alt Hacker News> The point Im making is this is true for a ton of psychiatric or even non psychatric treatments
That point wasn't intended to be taken in isolation.
I was making statements about how long-term treatment of an underlying condition is not the same as taking a drug which temporarily masks a problem or induces altered mood states.
The fact that a drug has acute effects, good or bad, is separate from any conversation about chronic effects.
For depression, anxiety, and other conditions it's the chronic effects that matter. The acute effects almost become side effects at that point. For some drugs, getting to long-term treatment involves tolerating the acute effects while your body adapts
You keep ignoring the fact that what you just said applies to current medications used to treat depression and anxiety. They do not treat the underlying issue long-term, and if you stop them, you are worse off than before due to rebound effects, and even if those effects subdue, your depression and anxiety returns. And just to add to this for clarification, antidepressants may treat depression, but it does not cure it either.
Same with amphetamines for ADHD. And yes, if you take much more, you will experience side-effects ("cause harm when abused"). Opioids are not an outlier at all.
> Recreational drugs make you feel good temporarily
Drugs are only recreational if you take them recreationally, there is nothing that makes them inherently recreational.
And we have not discussed MDMA, which is considered a hard "recreational" drug, yet there are lots of benefits for treatment of PTSD, for one, similarly to psychedelics.
... or ketamine for depression, which is now approved by the FDA, even.