If We Knew What We Know Now
I never questioned the adults around me or wondered if the medications were necessary. Of course they were necessary. A doctor said so.
Ken Burns’ “Hiding in Plain Sight…”: Candid Interviews, Canned Conclusions
I was hoping for more accurate representation of youth mental health challenges. What I saw instead was a glossy patchwork of mixed messages.
Catherine’s Story: A Child Lost to Psychiatry
A year ago today, our youngest child died, thanks to the adversarial actions and toxic treatments foisted on her by medical-model psychiatry. By telling her story, we hope to promote systemic change.
From Horse Ranch to Home Ground: Healing Families via Telehealth
Since COVID, NISAPI has transitioned our collaborative therapy setting from barns and fields to kitchens and living rooms. Our clients report similar positive outcomes with telehealth as in person.
ADHD: The Money Trail
Doctors, drug companies, and the news media have profited from skyrocketing rates of diagnosis and drugging for ADHD, and the law has created a perverse set of incentives for parents and children which favor the ADHD label.
The Abused Children to Bipolar Pipeline
The mental health system traumatized me further. They were allies with my abusers to cover up and continue my abuse.
From Labeled to Healer: A Road Less Traveled
We have let down our children (and ourselves) by losing touch with parental intuition and handing their care over to professionals at the first sign of a problem.
Saving Lives or Cementing Stigma? A Review of “Just Like You…”
In my experience, episodes of anxiety and depression dwindle in the face of hope and empowerment, while broken-brain narratives lead to deeper despair.
Connecting the Dots: My Toxic Workplace Made Me “Mentally Ill”
In 1996, I suffered my first manic episode. My mother was convinced it had been caused by chemical exposure. But I wouldn’t hear it, and neither would my psychiatrists.
Engaging “Madness”: A Guide for Significant Others and Families
Using personal stories from my own family, my new booklet Engaging 'Madness' paints a clear picture of what an alternative healing journey outside the biomedical paradigm can look like.
Parenting Changed My Perspective on “ADHD”
My experience of raising a son who was bright and creative but didn’t fit the mold helped me to approach my restless, impulsive students more compassionately and creatively.
Why Do People Self-Harm, and How Can We Stop It?
The psychiatric treatments I underwent did nothing to help me come to terms with my troubled past. Self-harm did not serve me well either. We must re-learn what to expect from ourselves.
Collateral Damage: The Negative Impact of Antidepressants on New Zealand Youth
Health and wellbeing in young people are trending down in New Zealand. Are antidepressants to blame?
Save the Date! Kids in Crisis: The Overprescribing of Psychiatric Medication
Mad in America presents a live Town Hall featuring a special, private screening of "Luna" followed by a panel discussion.
Why Is Child Sexual Abuse So Common in Institutions?
Where ableism and adultism allows disabled children to be seen as unreliable narrators of their own experience, sexual violence in institutions will continue to be pervasive.
Home Alone: Finding Connection During the Pandemic
This wave of emotional distress is a perfectly reasonable human response to living our lives in an increasingly isolated and uncertain world.
Guardianship Destroyed My Family
People who can’t take care of themselves need support and protection, but guardianship provides neither. I know: I've lived it.
Fatherland Dreamland Motherland Hinterland
I grew up in Rhodesia, a British colony in southern Africa. Until the age of 16, I lived on the grounds of Ingutsheni Mental Hospital where my father worked. As a psychiatrist, he had enormous power.
Getting A Diagnosis Meant That My Sister Never Had the Chance to Resolve Her...
My sister was told if she took medications everything would be fine. But everything was not fine, and the medications sent her down a path of no return.
Book Review: “Opening Up: The Parenting Journey”
This is a book about stories, urging families to recognize their own strengths and create new narratives on the path ahead.
“Floss on the Waves”: My Sister’s Journey
It takes a long time to recover from a psychotic episode, I understand now, and I wish someone had found a way, especially during those early years of her troubles, to give Rachel more space and time to find her own path to health.
Postpartum Anxiety, Psychiatric Drugs and Paternalism
My postpartum anxiety diagnosis became subsumed by an arbitrary diagnosis of depression. And this diagnosis has followed me for 30 years and counting.
The Sins of Conservatorship: Why Britney Spears Compared It to Slavery
For the last three years of my mother’s life, she was under absolute control of her conservator. If we dared to object to the neglect or abuse, retaliation was certain.
Garbage in, Garbage out: The Newest Cochrane Meta-Analysis of Depression Pills in Children
In May 2021, Cochrane published a network meta-analysis of depression pills for children. The abstract is misleading and reads like drug company marketing.
Why I Fight for Trauma-Informed Systems
I am not sure what was worse: being abused growing up while my community documented—then ignored—my torment, or being attacked for going public with my story.
