Why do psychiatrists feel compelled to include every “deviance from the norm” in the DSM ( the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), and by this why do they abnormalize everything?

So a group of ‘chiatrists (probably after quitting coffee or something) have decided that coffee withdrawl might be a pyschiatric condition worth listing in the DSM. Now I have quit coffee numerous times, and yes, it is painful, mentally so, but what is the point of inclduing this in the DSM?

Sept. 30, 2004 — Researchers are saying that caffeine withdrawal should now be classified as a psychiatric disorder.

A new study that analyzes some 170 years’ worth of research concludes that caffeine withdrawal is very real — producing enough physical symptoms and a disruption in daily life to classify it as a psychiatric disorder. Researchers are suggesting that caffeine withdrawal should be included in the next edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), considered the bible of mental disorders…

“The withdrawal symptoms can be mild or severe, but it’s estimated that 13% of people develop symptoms so significant that they can’t do what they normally would do — they can’t work, they can’t leave the house, they can’t function,” he says.”

I think one of the most fundamental incorrect premises of the DSM is that we are supposed to “function” normally all the time. Life is too rich and full of surprises in both those good and horrible ways for that to ever be the case. Now I am not one to say that no mentall illness exists (believe me there are too many literally crazy folks in my family for me to ever say that) but I wish they would stop wasting their time by putting everthing under the DSM bag and concentrate on the stuff that matters, which is also not just shoving medicines down people’s throats but that is another story…