential issue.

If you take a medication - say, Lamictal - and it does not work, you do not feel that you are taking it in a wrong way, not applying enough effort, not doing it sincerely enough, with less than 100% devotion or dedication, etc. etc. As long as you take it, if it does not work, you know that it does not work - not that you caused it not to work. With prayer, people are bound to feel that they have not been doing a good enough job, which can lead to guilt, hopelessness, beating themselves up, and other such bad things. Since bipolar people have a tendency to beat themselves up on their own, the danger of the prayer method in exacerbating the natural tendency to beat themselves up and feel guilty is very real.

In general, there is no such thing as a free lunch, so even something as seemingly innocuous as "a few words" can have costs and consequences.

All of the above applies to using prayer as one of many tools, not to the exclusion of other tools.

If, in addition, prayer is used to substitute for other tools, then there is also the opportunity cost - the possible benefit from using other tools (does not have to be psychopharmacology, but maybe simple sunlight and additional iron in the diet) that is foregone by putting all the eggs into the prayer basket.

I actually seen people say **** like "I am so broken even meds don't work, nothing will ever work" or "my new med didn't work, I will disappoint my pdoc".
:/

That part stems from treating the pdoc as an authority figure rather than as a service provider, which is a wrong way to treat the pdoc.

There was a long thread on another forum. Somebody has sent 8 page texts to the T. I do not know how it is technically possible to send 8 page texts. Emails, yes, but not texts. But the person was able to do it.

There was a long discussion about whether to cancel the upcoming appointment and how to face the T and all of that, many posts.

Well... if you think that the T went above and beyond by reading such a long text, offer her additional compensation for her time, and be done with that. Right? What else is there to it? So all this long discussion stemmed, in my mind, from treating the T as an authority figure, or a super power, or what not. If you treat T / pdoc as a service provider with special training, AND NOBODY ELSE, then you won't be afraid to disappoint the T.

All of this is really really unfortunate, because bipolar people have ENOUGH emotional problems all on their own, and they do not need EXTRA emotional problems such as the fear of disappointing the pdoc.

Because if you think about it... say for somebody who uses a private practice p-doc and has no insurance and pays entirely out of pocket...

you pay someone to feel an obligation to fulfill that someone's dreams?.. not to disappoint them?.. really?..

I believe in prayer and God and pray to get through the day with being bipolar but don't believe its something that can be prayed away. Would be nice though.
My family thinks is all in my head and like im faking it for attention. Nevermind several Dr.'s and being in and out of the hospitals

Olanzapine 15 mg (from your signature) is a very high dose for someone to take just out of the need for attention... your family would not understand that, though

guilt comes with meds too. everyone has their own emotions about their treatment. ive met a lot people that have felt guilty.

honestly though. too many people put way too much trust into psychiatry alone. their bodies are eaten away by these meds for years with most times very little results. and some accept it because theyd rather be "fat and mentally well" as some say. you can put any physical health issue in place of "fat". psychiatry is supposed to be a tool - at best. but many people use the meds for everything. not all. but an overwhelming amount of people do.

Well, I guess it's spin off from "trust your doctor". You are crazy and doctors are angels with prescription pads...

speaking of angels. I actually realized I do turn to my guardian angels with stuff peeps go to doctors with. Too far up? Ocean deep down? Seeing things and time is disorted? Objects telling me... whatever? Prayer seems to help somewhat. Or maybe **** naturally passes and my spirituality just keeps me going through.

Praying for others is a different business though.

((((((( Starlite )))))))