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I'm drained by talking to people who might be first discovering basic truths about the mental health system that I've been aware of for over 15 years. But my excitement comes alive when I consult with people recently off of psychiatric meds who are interested in doing work similar to me, mentoring others about coming off of psych drugs.

The adage that one must step outside their comfort zone if one wants to achieve success is troubling, and it’s time to stop letting it go unquestioned.

On December 29, Nassir Ghaemi, MD, a psychiatrist and a professor at Tufts Medical Center, published on Medscape an article titled Psychiatry Prospects for 2015: Out With the Old, In With the New? In it, he writes that with the changes in health care "Clinicians can stop pretending that relationship and social problems have to be shoved into a biological-sounding DSM category (such as major depressive disorder or generalized anxiety disorder) and treated with the only thing insurance companies would reimburse long-term: drugs." So there it is, starkly stated: Clinicians, by which he clearly means psychiatrists, have been pretending.

We suspect that many people would benefit from an alteration in diet and there is certainly growing evidence that improving diet affects physical health. Whether that is true for mental health needs to be more rigorously tested, and we are encouraged that there are studies currently being conducted around the world attempting to manipulate diet to directly test this hypothesis.

There has been quite a bit going on in the UK mental health world of late, and MiA already shares some of this in the form of open letters from Anne Cooke, et al. and Richard Bentall. Both are responses to a series of BBC programmes. In their letter Kinderman, et al. also make reference to a recently published report; The Five Year Forward View for Mental Health. This has been published by a so-called independent body; The Mental Health Taskforce to the NHS in England. Readers would find it encouraging; it refers to a need for closer attention to early intervention, to the need to address stigma, for a focus upon life’s transitions, and innovations that could support recovery, personal autonomy and well-being. What happened? Nothing!

Bob-- Yet another challenging day. I had two more patients today whose trajectories would relate perfectly to Anatomy of an Epidemic. The first was an 61...

Massachusetts Bill HD 4554 needs to gain sufficient state representative support by Tuesday, March 1, 2016. This bill will put restrictions on the prescribing of benzodiazepines and non-benzodiazepine sleep aids, and will require that all patients be informed of the potential dangers of these drugs, specifically the dangers of long-term use.

Allow me to introduce myself to you... I'm a California transplant and now live and work in the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex where I...

A lot of posts on this site are about the problems in mental health care. This post is about some solutions. Many of us can do small, simple things to move advocacy forward. We can all make a difference so people can learn how to handle emotional distress without using disease based approaches with chemically based "solutions." Here are 5 things you can do in the next five minutes to promote UnDiagnosing Emotional Distress.

It is hard for me to feel celebratory on the occasion of our 40th reunion. As my career winds down, I feel more disappointment and dismay than the glow of lifelong achievement.

This column is partly a report on the marketing of Abilify, the atypical antipsychotic that has become America’s best-selling drug.   It’s also an appeal for advice and feedback from the RxISK and Mad in America communities, and a call for some brainstorming about strategy.  The plans laid out by drugmakers Otsuka and Lundbeck for Abilify’s future, and the cooperation they’re getting from leading universities, are alarming enough to me that reporting on them seems inadequate.  We need action, although I’m not sure exactly what kind.

The Five Hindrances perspective encourages exploring the underlying causes of suffering and developing strategies for coping and resilience.

One of the biggest barriers that people who are “psychotic” face is one of communication: other people often have trouble understanding what they’re talking about. The way they describe their experience and their ideas are simply foreign to most people. This lack of clear communication is what gets them labelled as “psychotic” in the first place, and thus it leads to a breakdown between the “psychotic” and the rest of society. This is a loss to both groups.

Please join us in demanding that the FDA stop the shock device from being down-classified to a Class II device. We have until March 28th, 2016.

On October 7th I gave a talk titled "The Transformation Triangle: Public Education, Alternatives & Strategic Litigation." In thinking about my talk, I realized that I could piece together a very short video on neuroleptics reducing the recovery rate from 80% to 5%.

Apparently someone felt that I was giving President Trump a way out of his moral dilemma. However, I feel we all have moral obligations that do not end when we have mental and emotional problems. In fact, our freedom and empowerment when we are troubled may be necessary for our recovery and survival.

If a therapist is honest about their triggers, they risk equalizing the power imbalance. They risk being on the same plane as their client. If the therapist has triggers too, they may end up being as “bad” as the client’s, and then what? Then who is the healer?

I am flattered and pleased to have been asked by MadInAmerica to post here the letter PsychRights wrote Monday to Vice President Biden regarding the misguided, counterproductive and very dangerous focus on identifying and forcing "treatment" on people diagnosed with mental illness as any part of the solution to gun violence in the United States.

A review of the "Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents" books by Lindsay Gibson. Even though adults experience emotional loneliness, such loneliness can also start in childhood when we might have felt (and I would submit, actually were) unseen emotionally by self-preoccupied parents.

Did scientists recently discover that the Serotonin Theory of Depression is false? Or has this been known for decades? We investigate.

The disease theory of addiction had been ingrained in our culture for 200 years when Nixon signed this law. But had we ever actually checked to see if it was all true?

Ruling on a class action lawsuit brought against the nation’s largest health insurer, Judge Spero concluded that it had adopted treatment guidelines focused on saving costs through limiting coverage to the management of acute mental health episodes. How much psychotherapy does a person need to achieve meaningful and lasting change in their emotional outlook?

When I first saw this Lancet 2018 network meta-analysis of antidepressant trials, my thought was that the authors had rewarded those companies that had cheated the most with their trials. My suspicion was strengthened when I looked at the results in their abstract and the three drugs they claimed were more effective and better tolerated.

When I heard a voice speak to me last week, I was experiencing a response to significant events — the voice was a way for my mind to intentionally contain a confusing personal event or experience. As a professional, I am grateful for the powerful reminder that hearing voices is something to embrace and support, which includes putting aside my own prejudices.

What I find most compelling about the message of RECORD is its reclamation of pain, for the album makes clear that Dylan's is not the story of a journey to happiness and bliss and total peace of mind, but rather, one back to the truth of what it means to be human— pain, anguish, and all. It is an embracing of suffering, not a leaving behind of it, and this, too, has been my journey. This, I believe, is what psychiatric liberation is all about.