1. Start with diagnosis, not with drugs
There's one sequence of steps that Dr. Saulitis repeats insistently, almost stubbornly: first, understand what's happening, and only then decide how to help. Not the other way around. Not "came in, complained of a bad mood, left with a prescription." That path seems fast, but it skips the most important step — finding the cause.
Why does this matter? Because your condition — depression, anxiety, insomnia, exhaustion — can have a completely different nature than it appears. Sometimes behind what looks like a "psychiatric" picture lies a thyroid malfunction, a metabolic disorder, hidden inflammation, or a deficiency of some substance in the body. The mind and body are so closely connected that separating them is a mistake. The brain is an organ too — it's "fed" by blood, hormones, trace elements, and if something in this system goes wrong, mood and thinking are the first to respond.
That's why the doctor insists: before talking about medications for the psyche, you need simple blood tests, liver function tests, and other basic biochemical markers. This isn't a whim or a waste of time — it's a way to rule out disorders that disguise themselves as psychological but actually require a different approach.
"The first thing you need is to get examined. Simple blood tests for everything, and you need to check enzymes, liver function tests, to understand whether some other disorders might be affecting the psychosomatic picture."
Imagine someone who has felt sluggish, irritable, and unable to concentrate for months. They're ready to chalk it up to personality or "age," to see a psychiatrist and ask for "something for the nerves." But if a basic workup is done at this stage — a blood test, biochemistry, and more detailed tests if needed — a very specific physiological cause may turn up that explains both the fatigue and the mood swings. And then the path of treatment turns out to be quite different from what was assumed at first.
This doesn't mean psychiatric treatment is never needed. It means it should rest on the full picture, not just on how you describe feeling. A doctor who prescribes a medication without knowing your basic indicators is acting blindly — even with the best intentions.
The practical step is simple: before discussing starting medication with your doctor, ask for a referral for testing — if it hasn't been done already. Blood test, biochemistry, liver function tests, and more specialized tests if indicated. This is the foundation from which any meaningful conversation about treatment begins. And even if it turns out that everything is normal, that's valuable information too — it narrows the search and helps you move forward with more confidence.
2. The Mechanic and Your Body: Why You Need to Understand What's Broken First
Dr. Saulitis sometimes explains the logic of treatment through an image everyone who has ever fixed a car will understand. Imagine: a car starts behaving strangely — knocking, jerking, the radio cutting in and out. A good mechanic doesn't start randomly replacing parts right away. First, they run diagnostics: they look at exactly what's broken — the crankshaft, the suspension, the shock absorbers. Only after that, once they understand the whole picture, do they intervene — and they start small, with the gentlest option.