Part II: Michelle Starts Prozac and Sees the Devil
By 2011, anyone who read the scientific literature would have known that children cannot tolerate SSRIs and should not be given them. Neither Conrad nor Michelle seemed to have been warned about the common adverse effects (such as nightmares and compulsive suicidality) of the SSRI antidepressants they were on.
May Cause Side EffectsâRadical Acceptance and Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal: An Interview with Brooke Siem
Brooke Siem discusses her experiences of being medicated with antidepressants as a teenager, her withdrawal from a cocktail of psychiatric drugs and her debut memoir, May Cause Side Effects.
Pills That Steal Generations of Lives
Suddenly I had an insight into why my dad decided to end his life in 1976. I learned that, like me, he was on antidepressant medication. It seems highly likely that his illness could have been entirely caused by side effects of medication, just like it was with me.
The Year I Lost Everything, Psychiatry Offered Nothing
After a failed suicide attempt following my son's death, New York State incarcerated me in a mental institution for 21 days. The environment was degrading, stultifying, and downright depressing.
What Should We Really Call Psychiatric Drugs?
There is no rational way to argue against putting psychiatric chemicals into the category of neurotoxins. All psychiatric substances alter âthe structure or functions of the nervous system,â disrupt âthe normal function of nerve cellsâ and act âspecifically on nervous tissue.â It is time to clean up the misleading mess of words in psychiatry.
Why I Resigned From The Mighty
The apprehensions I'd initially had about joining the team returned to my mind. I'd allowed my original cautious disposition to be overtaken by optimism when I had accepted a position of contributing editor with The Mighty, but my hopes were about to be dashed.
Makers of Risperdal Sued for Breast Development in Boys
Thousands of boys and young men are lined up in courthouses around the country to sue J&J for gynecomastia caused by taking Risperdal as young children. The condition is irreversible except by surgical removal. Collectively, they have become known as the Risperdal Boys.
Psychiatric Detentions Rise 120% in First Year of 988
As contacts to the new 988 suicide hotline number have risen, so have call tracing and police interventions.
55 Steps to Informed Consent
55 Steps is a new film based on a true story that centers around two women: Collette, a lawyer with a tendency to work long hours, and Eleanor, who has spent far too much time incarcerated in hospitals. Over the course of five years, Collette fights for Eleanorâs right to choose whether or not she takes psychiatric drugs. This film is imperfect, but its importance canât be ignored.
Alternatives to Suicide: Strategies for Staying Alive
For more than 7,300 days of my life, waking up the next morning required me to make a conscious choice to diligently pursue something â anything â other than my impulse to die. Maybe the best teachers of how to avoid suicide will not be the people who are afraid someone else will die, but those of us who can explain how and why we regularly choose to live.
Neurodiversity is Dead. Now What?
The neurodiversity movement is a public relations campaign that emphasizes the positive qualities associated with some presentations of autismâcreativity, increased tolerance for repetition, enhanced empathy, and exceptional memoryâwhile erasing or minimizing the experiences of autistics who are severely disabled.
ADHD Diagnosis Based on âIllogical Rhetoric,â Analysis Claims
In a philosophically rigorous article, Spanish researcher Marino PĂ©rez-Ălvarez examines the logic of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Depression: Psychiatryâs Discredited Theories and Drugs Versus a Sane Model and Approach
Psychiatryâs depression outcomes are poor because its bio-chemical-electrical treatments are based on a depression model that science has flushed down the toilet.
The False Memory Syndrome at 30: How Flawed Science Turned into Conventional Wisdom ...
Soon after states finally began providing adults who remembered childhood abuse with the legal standing to sue, the FMSF began waging a PR campaign to discredit their memoriesâin both courtrooms and in the public mind.
Hereditary Madness? The Genain Sisters’ Tragic Story
The story of the Genain quadruplets has long been cited as evidence proving something about the supposed hereditary nature of schizophrenia. But who wouldnât fall apart after surviving a childhood like theirs? The doctors attributed their problems to menstrual difficulties or excessive masturbation â anything except abuse.
“Three Identical Strangers” and the Nature-Nurture Debate
Three Identical Strangers is a riveting film describing the story of identical triplets separated at six months of age and reunited in early adulthood. Their story provides no evidence in support of the genetic side of the nature-nurture debate, but it does supply some evidence in favor of the environment.
Why I’m Not Celebrating Being PMDD-Free
Iâm not celebrating because so many of my sisters are still stricken by this disease. They're remanded to the care of mental health professionals who ply them with therapy and scripts for SSRIs, SNRIs, and benzodiazepines, none of which offer long term relief from the horrors of PMDD.
Dying to Stay Alive: A Ketamine Disaster
Ketamine treatment, which was being hailed as a âmiracle cureâ, backfired so spectacularly that it very nearly cost me my life.
Peer-Support Groups Were Right, Guidelines Were Wrong: Dr. Mark Horowitz on Tapering Off Antidepressants
In an interview with MIA, Dr. Horowitz discusses his recent article on why tapering off antidepressants can take months or even years.
The Most Dangerous Thing You Will Ever Do
I am a psychiatrist and I have been watching my profession deteriorate for many decades. This is my most direct written statement about the dangers of stepping inside a modern psychiatristâs office. My conclusions are the culmination of mountains of research authored by me and by an increasing number of other psychiatrists, scientists and journalists.
Antidepressant Use Leads to Worse Long Term Outcomes, Study Finds
Results from a 30-year prospective study demonstrated worse outcomes for people who took antidepressants, even after controlling for gender, education level, marriage, baseline severity, other affective disorders, suicidality, and family history of depression.
Jordan B. Petersonâs Support of Corporal Punishment for Children: A Critique
In his book 12 Rules for Life, supposedly based on "cutting-edge research," Jordan Peterson attempts to justify the hitting of children as a form of discipline. But Peterson does so without citing a single study to support his view. In fact, this entire section of the book is bereft of any reference to any research supporting the effectiveness of corporal punishment.
New Book Deconstructs Ideology of Cognitive Therapy
CBT forwards a hyper-rational perspective of human suffering that complements a managerialist culture of efficiency and institutionalization in the Western world.
The Prescription that Changed My Life
What I have learned is that benzos donât discriminate. They donât care that you have a masterâs degree or that you are a good person in the community or that you were just doing what the doctors told you to do and you were woefully ignorant and misinformed of their dangers.
Response to Criticism of Our Serotonin Paper
Criticisms of the paper were contradictory. Some psychiatrists said that no one ever really believed the serotonin theory. Yet the public does believe it, and are very surprised to learn that it is a myth.