Just thought I'd share a little of my experience of a diagnosis of depression from last year. In February or March of last year, I expressed to my doctor symptoms of depression. He was quick to prescribe me Sertraline/Zoloft. During the first week, things actually felt better. But that didn't last long. I continued to take it exactly as prescribed. Upon my follow-up visit, I told him how it seemed to help at first but it didn't seem to be helping now. He increased my dosage and said this was typical. Increasing dosage seemed to make things worse. Upon my next follow-up appointment, seeing that it seemed like the increased dosage wasn't helping he scheduled me for a blood test. The results from my blood tests showed that everything was normal EXCEPT that I had SEVERE VITAMIN D DEFICIENCY. How many people have heard the term 'CABIN FEVER'? It's a common term in climates that experience the changing of the seasons.....specifically WINTER. I always thought cabin fever was just what you were feeling after being cooped up in the house all winter. Never did I think there was a biological reason behind cabin fever. After doing research, I found that the symptoms of vitamin D deficiency, were very similar to that of depression.....excessive sleeping, lack of motivation, loss of interests in things you used to enjoy, etc. My doctor prescribed me some high dosage vitamin D and what a difference that made. Things have gone back to 'normal' (I put 'normal' in quotes as I believe I've never been 'normal' and also think that 'normal' is an abstract construct....a subject for another thread LOL). My doctor never told me to stop taking Sertraline/Zoloft but I did anyways because I never liked the 'zombie'-way it made me feel. I was scolded for not discussing it with him first as I should've been weened off of it rather than cold turkey. The week after going cold turkey wasn't easy. It was an emotional rollercoaster but I survived and I do NOT recommend doing that to ANYONE....please discuss it with your doctor first. I've since found out that several people I know take a vitamin d supplement, especially after winter. It's typical here in New England, especially for those who don't drink much milk. Just thought I'd share my personal experience. Hope this helps someone else. Some doctors are too quick to prescribe anti-depressants.
Interesting experience. I have heard of this before and I wonder how many people suffer undiagnosed. is it prescription vitamin D you take or is it over-the-counter .?
I started with a high dosage because of the severity of the vitamin D deficiency but now just OTC. My levels are now in the normal range and seem to be stabilized.
Cabin fever is pretty common here. Aside from a vitamin supplement, some people use full spectrum lights specifically to prevent this problem. I think my dad does this, actually.
There's a clinical name for cabin fever, Seasonal Affective Disorder, and the preferred treatment is indeed exposure to full spectrum light. One has to be pretty long without direct access to sunlight to get super deficient in vitamin D, so I'm glad you (OP) were able to get help. For others: Don't just go taking Vit. D thinking it will fix your depression. Unlike many other vitamins, it is not water soluable, which means it builds up in your system, so you can develop toxicity from it, which can be severe and cause, among other thigns, liver damage. Any competent physician, when you discuss depression, will order blood work to check not just for Vit. D but for a whole bunch of other things that can cause or contribute to depression. There are many, many organic causes in addition to the ones we most commonly think about (major depressive disorder, persistent depressive disorder, etc.)
False. It is common in colder climates. As I said in my original post... And as my doctor explained to me, living in colder climates and being outside in the winter, your body is covered with limited skin exposure so unless you're going outside in shorts and a t-shirt in 20 degree weather, it is impossible to get sufficient vitamin D from the sun. In cases of severe vitamin D deficiency, full spectrum light therapy is insufficient to restore the body to normal levels of vitamin D. Therefore, a doctor will prescribe a high dosage vitamin D. I was prescribed 50,000 IU once per week. OTC vitamin D is typically 500 IU taken daily....which brings me to my next point. The amount a person would have to take to develop vitamin D toxicity is in the tens of thousands IU per day. As I said earlier, most OTC vitamin D is around 500 IU. It is almost impossible to develop vitamin D toxicity from OTC options. For prescription high dosage vitamin D, you would have to misunderstand your doctor's instruction and take it daily instead of weekly which would get flagged by your pharmacy after your first refill. I guess in the US, we are lacking 'competent' physicians. I've known too many people who are prescribed anti-depressants without proper blood tests (one of the main reasons that I made this post). US physicians are encouraged by the pharmaceutical companies to prescribe, prescribe, prescribe. Health insurance companies like this as well since it's usually less costly than sending a patient for the proper tests.
I guess the issue is "super deficient". I double checked the references sources I was after, and confirmed that severe Vit. D deficiency isn't common, and has severe symptoms. As I mentioned, the recognized treatment for SAD is exposure to full-spectrum light. But this assumes, of course, that the deficiency is such that synthesis from light will be adequate, which in an overwhelming majority of cases, it is. Additionally, the literature on whether vitamin D deficiency is actual causal to depression is conflicted; it appears there may be a link, but it's far from certain. Yes, and apparently, according to one scholarly source, if one is north of Atlanta (in the US) there's inadequate levels of UV-B in sunlight in wintertime to provide for adequate Vit. D synthesis. However, most people do get adequate Vit. D from their diets if they have a reasonably healthy diet. If you were really severely deficient, and I were your treating physician, I would probably also be looking at the rest of the biochemical synthesis chain to determine if there's any other issue going on, because really severe deficiency in a young person with an adequate diet is unusual. If you are only taking the RDA, that's probably true. However, many vitamin peddlers, especially those advocating vitamins as a treatment for something, advocate taking higher doses (1000-2000 IU daily) which, over time, can cause toxicity, due to the lack of water soluability. You'd have toxicity far more quickly if you take 50K IU (which I was on at one point, years ago) but as with any lipid-soluble vitamin, retention in tissues (and buildup) is significantly greater than water-soluble supplements. I work with a number of mental health professonals, including psychiatrists, and referring general practitioners. It is standard procedure, when someone mentions depression, to order bloodwork first (as well as to ask a series of screening questions to determine other areas of inquiry), because depression can have many causes, not all of which are neurochemical. There may well be a lot of incompetent physicians. I don't really buy into the pharmaceutical lobby conspiracy theory thing. While drug companies certainly have their sales reps that relentlessly pester physicians, competent physicians don't prescribe medication simply because some drug company is pushing them. And actually, a health insurance company would far prefer that an organic cause of depression be identified and treated if it exists, because it is generally going to be cheaper to do that than to cover the long-term cost of antidepressant medication, not to mention the cost of a missed diagnosis of a more serious condition with a side effect of depression.
