In many cases, for people struggling with anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, PTSD, or other psychiatric conditions, medication is often used as first-line treatment. Medication can be extremely helpful. It helps individuals manage symptoms that can seem overwhelming. Medications can help stabilize mood, improve sleep, and decrease intensity of symptoms.
But, for many people, they find themselves disappointed in the symptom control that medication provides. They feel that the medications “don’t work” or that the medication “failed.” This is not the case; it is because psychiatric symptoms are more complex than chemistry alone. Medications can be a necessary and valuable part of mental health treatment. They are especially helpful in times of acute crises, severe depression, mania, or psychosis.
So why, at times, does the relief seem temporary? While medications help address symptoms, they do not address why many of those symptoms exist in the first place. Mental health symptoms are as complex and individualized as the person experiencing them. They are shaped by lived experiences, trauma, relationships, beliefs, habits, and social conditions. So, while medication can make the symptoms seem more manageable, they do not process painful memories, teach coping skills, or change environments that contribute to symptoms.
What are some things that medication cannot address on its own?
Trauma and Life Experiences: Medication can help reduce emotional reactivity but cannot help someone make sense of what happened to them or help them feel safe again.
Behaviors and coping habits: Many behaviors and coping habits are developed over time, by our environment, or taught to us in key developmental phases of our lives. Many times, these are not healthy patterns of behavior that require awareness, practice, and support to learn healthier skills.
Social and Environment Stressors: Loneliness, financial stress, unhealthy relationships, and work demands can be strong contributors to mental distress. No medication can change these stressors and “make them better.”
For mental health to improve, it is important to understand that there are multiple factors that contribute to an individual’s mental wellbeing. Modern healthcare is based on a biopsychosocial model that incorporates three main areas:
Biological factors: brain chemistry, genetics, physical health
Psychological factors: thoughts, emotions, coping skills, trauma
Social factors: relationships, culture, support systems, stressors
While psychiatric medications can address brain chemistry, they cannot address all the other factors that contribute to our mental wellness.
For this reason, a holistic approach is better when trying to manage mental health symptoms. We are all human. We all have our unique lived experiences, and there is not a “one size fits all” approach. And needing additional support, in addition to the medication, does not mean that the medication didn’t work. It just means that medication alone is not enough. Medication can help with stability needed to address other factors on a deeper and more meaningful level.
Research consistently shows that people do best with medication combined with other forms of support. Using this approach, Mindful Health has made an intentional model to support individuals in reaching their goals. By offering services like Partial Hospitalization and Intensive Outpatient Programming (PHP/IOP), individual therapy, Transmagnetic Stimulation (TMS), Spravato, and Holistic Wellness along with medication management, it allows us to treat each individual and their specific needs.
Mental health challenges are as complex as the individuals we care for and often cannot be addressed with a single solution. Just as a physical injury often requires rehabilitation to recover, mental healing requires more than just medication alone. Mental health care is most effective when you treat the whole person and not just the symptoms.
