K finally got in to see one of the psychologists that the counselor at college recommended. The first 1-hour appointment was last week (after trying to get a hold of the lady since Dec 19th). K was told to get the book "Codependent No More" - not because she has or is around anyone with a drug or alcohol dependency, but to read it because it had some good coping strategies that she could use. Yesterday was her second 1-hour appointment with the doc. She told K that she thinks her problem is biological depression, maybe hormonal - not anxiety or stress - and that she'll need meds to fix it because she doesn't seem to be happy about anything, had 2 great uncles (whom she never knew - died way before she was born) who had drinking problems, and her father is grumpy.
I've never had to deal with a psychologist before, but that just doesn't sound to me like a good way to go about deciding that someone needs to go on meds, especially before trying anything else much. The book just arrived today, so she hadn't even started reading it when she had the appt. yesterday. I'm thinking the doc probably just didn't want to deal either with K or our insurance. She said she doesn't prescribe meds, but we should go find another doc who does, but she would be glad to continue the talk therapy sessions with K after the meds were prescribed.
K said if she had to go find another doc to be evaluated, than she'd just choose a practice where they do whole therapy - from eval to holistic to meds. I told her I thought working holistic treatment into an overall treatment plan, even if she does have to go on meds, would be the key to making this work for her. I found one that does take our insurance, has quite a few docs and therapists, they said that sometimes meds are needed for depression but they couple it with anxiety/stress management and therapy (one on on or group - whatever works best for the patient). This practice was created by the director of the psychology dept at our local hospital and does have scripting ability, along with access to prescribe blood tests, etc.
I was interested in your take on the situation so far. Like I said, I have no experience going down this path, but my intuition is telling me to encourage switching to this other practice before too much is invested emotionally in this first doc. I am really interested in what you think. With all this stuff, I kinda feel like I'm walking into a dark room and my candle just went out.
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