Elliot is twenty-two years old. He is not married and has no children. A child of divorce and a nail-biter, he is the only one sitting on the Cobblestone park bench tonight, hugging his knees like Glenn Beck in a crowd “too high for heaven” at Woodstock, some forty years earlier. He is depressed because every girl he has tried to connect with has rejected him. He is taking college courses and, in the meantime, has a job pushing around various fluids of different color and aroma with a splintered mop. He is tired and has lost sight of his last handful of adventures in what is surely the twilight of his youth.

Of course we have all felt like Elliot at least once, and I, along with the nurse’s staff, have felt blessed to be in the presence of each of you. And I know that this has been a lengthy stay for some of you, but I can only hope that your discharge will be expedient and convenient and that you can resume with your lives. Since, you have chosen to take part in the new study, I will expect to be getting some follow up e-mails within the next few weeks. One thing I can say about this medication is that I know it makes people feel like they can do what they saw as so stressful before. A buddy of mine was telling me the other day, at my favorite golf course in Michigan, how he had a client whose sister’s BFF was part of a similar study. Her worries about filling out a bikini top quickly turned into a desire to fill out job applications in a matter of days. This is the same girl who was telling her mother she couldn’t get the mail because she was always tired.

In group therapy, I remember someone saying “Id rather stay as myself than to take something that’s supposed to make me normal but really makes me someone else.” It’s a fair concern. Nobody wants that. But in certain cases, it’s harder to clearly point to the real “you.” The prescription of, and more specifically, the withdrawal from antidepressants such as Prozac, Zoloft, or Lexapro have taken blame from the media for over a decade for a multiplying army of young, aimless kids with access to daddy’s gun safe. Most recent case in point: Elliot Rodger, a privileged 22 year old who had no violent history, but had been diagnosed with severe depression and had apparently been coming down from the Xanax that he had been prescribed. Rodger, who just last month shot and killed 3 students at the University he attended in California, had been described as “socially awkward and outcast, but polite and courteous.” I’m not sure there’s any circumstance that can inspire a sane person to reducing young women to “mountains of skulls and rivers of blood” as Rodger has promised on video, hours before following through with his plan.

When you’ve approached the day that you’re making the decision between watching a reality-based show about incredibly fit, great looking people climbing mountains in their bike shorts and the reality of walking out onto the patio to remind yourself what the clouds really look like, it’s a decision nowadays most of us ignore. Widescreen makes it so easy to admire the painting hanging in the background of a museum in a movie adapted from an HBO series that was based on a novel.
Is it really worth the effort of trying to enjoy a jog through the neighborhood, Fleetwood’s “Don’t stop” playing from your i-pod, doing your corner-of-the-eye glance toward the sweaty, mustachioed barista and wonder just how long he’s been watching from his garage. What’s more important to you? Setting near impossible and shallow standards to meet or laughing while taking one in the gut? Laughing. To keep from losing it, or in some cases, fooling yourself into thinking you already have.

I hope that the treatment has been helpful, and that you’ll continue to take the medication. I trust that it will work well… By the way, I’m kind of going to this play on Tuesday and I don’t have anyone to go with. So, you know… if anyone knows anyone. Thanks.

- Dr. Wincott