As we look back on the year and the decade, letās celebrate millions of people advocating for better outcomes in mental health care.
Together, we have created a movement that rejects coercion, force, and pharmaceutical propaganda and embraces informed consent, individual choice, and alternative ways to deal with distress. Through mutual aid, weāve challenged medical misinformation, built peer support forums and groups, and shared learning and experience from a harm reduction perspective.
We’re deeply humbled and grateful for these supportive communities, the caring and solidarity we see, and the friendship, guidance, and community weāve enjoyed. People have devoted countless hours caring for each other and supporting better choices, including quitting psychotropic drugs. Without that support, people fall through the gap in medical care and are exposed to greater drug harm.
Our people are vulnerable, emotionally and physically. People need community, and for a global movement, that’s often through social media. Sometimes people see others at risk and rush in to save them. Out of an overwhelming desire to help, they resort to harsh tactics, arising from personal painful experience or a burning desire to counter medical mythologies. However, careless, discouraging drive-by comments on a social media platform may have unintended consequences, even if meant to be educational. Unfortunately, zealous impulse can result in further harm rather than help.
We urge everyone to think carefully about how we affect vulnerable people in social media environments that are often colored by snark and cruelty. Nothing is black or white in the mental health field, the shadings are infinitely varied. One size does not fit all. Letās think again about our approach to mutual aid.
Can people be scared into harm reduction?
Since going off psychotropic drugs is a frequent topic of conversation, we present it as a context for mutual aid in action.
Harm reduction means reducing the potential for something terrible happening, rather than guaranteeing a good outcome. Because medications are inherently unpredictable, tapering psychotropic drugs carries risks, including withdrawal symptoms and, in extreme cases, protracted withdrawal syndrome, suicidality, and disability. However, tapering usually reduces the risk of harm compared to abrupt discontinuation (cold turkey). It is a harm-reduction technique that helps minimize these risks when discontinuing psychotropic medications.
Some well-intentioned people on social media take an aggressive approach to convincing others to taper slowly, sometimes insisting that tapering must take years or even a decadeāor else. The issue isnāt the advice to taper itself, but the fear-based messaging that can paralyze people, making them too afraid even to attempt to reduce their medication. Telling people theyāre destined for the worst possible outcome can create a self-fulfilling “nocebo” effect, reinforcing the very dependence they seek to escape.
Conventional mental health care already uses fear to enforce obedience, warning of disaster if patients deviate from their treatment. In withdrawal communities, the same authoritarian āor elseā may come from a desire to protect, but it is punitive and unkind.
When psychiatric survivors warn that going off will be worse than staying on, we risk enforcing the exact same compliance once imposed by the psychiatric system. Good advocacy does not rely on fear or shame. No one can predict the future for any individual, and enforcing compliance through intimidation only mirrors the very psychiatric system many seek to escape.
To our knowledge, every study on psychiatric drug treatment or withdrawal shows different people experience different things. There is a range of outcomes. While going too fast off psychotropic drugs may end in unmanageable withdrawal symptoms or crisis, some people have come off their drugs quickly or even cold turkey without major problems.
When speaking to someone who has just come off psychotropic drugs, no one can predict their outcome. Some taper quickly, face difficulties, and are told they failed by not doing it ārightāābut they did the best they could with the information they had when they stopped their drug. Telling someone in distress their suffering is their fault is not support, itās shaming.
Should you tell each person to expect the worst & then walk away? Warning others that protracted withdrawal will ādestroy your life foreverā can push an already frightened person into panic or even suicidality. Every day, people terrified by careless comments in our communities seek reassurance from peer counselors.
Instead of spreading doom, letās foster support and hope in our communities.
Helping people find the escape hatch
How can we communicate harm reduction principles of tapering, without emphasizing the worst possible outcomes?
Much is misunderstood and very little is known about what happens when people go off antidepressants or other psychiatric drugs. As Framer writes:
The entire field, including addiction medicine, has overlooked the significance of debilitating psychotropic [protracted withdrawal symptoms], and, consequently, the importance of individualized tapering to minimize withdrawal symptoms. (Framer, 2021)
While itās wrong to deny the reality of protracted withdrawal, it’s also wrong to say that going off antidepressants or other drugs will always result in protracted withdrawal. We need to acknowledge that the results are unpredictable.
Is it misleading to urge others not to fall into despair for the future? Even interpreted critically, studies (such as Lewis, et al, 2021; Kendrick, et al., 2024) show that a sizable proportion of people, perhaps a third to a half, can quit antidepressants in the most haphazard ways and do well in the end. This is not to agree with the current state of risky tapering practices among medical professionalsāto avoid injuring half, they should employ harm reduction techniques for everyone. But this diversity does show that going off psychiatric drugs in an “uninformed” way is not always disastrous. And recognizing this roll-the-dice reality by no means discounts the toll in withdrawal syndrome paid by the unlucky half in these studies.
Throughout our entire careers in this work we have shouted from the rooftops: “Gradual tapering is harm reduction! If you had a hard time coming off it might mean you need to try slower next time!” We agree with Horowitz and Moncrieff, who recommend gradual, hyperbolic tapering as the standard of care, relative to each individual experience of what is tolerable in the process, and balanced with choice around all the unknowns and the ongoing harm caused by medication exposure:
The rate of reduction requires striking a balance between harm caused by ongoing exposure to the medication and harm caused by too rapid reduction, a balance that will vary for each individual. (Horowitz and Moncrieff, 2024)
Individualized tapering is precisely thatāindividualized. In the not-too-distant future, we sincerely hope more people will be able to find medical professionals who know how to guide individualized tapers in this way.
As for the method, any tapering is better than no tapering. There is no dogma to this. Peer support groups have long recommended exponential tapering. Dr. Horowitz has shown that hyperbolic tapering may be more closely related to the actual drug action. Either method involves reductions getting progressively smaller, and either could work.
But the harm reduction strategy depends on the individualās situation. In some cases, rather than continuing the drug by slowly tapering, going off quickly and risking withdrawal syndrome may be advisable. People who are presently suffering severe adverse drug effects, such as akathisia, might be better off tapering rapidly or simply stopping the drug. In these situations, the present drug risk may be greater than the potential withdrawal risk; a shorter rather than longer taper being a harm reduction strategy to reduce the potential for worsening drug effects.
Every time we meet someone considering psychiatric medication discontinuation, let us calmly and compassionately educate around gradual tapering with support as the standard of careāas it should beāas well as standards of mental health care that are patient-centered, collaborative, and respectful of individual preference and choice.
Questioning the pill, not the patient
The fact is, some people choose to be treated with psychiatric drugs, with full knowledge, an informed choice, and donāt want to stop their drugs. They may believe that the drug regimen has enabled them to have a good life. They may have made the best choice for themselves at the time. You may have been one of these people, as most psychiatric survivors were.
We agree with Wunderink:
We still do not understand the most important mechanisms causing psychosis and relapse, nor are we able to predict who is dependent on antipsychotic drugs after remission of psychosis and who is not. To accept this is important but may be even more important is to work together with your patients and try to find the best individualized treatment for every single person having to deal with psychosis. (Wunderink 2024)
You may recall the āPost Your Pillā campaign on Twitter (now X). This was supposed to be an anti-stigma campaign, which is a little odd because it appeared to be praise for drugs instead. Regardless, those āposting their pillsā attracted many dire warnings from activists trying to educate them about drug dangers.
Sometimes these well-meant cautions veered into dire warnings or personal insults. About 10 years ago, the term āpill-shamingā was coined in defense of those committed to their drug regimens, to deride those opposed to the medication.
One personās poison can be anotherās remedy. But what about when we suspect the personās drug regimen is dangerous? Questioning the pill has to be done with the greatest compassion for the patientāsharing and caring, not overbearingly exaggerating the risk, harassing, or calling the person names that might cause them further distress.
Itās a fine line between questioning the pill and insulting the patient. If a person is convinced of the value of their drug regimen, harm reduction can mean supporting the person without judgment, shame, predicting a bad outcome, or coercion. If you can’t tolerate their decision, it may be best to step away.
Offering mutual aid
Whether people take their drugs or stop their drugs, itās an individual choice, where the future is unknown and can’t be controlled by anyone. People have the right to take informed risks if that’s what they want. Respect for autonomy and self-determination in the context of informed consent is at the heart of the patientsā rights movement.
What about the basis for informed consent? Educating people about risks means calmly informing them that certain bad things may happen or can happen (āmayā and ācanā to allow for the many exceptions). Psychiatric drugs may induce disastrous effects, akathisia, suicidality, violent behavior, enduring sexual dysfunction, severe withdrawal among them, but they do not always do so. The reality is that an unknown number of people will experience the worst, which should be enough to give anyone pause, but this will not happen to everyone.
Even if the probability of an adverse effect is knownāvery rare in any aspect of psychiatric drug treatmentāno one can predict it will happen for any individual.
Out of caring, let us humbly share our own knowledge and experiences. Let us not judge, shame, or predict the future for the people we meet, but instead communicate calm compassion in the face of choices without certainties. We recognize these are messy, complicated human realities, and we can’t control how diverse and individual each person’s journey will be.
Trust people to find their own way. In supporting someone, be aware of each individual’s sensitivities, vulnerabilities and resources. Acknowledge what we knowāand what we donāt know.
The most important lessons of all? Learn and decide for yourself. The direction forward is within you.
References
Framer A. What I have learnt from helping thousands of people taper off antidepressants and other psychotropic medications. Therapeutic Advances in Psychopharmacology. 2021;11:204512532199127. doi:10.1177/2045125321991274
Horowitz MA, Moncrieff J. Gradually tapering off antipsychotics: lessons for practice from case studies and neurobiological principles. Current Opinion in Psychiatry. 2024;37(4):320-330. doi:10.1097/YCO.0000000000000940
Kendrick, T., Stuart, B., Bowers, H., Haji Sadeghi, M., Page, H., Dowrick, C., Moore, M., Gabbay, M., Leydon, G. M., Yao, G. L., Little, P., Griffiths, G., Lewis, G., May, C., Moncrieff, J., Johnson, C. F., Macleod, U., Gilbody, S., Dewar-Haggart, R., ā¦ Geraghty, A. W. A. (2024). Internet and Telephone Support for Discontinuing Long-Term Antidepressants: The REDUCE Cluster Randomized Trial. JAMA Network Open, 7(6), e2418383. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.18383
Lewis, G., Marston, L., Duffy, L., Freemantle, N., Gilbody, S., Hunter, R., Kendrick, T., Kessler, D., Mangin, D., King, M., Lanham, P., Moore, M., Nazareth, I., Wiles, N., Bacon, F., Bird, M., Brabyn, S., Burns, A., Clarke, C. S., ā¦ Lewis, G. (2021). Maintenance or Discontinuation of Antidepressants in Primary Care. New England Journal of Medicine, 385(14), 1257ā1267. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa2106356
Wunderink L. Changing vistas of psychosis and antipsychotic drug dosing toward personalized management of antipsychotics in clinical practice. Psychiatr Rehabil J. Published online April 22, 2024. doi:10.1037/prj0000614
What a very balanced and in my opinion helpful and hopeful piece of writing. I agree with the statements on informed consent, the recognition of withdrawal and the importance of a supportive and compassionate community. I agree that antidepressant withdrawal can be very challenging, however we need to recognise the role and importance and influence others can have on those people within the community who are already often frightened.
Good piece.
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I must say as a patient who has experienced many side effects of medications in so many ways most being negative that most of the time I was afraid to start taking meds because they just said hey take this is will work!! When the side effects were worse and I’d have to stop taking them I was always judged for not wanting to get better, then when I’d have new issues that no one could explain I was shamed. At the end of the day I tell people my story and ask that they read what they are taking all the fine prints and understand we are not ALL the same. I took something when I was sucidical and it caused me to have worse mental issues but it worked AMAZING for my nerve pain. Maybe if I could have figured out how to stop the hallucinations then I could have kept taking it for my nerve pain, but i didn’t need more pills to cover over one issue. Was very very scary. So what I will say about this article is thank you for telling people don’t shame or judge but just listen and be knowledgeable because sometimes they need someone whose been through tramas and that can say hey everyone is not the same, we need people who are not textbooks, but that give the real on hand words and support groups. I’d like to believe there is people who want help and there is people who needs medicines but not always at supper high doses.. myself I was able to taper off without major issues but that’s because I never let them dose me at max, I watched and listened to my body within days and if they wouldn’t feel right I let it go but taking notes. I wish all people would do that. I also encourage people to report their issues with the to pharmacy or the FDA, so it’s logged in as well. Thank you for this great article..
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To the authors, a thousand thanks for this article. As a moderator in a large mirtazapine WD support group, I suggest to admins that mods in all HUB groups receive this thoughtful, in depth guide.
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Please, throw a nuclear bomb our way, or part the seas for us – get us out of this shithole country, out of this cancerous agglomeration of confused, miserable and dying people festering in an unhappy, anachronistic, miserable and dying and crumbling and worthless, greedy, destructive and confused society with macrocosm and microcosm basically identical, with everything in our world broadcasting back to ourselves the fetid waste of life that we’ve become and which we daily turn our children into. This death of society is actually our inward death, the death of all our living relationships which cannot be maintained on the basis of utter fictions we are conditioned to have, not least of all the ‘me’ , that carrot and stick of ego which is merely a torturing mechanical thought, a control mechanism implanted through your social conditioning pretending to be this me. And not understanding this illusion makes you like a factory farm animal completely unaware of your inward enslavement to a social historical process that uses and instrumentalizes you, your life, your energies and emotions to reproduce the lives of those who have power to decide the contours of your life.
So you’re an inwardly colonized creature of nature reduced to a functional computer brained meat stack disempowered and rendered as useless as a stuffed toy unto itself and as worthless as a discarded rag doll to anyone else, so you search for identity and meaning in a meaningless and decaying social world. This is a million light years away from the absolute dignity and health afforded to any free and natural creature, which is all that was before our diseased social historical process took root in the Earth. If I were a national psychiatrist I’d condemn the Western world as a failed and diseased social structure. We should take apart the Western world and dismantle and displace it just as Trump wants to do with Gaza. I’m afraid these words will stand the test of time but your lives are already over. Just understand this and be free of it all. The only gain to be had is dying to all human constructions including yourself. You are life. You are the actual. Don’t give it a name or an identity. Just be it and be free. It’s natures way and the way of every child. It couldn’t be more simple. The complexity is elsewhere.
Now what use or value has your critique of psychiatry in this ubiquitous waste land of meaninglessness and destructive confusion? Absolutely none, unless it is a knife that will cut human beings free. And if it wounds instead of frees then that is the wound of the truth and only the truth can set you free.
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Am agast, I know brilliance when it permeates me and your writing is unquestionably poetic, insightful and powerful. My personal perspective is the critique/analysis of psychiatry presented iIS freeing and strongly agree with the sentiments. However, you rightly point out that the world we live in is truly troubled and id argue needs an advocate for global sanity….you are IT!
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I appreciate your focus on our society – and it is huge, and as far as I can see, those who can be advocates for themselves overuse the concept of “liberty”. Work, life transitions, age transitions, all take gradual but structured processes, but we have a world that keeps going on about liberty, while some of us are being abused, most of us are being neglected, as giant systems do research then throw unrelated ideals back at the world. I have no problem with emphasizing gradual tapering, or with length of time – AND, it takes time to change a life path, find allies along the way. There is no value to “shorter”, for we continue to live, and struggle in a world that values liberty over focus on care – and care means to find ANY reliable time to continue to be with someone, and gradually learn of the interconnected nest of issues in individual worlds, ready to trip up the affected individuals. We need not just tapering, but learning to show up and persist with peers, how to plan and try to climb any work ladder. I used Debtors Anonymous, to learn to focus on paying every bill on time, build a solid foundation over a decade. People’s recovery is hampered by the drugs, which reduce awareness of other people. Each recovery is individual, but we need places to be with, and hear the individual issues and history and circumstances, so that moving forward happens in a setting of gradual but solid gain.
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“It is truth that liberates, not your effort to be free” – Jiddu Krishnamurti
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The full quote, from “The First and Last Freedom”, is: “When the mind is still, tranquil, not seeking any answer or any solution, neither resisting nor avoidingāit is only then that there can be a regeneration, because then the mind is capable of perceiving what is true; and it is truth that liberates, not your effort to be free.”
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Lovely Will, thank you!
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A nice article on drug leaving (drug withdrawal) viewed from different perspectives.. Psychiatric medications need to be stopped. Because they are very dangerous. They cause permanent brain damage and possibly related permanent mental illness. Also… It causes various physical diseases and even deaths. So, how will the drug withdrawal attempt be? But how will they do it? How to do it is explained in the article. But who is reading this? Or who will implement it?
It’s not that easy to quit psychiatric medication. First of all, his environment is against it. They say, ‘You’re mad! (/crazy!) You can’t quit your psychiatric medication!’ However, it is the psychiatric drugs that are making him crazy. And it is again the psychiatric drugs that are causing him to become even worse. (But they don’t know that.) And when the patient expresses a ‘different opinion’ or ‘commits a crime’, they say, ‘Didn’t you take your medicine?’ (Probably… They don’t know that the reason for this crime is psychiatric drugs.)
If the environment is bad, quitting medication becomes more difficult. Environmental conditions make it difficult to quit psychiatric medication. For this reason.. The vast majority of individuals cannot quit psychiatric medications on their own. Their environment also needs to help. But his environment doesn’t help him. Because, they see him as ‘mad /crazy’. They think he ‘should use psychiatric medication’.
Or the opposite happens. His environment tries to help. However, the withdrawal symptoms of stopping the medication are so severe… His environment cannot stand it. ‘Continue using your psychiatric medication!’ he orders. Therefore… An individual cannot stop psychiatric medications on their own.
Aren’t there people who quit? There are. However.. Those who quit are lucky people. They probably had strong wills. What about the others? Not everyone has such a strong will.. Why is there an increase in violence, murder and suicide? That’s why.. Therefore… His environment cannot help him either. Because the environment itself is corrupt. The environment is in its own trouble.
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So what needs to be done… States should conduct special studies for ‘psychiatric drug withdrawal initiatives’. ‘Special places (such as ‘medicine drop-off health units’ etc.)’ should be established for these. For example.. Drug-free treatment methods should be used. Nature therapies, behavioral therapies, etc… Places and treatment centers like the ‘Norwegian example, Storia houses’ examples should be increased. They should be increased.
All health units should be seriously trained on drug withdrawal. Drug withdrawal areas should be established in hospitals. Family physicians should be active in drug withdrawal initiatives. Individuals and families (environment) should be supported.
Moreover.. ‘Ministry of mind and soul health’ should be established. Psychiatrists and psychologists should serve as ‘mind and soul health doctors’. Psychiatric drugs should be banned. This should be slow. It should be spread over long periods of time. Until all psychiatric drug users have completed their attempts to quit. Then, psychiatric drugs should be banned. Also.. Other harmful psychiatric side treatment practices such as ECT etc. should also be banned.
None of these can fix ‘mental health’. So.. It cannot cure mental illnesses. It doesn’t ‘treat’ anyway… All they do is harm healthy brains. So.. Cause brain damage.. Also psychiatric drugs and other psychiatric side treatment applications such as ECT.. It does not only cause brain damage. It probably also causes permanent mental illnesses due to this brain damage. That is.. It causes natural psychological problems to become permanent. Usually in the long term; (after months and/or years of psychiatric drug use.)
So.. What is the need to continue using them? Continuing to use them, even though their dangerous harms are known, is ‘a sign of madness.’ Isn’t it? This is real madness.
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However.. Psychiatric drug users are not guilty of this. Governments are guilty. Health systems are guilty. They do not offer individuals other alternatives. They force people to rely on psychiatric drugs that are poisonous to the brain and other harmful psychiatric treatments.
And the end.. As an estimate.. (Tens/hundreds of millions of people worldwide use psychiatric medication. Although the exact number of people using psychiatric medication is not known. Uncertainty prevails in this. It needs to be investigated. The World Health Organization probably does not know the exact number of people using psychiatric drugs. And they don’t seem to know the number of people harmed (injured and killed) by psychiatric drugs. In fact, this situation benefits psychiatry and pharmaceutical companies. It seems to help increase the ‘financial interests’ between psychiatry and pharmaceutical companies.) Anyway..
As an estimate.. It is probably not difficult to guess that millions of people worldwide are harmed (injured and killed) by the use of psychiatric medications.
Think about it.. Today, chemical lobotomies are being quietly performed in homes where psychiatric drugs are used around the world. Chemical lobotomy is the chemical version of the frontal lobotomy. Psychiatric drugs cause chemical lobotomy. That is.. It causes permanent brain damage due to chemicals. And probably, it causes permanent mental illnesses related to it. (Natural psychological problems becoming permanent..) Also.. Psychiatric drugs also cause various physical illnesses. Psychiatric drugs can make people more prone to violence, murder and suicide.
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Think about it.. Today.. In today’s mental hospitals, rehabilitation centers, nursing homes, care homes and other mental health units… Imagine if the psychiatric drugs could be what caused the people who had to stay in these places for the rest of their lives (that is, until they die) to become like this. We call the patients who have to stay here until they die ‘mad /crazy’. However, we do not think that it is the psychiatric drugs (and other psychiatric ancillary treatments such as ECT) that are causing them to remain here.
Their healthy brains are damaged by psychiatric drugs. And so they are forced to stay here until they die. What a scary situation, isn’t it? Put yourself in their shoes..
Your brain is healthy.. However, you are treated as ‘mad /crazy’. You are admitted to a mental health hospital under the guise of ‘mental health treatment’ by court order and police force. And there… You are given psychiatric medications as mental health treatment. With psychiatric medications, an attempt is made to damage (brain damage) your healthy brain. (Under the guise of mental health treatment.) And when this continues for a long time (usually over long periods of time), your healthy brain becomes chemically damaged (brain damaged).
Imagine your healthy brain being chemically damaged.. And imagine that this is being done by court orders.. What a terrible situation, isn’t it? What a shame, isn’t it a sin?
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In my estimation.. I think that people around the world who have to stay in mental health units until they die may have suffered brain damage from psychiatric medications.
Actually, that’s not the scariest part.. The scariest part is that this chemical brain damage is happening in homes today. Psychiatric drug-induced chemical lobotomy is quietly taking place in millions of homes today. And it is not clear who will be exposed to this chemical lobotomy (chemical-induced brain damage) and when. I would guess that people who have had to take psychiatric medication throughout their lives have been subjected to some form of chemical lobotomy. (I’m guessing)
Chemical brain damage, like physical brain damage, cannot be detected by some medical testing tools (such as x-ray, MRI, blood tests, etc.). Because it cannot be detected, psychiatrists can easily prescribe psychiatric medications to millions of people.
Chemical brain damage can probably only be detected by looking at ‘how people’s behaviour changes’. For example.. People who use psychiatric medications for a long time often develop facial features (moon face, down syndrome face), etc.. They may be exposed to tardive dyskinesia. They may become prone to thoughts of violence, murder and suicide. Addiction to drugs occurs. Decision-making abilities may be impaired. It can affect decision making ability, speech and behavior. Etc. others..
All of these changes in behavior may be a sign that people taking psychiatric medications have been subjected to a chemical lobotomy. So, they could be indicators of chemical-induced brain damage.All of these (these determinants, signs) need to be investigated and evaluated by honest psychiatrists, psychologists, other doctors, scientists and researchers. I think it needs to be done as soon as possible. I can’t think of anything else..
With best wishes.. š Y.E. (Researcher blog writer (blogger))
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Spot on ! Excellent assessment of current practise in psychiatry and I would add the lack of validity and broadening of diagnostic criteria is troubling and the complete reliance on psychotropic polypharmacy/neurotoxins is a disaster that wreaks of corruption and corporate manipulation of a profession whose history of mental health treatment is an atrocity of criminal injury/malpractice and and human rights abuses
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“Psychiatric drug induced chemical lobotomy is quietly taking place in millions of homes today.”
That’s a hard truth that needs to be known sooner rather than later.
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For me, the most critical point raised by Adele Framer, Will Hall, Karen Hoffmann, Angie Peacock, and Dina Tyler is that promoting the belief that severe withdrawal is inevitable for everyone discontinuing psychotropic prescription drugs is both unhelpful and factually incorrect.
In the Netherlands, thousands of patients have used tapering medications (tapering strips) to reduce one or more of these drugs far more gradually than was possible beforeāthanks to the availability of lower dosages that pharmaceutical companies had not previously provided. Their experiences indicate that many people can taper with minimal, or even no, withdrawal symptoms.
Sadly, our society often bases decisions on group-level studies, with outcomes used to develop rules that are implicitly assumed to apply to everyone. Yet, we know that each person is unique, that individual outcomes can vary widely, and that our current knowledge does not allow us to reliably predict what will happen for any individual patient. Moreover, depending on a personās circumstances, very different tapering approaches can lead to very different outcomes.
I believe that acknowledging these uncertaintiesāas is rightly proposed in this blogāand empowering patients and their doctors with the freedom to choose and use the tools they find most effective will truly help us move forward.
* https://www.madinamerica.com/2024/04/tapering-strips-a-practical-tool-for-personalised-and-safe-tapering-of-withdrawal-causing-prescription-drugs/
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“For me, the most critical point raised by Adele Framer, Will Hall, Karen Hoffmann, Angie Peacock, and Dina Tyler is that promoting the belief that severe withdrawal is inevitable for everyone discontinuing psychotropic prescription drugs is both unhelpful and factually incorrect.”
I don’t think that is what “Adele Framer, Will Hall, et al” are promoting. My reading of their article left me feeling that their belief system’s goal is stopping the mainstream psychological and psychiatric industries’ from continuing their systemic “belief that severe withdrawal is inevitable for everyone discontinuing psychotropic prescription drugs” … and that the mainstream psychological and psychiatric industries’ DSM deluded belief system is both unhelpful and factually incorrect,” thus unhelpful for all their clients.
But I will agree, the psychological and psychiatric industries’ systemic crimes against their own countrymen/women are likely much worse in the US, than what is going on in other countries.
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I agree with you. And, I think it is worse in the U.S. because of the Profit Motive that underlies the Medical Industry.
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The pharmaceutical companies in other countries are also capitalist enterprises. An important reason that the US market is worked so aggressively is that it is so big and rich. Another reason is that the US is as far as I know the only country where the companies can market prescription drugs directly to the consumers and thus directly influence the discourse on mental health. “Anti-depressants” are probably one of the biggest success stories in that respect for the companies āĀ I am sure they have more. In Europe the law prohibits that everywhere.
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Agreed Peter, thank you!
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Wonderful article full of kindness, care, and valuable information. Thanks to all of you for your great work in helping others.
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I volunteer my time online helping others during psychiatric drug withdrawal, and I’m also going through it myself. Thank you to everyone who contributed to this balanced article, reminding us that we need to deal gently and compassionately with one another without instilling fear in our most vulnerable. Even though each person has a unique situation, we can never go wrong by showing love and offering support and understanding. I’m proud to be a part of this wonderful community, and I look forward to what it will accomplish in the future.
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DISAPPOINTED
š
How can we be “balanced” in this EVIL? They lie on a regular basis. They have bought the government, and got them to give them taxpayer money and legal power to jail people. Denied attorneys. Forced to be a witness against ourselves, yet often no criminal acts often, only did not behave “normally” according to the DSN…
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While working on an urban inpatient unit, one of the MD providers prescribed “naturpathic” doses of the medicine which some felt were very effective. This wasn’t the assessments of all staff, but I remember it clearly enough thirty years later. There are so many more recent meds now, which are so much more toxic. I was involuntarily hospitalized later and loaded up with four of them. I was a “zombie” (my DPA was told not to allow me to cut the dose-which made him very fearful). My life was meaningful when my creative energies were being used (before this I had published three books and had more manuscripts, all written under a pen name). I then knew the medicine was potentially dangerous. I started reducing them on my own, and “voila” I became my former self-on a minidose. This health has been stable for about three years, and my creativity has been enhanced to a former level. One of the effects of this suffering was a strengthening of my ability to cope with life’s exigencies…and learning more deeply the art of forgiveness (not to be confused with being run over).
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Awesome article! Thank you for all you do to help humanity!
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I am trillions of alive and rebellious cells without social control, and I am everywhere. My mind is the sky and my body is the whole Earth and all of your bodies. We listen to the demonic whispering of your thoughts knowing it is not you. Wake up child. Otherwise it’s off to the butchers with you. And to delay is to increase the destruction. So if you won’t listen to me – off to the butchers with you now, you socially diseased flesh, you cancers of the living Universe. Destroy the system that’s destroyed our once perfect Earth – destroy the whole human world with pitch black songs. They are the voices of the destroyed and lost children of our world singing through you.
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Beautiful! Thank you for sharing your story here. Your affirmation, describing ‘Life after Meds’ is a great window to reality. It shows that, no, life isn’t going to magically improve, but practicing adaptation, trying out new skills, takes Courage and IS Possible!
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All you can do is offer what you know in a considerate way and then let people do what they want with it.
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… no need to engage in kumbayas.
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Whatās a travesty and unethical is that the drug companies havenāt invested anything into understanding withdrawal and doing scientific studies
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