"Can you believe how cold it was this winter? It was so bad that I had to increase my antidepressants."
"I think I'm going to have to do that too."
I recently overheard this conversation while dining at a restaurant and sat there in partial disbelief. But then realized I was not surprised. I hear this type of talk often, and it makes me wonder: Have we become a country populated by emotional wimps?
As a nation, we've turned toward medicines as the solution for emotional pain. According to a 2011 study by the National Center for Health Statistics, the rate of antidepressant use by teenagers and adults jumped almost 400 percent between 1988 and 1994. That trend continued between 2005 and 2008 with 1 in 10 Americans using an antidepressant medication. Among women in their 40s and 50s, the number is even higher at 1 in 4. Antidepressants are now the third most prescribed class of medications in the United States.
Do so many people really need them? An April 2013 study in the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics found that nearly two-thirds of the 5,000 people studied did not meet the diagnostic criteria of depression despite receiving this diagnosis and taking antidepressants because of it. A 400-percent jump in antidepressant use would suggest that rates of depression increased by this amount in just a decade, yet this is doubtful.
Why don't more of us work through powerful emotions, attempt to understand them and allow them to serve as an impetus for growth and change? Because most are not taught how to sit with emotions. Instead they distance themselves, using medications to numb them.
The anecdote I shared about the two people in the restaurant illustrates the growing refusal to explore real emotions that humanize us, and the rise of a quick-fix, reach-for-medication mindset--the same mindset that weakens most who adopt it.
I'm not against antidepressants. For those who truly need them, they can be lifesaving. Extensive research shows they stabilize both mood and emotions. I've seen many patients lifted from the dark despair of depression with the help of medication and go on to have healthy and fulfilling lives. When diagnostic criteria are met, then medication is a viable treatment option, along with therapy.
What I don't agree with is the tendency to reach for medication for the equivalent of a psychological sniffle or for simply feeling down. Just as we wouldn't take morphine for a paper cut, we shouldn't jump to antidepressants to treat everyday stress, mild depression or anxiety. Yet patients are quick to ask for them and doctors quick to give them, sometimes after mere minutes of talking to patients.
Simply put, difficult emotions have a bad reputation. In many cases, feelings of sadness, envy, jealousy, anger, frustration, fear and anxiety are exactly what we need to grow stronger, find a sense of purpose and ultimately discover happiness and success.
Like a reaction to touching a hot stove, painful emotions urge us to act. Anger, for instance, can energize and mobilize us. As the movie Selma reminded us, the civil rights movement of the 1960s stemmed from outrage. People had had enough, and they wanted a change. This anger mobilized and united the masses and provided them remarkable courage.
Sadness is one of the emotions people are most inclined to medicate. But, with the exception of chronic depression, sadness won't interfere dramatically with your daily functioning, especially if you work through it. It's what allows you to process difficult events. After the death of a loved one, for example, sadness is an expression of your love.
Finally, fear and anxiety, when not crippling to one's daily functioning, keep us alive. Fear activates our fight-or-flight response in the face of danger or a threat. People who remain alert to possible dangers learn how to deal with them or avoid them altogether, whereas those who aren't aware of them are at greater risk of running into trouble. The ubiquitous post-9/11 slogan of "If you see something, say something" taps into the benefits of our inherently fearful nature and, as a result, we remain vigilant about what could possibly go wrong. Feeling fear can be beneficial.
Embracing emotional pain can lead all of us to inspiration, growth, clarity of mind, strength, success and the ability to live. Ultimately, it builds character. Answers aren't always found in a pill.
Jonathan Alpert is a Manhattan psychotherapist and author of Be Fearless: Change Your Life in 28 Days.
Editorial on 04/19/2015