Do antidepressants kill love?

Single people who take antidepressants such as Prozac and Zoloft may be depressing their chances of falling in love, according to a new theory. Biological anthropologist Helen Fisher and psychiatrist James Thomson, who specialize in studies of romantic attachment, say they’ve seen evidence that antidepressants alter brain chemistry in a way that minimizes the chance a person can fall in love or feel strong romantic attachment. Antidepressants called SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) lift mood by increasing the concentration of serotonin between nerves in the brain. But SSRIs also decrease levels of dopamine, a pleasure chemical that has a key role in the brain’s love and sex pathways. Research has shown that these medications suppress sexual desire in many people, and a recent study found that they even led women to rate photos of handsome men as less attractive. Thomson believes that there are many antidepressant users out there whose feelings for new dates or for long-term lovers have been dulled by their pills. “There are all sorts of unconscious systems in our brain that we use to negotiate romantic love and romantic attraction,” Thomson tells Wired.com. “If these drugs cause conscious sexual side effects, we’d argue that there are going to be side effects that are not conscious.”

http://www.theweek.com/article/index/94281/Health_scare_of_the_week_Do_antidepressants_kill_love

maybe I need the antidepressants, so as to stop caring about the libido.

:P

libido more then the drugs used to control depression symptoms. Try getting someone depressed interested in sex once, you end up spending so much time trying to convince the depressed that they are not a piece of worthless shit no one wants, by the time you get them out of their depression they have you in a depressed mood.

love....and I love it.

I love my pups though. But they have dulled my need for human companionship. Even my need to post on DU has diminished.

There are plenty of reason a woman might rate the photos less attractive. Isolating the single variable of SSRIs seems quite unlikely.

And they seem to be ignoring the possibility that the problem may be the disease, not the cure.

The whole thing looks like confirmation bias to me. They seem to be looking for evidence to support their theory rather than a theory to support their evidence.

At least the article was accurately titled: "Health scare of the week: Do antidepressants kill love?"

People in this forum thrive on health scares, regardless of the validity.

Is it the anti-depressants or the depression? Much more study needed which brings up the question is it ethical to give people without clinical depression therapuetic doses of anti-depressants? Seem like someone looking to grab a headline.

David

in the medical field that SSRIs decrease libido.

An alternate antidepressant, bupropion, has quite the opposite effect.

If the main reason you love someone is you are sexually attracted to them, or the amount of "love" is directly proportional to the amount of libido, that could very well explain that. I think there is a certain 5 of people who feel that way.

Life has its ups and downs. So do relationships.

Hours of giggling and pillow talk is just as wonderful without sex as it is after. :)

This is an established part of the literature. Suppressed libido is listed by the drug makers themselves as potential side effects.

The only question raised by the OP article is whether in addition to suppressing libido, they also suppress the more amorphous psychological phenomena of "love" and "attraction" to potential love objects.

It is not illogical to hypothesize that libido and "love" or "attraction" may be involved in the same neural pathways.

How anyone could dismiss this a priori as bullshit is puzzling.

no one knows exactly why the side effects include reduced libido.
It has been observed, but never explained.

My anecdotal experience is that bupropion (not associated with LOSS of libido) has major effects on hormones.

were in the mainstream media. The first symptom which is actually very widespread, is that patients can't reach orgasm. So ironically, the first effect is often prolonged sex. But then libido slowly fades.

I remember one person interviewed in I think New York Magazine said she used to be crazy and sexy, then she took the drug and became sane but completely asexual.

Kramer himself wrote a long passage about a patient who had a fixation with pornography before treatment for depression, and after treatment lost all interest in porn.

Perhaps it has something to do with pleasure circuits.

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without being called on it.

I have asked you politely not to stalk me.

I will alert on any post you make stalking me including the posts in this thread.

Please quit stalking me.

that is open to all DUers, including regular participants in the Health Forum, like me.

Why have you tried to take a rational discussion of SSRI's effects on libido and attraction and turn it into some kind of weird personal attack?

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The OP article investigates the perfectly rational argument that in addition to SSRI's well documented effect of reducing libido, they also reduce subjective related mental states like "attraction" using the well accepted methodology of having people rate faces, and suggests that the same networks that affect libido may affect attraction and love.

You called it all bullshit with virtually no rational argument, which, I pointed out, is manifestly wrong. That's not picking a fight, it's correcting misinformation.

At any rate, I'm through with your paranoia. You can carry on by yourself.

Just like your stalking, you have an obsession with getting the last word.

I made many posts about your M.O. You are not fooling anyone anymore.

1. Change the subject.

2. Blame others.

3. Resort to insults.

4. Declare victory.

And a late addition, STRAW MEN!

That's your pattern. It is as old as the hills. We have all seen it many times.

Seems the post you started replying to here was talking about science, not anti-science woowoo.

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health forum is such a fun place

Defined as "Do not follow someone into another thread to try to continue a disagreement you had elsewhere."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/forums/rules_detailed.html

And, possibly, psychosis.

Posted in the RELIGION forum:

cosmik debris Donating Member (1000+ posts) Fri Mar-13-09 07:11 AM
Response to Reply #7
29. "highly abnormal" ???

I believe that would include your saying that people who don't hate pharmaceutical companies and believe in god are "unbalanced" and "shallow".
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=200078&mesg_id=200162

No one has said anything untoward in this thread. But for your rantings, it's a healthy discussion.

Dial it down and get off the computer for a while.

And misrepresenting my posts to start arguments.

I alert on every stalking thread.

He has been bitter and resentful of me for a long time because I bettered him in several debates.

He consistently looks for opportunities to start a fight with me.

I don't have to tolerate such behavior.

Supernova is correct. You are acting really strangely, including with a pretty scary level of paranoia.

And, I should add, a certain amount of fantasy wish fulfillment ("He has been bitter and resentful of me for a long time because I bettered him in several debates." :rofl:)

That said, have you ever considered that your alerting to, and describing as stalking, normal posts that disagree with your facts and analysis might actually backfire on your reputation, such as it is?

;-)

My ex wound up having to take prozac at the time, and he lost interest in sex.

He was dealing with his problems, but he was more interested in that than he was in our romantic life. We eventually broke up because of it.

edit: I' not saying prozac broke up my marriage directly, but me feeling neglected was a part of the package.

He was too depressed to have any sexual desire, before started ssri's.

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