Seeds of Hope: A Journey Toward Truth about Psych Drugs
I believed I needed the drugs to keep me going, because every time I tried to get off, I couldn’t function. Years later, I learned the truth: The meds had only been masking the festering sores beneath the surface of my stability.
A Positive Change for Mad in America Continuing Education
We are going to organize webinar events, starting this fall, that will be easier to register for (sign-up on Zoom), free (donations will be accepted), and often feature two or more speakers (or a panel), with more time devoted to an interaction with the audience.
An Obituary for My Colonizer: Reflections on the Legacy of DJ Jaffe
When I heard this morning that DJ Jaffe was dead my face went through its own mutation; a moment of surprise and wonderment followed by swift elation, and then, very quickly and now for so many hours afterward, an enraged, frustrated, quick-breathed grimace.
Can We Allow Suffering?
After 9/11, no psychiatrist, nurse, or social worker asked me what it felt like to watch as nearly 3000 souls left this planet in flames; what it felt like to be so afraid. There was a strange silence around it, as if this horrible event was unrelated to my mental state.
Very Slow Taper Best for Antipsychotic Discontinuation
An article in JAMA Psychiatry advises very slow tapering for best results when discontinuing antipsychotic drugs.
UN Special Rapporteur Dainius PĹ«ras: Biomedical Approach “Still Has an Important Role to Play”
In PĹ«ras' new UN report, his use of biomedical language seems at odds with his message to move beyond the medicalization of distress.
Dear “Psychology Today”: Believe Incest Survivors
Incest survivors are the neglected heroes of the #MeToo movement. Yet when it comes to entrenched narratives that silence incest survivors, mainstream media continues to propagate these harmful myths unchecked.
Born Addicted to Valium: Understanding a Lifetime of Symptoms
Withdrawal felt like: evil feeding on my soul, my spirit being tortured, not being able to feel love, constantly feeling like I was falling in a dark tunnel, and wanting to get out of my body.
Deep Sleep “Therapy” in Australia in the 1960s & ’70s: Could Something Like This...
Psychiatry has a history of continuing to perform harmful, even deadly procedures. But does it still happen? Medication-induced akathisia filled two and a half pages of the DSM-IV. Why was it written out of the DSM 5?
Inequities in Mental Health Services: It’s Time for a Reckoning and Rectification
Clinical education must include more training in macro skills that help build the supports, policies, and community infrastructures under-served clients need.
SSRI Withdrawal’s Elephant in the Room: Tardive Akathisia
Slower tapering of antidepressant dose is generally more comfortable. However, success or failure after stopping completely mostly relates to whether tardive akathisia occurs.
Do We All Need Tinfoil Hats? Considering Schizophrenia
If alien species wanted to intervene in human society without fully revealing themselves, how would they do it? Choose a select number of individuals who are easily discredited by others in the group. In other words: Turn people into schizophrenics.
Psychiatry and the Selves We Might Become: An Interview with Sociologist Nikolas Rose
MIA’s Ayurdhi Dhar interviews the well-known sociologist of medicine, Nikolas Rose, about the role psychiatry plays in shaping how we manage ourselves and our world.
An American History of Drugs and Addiction, Part Two: Immigrating to a Temperance Culture
As Prohibition was taking hold on the East Coast in response to European immigrants, equal efforts for Prohibition were occurring on the West Coast, fueled by racist caricatures of Chinese immigrants.
Antipsychotics Associated with Severe COVID-19 and Fatal Outcomes
A new study has found a strong association between antipsychotic drugs and higher rates of severe cases of COVID-19.
Then and Now: Will Psychiatry Ever Change?
In my experience, psychiatry is a discipline in which treatment and gaslighting exist in a complex braid. One side might show more than the other at times, but they’re closely woven together and hard to pick apart.
Who Is a Danger to Others: The “Mentally Ill” or the Powerful?
If the cultural and socioeconomic structures of society had, from the beginning, allowed me to function, and even thrive, I undoubtedly never would have felt a need for antidepressants and “therapy.”
Validating Psychosis: The Missing Narrative Â
I am here today because I didn't take the psychotropic medication I was prescribed. Because I didn't accept someone else's narrative about MY story. Because I listened to my voices. Because I let them guide me— into the underworld, and back.
Ecotherapy/Nature Therapy/Green Therapy
Do you love hiking, backpacking, gardening or taking walks in beautiful places? Ecotherapy explores how our relationship with nature is an essential and therapeutic part of our humanity.
Behavioural Geneticist Robert Plomin: “There Are No Disorders, There Are Just Quantitative Dimensions”
It is encouraging to hear leading scientists such as Plomin acknowledge that psychiatric diagnoses are fundamentally arbitrary and that the idea of a “cure” does not make sense with regards to psychological issues.
A Tale of Two Paradigms
Two recent mental health reports from Oregon are steeped in the medical model, written by "experts" without lived experience and sponsored by the pharmaceutical industry.
Stop Saying This, Part Three: “Everything in Moderation” and More
Let’s start only accepting real relational offerings that do not make us contort, disavow comfort, strong-arm ourselves into appearing strong, or shoulder responsibility that is not ours.
Identity, Oppression, and the Culture of “The Mentally Ill”
A "mental illness culture" means that full time work is seen as impossible and discouraged, and your social world only consists of other mental health "consumers" and mental health workers.
Kicking Over a Straw Woman
The Galvin family is the quintessential example of "genetic" schizophrenia. But their history of sexual abuse, violence, and trauma provides a clearer and simpler explanation.
A Recovery Movement Jedi Master, Bill Anthony, Died Recently
The first time I met Bill was in 1991. I was just a couple years out of residency, and he was already the legendary “father of psychiatric rehabilitation.”
