WOW!! Now I’ve heard it all. I was driving home from work a few days ago and a commercial came on the radio. It was talking about symptoms like fatigue, irritability, etc. It went on and on and on with different symptoms and then the sweet sounding lady on the commercial says, “If you suffer from these symptoms you may be suffering from “Shift-work Disorder” “. I laughed and then sat there waiting on the punchline because I was thinking this was surely a joke…but I waited and waited and then the music started again…..THEY’RE SERIOU!?! They have actually created a true medical diagnosis out of where someone works! Unbelievable…truly.
If you’re still confused about the diagnosis, here’s what one website described it as: “SWD occurs when your body’s internal sleep-wake clock is out of sync with your work schedule—your body is telling you to go to sleep when your work schedule needs you to stay awake. Because of this disruption of your body’s natural rhythm, people with SWD often struggle to stay awake during their waking hours, or have trouble sleeping during their sleeping hours.” WELL, NO JOKE! I want to talk to the guy who thought working a 24 hours shift and then being off was going to improve his sleep and help him focus better…lol
You have to understand the reasoning behind any diagnosis in order to understand fully my frustration. In order to create a medication an thereby create a market for a certain drug, you have to first have a diagnosis of something. So voila!! SWD now has a medication to help all those poor people out there that weren’t told that if you work all night long, you are going to be sleepy during the day. That drug is called Nuvigil, if you look it up online, here are the side effects of this drug:
Common side effects may include: headache, nausea, dizziness, trouble sleeping, serious allergic reaction or rash; swelling of the face, eyes, lips, tongue, or throat; mental (psychiatric) symptoms such as depression, anxiety, hallucinations, mania, or thoughts of suicide; or heart problems including chest pain.
I love that one of the side effects of the drug to help you sleep, is “trouble sleeping”! But don’t worry about all this Mrs. Jones because we have drugs to help all the side effects so we’ll fix you right up!
Diagnosis and corresponding medication creation in our country has arrived at the point of ridiculous. The public has allowed this and in some instances even begged for this to happen though because everyone relies on the medical community for their health. We’ve stopped thinking for ourselves and using common sense and have blindly trusted so much of what has been given us from the media and the medical profession that we just take whatever we’re given. How convenient that no matter what’s going on with me today, I can go get a pill for that. Headache? Pill for that… Can’t have sex?? Gotcha covered… Can’t get pregnant?? Don’t worry, we’ll fix you…. No matter what you can come up with, they have a drug for. This is why some people look at me so funny in the office when I tell them they need to take responsibility for their own health. They look at me like “Why?? I thought you were a doctor?” As if because I have letters behind my name, I am now responsible for their health and the health of their family.
One of our friends calls people that just blindly do whatever they’re supposed to do “Sheeple” and I totally could not agree with him more. We have to break this cycle! Please don’t just do what you’re told because you’re told, from me or anyone else. DO YOUR STUDIES!! And use your head, Shift-Work Disorder???? Sheesh….
Dr. JB
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Agreed. What angers me most is that some people will fall for this mess and support this insanity. This post can be summed up in one statement: “We’ve stopped thinking for ourselves.”
Wait. You’re NOT responsible for my health???
Sorry to disappoint Daniel!
The first paragraph of this article was, EXACTLY, how I’d first heard of this. I was sitting there waiting for the punchline until I realized it was for real.
What a joke! Its not hard to believe industry at large takes the masses for a bunch of tools. We’ve done it to ourselves! START THINKING AND BEING RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUSELVES FOLKS!!!!
I heard the same commercial too a couple of weeks ago driving to work. I also thought it was a joke. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Pharmaceutical companies are turning people into zombies. Why would anyone “ask their doctor about a medicine? Aren’t doctors supposed to be the experts?
They want to treat the problem, not the cause. All people need to do is get some fucking sleep and they will be fine. Drug companies want you to stay miserable and take their drugs so you can continue living a shit life but not think too much about it.
Im a clinical social worker and there is no thing such as shift work disorder. it was created by that drug company to make ppl think they have a disorder when they don’t. The reason I am not rich is b/c I am not going to exploit the masses for profit. This is ruining peoples lives. Then you have to treat the side effets with more drugs. Sick
I was driving in my husband’s car late last night, and I left the radio on the station he had been listening to. I heard this commercial for the first time, and couldn’t believe my ears. Who on earth would take that!? Seriously! Just don’t get it.
How about “reality show stress disorder” or “have to got to work” stress disorder. It’s getting to be a bit ridiculous people. When did commen sence go out the window? Did we just stop thinking for ourselves? Must be a “human sheep disorder” and pill to fix it?