what's even darker about this is that there actually are prescription drugs that do just make you feel better (gabapentin, amitriptyline, mirtazapine) but psychiatrists don't consider "making you feel good" an effective treatment for depression https://twitter.com/robkhenderson/status/1341769512836866048

gabapentin is classified as an anti-convulsant but it is more often prescribed off-label for neuropathic pain management, it is also noted for cognitive enhancing properties but the literature is hard to find - you'll find better reports of user experience on erowid

here's some studies that more or less directly study the cognitive and mood enhancing properties of gabapentin https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0304394001021814

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%252Fs12630-013-9890-1

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1528-1157.1999.tb00830.x

now amitriptyline and mirtazapine are actually classified as anti-depressants, and they're also very cheap - $10-15/month *without insurance* if you use goodrx!

if you take them before bedtime you might actually wake up feeling refreshed and ready to take on your day

this is info easier to gather from user experiences, studies often consider "subjective user experience" useless info because not easily quantified! and then psychiatrists are trained out of taking seriously "subjective user experience" as a feature of drugs they prescribe!

this is why psychiatrists are likely to wave away any problems you might bring up about a drug making you feel negatively, because to them drugs are not about making you feel better, they're about causing measurable "improvements" of features that studies can actually measure

this is one of the few studies to directly assess mood enhancing properties of gabapentin, alas they only studied the effect in epileptics! but the same mood enhancing properties are also shown (statistically) to not be dependent on the reduction of seizures themselves

I know plenty of you are trying out obscure nootropic stacks trying to boost mood and focus, and I know what a lot of you are looking for is gabapentin

it's safe, it's cheap, psychs are willing to prescribe it to you if you ask for it because it's basically impossible to abuse

a careful reading of available studies on gabapentin demonstrate that gabapentin is effective for reducing anxiety, but it is not nearly so dangerous or habit-forming as benzodiazepines

gabapentin might even help with memory retention, not only providing a boost in motivation and focus but also helping you retain the things you learn while studying! altho I will admit I'm less certain of this effect per se

a study demonstrating improved cognitive performance in mice on visual-spatial tasks and improves memory