Comment by nvarsj | Hacker News Reader

Comment by nvarsj | Hacker News Reader

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I think the only people who think exercise solves depression are those that have never suffered clinical depression. Dopamine from exercise is pretty much a temporary relief. Just like drinking, smoking, or binging netflix - they provide temporary relief and let us ignore the root problems.

Therapy is what finally taught me how to actually process my thoughts and feelings, and let me make real progress against depression.

And now, when I go for an outside run or walk, I can spend that time focusing purely purely on my internal thoughts/feelings. Done like this, exercise can be a great therapeutic activity - but it's not the dopamine or act of exercise itself, it's creating the time for self-therapy.

The meta analysis linked in the article we're discussing wouldn't really agree with you.

> Physical activity had medium effects on depression (median effect size=−0.43, IQR=−0.66 to –0.27), anxiety (median effect size=−0.42, IQR=−0.66 to –0.26) and psychological distress (effect size=−0.60, 95% CI −0.78 to –0.42), compared with usual care across all population. The largest benefits were seen in people with depression, HIV and kidney disease, in pregnant and postpartum women, and in healthy individuals. Higher intensity physical activity was associated with greater improvements in symptoms

I think comparing exercise to drinking is pretty silly and doesn't suggest a wide berth of knowledge on the topic. I'm glad to hear that therapy was the silver bullet for you, but if there's one thing that's _abundantly_ clear about mental health treatments, it's that there's no one-size-fits-all solution.

> I think the only people who think exercise solves depression are those that have never suffered clinical depression.

What about the studies with clinically depressed people who treat their symptoms as effectively as SSRIs with exercise? I'm thinking specifically of a running therapy study that was done recently, I haven't read the study linked by OP.

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