[bserge]

A worthy endeavour, but CBT doesn't help the physically broken. Brains break and malfunction just like other organs and no amount of telling them to fix themselves will work.

I built my custom "therapist", I know exactly what I need, but it worked sporadically for a while then just seemed like a complete joke.

Perhaps someone could fund a startup that would connect people with suppliers of medicine that is non addictive yet prescription only, like most antidepressants, anxyliotics and DNRIs.

There are still some countries where some are OTC, which is a godsend, but having to physically travel there is hard, slow, expensive and not for everyone.

And for absolutely asinine reasons governments got to eBay and online payment processors and all the sellers have disappeared.

[phowson83]

I agree, CBT is certainly no panacea, and as mentioned in the post, for those at the moderate to severe end of the spectrum, or for those where CBT is ineffective, it may be the case that medication is the only viable solution.

Y Combinator has actually funded several companies looking at the usage of various drug-based mental health treatments, including Osmind (S20) and another company in this batch (S21) who are looking at the use of psychedelic therapeutics for mental health, although none are addressing your specific issue with availability / accessibility which is a tricky one with respect to legislation and regulation.

[GordonS]

> Perhaps someone could fund a startup that would connect people with suppliers of medicine that is non addictive yet prescription only, like most antidepressants, anxyliotics and DNRIs.

While many antidepressants are not psychologically addictive, it's worth noting that they many cause physical dependence due to receptor up/down regulation, and can cause horrendous withdrawal symptoms.

I have personal experience of this - when coming off a TCA (which are effectively SNRIs) I felt like I was dieing - I vomited for days, had hallucinations, the whole works. And perhaps worse, there is a 2 week gap in my life where I don't remember a thing.

As someone who has tapered off (prescribed) opioids before, coming off opioids was easier for me than TCAs or SNRIs (which I also, unfortunately, have experience of).

And all that is before considering the common side effects, such as dizziness and vertigo, headaches, vision problems etc. I'm really not sure it's a good idea for people to take meds like these without medical supervision.

[bserge]

Yeah, been there, done that. SSRIs are garbage for me. Withdrawals are just time off work, though.