[maxie154]

I'd like to hear your personal opinions.

My whole life I had considered mental health diagnoses (e.g., bipolar disorder, OCD, or PTSD) to be positive because they allow for organization and classification of mental health conditions. This past year my opinion was changed as I considered stigmatization and other potentially harmful effects of diagnoses. I'm interested to hear any of your thoughts on this.

[Thunder Bow]

Labels can be an easy way to feel bad about oneself. They can keep you feeling bad as well. They also can be an excuse to feel bad and re-enforce angers and the like.

Doctors use diagnoses to organize and classify for record keeping reasons. Labels are often used to classify one self and others. The risk is that they can be more judgmental rather than being accurate.

[maxie154]

I've never thought of labels as being an excuse to feel bad or perpetuate negative emotions, but I totally agree with you now that you bring it up. Interesting, thank you.

I wonder if things would be easier if everyone was placed on a continuum. Like, everyone is on a clinically depressed continuum, for example. Some low, some high, some intermediate. Still, people high on the scale might suffer similar problems incurred in diagnoses, but maybe to a lesser degree since everyone is somewhere on the continuum.

[Perna]

I think diagnoses are really only useful for the medical/psychiatric side of mental illness for the doctors to work with what prescriptions they want to try. People with emotional or life issues going to see a psychologist, social worker, or other counselor don't really need a diagnoses in that they already know they are depressed or anxious or "a mess"? :-)

Both, I think.

I think the way we have used labels and the way the DSM has evolved over time has only been getting worse...

Youth, especially, seem to take on their dx as an identity. I have known many like that...

That the system is so obsessed with diagnosis also means that when someone doesnt fit a label (like me) they are often left out in the cold...

Some criticism of western psychiatry suggests that people become the labels merely because the labels exist... I think there is some evidence for this.

But we use labels every day in all sorts of situations. They have uses.

[lizardlady]

I would say both. If labels are used to stigmatize someone that's harmful. But as somat points out labels can also be useful. Not to be silly, but imagine opening your kitchen cupboard to discover a bunch of cans with no label to identify what's inside.

I believe a diagnosis is helpful in giving a professional ideas how to treat the person. Stepping outside the mental health field for a second - if I go to my doctor with a stuffy nose and sneezing it's helpful to know if I have a cold or a sinus infection. Treatment for the two is different. Personally, I consider a diagnosis a form of short hand for communicating what is going on with a client/patient. It's also how doctors get paid by insurance companies.

[A Red Panda]

I think it depends on your individual perspectives and actions.

Some people may find it validating to know that they aren't just bonkers or broken.

Some people may worry about the stigma.

Some people may use a diagnosis as an excuse to behave poorly at all times.

Some people may use a diagnosis as motivation to improve themselves.

Some people may be angry and think that the professionals are out to get them or are just trying to make money off them.

Some people may feel relief, understanding, and/or acceptance in having a professional see things that others might not.

It really depends on the individuals!

For me, I find it validating to have people believe and identify things I've known for years but thought I was just overreacting/overthinking. I'm also terrified of the stigma so I only tell friends. I have also (even before diagnosis) used it as a means to accept myself, and work to improve/manage my symptoms.

But it is different than knowing the difference between a cold and flu because psychiatric labels are essentially social constructions. Why the definitions keep changing whereas the definition for cold or flu does not change.

Acting like they aren't just collections of symptoms but something more concrete is part of the problem...

Also, there are clear treatment decisions for cold/flu because they aren't constructions. However, with mental health labels, you can be prescribed the same med with any label and no label guarantees that any med will work. When we barely focus on treatment, our obsession with diagnosis is rather inane (and often destructive).

[A Red Panda]

Yes, treatment is vastly more important than the actual diagnosis! But having a diagnosis can help alert both the individual and other professionals involved as to what symptoms are likely present. Not that they all will be - but then again, even non-brain related health issues rarely show all the same symptoms!

The reason why the mental health diagnosis labels change is because the brain is a much more complicated organ than the nose, stomach, etc. We can't visually SEE most problems with it, and technology isn't all the way developed yet. Even once they're fully developed it will still take a long time to properly understand them.

Science is a process, but it does the best it can. While it's not perfect, it keeps working to improve. Maybe someday they will have something more concrete to help in diagnosing the various disorders affecting the brain. Until then - trial and error, hyposthesis and revise!

And even the treatment of a cold or flu varies from individuals, so why wouldn't it be the same for mental health? The individual and the professional have to work together to find out what works. With simpler ailments it's just easier to find the most common helpful things.

I have this in mind for a while, that is, beside stigmatization, knowing your mental illness might make you more accepting to your limitations and thus will make you lazy to try harder to be a better person. At least this is true with my experience, where when I have these inner conversations that I might be so and so, I become depressed and hopeless. This is why I haven't sought any help so far.

Originally Posted by A Red Panda

Yes, treatment is vastly more important than the actual diagnosis! But having a diagnosis can help alert both the individual and other professionals involved as to what symptoms are likely present. Not that they all will be - but then again, even non-brain related health issues rarely show all the same symptoms!

The reason why the mental health diagnosis labels change is because the brain is a much more complicated organ than the nose, stomach, etc. We can't visually SEE most problems with it, and technology isn't all the way developed yet. Even once they're fully developed it will still take a long time to properly understand them.

Science is a process, but it does the best it can. While it's not perfect, it keeps working to improve. Maybe someday they will have something more concrete to help in diagnosing the various disorders affecting the brain. Until then - trial and error, hyposthesis and revise!

And even the treatment of a cold or flu varies from individuals, so why wouldn't it be the same for mental health? The individual and the professional have to work together to find out what works. With simpler ailments it's just easier to find the most common helpful things.

A mental illness is a social construction because it varies across cultures and times the way physical illnesses do not. And not due to the complexity of the brain... A diagnosis is just a syndrome (label given to a collection of symptoms) rather than a concrete thing (like the flu).

This doesn't mean it isn't real or the label doesn't serve a purpose, but I believe that acknowledging that it is a syndrome is important otherwise we create dogma.

Furthermore, a diagnosis can only be given based on a symptom. The diagnosis doesn't tell us of symptoms we aren't aware of...

If we act like this isn't the case, we are in big trouble for we create a self fulfilling prophecy. Much research shows this dilemma.

[(JD)]

Labels can also be used for malingering.

What concerns me most is that we've pathologized all suffering and as our society becomes more disconnected, causing more suffering, we merely invent new disorders and one cannot get help for suffering without first conforming to a disorder.

[JadeAmethyst]

Labels seem suggestions to me, questionable at best.

Originally Posted by maxie154

I've never thought of labels as being an excuse to feel bad or perpetuate negative emotions, but I totally agree with you now that you bring it up. Interesting, thank you.

I wonder if things would be easier if everyone was placed on a continuum. Like, everyone is on a clinically depressed continuum, for example. Some low, some high, some intermediate. Still, people high on the scale might suffer similar problems incurred in diagnoses, but maybe to a lesser degree since everyone is somewhere on the continuum.

It is interesting. But I think they are always say that everyone suffers from so and so (like depression, or social anxiety) from time to time, but these things don't interfere with their everyday life ... etc. I am not sure how placing everyone on a continuum would help people from stigmatization. I think the word "mental illness" in itself is harmful, because it implies craziness, even though psychologists and psychiatrists say otherwise.

i actually prefer being called crazy to mentally ill. why cant we accept people because they are people? as soon as we need an illness to be accepted... scary thought. and what does that say for people who are different who are not mentally ill? this is partly why, i believe, everything has turned into pathology.

Originally Posted by somat

i actually prefer being called crazy to mentally ill. why cant we accept people because they are people? as soon as we need an illness to be accepted... scary thought. and what does that say for people who are different who are not mentally ill? this is partly why, i believe, everything has turned into pathology.

I am skeptical about the health system regarding mental illness, which, I think, perpetuates it in a way. The problem is in our societies and systems, they are not flexible enough to accommodate different colors on the spectrum. This is my opinion at least.

Take for example the educational system; if someone suffers from ADHD , then (s)he is doomed, basically. That person will be labeled as lazy and annoying, which will make him/her not "normal" in others' as well as that person's eyes, and not normal means abnormal=crazy, which will separate him/her from the "(normal) group" (the human brain is very good in classifying people in-group and out-group). Another example, if someone has social anxiety, people wouldn't be considerate and understanding, but they will say (s)he is not sociable/shy and probably has issues and thus must be avoided.

[indigo11]

I used to think that they were helpful, but after going into this career choice, and my own personal issues, it has changed to be not helpful. More of it goes to the insurance companies regarding people's "named diagnoses" than anything else and has just another label for people.

[Kitten00]

I think getting a diagnosis can be a little validating, actually. It's like you finally know that all the behaviors and thoughts that were totally messing up your life weren't just you being a flawed, horrible person. You had an actual problem with specific characteristics and said behaviors and thoughts were normal and could be fixed. Maybe it's just me, but I've always found labels comforting to a certain extent. They make me feel secure.

[Hellion]

Originally Posted by somat

But it is different than knowing the difference between a cold and flu because psychiatric labels are essentially social constructions. Why the definitions keep changing whereas the definition for cold or flu does not change.

Acting like they aren't just collections of symptoms but something more concrete is part of the problem...

They actually are more complicated than social constructs, I mean people with mental disorders often suffer very real, debilitating symptoms...its not like the term depression just gets randomly applied to people for instance one gets the diagnoses from suffering very real depression symtpoms. Also whilst criteria can be altered/changed and names of disorders can change its not as if every disorder is constantly being drastically changed into something else. For instance what is considered anxiety symptoms now was considered anxiety symptoms 10 years ago to.

Originally Posted by Hellion

They actually are more complicated than social constructs, I mean people with mental disorders often suffer very real, debilitating symptoms...its not like the term depression just gets randomly applied to people for instance one gets the diagnoses from suffering very real depression symtpoms. Also whilst criteria can be altered/changed and names of disorders can change its not as if every disorder is constantly being drastically changed into something else. For instance what is considered anxiety symptoms now was considered anxiety symptoms 10 years ago to.

Being a social construct does not mean they are not real.

[*Laurie*]

Originally Posted by lizardlady

I would say both. If labels are used to stigmatize someone that's harmful. But as somat points out labels can also be useful. Not to be silly, but imagine opening your kitchen cupboard to discover a bunch of cans with no label to identify what's inside.

I believe a diagnosis is helpful in giving a professional ideas how to treat the person. Stepping outside the mental health field for a second - if I go to my doctor with a stuffy nose and sneezing it's helpful to know if I have a cold or a sinus infection. Treatment for the two is different. Personally, I consider a diagnosis a form of short hand for communicating what is going on with a client/patient. It's also how doctors get paid by insurance companies.

Good post, Liz. I agree...you covered everything I would say about diagnoses.

[joshuas-mommy]

Originally Posted by maxie154

I'd like to hear your personal opinions.

My whole life I had considered mental health diagnoses (e.g., bipolar disorder, OCD, or PTSD) to be positive because they allow for organization and classification of mental health conditions. This past year my opinion was changed as I considered stigmatization and other potentially harmful effects of diagnoses. I'm interested to hear any of your thoughts on this.

Mental Health Diagnosis are detrimental. Even if you dealing with people who work in the mental health field.