Question:
I have a social friend of 10 years with a 16 year old son. She is divorced
and he has an elder brother who is not affected in the same way.
The 16 year panics at the thought of going out and can only do so if his
mother accompanies him.
In desperation she went to the GP last Friday. He said he would give him two
choices 1. antidepressants and 2 counciling. The mother said no to drugs and
asked what the quailification of the councilor were.
The doctor said he did not know. He said that was all he could do for the
mother and son and they left with no guidance or help.
Has anyone any where some suggestions I can pass onto the mother? The
mother is a highly intelligent working woman who holds down a responsible
job. However she has to take time off to take the son to the doctor.
Answer:
sadly this is all too common in the UK and I feel deeply sorry
for your friends' son. It sounds like they went to a fairly bog
standard NHS quack who slept through the 15 minute lecture on anxiety
disorders during their medical training! Whilst anti-depressants can
help, they are not a cure - sadly, there is no 'cure'. Most counsellors
have at best a passing knowledge of how to manage anxiety disorders, and
since there is no standard qualification here for becoming a counsellor
they might easily find themselves in the hands of another quack.
There are really only two useful pieces of advice that I can offer.
Firstly, both your friend and her son should learn as much as possible
about anxiety and its treatment. This newsgroup is a good place to
start. The weekly FAQ is normally posted here every Tuesday and there
are lots of links in there to websites with good information. Knowing
more about the subject than your doctor amounts to self defence in the
UK. That will at least mean that an NHS quack can't bullshit them
easily, which is all too common. You need to be aware that some of the
medications most commonly used to treat anxiety are difficult if not
impossible to get in the UK, specifically Xanax (alprazolam) and
Klonopin ( Clonazepam). Secondly, forget counsellors and see if there
is a Cognitive Behavioural Therapist in your area. Cognitive
behavioural therapy is the only psychotherapy with a good track record
with anxiety disorders. In some areas it is available on the NHS, but
it depends on where you live. At the minimum a CBT therapist should
have a degree in psychology, so DO check out their qualifications.
OK, that's it, I've finally had enough of ASAP, I'm leaving for good. The
few people who continually characterise all doctors as quacks because some
doctors don't fully understand anxiety really bug me.
In case you hadn't noticed, medicine is a vast subject area and you
seriously expect your neighbourhood GP to fully understand every last detail
of every possible physical and psychological symptom that they are going to
come across in their careers?!
Of cause as in any profession there are a few quacks, but the vast majority
genuinely want to do their best for every patient that comes through the
door, if they don't know the answer, they will generally refer you on to
someone whose field covers it better.
And before you ask, no, I'm not a doctor, my father was and it was the need
to continually reskill himself, people like you and others who consider
themselves better qualified than the doctor, who phone up in the middle of
the night wanting a home visit because of some trivial ailment that he could
do nothing about, that killed him with a stress induced heart attack at an
early age.
Anyway, in response to the original poster, Yes, CBT is often good for
anxiety, but doesn't work for everyone (it's had little effect for me). You
might also want to investigate psychoanalytic approaches (which are working
for me), I don't know where your friend lives, but have a look at
www.lcp-psychotherapy.org.uk or www.bcp.org.uk
