Out of the Abyss (with a Little Help from My Friends)

Sherry Julo
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I’m a 57-year-old native of Kansas City, Missouri. A lifelong accountant, I used to work for the City of Kansas City. I also used to be very active: volunteering, taking care of my mother, socializing with friends, and enjoying yearly vacations to the Caribbean. From the time I was 27 until I was 49, I took 20 mg of fluoxetine (Prozac) with very few side effects. But everything changed after my psychiatrist tried me on a different antidepressant that was then new on the market.

Highjacked by a Drug

In 1988, doctors had put me on alprazolam (Xanax) after I had a severe panic attack. They told me I was “stressed out” but never explained what panic attacks were. Alprazolam made me very sleepy, so I only took a couple and then stopped. Not long after that, I started having non-stop headaches and achy muscles. After blood tests came back normal, my doctor prescribed me fluoxetine and I started feeling better. My doctor told me I need to take them every day for life, just like a diabetic or someone with high blood pressure. We didn’t have the Internet back then and I was raised to trust my doctor, so I continued to take them.

When I reached my late forties in 2012, I was under a lot of stress, what with a new position and my mother’s health failing. My doctor told me it was time to divorce fluoxetine, that it wasn’t working anymore. She took me off Prozac and instead prescribed me 37.5 mg of venlafaxine (Effexor), increasing the dose to 150 mg over a few weeks.

I gradually started noticing changes in how I felt. I told my doctor about them, but she denied that they had anything to do with the pills I was taking. Then I started getting severe migraines, rendering me bedridden. Since my doctor had told me my symptoms were unrelated to venlafaxine, I started seeing specialists, including an allergist and a neurologist, to no avail. I was also having severe digestion and bowel problems: I couldn’t eat much without feeling extremely full and was so bloated I looked seven or eight months pregnant. For over a year, I didn’t have a normal bowel movement. My insides felt inflamed; I could feel food moving through my intestines and had extreme pain in my upper left side. I had a colonoscopy done and it came back normal, so I thought maybe I was gluten intolerant and changed my diet. I started walking 30 to 40 minutes, but nothing was helping. I found out years later that I had all the symptoms of gastroparesis.

At this point, my memory started deteriorating. I couldn’t think clearly or remember things and sometimes my mind would go completely blank. This was affecting my accounting job working with balance sheets and doing payroll. I started making a lot of errors. My vision also changed drastically, so I had to get glasses. New symptoms kept cropping up:

  • sweating a lot with little or no exercise
  • getting lightheaded upon standing
  • losing 50% of my head hair and all the hair on my arms
  • tremors, tingling, and numbness in my hands
  • vertigo
  • chest pains
  • constant itching
  • joint pain
  • a copper taste in my mouth
  • bruising easily
  • dental problems
  • twitching of my eyes and body, including jerking up at night or when lying down
  • dry hair and skin

My brain felt like a shriveled-up raisin and the bones in my feet felt like they were fractured. But I just assumed this was what it’s like to get older in combination with the stress in my life.

First Withdrawal

A year later, on a Sunday in March 2013, I forgot to take my 150 mg of venlafaxine. When I woke up on Monday morning, I was so dizzy and nauseated I couldn’t walk to the shower without holding onto the walls and furniture. That’s when it dawned on me: This feels drug-related somehow.  I decided to look up the side effects of venlafaxine on WebMD. I was shocked at what I discovered. I had a lot of the listed side effects as well as others not listed. I printed out the list, highlighting all the ones I was experiencing in yellow and the side effects my psychiatrist already knew about in orange. I called her office and said I needed to get in as soon as possible.

During my appointment, I told her I was very disappointed in the way she had managed me on this medication. I handed her the highlighted printout with my side effects. She told me, “They have nothing to do with venlafaxine…Where did you get this? The Internet? You can’t believe everything you read on the Internet!”

I replied, “All my previous doctors have told me to get medical information from WebMD.com and this is where I found that list.”

She became very condescending and told me to feel free to get a second opinion. I told her to take me off this crap and put me back on Prozac! So she wrote me a script for both drugs, weaning me off venlafaxine and onto Prozac over a two-week period. The first day she had me drop from 150 mg to 75 mg of Effexor and also take 20 mg of Prozac as a “bridge.”

By that afternoon, I thought I was losing my mind. I was so dizzy, nauseated, and disoriented and couldn’t think straight. So I called my psychiatrist, who told me I needed to go to the ER and check in for outpatient treatment to “manage you on your medication.” I didn’t feel able to drive there, but she told me that if I didn’t, my doctor would not write me the note I needed to use the Family and Medical Leave Act to take time off from my job. So I drove to the ER and almost hit another car on the way.

The ER doctor did a physical evaluation and then proceeded to tell me what I was experiencing was venlafaxine withdrawal.  My jaw nearly hit the floor! (I associated “withdrawal” with street drugs, not antidepressants.) He then told me to go home, crawl into bed, stay hydrated, and take care of myself. I could not believe what I was hearing. I hadn’t felt this violently ill in my entire life! As I drove home, I caught myself driving on the wrong side of the road.

Descent into Hell

Unbeknownst to me, I was about to enter pure hell. I was bedridden for three weeks with severe sweats, shivers, dizziness, hallucinations, and freezing hands and feet. If I closed my eyes, I would see white dots coming at me and I couldn’t watch TV because it made me nauseated. It felt like I didn’t have any control over my brain or body anymore. I lay in bed staring at a wall trying to stay as still as possible, thinking to myself, I’m under doctor’s care…she can’t be killing me? I reached out to friends and family for support, but none of them understood and pushed me away.

So for three weeks, I lived mainly on toast, soup, and cereal, only getting out of bed to eat or use the bathroom because I could barely walk without having to hang on to something. It was the worst mental and physical torture anyone could imagine. I literally thought I was going to die alone in my bed. If my brain had been working properly, I would have ended my life with no second thoughts.

On April 11, 2013, desperate for answers, the only thing I could think to do to help myself was to start a closed Facebook group to see if anyone else was going through the same hell I was. Deep down I felt like I was wasting energy I didn’t even have. I didn’t think anyone would join.

To my surprise, people gradually started to join my Facebook group and began posting their stories. They shared about the disabling side effects their doctor never warned them about or had ignored or dismissed. Those wanting off venlafaxine weren’t able to due to severe withdrawals, and expressed how some of their doctors had told them they could stop cold turkey, taper off by cutting their dose in half each week and then stop, skip or alternate days, or bridge to another drug.  Each of these methods caused some of the group members severe if not disabling withdrawals, and some of those bridging found themselves having worse symptoms, and/or ended up stuck on venlafaxine and the new drug, unable to taper from either.

It was obvious after reading several members’ posts and comments that doctors have no idea how to taper people off venlafaxine safely, nor are they aware of the side effects or withdrawal symptoms venlafaxine causes. This drug has one of the shortest half-lives of all antidepressants, causing dependence and difficulties getting off due to severe or disabling withdrawals—some of which last months and even years.

Hitting Rock Bottom

I returned to work around week four of my withdrawal from venlafaxine (after suffering a kidney infection from lack of fluids while I stayed in bed, barely eating or drinking) only because I was in fear of losing my job. I started out working half-days for a few weeks, still very ill, weak, and disconnected. I was able to work about six to eight weeks before being slammed again with disabling withdrawal symptoms. I called my psychiatrist, but she never called me back. Instead, I received a letter in the mail from her office saying I was no longer her patient.

So, I found a different psychiatrist who didn’t believe me when I told him I was having withdrawals from venlafaxine. He told me the drug had to be out of my system by then and that it was not possible. I later learned this was false: Tapering too fast can compromise the nervous system, causing withdrawal symptoms that can last an indefinite amount of time. My doctor then tried me on Paxil (paroxetine) and out of nowhere, after not being able to work for several weeks, I felt better than I ever had in my life. I had so much energy and didn’t even need to sleep. I had been up for two days straight and felt awesome! I called my doctor and told him I was better and to write me a note so I could return to work and get my life back to how I knew it before.

During my workday, I hit bottom again—and even harder this time. The withdrawal symptoms were back with a vengeance and this time stripped me of all desires, goals, and purpose. I asked myself, Why am I here? No one cares about me and I’m living in PURE HELL. I can’t even take care of myself. So, I decided to end it all. I searched and searched the Internet for ways to end my life, only to find suicide hotline phone numbers on every website. I was so angry and frustrated, I just wanted to end this torture. I ended up curled up in my shower, crying and begging God to help me.

Somehow, I made it to the next day. I called my psychiatrist and told him what happened, and he almost had me committed for treatment until I insincerely promised him I would not harm myself. He then proceeded to try me on all kinds of drugs again: Seroquel, Latuda, Abilify, Celexa, Lamictal, Hydroxyzine, Lexapro, Zoloft, Adderall, etc. The only ones I didn’t get prescribed were Cymbalta and lithium.

All these drugs were making me worse (Adderall made me so aggressive I nearly killed a family member and attacked complete strangers). So, I made yet another appointment with my psychiatrist. During this appointment, he told me I was only taking Xanax! I had to correct him and tell him all the medications he had me on and at which dose. While I was telling him this, he was frantically writing it down in my chart.  He didn’t even remember what he had prescribed me! At the end of my appointment, he told me I was “non-compliant” and wanted to refer me to a different psychiatrist.

So I called my general practitioner, begging him for a referral to a psychiatrist that actually knew what he was doing. He gave me two referrals, but I soon found out it would take almost two months to see one of them. At this point, I hadn’t been able to work full time in four months and had used up all my federally guaranteed medical time off.

I couldn’t handle it anymore! But this time, I had figured out how I was going to take my life. Feeling completely numb inside and out, I climbed out of bed and was gathering razor blades when the phone rang. I saw it was an old girlfriend from junior high school with whom I had reconnected several months back. When she greeted me, “Hey, what are you up to?” I broke down crying, sobbing nonstop and unable to catch my breath for some time. Then I blurted out what I was in the process of doing. She stayed very calm and talked to me until her husband got home, and then they rushed over to my house and stayed with me until I almost fell asleep on my kitchen table. Before they left, they made me promise God and both of them that I would never take my life. So, I did.

I didn’t say anything about the incident to anyone in my Effexor support group, though. I didn’t want to scare them. I was trying to be their rock and find out how to fix us all.

As I waited for my appointment, I continued to endure dozens of different withdrawal symptoms (which persisted for more than three years). I struggled mentally. Common things that had come naturally didn’t anymore, and my short-term memory was very poor. It felt like someone had clipped circuits in my brain, causing me to do strange things like taking a frozen dinner to the bathroom to microwave it, or not being able to figure out why my car wouldn’t start when I didn’t even have my key fob. I had to double-check everything I did.

I also couldn’t concentrate properly, sometimes feeling completely blank, and found it difficult to figure out how to pay my bills online when I’d done it the same way for years. I became afraid to drive or take the trash out, and my anxiety levels were off the charts. I also had bizarre psychological sensations and thoughts, including paranoia and surreal feelings—as if someone had entered or that I was leaving my body, or that someone had slipped me a bad street drug.

Every day brought different physical symptoms, including:

  • dizziness
  • nausea
  • lack of energy/fatigue
  • insomnia
  • digestion problems
  • scabs on my head and body
  • sensitivity to foods, chemicals, noise, and/or light
  • feeling bruised to the touch
  • feeling of a vice grip squeezing my head
  • brain zaps (electric shock feelings),
  • hand tremors
  • numbness and tingling in my fingers
  • cold hands and feet
  • poor vision
  • bloating
  • back, shoulder, and/or foot pain

The whole time, I’d been talking to other members in my Effexor Facebook group. It was a huge relief to know I wasn’t alone. Many were going through the same thing and not getting any help or support from their doctors. I couldn’t believe what doctors were doing to these people, and to me. So I kept searching high and low for ways to fix us all.

I found information on high-quality supplements, how to taper safely, and how to reinstate drugs and then taper off slowly from multiple websites, including the Surviving Antidepressants forum, to help us with discontinuation syndrome and protracted withdrawals. Unfortunately for me, it was too late to reinstate: My brain and body were too sensitized at that point, so I couldn’t tolerate any supplements or remedies.  And I also discovered that what helped one person might make another person worse. I couldn’t find a remedy or test that would work and help everyone as a whole because antidepressants alter each person’s brain and body differently.

Finding My Purpose

My appointment with a new psychiatrist finally arrived. During intake, he asked me what medications I had been on. When I began listing and said venlafaxine, he stopped me in mid-sentence. “Effexor is the last medication I would put any patient on,” he told me. I knew right then I had a good doctor. Instead, he put me back on Paxil, and I started doing better, so I requested to try and go back to my job— after a five-month absence— starting out with half-days and building up to eight-hour days over two weeks.

Then, on the week I was to start back full-time, my boss put unrealistic demands on me without any training, denying me breaks and lunch for nine hours. Of course I couldn’t think straight, and he wouldn’t help me. His patience had run out.

I was barely functional when I left work that day. Sitting at the entrance of the parking garage, I would look both ways for traffic and pedestrians, but my brain wasn’t keeping up with what I was seeing. I finally just pulled out, praying I didn’t hit anyone. No words can explain the mental torture I was enduring, and I hit rock bottom for a third time. I prayed to God, “You saved me from taking my life. But I feel like I have no purpose here…please let me know what my purpose is?”

Then, on one of many nights I couldn’t sleep, I got up and turned on my laptop. Not long after, I noticed someone wanting to join my Effexor Facebook group.  I accepted her and the next thing I noticed was a desperate, suicidal post she’d made. I immediately friended her and started private messaging her for over an hour, just chatting back and forth. Then she asked me if she could call me; she wanted to put a voice to my name. We then spoke for over an hour, and before we said our goodbyes, she told me, “You just saved my life.” She had been planning to end it that night. After we hung up, I cried and looked up to God and said, “Thank you for showing me that even at my lowest point, I do still have a purpose.”

I also tried a new tactic, calling my county mental health department twice and begging them for an in-home counselor. The county got me set up with a counselor who came over for 1½ hours once a week, and that arrangement continued for approximately two years. My counselor, Kathryn, was a lifesaver. She saw firsthand what I was enduring, and I educated her on what protracted withdrawals looked like. She was very compassionate and willing to learn, supporting me by helping me to get groceries, picking up my mail, and taking out my trash. She also helped me with filing for disability, drove me to disability hearings, and even testified on my behalf.

My recovery has been so gradual that I can’t pinpoint when most of my symptoms eased. I do remember that in August 2016, I saw the first sign of healing. Though I was still stuck on Paxil, my non-stop nausea stopped and only comes in waves now. Around January 2017, my vivid and gruesome nightmares were easing up and eventually stopped. To this day, I still find it difficult to focus enough to read, my short-term memory is poor, and I struggle with fatigue, energy, balance, and motivation. I sometimes have waves of severe body pain and what feels like a floating brain, when I am foggy-headed, off-balance, weak, and very anxious.

After 7½ years (3+ of them bedridden), I’ve made it past the worst and am still healing. I’m not even sure how I did it. I just kept asking myself, “What if I heal some and get relief tomorrow?” It was that “what if” that pushed me to continue. That, plus my promise to God and my Effexor Facebook group, because I know we will always be there for each other.

Some people don’t make it through the years of protracted withdrawals, though. We have a memorial page in the group (which now has more than 6,000 members) to honor our fallen warriors, including five individuals who have died in the last two years alone.

I would like to end my story with a question: When will pharmaceutical companies and medical schools start educating our medical community about the warnings on and side effects of these drugs, the likelihood of withdrawal, and how to taper people safely off them? That day is long overdue.

 

***

Mad in America hosts blogs by a diverse group of writers. These posts are designed to serve as a public forum for a discussion—broadly speaking—of psychiatry and its treatments. The opinions expressed are the writers’ own.

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48 COMMENTS

  1. Salute your battle!

    “When will pharmaceutical companies and medical schools start educating our medical community about the warnings on and side effects of these drugs, the likelihood of withdrawal, and how to taper people safely off them? That day is long overdue.”

    The criminals know all about it. Psychiatry is a eugenics movement – it sees people who have these problems as vermin to the gene pool to be got rid of.

    Abolish and outlaw psychiatry for major crimes against humanity!

  2. Why the fuck do so-called “professionals” put people on all of these medications without a second thought? Do they just not care or just don’t know? That’s a hell of a lot of power to hand to someone, considering that absolutely everyone has a different response to these drugs.

    And why do so many people buy into this? Why is the “norm” basically to pick drugs at random and mishmash them together in different amounts until the patient either feels better (relatively speaking), goes off of them, or dies? We don’t do this for any other “medical condition,” so why are we so accepting when it comes to the brain?

    I recently joined a group on Facebook for people who have Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD) because I’ve been having hormone-related mood swings to an nth degree to the point where I go between an almost mania during ovulation to suicidal depression during the week before my period and the first few days of it.

    And I’m just shocked that all of these people are being put on SSRIs as a first step. Some of them take it for their entire cycle, but a lot of people are being told to take the meds for half the month and then stop them cold turkey for the other half. And the meds are switched up over and over again until something “works.”

    And it’s like, “No wonder you feel terrible! You’re constantly withdrawing from different medications!”

    I’m sorry that your doctors didn’t give you enough information to formally consent to the different drugs they threw at you. No one should have to go through that.

    • I will never trust another psych doctor, any doctor again. When I was in the depth of hell I couldn’t believe or wrap my head around the incompetence and lack of empathy from psych doctors. Even being told I was non-compliant when I refused to try anymore drugs that were only making me worse. It felt like my body was shutting down at one point and I made the decision to die in my bed versus calling an ambulance. Even if I called an ambulance I had no way to unlock my front door, I could barely pick up the phone.

      The off label prescribing for migraines, premenstrual dysphoric disorder, perimenopause, fibromyalgia, you name it should be banned. We have lots of members that has never had any mental issues that were prescribed Effexor for off label symptoms end up having a hard time tapering off and end up with depression, anxiety, etc. that they never had before taking Effexor.

      What happened to doctors healing instead of prescribing drugs that harm us.

      • MD’s gave up medicine the day they jumped on board with prescribing poisons to people. Any MD that prescribes psych drugs should be charged with doing another specialist’s work. Does a shrink prescribe cancer drugs or high colestorel drugs? nope did not think so. If it takes 8 years to become an expert shrink, then MD’s should have to take that extra 8 years on top of MD school. After all, if an MD cannot find the reason for the pain, then if he prescribes psych drugs, he is in fact stating that scientifically he knows everything there is to know about the body.

        And neurologists and all specialities are no better. Psych drugs are their way to get rid of patient overload. They are COMPLETELY aware of the false medicine they are practicing when they give people these nasty chemicals.

        All we can do is warn people that these are not “treatments” but rather cop-outs and bad practice.
        Amazing that this is allowed. There is no pride in being a doctor if you resort to this garbage. After the shit I have listened to, I no longer hold my disdain for only psychiatry. Find me an MD that does not ever prescribe poison to people and I will hold them in respect. Done with my “rant”. Yes and I hope nurses read this too. Yes and we will be “non-compliant” and we will keep calling your BS out. And we will not be intimidated even though we know you have the ultimate power to be nasty.

      • I don’t blame you for not trusting doctors!

        “Non-compliance” is such a bullshit term. All it says to me is “I don’t know what to do with you because you’re not getting better, so I’m going to redirect the blame back to you.”

        I would place my bets that there’s going to be lawsuits in the future from people who’ve been prescribed psych drugs off label and had horrible reactions to them. I’m pretty sure that we’re also going to see lawsuits about antipsychotics being used off label, as well.

        Anyone who prescribes psych drugs should have to go through a trial run of them. Let them experience first-hand what they’re telling people to take. If the medications are so simple and good and have “minimal risk,” then they should have no problem going on the medications.

  3. Thank you to Sherry, for reliving, what must be very painful memories, in order to get your story out.
    I applaud your efforts, to spare others, the suffering.
    In my book you are a true Warrior!
    Best wishes for continued healing, and may God bless you, as you endeavor to help others.

  5. “When will pharmaceutical companies and medical schools start educating our medical community about the warnings on and side effects of these drugs, the likelihood of withdrawal, and how to taper people safely off them?”

    A quote from a story from PBS on the opioid crisis. The show is called Opioids Inc.

    “When executives go to jail, that sends out a pretty serious message to the wider business and financial community. And certainly with the Insys story, that message will be pretty clear-cut to the rest of the pharmaceutical world.”

    Lets start sending these people to prison, removing the money they have effectively stolen, and get rid of the people they have corrupted in our governments who are dismantling legislation that stop these “Pill Mills” from operating. See for example the concealment by the State of a doctor (psychiatrist) who prescribed ADHD drugs (amphetamines) to 2074 patients in one year from public scrutiny. We can no longer know that this is happening, and thus no questions will be asked. Legalised drug dealing, nothing more.

    Good article Sherry, and one I intend sharing with a friend who is struggling to understand why she is having so much trouble as a result of reducing/ceasing with her anti depressants. Her doctor telling her that the “chemical imbalance” required her to take them for the rest of her life (and attend his office for a $200 hand shake each month).

  6. Thank you so much for sharing Sherry!!!

    I am not sure any other profession allows people to practice with such little competence. How is it you can be certified to use drugs that you don’t even know the effects of withdraw for? And, how much worse is it that an ER Dr. who is not as learned as a psychiatrist would be well aware of the withdrawal? Maybe because they have to handle the blow-over of this malpractice more often.

    Thank you for bringing this incredibly important topic up for anyone that is wise enough to read it.

    • My ER doctor tried to call my psych doctor when I was there to ask her why she had sent me to the ER but her office had already closed for the day. I think and hope the ER doctor was able to get ahold of her and he gave her a piece of his mind and most likely why I received a letter in the mail saying I was no longer a patient of hers (my psych doctor). I did what my doctor told me to do then I get that letter in the mail. What kind of doctor does that.

  7. I feel so for you, what you’ve been through. Like running around in a war zone, no one wanting to hear the horrors it leaves you in while they keep the war going. This whole war against the brain’s natural responses, you can see that even calling something a panic attack can be predatory to get you to become a drug company consumer. The very labeling of any symptoms itself.

    You’ve come a long way not giving up, thank God you didn’t, and are doing something to help thousands of others. That’s beautiful! Thank You for sharing your story so that others know they aren’t alone!

    Sometimes when it seems that my brain has abandoned me, just waiting a bit longer while thinking it’s not going to something surprisingly kicks in, I’ve noticed myself, if that helps at all (not all the time, but it’s so soothing when it does): Am I going to remember that word? What was I doing again? Why am I in this room?

    Everything labeled as a psychiatric symptom can have an intelligence of its own, that when allowed to just be felt rather than reacted to (I don’t like this feeling, how can I get rid of it, what drug will help, this is going to ruin my life if it doesn’t go away) can be much gentler and more subtle and more helpful than trying to get rid of it, although we’re trained to think we have to.

    It’s not just psychiatric drugs, it’s the whole consumer oriented society people are trained to think will solve their problems; everything from food to entertainment to technology. And we’re incredibly being setup to be consumers.

  8. Hi Sherry.
    Imagine knowing these drugs are horrible and then as a “professional” actually prescribe them, and then purposefully try to make you look crazy or “bad” for revealing your ailing health. The thing that invalidates the whole industry is to first of all “diagnose” and second, to keep poisoning people’s systems despite their resistance.
    Basically that “non compliant” garbage is like a cop saying that the criminal is not following his parole orders.
    Except the criminal still gets other real medical treatment whereas the “diagnosed” are completely discredited by that “non compliant”.

    So it makes one non compliant if one’s body screams no? Psychiatry would look a lot more credible if they did not go out of their way to invalidate millions of people. And regular medicine is right up there with them.
    And it’s all borne out of prejudice, power and pretend science. To dabble in biology and create chemical mixtures for experiments in no way makes anyone a real scientist.
    So far we are only in experiments but that have their roots in extreme bias and prejudice.

  10. Thank you for sharing your story. I am so very sorry for your suffering. I recognize so many of the details from my own experience. It strikes me as the ultimate contradiction that the doctor who is trusted to relieve distress ends up causing much more significant pain and symptoms that may lead to death. How can any of what you describe be acceptable? How can patients continue to be gaslighted when they describe the side effects of drugs? How can the answer to the debilitating side effects be to pile on more mind altering drugs with a hope of a better outcome?

    The 6000 people in your Facebook community. The 5 lives lost in the past two years. They are human beings. They have families. They have jobs and communities. Their often extreme long term suffering from medication is an outrage. Do we really have any idea of what percentage of people these medications harm? For those that they help, is it worth the risk of the lives completely lost and the years of suffering? Would anyone in their right mind choose to take a drug with the potential for such an outcome? “Your cognition and memory may become so compromised you may lose your ability to work. You may end up bedridden for years. You may have unexplained physical symptoms that remain long after you discontinue this drug. Your pain and disability may become so great that you no longer wish to live.”

    Is there any way to have the medical community recognize the results of the lived experience of protracted psychiatric drug withdrawal versus the short term clinical trials?

    I don’t know how but the system has to change. The perilous effects of and destruction of lives by these drugs need to be acknowledged!! #metoo

  11. prescribedharm I couldn’t agree with you more.
    It’s all about numbers. Prescriptions being filled $$$$ versus those being harmed.
    Those of us being harmed are the minority (right now) therefore don’t matter in the eyes of the medical arena.
    We’re easily dismissed and don’t matter. Who allows this to happen? Our governments. I would like to know how much our governments get paid by pharma to allow this to continue. Our governments know, they see the mass shootings that are connected to these psych drugs for just one example.

  12. It seems to me that there needs to be much more participation from journalists and media to expose the issue of the danger of psychiatric drugs and educate the public in the same manner that happened for opioids. Not only was there an epidemic of users, over prescribing by doctors but also there was evidence proving Pharma was aggressively marketing the pills knowing their addictive and deadly nature. Then class action lawsuits followed.

    It seems that no mainstream publication wants to cover the topic of the ills of psychiatric drugs in a serious way although there have been many books written about the seriousness of the issue.

    The problem is that the medications don’t cause every patient side effects or tapering issues. I have had friends and family who have taken psych meds long term without problems – like your experience with Prozac for many years. They doubt my experience. Instead of seeing someone completely wrecked from doctor prescribed drugs, they see someone who has become seriously ill.

    I worry that while talking about mental health seems to be easier these days and even encouraged there will be more people seeking help put on medication. There is less discussed on the causes of distress such as divorce, financial insecurity, illness, loneliness, abuse, addiction, loss – which are things that many people go through in their lives versus just “mental health” with an associated diagnosis as a vacuum to enter into a prescribing cascade.

    • “Put on medication” is very much implied in “Get help.” All of these societies are trying to normalize being on psych drugs, most likely for the rest of your life because you have a “brain illness” that can only be treated with drugs.

      It’s just frustrating to watch friends go through a low point in their lives and be bounced around over and over from therapist to psychiatrist to psychologist, trying on different mental illness labels and changing the perception of themselves based solely on those labels. After that, they see any kind of problems in their lives a result of those “illnesses” and never stop and realize that they’re *allowed* to have feelings. They’re *allowed* to feel like shit sometimes. That’s part of being a human.

      I went through the majority of my life seeing myself as “sick” and trying to pass all of my emotions and experiences through that filter. I dehumanized myself and my life and now I’m trying to undo that.

    • A big problem is all or almost all the media rely on Big Pharma ad revenue for the magazine or channel to stay afloat.

      “Always the patient’s fault.” Should be the motto for the American Psychiatric Association.

      I strongly recommend the site Surviving Antidepressants for those who need help coming off and can’t get it. I cold turkeyed off Lamictal since I couldn’t cut the tablets. But I only took it for 13 days after being hospitalized.

      Personally I found Abilify was a snap to come off. Went from 20 mg to 15 mg. Then 15-10; 10-7.5; 7.5-5; 5-2.5; 2.5-0. 2 weeks between each gradation. 10 weeks with only a few headaches. But Effexor was another thing altogether. Took me 13 months to come off 150 mg.

      No more suicidal thoughts or melt downs since. The pills were holding me back.

      • I’m glad you were able to do it Rachel. I am starting to think we do not need to blame big pharma. It is not they who hold the script pad. And psychiatry is plenty informed. There is only one reason they belong to their club and cult. Saving face with colleagues, but mommy and daddy, aunts and uncles are right up there. After all, they paid and their little child is now a psychiatrist, damaging little children and lost teens, lost young adults.
        Just for their shitty 50 years on earth working their BS. And after all that, all they get is a tombstone with nothing but damage in their path.

        It is absolutely disgusting.

  14. Thank God you survived. I am scared. Still tapering lexapro and klonopin myself and my son is in the beginnings of tapering 150mg Effexor XR and clozapine. I’m terribly frightened. I’ve already been through hell because a hospital cold turkey stopped my son’s meds and forcibly overdosed him with injections of Haldol and Ativan and left him alone in isolation to suffer and they would have let him die. He suffered 14-16 hours. Withdrawal plus their forced overdose. I do not know how he is still alive. I am traumatized myself because a nurse had enough compassion to allow me to see him as he was fighting for his life. It was an awful scene. I’m haunted to this day by it. I had to argue with staff to get help for him. He was finally rushed to CV-ICU. The doc in ICU documented that he was in respiratory failure, acute kidney injury with rhabdomyolysis, dehydration, leukocytosis all vital organs shutting down. They worked on him for 48 minutes to stop his death. I’m still traumatized to even write this. It’s awful. They did not want to admit their wrongdoing, so soon threw him back in psych while he was still physically very ill, restricted all visitation, kept him in restraints and began forcibly injecting him with Thorazine, restoril and more. The med techs also held him on the floor while other med techs kicked him in the face and head. It was a miracle that I got help to get him discharged one day before they were going to send him off to a state mental hospital and assign a stranger as his guardian. They discharged him to a residential home. I had to fight for his life and freedom for three months. He finally was able to come home. God help us. It’s been two years- still have not recovered. No help from the medical community. No help from friends. He has heart and brain damage but is being passed around. No help. God help us. I don’t know what to do. I can barely read things like this anymore. Psychiatry is evil. Pure evil. Run by Nazis or the mafia. I’m shocked that they kill and torture people every day. We need a way out too. God help us. He is our only help. No one else cares. I pray we can both break free from the psych drugs and psychiatry. We need to move too.

    • mmarti I read your response, and also your post from more than a year ago: https://www.madinamerica.com/2016/06/abolishing-forced-treatment-in-psychiatry-is-an-ethical-imperative/#comment-157028
      I don’t know what to say other than I’m trying to not cry, just so I can stay clear and maybe send some hope, some healing energy, and then a tear trickles down, regardless…

      It’s ABSOLUTELY insane. Someone that had difficulty because they tried a street drug, doesn’t need to be assaulted with other controlled substances, that’s truly insane. Don’t even try making any sense out of it.

      And I don’t know how to commend your behavior that you got your son OUT OF such a situation, and spared his life. It’s like anything I’d say wouldn’t be enough.

      I’ve seen this myself, when someone in an asylum was prescribed said medication, and then got out, but couldn’t get nor had a prescription for it — I think there was no psychiatrist available, I can’t even remember exactly, but it was so irresponsible you just go into shock trying to cognate it — and then had to titrate off of what she willingly was taking that they had put her on in the asylum, but they couldn’t get her a prescription for when she got out!? They have enough money for fooling everyone with ads, and enough money to imprison someone within an asylum, and enough money to keep the psychiatrists in their niche https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/What-Is-the-Average-Psychiatrist-Salary-by-State But force taking someone off cold turkey, not listening to advice regarding ill effects of the new medications forced on him which he already couldn’t tolerate; ignoring signs of how it’s killing him…

      And it seems it just started because he dared to ask something about where certain money went, which it seems you can’t ask them; which I don’t know if that was the case, but why could it or would it be?

      From what I’ve seen, as soon as you are monitored by them, there’s a whole list of normal concerns you might have that you can’t voice, or be seen as disruptive, non compliant, you name it….

      If that was the case, they probably tried to make him out to show signs of paranoia, because he had a legitimate question about where the money went.

      That’s really just torture and mind control, that’s not medical treatment.

      What is going on with a “society” that can just assault someone with labels and pills, and have the “society” ignore what the pills are doing, or they’d have to question the labels!?

      I have to deal with that every day, although I’ve never been forced on a psychiatric drug, and never taken any, people are so ripe as to how they’ve compromised themselves to a dysfunctional society, and so in need of not questioning their brainwashing lest the whole pretense they think their existence is based on would fall apart believing they are in danger would it, that they are so stuffed with labels they pop right out of them at any moment causing alarmist responses have they heard anything about someone being “crazy,” or anything that goes with social non compliance. And they’re more up on that then what’s really going on, which explains a lot… And they’re real spiteful, angry, resentful, hateful. Once they think anything’s going on, you can’t do anything unusual, or else.

      Anyhow

      To show that I’m still “crazy,” and “non reality based” to those people, I’ll say that it’s not crazy to trust God, and that is realistic.

      And don’t worry about those people, don’t let it get to you, who knows what they went through to get the way they are, but if you let go of it that can be attended to by what other people would say is impossible…

      You’ve already done quite a few “impossible” things just to save your son’s life.

      “Impossible” things aren’t impossible…

      And my heart goes out to you…

        • Wow, mmarti2007

          This reminded me of a young man picked up by police and identified as a missing patient from the hospital. They forced him to accept that he didn’t know he was the missing patient, and then forced him to take that patients ‘medications’ which resulted in him being transferred to the emergency dept dying as a result of taking someone elses drugs.

          I really don’t know what to say. But I know this, we need to start documenting and recording these crimes so that when the time comes (and it will come) when these people are being held to account, their names are not forgotten.

          • It happens all the time. I know of two other mothers whose sons have died in psych wards. People with “psych” labels are not even viewed as human beings. The “professionals” are always correct and if anything goes wrong it is the fault of the “label”. So, they are clear and free to abuse and even kill. Some, by accident I’m sure, but many not. Holding my son down and kicking him in the head multiple times was not an “accident”. Those men should be charged with assault and battery. You know if it were the other way around, my son would be in jail! And the doctor should be liable for overdosing my son and not stopping his death. She just had him held in isolation as he slowly suffered a slow death. Awful suffering. I knew he was almost dead and I am not a medical professional! If I had not seen him, he would be dead. I had to argue with nurses to get help for him. These definitely are crimes. But our society does not seem to care what happens to people with psych “labels”. I have my son’s medical records. The discharging MD noted “two black eyes”, but nowhere is there any documentation during his two weeks’ stay of how he got “two black eyes”. They do not even have to explain themselves. Looking back, I should have filed a police report for assault on my son I guess. I don’t know.

          • “Looking back, I should have filed a police report for assault on my son I guess. I don’t know.”

            Police are fully aware that the ‘staff’ will not testify due to the issue of ‘joint enterprise’. If they testify they may be incriminating themselves, and so will be advised to remain silent.

            Video evidence (according to the large volume of documentation I have from our authorities) can be “edited” to remove any criminal acts before being provided to your legal representative, and so even if the proof exists, they will be allowed to mislead the courts into false conclusions. See for example in my instance the request for documents relating to my ‘detention’ by lawyers resulted in them being provided with documents that had the fact I was ‘spiked’ with benzodiazepines without my knowledge removed, and the ‘police referral’ obtained under s. 195 of the Mental Health Act was changed to make me look like I had been a “patient” of this hospital for more than 10 years.

            I consider the changing of legal narrative in this manner to be criminal fraud, the Clinical Director of the hospital calls it “editing”.

            “And the doctor should be liable for overdosing my son and not stopping his death. She just had him held in isolation as he slowly suffered a slow death. Awful suffering. I knew he was almost dead and I am not a medical professional!”

            In my State there is “no National standard as to what constitutes a ‘chemical restraint'” thus allowing doctors to take anyone who uses the word “no” (considered justification for the invocation of ’emergency provisions’) to deaths door. I was surprised to learn that your right to consent ended when you say “no” but ….. there it is. That constitutes an emergency and they then do whatever they wish to you. The ‘dinner with a rapist scenario’ I call it. You are fine as long as you go along with them, it’s when you say no and they decide to use the force available to them that problems for the victim arise. You asked for ‘help’, you got it.

            “People with “psych” labels are not even viewed as human beings.”

            That’s the reason they change your status to “patient”, you can do all sorts of things to people defined as “patients” that would be unlawful if they were considered human. It worked for a lot of years in Australia until the indigenous people of the Nation were made human in 1967. You should see how they were treated before that. Not that much has changed, we just need to be a little more covert in our violence towards them these days.

            I guess gay people must have felt so liberated when they were removed from the DSM and were therefore no longer automatic “patients” for their sexual preference. No more ‘poofter bashings’ by police, no more ‘chemical castrations’ and ECTs to ‘cure’ them of their ‘illness’. Still, it looks to me like they slowed the gravy train down long enough to get on, and left others behind to be harmed (to quote Desmond Tutu speaking about the ANC in South Africa)

            So who is it that is being given status ‘outside the law’ in our current times? Inconvenient truths? And who is it making these designated changes to status and how? All done with a telephone call to police by a doctor in my State, though our politicians won’t allow you to publish that fact (mainly because it’s criminal but getting ‘healthcare’ to people complaining about your conduct is seen as being in the ‘public interest’, so turning a blind eye and denying access to remedy is the only real method of enabling these criminals). In fact according to the current Minister for Health complaining about being tortured and kidnapped is an ‘illness’ you should be treated for, especially in a State where having the proof of the crime is a crime.

            I note in my instance the lack of any defense due to the fact that the fraud is all that is maintaining their position of enabling these criminals. The breach of the Privacy Act in releasing my medical records to support the false narrative still not enough to maintain the fraud. I was not anyones “patient” (by definition of the MH Act) and thus, like the person who has a knife being plunged into their heart, was not being ‘operated’ on by a cardiologist without consent due to incapacitation [aka ‘spiked’]. These were criminals concealing their crimes through the procurement of police, and any claim otherwise is a lie, and a known lie being supported with the uttering of fraud Minister.

            Not that this is an issue where the Attorney General is referring inconvenient questions of law (torture) to mental health for “actioning”. And should they never return…….. oh well, must not have been torture then. I’m guessing most of them stop complaining with the mock executions by police which is an excellent coercive measure (though only reaches the status of ‘soft torture’ unlike the ‘spiking’ which is an actual physical assault and constitutes ‘hard torture’).

    • mmarti,
      They are hateful. They don’t even recognize their hatred. Like njinsky, my heart goes out to you. I am
      glad you came here to give your testimony of their assaults on your son, and ultimately of the world.
      Their chemical and physical assaults are blessed by the systems we live in, and it leaves every single person vulnerable. I so badly wish for you to be free, or feel free.
      IF psychiatry was indeed a “mental health” specialty, this could never have happened, and what is alarming is that MD’s join in prescribing.
      It is all beyond something called irresponsible, it is criminal activity to knowingly hurt people. But it is like a government run mafia, because they duped the government. We have applied to that same government to hear us, but they refuse.
      We have to be cognizant of the fact that governments are there for themselves, as are psychiatrists.

      • I feel as if I am up against a mafia. I have felt that way for the past two years. I saw something I wasn’t supposed to see and have seen mafia-type behavior for the past two years as I have been trying to advocate for my son. It is difficult for me to discuss or write about it anymore.

        • mmarti, I understand that writing the truth is painful. It feels like reliving not just what happened, but knowing just what is being done and continues to be done. And there is not a judge or jury that is brave enough to stand up against psychiatry. assylums are worse than ever. This is much worse than a mafia, a mafia has the guts to shoot and not hide it behind a veil of caring.
          I am sorry they did this to your family, and I am sorry it continues to be that threat.

    • mmarti, you stated: ” Then, in his 10th month there, they received over $7000 in backpay — things happened and he began asking about the money. That very day – they instantly “ran out” of his 500mg of Clozapine. He immediately called me, scared, asking if he was going to have to go to the hospital. I assured him I would call to get his Clozapine reinstated. I called and was met with incompetent, defensive, rude staff members, blaming my son for everything.”

      Could you tell us more about what these people said? Because not only did they take him off of Clozapine, which one just can’t do cold turkey, certainly not ignoring the effect; but they also put him on Haldol, which you told them that he can’t take. I don’t think that would happen in any other branch of the medical community that it’s simply ignored that someone already had a bad reaction to a medication, or that they don’t acknowledge withdrawal symptoms in such a manner. In fact in other branches they would ask you, such as the question whether you’re allergic to antibiotics. And he could have died from it (and you were almost not allowed to see him), which brings another matter up, that often after someone dies in an asylum that there isn’t any proper autopsy done, and the reporting of how often psychiatric drugs kill someone is under reported, although we still hear about it. And it hasn’t stopped, and the psychiatrists are only given a hand slap. Probably there’s been no action by the system regarding the psychiatrist that abruptly changed his meds and then put him on haldol while no one would listen to the fact that it was known he couldn’t take that drug. ALL psychiatric drugs have bad side effects which are often not tended to. And they aggressively attribute withdrawal symptoms and side effects to an alleged disease…

      I mean this should be reported such behavior. Sherry Julo who wrote this blog has quite a few stories of how she wasn’t listened to as well. And that’s all allowed in the system, and the horrible effects are somehow excused, even when they kill people.

      • The residential home he had been court-ordered to stay for treatment “ran out” of the Clozapine. They have a psychiatrist in charge of all medication management, so I would say the responsibility lies solely on his shoulders. This is malpractice, to abruptly stop 500mg daily Clozapine. My son had been on Clozapine for probably 16 months at this point. He wanted more than anything to be “compliant” because he wanted to come home. He knew the routine, the blood draws, etc. In fact, for some reason, when he began “treatment” at this residential home, the psychiatrist immediately raised his 300mg daily Clozapine to 500mg daily Clozapine. I think that most the guys in the home were given clozapine – cookie cutter psychiatry. I was very involved and saw what was going on in the home and saw all the guys going for their blood tests. My son did very well at the residential home for 10 months. They complained that he would not wake himself by 9AM daily. So, they would “write him up” for not getting out of bed by 9AM. He would get written up and disciplined – not able to enter his room until bedtime each day. That was his only trouble there. Otherwise, he did all chores, attended day programs and groups, even led an exercise group voluntarily. But, when they ran out of his Clozapine, he called me scared. He knew it was trouble. When I called the next day, I got the same story from 3 different employees: It is yours son’s fault that we ran out of his Clozapine because he refused a blood test on 07/12/2018. And I was told that because of that refusal, they ran out of Clozapine for him on 07/20/2018. I have everything documented. I was told that the pharmacist called the home asking for my son’s blood test results in order to fill his RX. That is when they supposedly realized that he did not get his blood drawn. Later, they changed the date to 07/05/2018. Then, one of the administrators told both my husband and me in a 3-way conversation, that they do EVERYTHING to avoid a crisis. He was a good talker and soon took over all communications with us. After that 3-way phone conversation, I immediately called him back and got his VM. I left a message telling him that at least THREE employees were aware that my son supposedly refused a blood draw for TWO weeks. They knew that in two weeks, he would run out of Clozapine. If they do everything they can to avoid a crisis, why did they not take him for an emergency blood draw, or have it drawn the next week (the nurses came every Thursday to draw blood). He never answered my questions.

        And, the haldol was not administered until the residential home allowed my son to became horribly ill and they had him “Baker Acted” and had police escort him to the hospital. I even have the police report. There was no struggle or mention of psychosis. The police just said he took the baker act report from an employee. They dropped him off at a psych hospital.

        On this day, 07/26/2018, this hospital forcibly injected him with Haldol, Ativan and Versed without my knowledge or his consent. I was out trying to find out where he was. That hospital claimed he fell and hit his head (another report from the MD says he banged his head against the wall). Either way, they had my son transported via ambulance to a medical hospital that also has a psych floor. (I believe that they knew he was physically ill from abruptly stopping the Clozapine) During transport, EMS forcibly injected him with haldol, ativan and versed. I finally found my son at the medical hospital ER. My husband and I were there. They told us our son needed a CT scan of his head and was refusing. My son was not combative. He was just refusing a CT scan. He told me that he had never hit his head. He even asked me to feel his head and I did. There were no lumps on his head. Anyway, the nurse came in with a syringe filled with haldol and ativan. I told her immediately that he cannot tolerate haldol. This was documented in the records. She returned with geodon and ativan. I didn’t want him to have geodon either, but he got it. I do not know how he is alive. Then, the hospital that day (07/26/2018) cold turkey stopped his daily 225mg effexor too. So, he was suffering severe withdrawals of Clozapine and Effexor. And, little did I know, he already had haldol and ativan in his system. The ER nurses told us that our son had to be admitted to medical for observation because his bloodwork was not good. Meanwhile, the hospital continued to forcibly inject him with haldol and ativan without my knowledge. And by 07/28/218, early morning, not even medically stable, they transferred him to the psych floor. One nurse admitted to me that he was admitted “in respiratory distress and in restraints” that morning around 1:00AM. I later got a call that he had been transferred and that he was “producing excess saliva in order to choke himself” but not to worry because he cannot choke himself that way. That was a lie! He was seizing and foaming at the mouth all day!!! Trying to breathe! Anyway, the nurse told me he was in isolation because he had spit on a med tech.

        Then, you read the rest – we came to visit him at 5:30PM and saw what we saw. He was dying.

        And another mother I know, who has written a book about her son’s experiences, and who is promoting early treatment etc… In other words, she believes the medical model — I found out that her son died in a psych ward. I asked her once: I know this is a very personal question and you do not have to answer if you are uncomfortable, but how did your son die? What did the hospital tell you was his cause of death? She responded by telling me that the hospital told her that her son died of either a cardiac event or some type of seizure. She told me she will never know for sure. I am sorry, but I told her they killed him. I know that is a difficult truth. But she knows my son’s story. I told her that they would have told me the same thing had my son died. I encouraged her to try to find more information, but I doubt she will. What makes me sad is that this is still happening. The same people are still employed, same doctors still have their licenses to practice, the same things are happening right now. Most of the men in the residential home did not have family involved. No advocates. They just disappear. I have so much I could tell of how I was intimidated and more. Awful things. It is a mafia. I cannot even think about it right now.

        I also have met a woman whose father was murdered in a FL hospital with injections of haldol and ativan as well. He had dementia. He begged her to get him out of the hospital because as he said to her, “they are going to kill me”. Well, they did. And she now is politcally active to change a law in FL that she calls the FL Free Kill Law. Basically, if someone is single and has no dependents under age 18, dies in the hospital, nobody can get information nor sue the hospital.

        This is her story if interested: https://www.floridamedicalrights.org/single-post/2020/02/15/CBS-News-covers-Florida-Free-Kill

        Something has to change. When did our hospitals and doctors begin harming and killing?

        • mmarti2007

          Apart from seeing close friends lives destabilized by the mental health system, committing suicide or dying of other related causes brought on by the mental health system, I actually forgot that I know a story of someone being directly killed by the mental health system, in the city I live in. I only heard about it from someone who was a friend of a lady barber, who knew a poor elderly man who got thrown into this mess, where the lady barber had been trying to intercede and become his legal guardian. The poor old man had gone to the hospital distressed because of a valid skin condition. Because he was distressed they had suggested he take an anti-depressant, which he declined, and then he got committed. And that’s simple distress because of a skin condition. At one point he was in an asylum getting shock treatment, and the barber (who I still have to look up, I only know where she works) she was trying to become his legal guardian, but was being prevented by lawyers who had taken over his money, and consequently also being paid to be his guardians I think, the barber lady was told by the poor old man: “get me out of here, they’re killing me,” and next she heard he had an apartment for awhile, but then died. They had managed to take over his whole life. House Everything… Mindfreedom had TWO stories like this of girls who with their mother had gone to the ER, and when the mothers had stated they didn’t want their children on an anti-depressants for valid distress involving a physical condition, the girls were both thrown into the system, and were ward of the state.

          Stuff anyone of us hears regularly that others wouldn’t believe. It’s also QUITE scary the amount of nurses that go on anti-depressants, also when they are still in school.

          https://www.idealmedicalcare.org/75-med-students-antidepressants-stimulants/

          And you just have to truly research what anti-depressants really do to be highlyg concerned about how much anosognosia is going around regarding what the “medications” really do with the people who are supposed to tend to the sick.

          If your son is foaming at the mouth, because of the medications, and it’s not acknowledged that that could be causing him to choke, and that then it’s listed he’s trying to do that on purpose, this is so pretentious that most people would shriek upon hearing such nonsense, but people like us hear it regularly regarding psychiatric treatment reports.

          One can only assume, given that your son never wanted to abruptly be forced off of clozapine, that he wasn’t told why he needed to have blood tests, and wasn’t told that if he refused them that they couldn’t keep him on clozapine. When I do a search for clozapine and blood tests, it also mentions that when someone has been on it as long as your son was, they only require blood tests every month; but it’s quite clear that they didn’t avert at all a crisis, and didn’t tell your son they needed blood drawn to get his prescription, and when the pharmacists said he needed the blood test, they didn’t give him one afterwards. Here:
          https://www.pharmaceutical-journal.com/cpd-and-learning/learning-article/how-clozapine-patients-can-be-monitored-safely-and-effectively/11138788.article?firstPass=false
          it says that after one has been on clozapine for 34 weeks (your son was on it for 16 months) that one only has to have monthly blood tests, so they still had two weeks to get the next test in. And that’s information that’s freely available online. And clearly if they had told your son this, he would have complied with a blood test, it really wasn’t that he was refusing all blood tests.

          I have to tell you that I’ve experienced this all over the place, that as SOON as people think that you’re crazy, you can’t do any normal thing that they might be suspicious of without them adding on ad hoc diagnosis. It’s not a pleasant experience to have a needle stuck in you every week, and it should be understandable should someone not like it – if that is even the case that he refused – but to not make it clear why it would be necessary, while it’s completely clear that he would have complied since he called you up begging you to get them to reinstate his clozapine, that’s highly irresponsible. It’s like your son is supposed to be a mind reader, when there’s no way he could know that the blood tests are necessary or his clozapine won’t be refilled. It sounds like mostly that because he didn’t want a test, and wasn’t compliant, that they hurled their own irresponsibility at him for not telling him why the test would be necessary when then he would have taken it. And it seems that they cover all of that up thinking he’s being non-compliant, as if he’s supposed to be a mind reader or be seen as non compliant. And that’s another thing; as soon as they think someone is crazy, they don’t openly talk to that person anymore, but get together and make ad hoc diagnosis, without even finding out what’s going on with that person. Here, all they had to do is tell him why the blood test was necessary. And one is left having to convince them that they aren’t dealing with or relating to you anymore; instead of them honestly or openly dealing with you, you have to deal with paranoia do you have what’s really normal healthy self determination anymore, or question them about normal things anyone should want to know. WHERE ELSE in medicine do they do such things?

          We all have heard this story about psychiatric drugs being like diabetes – which isn’t true https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OVNiLKjMME – but can you see them not telling a person that he needs blood work to get his prescription filled, when he is on diabetes medications, and then taking him off of them without telling him beforehand why the test work is necessary if he declined such tests although would have taken them did he know they were necessary. But here, someone can’t not want to take a test they aren’t informed of as to why it’s necessary, without being treated as if they are supposed to know that. And who is the “professional!?”

          And EXCUSE ME, but someone is going to say there’s something wrong with me when I think: “you know that’s just like fascism: when you’re not allowing yourself to be controlled by another, when you don’t just simply to as you’re told, you’re non compliant.” And all they had to do is explain why the blood tests were necessary. It’s about someone not questioning them, and doing what they are told to do, or be seen an non compliant, or showing “symptoms” of a “disease.”

          And how did he get two black eyes, and how is him foaming at the mouth because of medications equated with a suicide attempt on his part, and how can it not be seen that a medication that they are informed of he can’t take is going to cause terrible side effects when given to him (while going cold turkey off of others, and not just one)!?

          And mmarti2007. This is all really disturbing stuff, that would push anyone over the deep end. I hope you do things like take walks, watch sunsets, do yoga, meditate, listen to calm soothing music, go to museums, read books that sooth you about life and that it all comes out in the end, read poetry, write poetry, play a musical instrument, eat healthy food (lots of vegetables and green stuff). I’ve taken a break from the computer twice writing this, to do yoga. This is all highly abusive distressing stuff that most people when they hear about it either don’t believe it, disassociate from considering it, or even blame it on the victim.

          And I would perhaps encourage you not to watch scary movies that are full of scary chase scenes making you feel something is after you, because that adrenaline will put you on edge and rob you of the answers that might be there when you haven’t been driven to distraction and desperation; even when you feel guilty you’re not doing something, or feel like you’re being defeated not doing anything, it could be better to just let go of stuff, and let the truth shine, because that’s not going to go away. None of us can know what went on with these terribly paranoid brainwashed people to get them into such a fascist state, but sometimes, when we get out of the way, the the turth (or God if you will) has the chance to shine through.

          These people are going to fixate on anything they have the chance to “diagnose” in order to disassociate from all the compromises they’ve made in life. Like the old church bitties that start gasping when anyone shows up in easy clothes, too colorful clothes or behavior, hair too long looking too much like the pictures of Jesus etc..

          There’s no great loss in getting out of the way, sometimes.

          • “None of us can know what went on with these terribly paranoid brainwashed people to get them into such a fascist state”

            Too true Nijinsky, but it’s a question i’ve pondered for some time. But they certainly are paranoid about having the truth exposed.

            I don’t live with the fear they do, though they have certainly tried to make me live that way. They wish to control everything around them, and yet isn’t that a form of insanity?

            I’ve found so many times that what has been recorded in medical records is much more telling about the author, than their subject. The fact that the author is prepared to openly lie on such documents much more revealing of character, than the lies they pointed at others to have them drugged. They are much more poisonous to our communities that the person they have harmed, and then that they deny any responsibility for. See for example the high profile cases where ‘shooters’ have been under the influence, though it could not possibly have had anything to do with the violence they have been subjected to by mental health services. If we had just got to them earlier…… more money please.

            I know in my instance the fact they feel the need to kill people to conceal their acts of torture and kidnapping (which would be lawful had I actually been a “patient”) is telling. They know the ‘treatment’ of these people who have been labelled “patient” goes so close to the line in terms of human rights abuses, that they move the lines further to ease the paranoia, and in the process actually make bigger abuses possible. It must of course all come crashing down at some point, the victims bulldozed into pits and the tutt tutts this should never have happened will be uttered ….again.

            I know I just watched the link to Judgement at Nuremburg posted in another article by Lametamor. It really made me appreciate that I’m not an aboriginal living in this land given the way human rights legislation is being dismantled. When we are attempting to pass clauses in the Mental Health Act for the forced sterilization of children without parental consent, and actually passing a Euthanasia Act with legal protections that will be ignored by those with a duty to enforce them. I’d be running. The ‘targets’ of these legislative changes are fairly obvious, land rights will need to be stopped at some point (particularly when one considers the consequences of the “Terra Nullius” lie on which this Nation has been built). It’s theirs, but we are going to ensure they are never in a position to take it back. Our Prime Minister lied when he said we are a Nation of people who value a Rule of Law, because if we ever did, we would recognise our theft, and return what was stolen.

            And how much does that theft play on the minds of people in power who are becoming increasingly paranoid? I know I had a discussion with someone yesterday regarding the claim by our Premier that he had been “ambushed” by our Prime Minister. Using the same reasoning that was weaponized against me, without any proof that he was “ambushed” all he has is his paranoid delusion of persecution. The Prime Minister is way too busy to be worried about having an email to all Premiers delivered at specific times to embarrass them. I wonder if anyone has noticed he may be losing the plot.

            Habius Corpus Premier before making such allegations. Without the proof, you’ve got nothing. In as much as if the police had managed to retrieve the proof I had been spiked, tortured and kidnapped, then I could have been drugged for speaking the truth. As it stands all we have is a list of crimes as long as my arm being ignored by a police force that is doing more ‘planting’ that the Forestry Dept.

  15. I have not logged in here in a long time, yet felt I had to, to thank you, Sherry. Was once again feeling very tired of no one believing me about these drugs and yet, I know if I told you my experience you would. Finding your post this afternoon has made me feel so much better after a difficult day. Thanks so much!

  16. Psychiatry’s excuse for throwing unsuspecting people into iatrogenic apocalypse boils down to, “They were dysfunctional *before* I treated them!”. And, Sherry’s story exposed it as an absolute lie. Diagnoses and VERY dangerous drugs really are psychiatry’s first-response to “ordinary” stressors. The irony in Sherry’s life was what psychiatry had subjected her to, for so many years, as she maintained a state of imperiled existence that would have been viewed by any clinician as robust, “ordinary” health. She was working hard, conscientious in meeting her domestic obligations, trusting – and paying – her authority figures, and requested support while she managed her “ordinary” life, which sounded quite nice, but also demanded a LOT, perhaps an excess, of her energy and time. Psychiatry’s refusal to care for Sherry in a safe and basic way (Those quacks eschewed so many better alternatives to drugs: massage therapy, counseling, referrals to elder care services for her mother, etc..) was a direct consequence of its unconditional animus towards ANY level of individual need. That “profession” is a #shithole of hatred, recklessness, and waste.

    • “They were dysfunctional before I treated them.” I always find this a very lame line of “reasoning” and don’t understand why it seems to work to deflect so many people’s concerns. If I went in for a sore shin and came out of the doctor’s office with a broken leg, I don’t think they’d get away with saying, “Well, the leg was dysfunctional before I treated it.” Treatment, if we may even use such a term, is supposed to improve the condition. Even accepting that the person was “ill,” if they continue to act “ill” despite your “treatment,” how does that let you off the hook? If your “treatment” doesn’t work, why are you accepting money for “treating” them in the first place?

      • Excellent Steve.
        I could never ever honestly argue that I have not been or felt dysfunctional, at least in comparison to my ‘norma’l counterparts. But I have gone to medical doctors in the past with pain which they could not identify, but they never overrode science and went to a boardroom and made up illnesses with prescription pad in hand.

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