Fairly new to this forum and noticed this hadn't come up as a subject. Thought it might be interesting to discuss? I had mental health problems when I was a teenager, depression from about 13 onwards until I had a mental breakdown when I was 19. I stayed in my bedroom and/or in bed most of the time for about a year. During that time I started getting interested in Eastern philosophical and religious ideas, I also heard about Taijiquan and Wing Chun MA systems. The philosophy enabled me to build a coping strategy to come back into the world and I took up CMA as soon as I could find a class. My teacher was a very strange person who used all sorts of different MA and exercise systems to train me, eventually leading me into practising Taijiquan more or less exclusively. I changed so much, really finding myself and learning self-confidence. When my mental health collapsed again when I was 30 I was able to practise Taiji movements in the hospital grounds and this helped keep me anchored in reality when my mind was flipping all over the place. I was diagnosed with bi-polar affective disorder (or manic depression) and put on loads of drugs. I was in and out of hospitals for about year and even got sectioned at one point coz they thought I was dangerous! When I came out, I weaned myself off drugs and haven't taken any since then, despite what the doctor's said. They told me I'd need to be on lithium for the rest of my life, but I find doing MA, Taiji, neigong and other stuff keeps me stable. Anyway, that'll do for me to kick it off. Anyone else had experiences with MA and mental illness of any kind?
Just to let you know, this topic has come up many times. Do a search for "depression." And you'll see there are quite a few threads going (or past). It's a good question though. I'm glad to hear it helped you. I did experience depression for a while, yes. At the time, I referred to it as clinical depression. But in retrospect (and after getting a master's degree in mental health counseling), I don't think it was really clinical depression. If I were going to diagnose myself back then, I'd say it was more like an adjustment disorder. A direct reaction to a lot of changes going on in my life at one time. I certainly did train in that time. Whether it directly helped with the depression... In some sense, it did. One of the symptoms of depression, as I'm sure you know, is a lack of motivation. So having that regimented "get up and go to practice" structure in my life certainly helped. I'm sure the exercise-induced endorphines and all that helped too. And it was an established social outlet. I don't think it had any special power that, say, running wouldn't have had. But it was my thing. And hanging onto it, even when I was struggling, probably helped. Zoloft didn't hurt though. Stuart
Although ive never been on happy pills or to the doc and diagnosed with depression, i do find i can get very low sometimes, more so in the winter time. Training, be it running, martial arts or anything really is good for me because it helps to have something to live for - something to do in life besides a slave to money. There is also, as Stuart said the endorphin release after - the healthiest high you can get! Also if something specific is getting you down, going training can help you lose yourself for an hour or two - and sometimes after things don’t seem so bad. The hard part comes when it starts having an effect on your motivation to train; i had this a month back. If this happens take a week off, when you go back to training you will be on fire again! Well it worked for me anyway! Just never give up.
Likewise - i've been through it too and agree with the above - I don't think it's MA's per se, more the fact that you can (a) create a structure for some activity (b) get some physical exercise (mental health benefits well documented) and (c) put your mind somewhere else. In a sense, (c) worked for much like my understanding of meditation. By practising certain techniques, patterns etc, I was able to focus on single thought threads and quieten my mind - a big problem for me..."switch off" in a sense. Nowadays, my MAs are a lot less about patterns etc, but I can still "switch off" and also love the feeling of blowing off some steam...I really feel it if I can't train. So for me, MAs did help (although not excusively) but could just have easily been another sport or physical activity..just I chose an MA I guess.
Thanks for all the input so far guys. Cheers. Re: previous depression threads on MAP, I didn't want this discussion to be limited to depression only, more mental illness as a whole. I also felt it belonged in this forum because depresson is probably the most acceptable of mental illnesses and loads of people go through it and then they're fine but lots of other people suffer mental illness as an ongoing condition. Just to be 100% clear, my problems sort of started as depression but then wondered into the psychotic-schizophrenic zone.... I've also exhibited obsessive symptoms, paranoia and even some autistic stuff when I was much younger!! These days it's just mood-swings and occasional paranoia. Agree about the 'exercise generally helps' viewpoint. I find the contained structure of MA forms really helpful when my boundaries are breaking down tho too.
I honestly understand, and to some degree, agree with the idea that martial arts is as effective at staving off depression. However, I think that it honestly has a more effect on mental health than other types of exercise do for the simple fact that you are really spending alot of time and energy examining yourself. Whether it is practicing a technique over and over again and critiquing yourself or practicing with a partner and trying make it effective, you are getting your mind in the mode of 'inspect, improve, re-evaluate,' and I think that mode helps mental illness or depression more than anything.
Reason why for can't take much more Well here this will say it all! This also will help. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9155021346589357277&q=Muay+Thai++roundhouse+kick Honestly i think regularly i have some form of well.
Superb clip FonB Might be worth digging out a track by another american band it's called 'therapy' featuring vocals from Ozzy Osbourne, but I don't remember the name of the band now...
Metal Lives Well alrighty then. It's seems I'm not the only one around here who likes a bit of metal in his day. The band w/Ozzy is also called Therapy. They played "Iron Man" on the first N.I.B Sabbath tribute CD w/Ozzy doing vocals. To get slightly back on topic, martial arts practice has many well documented health benefits. Of course pounding away on a heavy bag while jammin' to some Tool on the Ipod can be therapeutic also. I do this as often as possible.
Hi Pu gin, I started a post like this about a month ago, believe me you are not alone. I however am not so lucky with my results of MA. Don't get me wrong, it has helped out a lot, but I am still on antidepressants, and probably will be for the rest of my life. I am glad you found something that really helped you. MA for me is an outlet, it's something that when I am at the dojo or dojang, the only think I think about is Judo or Hapkido, nothing else. My wife has actually started and she is really getting into it (something about being able to throw me??) I always think of mental illness the same way I would for high blood pressure or diabetes. It is a medical condition, sometimes best treated with medications, put never underestimate the bodies capacity to heal itself (osteopathic dogma ) Keep up your good work, it's sounds as it you found something that gives your life meaning!
