Bleak.

I don’t quite understand how deinstitutionalizing was supposed to work here. That’s like dissolving the fire department because we want to avoid cars. Was there no way to reform or replace the institutions? Just getting rid of an emergency service seems kinda like the situation you’re describing was part of the plan.

If you live in the US and experience a psychotic episode, a suicidal crisis, or another mental health emergency - where do you go?

Farming locally doesn’t mean use a city building, it means use a field thats kinda in the same region, not at the other end of the world. And of course that’s more sustainable. The shorter the transport routes are, the better.

We gave up on reusing glass bottles in large part because they were not sanitary. Every boomer has stories of finding cigarette butts in their soda and beer.

I live in a county that almost religiously reuses glass bottles and have never heard nor experienced such a story. Seems like someone figured out how to sanitize them.

No what I’m saying is maybe you are sensitive (for whatever reason - from a exceptional metabolism to placebo, over other sensitivities/allergies, complex psychological effects, etc everything is possible) but it’s certainly not because glutamate is a neurotransmitter.

Neurotransmitters and the stuff in our bloodstreams (nutrients, hormones and so on) are two very different systems. Think of it as a river and a power grid. We all have this massive stream of different molecules in our bodies, and we have an elaborate information system made from electric and chemical signaling, like cables and batteries, working right beside it. The batteries might happen to utilize the same molecules that swim around in the river, but they still have nothing to do with each other. The river doesn’t touch the batteries, and your body very carefully decides which part it takes out of the water and into the batteries. Highly simplified of course, but that’s kinda how you can imagine why one doesn’t hurt the other.

To add:

• No visible clocks. If possible don’t check the time at all while trying to sleep. Doing math at night (aka “oh no only 4 hours left”) only makes you angry or sad.
• No alcohol. If unavoidable, try to be sober by the time you want to fall asleep. (Dring sooner, if at all.)
• No coffee after midday. Some bodies suck at metabolising it.
• Bedroom should be as dark and silent and comfy as possible. If there’s any way you can add comfort, do it.
• For persisting sleep problems: Change position or location. (E.g. turn completely around in your bed, feet at the headrest, or sleep on the couch if comfortable.) Brains are very good at linking a location with a state of mind, and changing things around can help if the thought of your bed stresses you out already.

For severe problems it’s probably always wise to check with a physician, or if there’s specific stuff in your head that keeps you awake to consider telling a friend or therapist about it. To distance yourself from your thoughts is something everybody can learn and it can be tremendously helpful with stuff like that.

Even though you’re right in that glutamate is a neurotransmitter, eating it doesn’t affect our brain chemistry at all. It can’t pass the blood-brain-barrier. Which is relieving since basically every food group contains it and flooding our brain with that would lead to violent epileptic seizures and certain death. Not insomnia.

And melatonin isn’t a neurotransmitter but a hormone.

So maybe you do in fact sleep better when avoiding specific food groups in the evening, but your explanation certainly isn’t correct.

Just putting this out there since glutamate is such a highly misunderstood molecule surrounded by many misconceptions, this one being a very common one.

I mean what’s more important to you, being able drop the info about time zones when scheduling international meetings, or preserving humanities ability to communicate time respectively to the actual time of day?

I’ve lived in three countries so far and never actually had trouble scheduling anything. The concept of time of day on the other hand is pretty prevalent in my daily life.

Ahem. Oops.

But in a way that’s a good example for what I meant. You and me communicate time both in reference to the time of day, not a virtual time of the planet that means something else to everyone depending on location, and you easily could spot my mistake.

So let’s just say I did that on purpose.

Communication about times would get so much easier, communication about schedules would get so much easier.

Except that it wouldn’t. It would make communication about time a culture sensitive topic. Sure, the exact time of day in relation to the position of the sun might get lost with our current system, but if someone tells you “I’ve slept til 12am” at least you know it was somewhat around noon. Under your new system you’d always have to consider where someone lives.

Good tips in the comments - although in my experience sometimes it just doesn’t work. I’ve got 3 litter boxes for one cat, they are accessible to him, private, and clean. He still poops on the floor when I’m not at home (or asleep).

Animals can have behavioral issues just like people.

Psychologically that would be a desaster. People would wear themselves out in an instant, and in 6 months top we’d have a world population suffering from clinical depression.

Obviously we need to be critical about our own history, but with this line of thinking we literally couldn’t condemn anything.

“Slavery? Genocide? Mass rapes? Authoritarian persecution? Oh well, that happened here as well at some point so I guess it’s okay.”

:(

You could totally work with your inner child on that basis. Obviously don’t have to. But just imagining this little version of you and the hardship they had to endure, thinking about what they would have needed from an adult, and imagining yourself being that adult for your imaginative younger self - that would be very much in line with the idea of the technique.

This may depend on the country but I as a therapist ask everyone anyway. And I’ve experienced many, many people over the years being afraid of speaking up. It’s always a moment of relief when it’s out there and they realize I’m not freaking out over it.

I’ve pretty much heard it all. Including the various ways people try to approach the subject while still unsure how I will react. And I do think that is something you could try if you’re unsure about your therapist - talk to them about your suicidal thoughts and see how they react before you confirm plans or attempts.

Chances are of course they can get quite a bit from your way of talking about it, because you’re definitely not the first person with those thoughts in front of them. The thing is - suicidal ideation is, depending on the type of disorder, quite common. If we’d admitted anyone who thought about suicide to a psych ward immediately they would be bursting at the seams and we’d get nothing done at all. So that’s not happening. As long as you can convincingly agree with your therapist on a plan forward (which could mean: Okay, I promise not to kill myself until next Tuesday) you don’t have to be admitted if you don’t want to. Which also would be an option of course. Psychiatric wards are emergency departments. They are supposed to be there for you when you’re seeing no light at all and in my experience, at least where I live and work, in fact have saved quite a few lifes.

There are cases where psychiatric admission is the right call though. Sometimes it’s literally life saving. Depression isn’t static - it goes up and down, goes loud, goes silent. When you’re deep in a life crisis, when you’re feeling like you’re losing your fucking mind and are actually about to kill yourself those are the places to go to get you over those critical days or weeks to recalibrate and reconsider. I’ve personally spoken to many patients who were completely releived afterwards and glad that there was such a place for them. If the alternative is a lost life, psychiatry is a valid attempt to get better, even if it doesn’t work for everyone.

Of course it’s an even better route to get there by admitting oneself - I just believe the likelihood of that happening depends a lot on how afraid people are of psychiatric clinics. And they do vary of course. I personally still would go though. Before I end my life I guess there wouldn’t be anything to lose anyway.

I do think that is true. I’ve worked in a clinic through the whole pandemic, which meant mandatory tests everyday. Cought two asymptomatic infections this way. With the first one I had a very light headache - I would have thought absolutely nothing of it if it weren’t for the test. Second time I’ve got no symptoms whatsoever. I then got it again for round three and that one suuucked.

Who knows how many had it were none the wiser.

The best alternative would probably be, if feasible at all, a bike coupled with public transport. For our privacy as well as for the environment.