Blogs

There was a lot said, shouted, chanted and sung about the rights of individuals (such as myself) who have mental health conditions at the March for Mental Health Dignity on the National Mall on August 24. The march—which was sponsored and supported by a list of advocacy organizations as long as your arm—had two basic demands: changes in policies that obstruct recovery from mental health conditions, and changes in society’s treatment of individuals who have such conditions.

I think we need to posit a meta-autonomy and meta-equality as being principles of natural law. To say "meta" here means that we do not have to adhere to traditional western constructions of the self and state - both legal fictions - but to go beyond them to what we actually value without thinking that everyone has to be the same as white non-disabled heterosexual males in order for our perspectives, our choices, our contributions and our claims and criticisms to be valid and for us to have standing in the social order.

What better way to keep people who have been dehumanized due to repeated traumatic experiences, and marginalized and stigmatized due their emotional distress, quiet and invisible than to do it legally and medically? Is there no better place to hide people who, when visible, are proof of social and psychiatric failure than in locked institutions? I have worked with many such individuals in the LA County Jail, and the locked inpatient wards, and in each case the institution’s process — although in compliance with legal and medical protocols — seemed to conspire to keep the individual powerless, medicated, isolated and confused.

My prior MIA blog posts have largely addressed the problems that can occur when people try to stop taking serotonin-related antidepressants, particularly  after taking them for a long period of time. I wanted to share a few updated thoughts that I have on the problem.

What is used to justify psychiatry today, if it is science at all, is bad science. Both the pharmaceutical industry and many of today’s psychological theories including those that support CBT employ the hoax of evidence-based psychiatry. We need to blow their cover.

In this truly remarkable — and meticulously researched — volume, Dr. Lynch annihilates psychiatry's cherished chemical imbalance theory of depression. Every facet of this theory, which the author correctly calls a delusion, is critically analyzed and found wanting. Please read Depression Delusion, keep it close to hand for reference, and encourage others to read it also. Ask your library to buy a copy. The spurious chemical imbalance theory is now so widely accepted that it will take enormous efforts to dislodge it. In any debate on this matter, Dr. Lynch's book will, quite literally, put the facts at your fingertips.

Study 329 is probably the most famous clinical trial ever. It is one of the few to attract a Fraud action and is certainly the only one with a $3 Billion fine linked to it. The study began recruiting adolescents to Paxil, imipramine or placebo in 1994 and finished up in 1998. Later in 1998, SmithKline Beecham, the marketers of Paxil (they hadn’t discovered it), acknowledged in an internal document that the study had shown that Paxil didn’t work for Children. This lack of benefit was something they were not inclined to share with the outside world. Instead they decided then they would pick the good bits out of the study and publish these.

Marijuana is now legal in two states, and legal for medical use in 23 states and the District of Columbia. Polls show the majority of Americans support cannabis legalization, and more and more of the country is joining the legalization trend. As a counselor working with people diagnosed with psychosis and mental illness I am often asked about my opinion and clinical experience — as well as my personal experience — with medical cannabis.

What would happen if the mental health system fully recognized the pervasive and profound impacts of trauma on their clients? How might a deeper appreciation of the multi-faceted sequelae of childhood maltreatment and toxic stressors reshape mental health services? While the implementation of trauma-informed care in mental health programs has made significant inroads, the dominant bio-reductionist model continues to constrain and undermine progress.

Today a 10½ minute long documentary airs on Oregon TV. You can see me tearing up my psychiatric label, “psychotic,” Martin Luther King calling for us all to be “creatively maladjusted,” a re-creation of my big fall that broke my neck, what screwing up your vocal chords can sound like, and us protesting for global revolution. Yes, making revolution visible now all over Earth is a great way to be creatively maladjusted to global warming, and this documentary shows that if I can do it, then so can you!

One cannot be with other individuals without encountering their belief systems at some point. My work with individuals in locked in patient units, mental health clinics and the Los Angeles Jails has brought me into close contact with people who had diverse belief systems, some of which were cultural and life-long, others were trauma-induced or influenced by drugs and alcohol. These experiences taught me to approach belief systems without prejudice and with open receptivity to their meaning and importance to the person.

In the late 1990’s, the NIMH set out to provide the most extensive review ever conducted of the effectiveness of ADHD medications in children. It was known as the Multisite Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD (MTA study). In 1999, NIMH announced that after 14 months, well-constructed medication management programs provided better results than other treatments, including behavioral therapy. But the study was not over, and the tables started to turn. By the end of three years, medication not only provided no more benefits over other options, it actually predicted greater deterioration of symptoms.

On a beautiful Vermont summer week-end, about 40 people – social workers, psychologists, psychiatrists, administrators, and people with lived experience among us – gathered together. Our purpose: To come together and model what many of us had experienced in Europe at the International Meetings for the Treatment of Psychosis.

I'd like to share some personal thoughts on the nature of the Hearing Voices group method, and the insights that this kind of support generates. Through these groups, a tradition of mutual healing is being created that honors subjective experiences, and sharing our stories with each other in this way propels this exciting movement forward.

The past several years have born exciting developments for those critical of the current psychiatric paradigm. We have witnessed outright criticism of the DSM by prominent psychiatrists (i.e., Thomas Insel, Allen Frances) while others have admitted that no “biological markers” exist for any DSM-defined disorder. Amazingly, however, the suggested response to these problems is to continue pursuing the search for the biological underpinnings of so-called “mental illness” through an almost evangelical hyper-focus on brain research.

DSM-5 defines delusions as "…fixed beliefs that are not amenable to change in the light of conflicting evidence." The manual lists six kinds of delusions: persecutory; referential; grandiose; erotomanic; nihilistic; and somatic. The APA provides another definition of delusions that is substantially the same as the one above, but offers additional varieties; Interestingly, nihilistic delusions are omitted from the second list. It is clear that the APA's definition of a delusion is not specific enough for consistent application.

There has been a lot of attention on clinical trial registration over the last decade. Essentially, because of some very clever and courageous researchers and clinicians the public have increasingly become aware that the literature base to support medications, including psychiatric medications, is tainted and biased at best and fraudulent at worst. What has been exposed is that medications, that we have been led to believe are evidenced based, are not as good as we thought they were. Negative trials haven’t been published, and researchers have been changing primary outcome measures.

Arguably the most controversial drug study ever, Study 329, concluded that paroxetine was a safe and effective medication for treating major depression in adolescents. It concluded that paroxetine was a safe and effective medication for treating major depression in adolescents, and it is still widely cited in the medical literature. Though GlaxoSmithKline’s promotion based on Study 329 resulted in the biggest fine in corporate history, the study remains unretracted.

The long-running debate on the validity of twin research recently resurfaced in American criminology, and has major implications for behavioral and medical twin research. Most twin researchers and their critics agree that reared-together monozygotic (MZ) twin pairs experience more similar environments than experienced by same-sex dizygotic (DZ) pairs, and we argue that the twin method is therefore unable to disentangle the potential influences of genes and environment on human behavioral differences, a conclusion supported by the failures of molecular genetic research.

Since a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advisory committee, on June 4, recommended approval of flibanserin (AddyiTM) in June, there have been numerous editorials and news stories about the controversies surrounding the first “pink Viagra” to hit the market. We have sought to understand the process and financial incentives that led the advisory committee to recommend its approval, with Sprout Pharmaceuticals prepared to market it as a treatment for a new disorder in DSM 5: Female sexual interest/arousal disorder.

Risperdal is increasingly used in nursing homes for “agitation,” especially on those suffering from some form of dementia, even when no hallucinations or delusions are observed. Risperdal has quite a long list of side effects including heart problems, metabolic difficulties, diabetes, involuntary movements, agitation, flat affect and sedation. Risperdal has earned a “black box" warning that its use in those with Alzheimer's increases the risk of earlier death. Yet its use in Alzheimer's patients in nursing homes is extremely common.

Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut released a new ‘Murphy Bill’ this past week. It’s called the ‘Mental Health Reform Act of 2015,’ though it has yet to be assigned an official number. While many words appear in its more than 100 pages, it’s worth noting that the term ‘evidence’ (most often paired with ‘based’ to form the familiar and supposedly scientific phrase, ‘evidence-based’) appears 27 times. Never to be outdone, the almost 200-page House version (‘Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis,’ H.R. 2646) from Representative Tim Murphy uses the same word 38 times. This makes sense. Why wouldn’t anyone want anything to do with… well… just about anything…

Lables such as schizophrenia mask all of the strengths, feelings and talents that individuals possess, The labels can make people's behavior appear aggressive, when in fact they are terrified. On the other hand, people in extreme states respond as all humans do to an approach that is calm, supportive, and allows them the space that they need at critical times. Individuals who have been abused, neglected, or suffered from traumatic experiences communicate these fears to those who have the patience and willingness to listen to them.

The story starts on 19^th of March, 1986, when I withdrew myself from 30 mgs of Ativan daily and 360 mgs of Opiate painkillers daily—all doctor-prescribed—with no support or assistance, other than the love and full support of my lovely wife Sue. It took me 15 months of hell on earth to withdraw.  So afterwards I researched the issues involved (after my brain had started to function again) and started on the long road of campaigning for dedicated withdrawal services by contacting our local newspaper and telling them my story. Horrifying as the facts read, not only was it a release for me to express my emotions and observations, but it slowly informed the general public of the dangers of long-term prescribed addiction.

Robert Whitaker and Lisa Cosgrove’s new book Psychiatry Under the Influence investigates how drug company money and psychiatry’s own guild interests have corrupted psychiatry during the past 35 years. I had some questions for them about: (1) guild interest corruption; (2) psychiatry’s evasion of responsibility and “cognitive dissonance theory”; (3) the “social injury” caused by psychiatry, especially to children; (4)whether they are being “too easy” on psychiatry; and (5) if it is possible to reform American psychiatry.