4 ms·

Lincoln's Great Depression (2005)

18 points by poindontcare 11y ago

lincoln_med 11y ago
It is by no means clear that Lincoln had the illness that today carries the name "depression." My 2008 book, _The Physical Lincoln_ discusses why, and offers an alternate diagnosis that is holistically far superior to the piecemeal mental and physical diagnoses that others have bestowed on him. In brief, there is abundant evidence that Lincoln, his mother, and three of his sons had a genetic disease called MEN2B that made them all tall, thin, and unusual looking (exception: Willie Lincoln was not so unusual looking). Features of MEN2B can mimic Marfan syndrome and depression, and this is what happened in Lincoln and his mother: Owing to variant neuromuscular function associated with MEN2B, they were physically constituted to look sad, because their muscles (body and face) had low muscle tone as a result of MEN2B. I don't think there is a chance in the world that Lincoln was depressed as President, but Sheik's work has persuaded many people. I tackle all of Shenk's points (and others) in the book. If you're interested enough to debate the topic here, please read The Physical Lincoln first, and then write me -- so I don't have to repeat myself. :-) Please see: http://www.physical-lincoln.com http://www.physical-lincoln.com http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22504423 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22504423 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19841386 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19841386 [peripheral]
- btown 11y ago
  Thanks for your response, Dr. Sotos, and welcome to HN! Without diving into the book - it certainly seems from the Atlantic article that Lincoln, on multiple occasions, exhibited suicidal tendencies. A primary source is quoted as saying, "Still when by himself, [Lincoln] told me that he was so overcome with mental depression, that he never dare carry a knife in his pocket." Do you believe that the article is exaggerating these reports, or otherwise putting them out of context? Regardless of whether Lincoln had MEN2B, these quotes certainly indicate to me (as someone without medical training, to be fair) that there remains a possibility that Lincoln separately suffered from depression, and therefore give me pause when you say as a medical professional that you "don't think there is a chance in the world that Lincoln was depressed as President." (For others interested in this research, http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071130/full/news.2007.226.html http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071130/full/news.2007.226.ht... goes into a bit more detail without requiring a full read of the book, which is not available in electronic format.)
  - lincoln_med 11y ago
    Robert Wilson's knife quote did not describe Lincoln in the White House, but in the 1830s, when Lincoln was in his 20s and trying to deal with debt, career uncertainties, courting, deaths, and malaria. It was a hard hard decade for him. One clarification. Mr. Shenk is interested in idiopathic depression. It is interesting that malaria was well-known among frontier dwellers to cause terrible depression of spirits afterwards -- i.e. a secondary depression caused by malaria itself. Lincoln was indeed low during his malarious period, but this has no bearing on the question of whether he had idiopathic depression, except that peri-malaria depression cannot be used as evidence for idiopathic depression.

18 points by poindontcare 11y ago

It is by no means clear that Lincoln had the illness that today carries the name "depression." My 2008 book, _The Physical Lincoln_ discusses why, and offers an alternate diagnosis that is holistically far superior to the piecemeal mental and physical diagnoses that others have bestowed on him. In brief, there is abundant evidence that Lincoln, his mother, and three of his sons had a genetic disease called MEN2B that made them all tall, thin, and unusual looking (exception: Willie Lincoln was not so unusual looking). Features of MEN2B can mimic Marfan syndrome and depression, and this is what happened in Lincoln and his mother: Owing to variant neuromuscular function associated with MEN2B, they were physically constituted to look sad, because their muscles (body and face) had low muscle tone as a result of MEN2B. I don't think there is a chance in the world that Lincoln was depressed as President, but Sheik's work has persuaded many people. I tackle all of Shenk's points (and others) in the book. If you're interested enough to debate the topic here, please read The Physical Lincoln first, and then write me -- so I don't have to repeat myself. :-) Please see: http://www.physical-lincoln.com http://www.physical-lincoln.com http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22504423 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22504423 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19841386 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19841386 [peripheral]

btown 11y ago
Thanks for your response, Dr. Sotos, and welcome to HN! Without diving into the book - it certainly seems from the Atlantic article that Lincoln, on multiple occasions, exhibited suicidal tendencies. A primary source is quoted as saying, "Still when by himself, [Lincoln] told me that he was so overcome with mental depression, that he never dare carry a knife in his pocket." Do you believe that the article is exaggerating these reports, or otherwise putting them out of context? Regardless of whether Lincoln had MEN2B, these quotes certainly indicate to me (as someone without medical training, to be fair) that there remains a possibility that Lincoln separately suffered from depression, and therefore give me pause when you say as a medical professional that you "don't think there is a chance in the world that Lincoln was depressed as President." (For others interested in this research, http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071130/full/news.2007.226.html http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071130/full/news.2007.226.ht... goes into a bit more detail without requiring a full read of the book, which is not available in electronic format.)
- lincoln_med 11y ago
  Robert Wilson's knife quote did not describe Lincoln in the White House, but in the 1830s, when Lincoln was in his 20s and trying to deal with debt, career uncertainties, courting, deaths, and malaria. It was a hard hard decade for him. One clarification. Mr. Shenk is interested in idiopathic depression. It is interesting that malaria was well-known among frontier dwellers to cause terrible depression of spirits afterwards -- i.e. a secondary depression caused by malaria itself. Lincoln was indeed low during his malarious period, but this has no bearing on the question of whether he had idiopathic depression, except that peri-malaria depression cannot be used as evidence for idiopathic depression.