Everything I relate in the above comments occurred late in life. A big difference from someone just starting out.
Ecotherapy sounds good. Physical activity, walking, running. Therapy sessions outdoors. Almost sounds like things are coming full cycle.
The first psychotherapy book I read was āDepression and The Body.ā The author Al Lowenās emphasis was the same as EcoT only he called it being grounded in the body. He knew way back that the whole idea of therapy needed a radical upgrade. Sitting on a couch and talking was only 50% of his session. His Bioenergetic exercises adapted from yoga were made to facilitate body and vocal expression and *grounding.* Such things were ridiculed and considered a breech of orthodox professional practice & decorum.
Much later I moved away from that and tried the traditional route. The Gestalt therapist I mentioned was good. But that led to the psychopharmacologist MD and anti-psychs. Extended insomnia, voices, working too many hours led to a routine of nasty learned helplessness and compliance (OBEY, comply) with proscribed methods. Compliance is ok up to a point. If it leads to observable psychical and mental progress. Sometimes being sedated is progress when things are really bad. As long as the āside effectsā arenāt worse, long lasting and traumatizing.
I saw the movie Donny Darko in 2001. Fictional Donny was taking medication for depression. Bad things sometimes happen when messing with the neural matrix. Meanwhile in 2020 another Donny likely hyped on something is making people like me depressed but thatās very much beside the point.
Instead of the terror of Akathisia I had the complete sleepless equivalent extended over a 9 month period a decade ago. No street stims wanted or needed. Likely the result of abruptly discontinuing Seriquel & Provigil. Very nasty. Later at a hospital ward a dozen of the staff gave my psychiatrist a naughty naughty for proscribing Provigil to someone with insomnia. Where was my brain when I actually took it? Anything can happen when sleepless even for more than 3 days.
I was glad to see that someone, in this case Audrey, came close to how I look at meds, psychiatry and experts generally.
I try not to take on an identity wrapped in victimhood and complaint. I can say that bc I āonlyā hear voices along with occasional thumping, slamming, closed door effects and mild tinnitus when indoors. I can read anything I want without interference. The fact that my external reality is completely changed is mostly just a footnote at this point. I got off easy even though huge chunks of my life went out the window.
A decade after stopping anti-psychs and now all prescriptions I donāt even consider going back to see a psychiatrist. And not only bc they default so quickly to their prescription pads. The former head of psychiatry at a large hospital chain was charging me $300 per session a decade ago. After one session he told the simple truth for a change, that there was nothing he could do. He didnāt charge me and gave me printed affirmations that I never used. Theyāre not all bad guys.
Per Kristen Freedās comment:
psychotherapy is still an alternative. The American Gestalt therapist I saw in 2002 who recommended I see a psychiatrist was pretty good. He was also a Zen teacher who gave me the simple 4 words divided between the inhale and exhale to slow down breathing which interfered with and to a certain extent controls voices. āTheyā, the auditory hallucinations, mostly imitate and repeat which means repeating in the background the 4 words as Iām saying them for however long. Very simple and direct.
Mention anything about Zen Gestalt and mainstream eyes roll up in the heads of people who think that anything outside their practice automatically means quackery, anti-vaxx or Health Ranger magic pills to cure viruses etc. Mainstream psychiatrists exaggerate about this stuff for effect, for insurance and for legal reasons. And then prescribe an entire menu of drugs including Provigil for a person who worked 2 jobs and who had, among other things, insomnia. At least one psychiatrist did exactly that. The results were massive and were a massive waste of time and money.
Good article. This is basically how I feel about medication: āI am not anti-medication. I am anti-lack of choices. Lack of options, alternatives, education. I am anti-lack of self-trust and self-worth. I am anti- āthe experts always know better, and this is why.āā
I do not idealize or ignore experts. The slowness of medical progress, lack of R&D funding, symbiosis of psychiatry and Big Pharma regarding the selling of opioids and anti-psychs is pretty damning. So as Audrey says, I rely on myself for finding answers in and out of the mainstream. That can be difficult.
For me, everything got worse the more I relied on psychiatric prescriptions. Extreme sleeplessness beyond insomnia was the result. That was a decade ago. Still have voices and tinnitus but nasty delusions are gone. So I stopped all psych prescriptions a decade ago. Even asthma spray prescriptions 3 years ago.
I donāt agree with most of the articles on this site but some are useful. Eric Coates takes big chances to make the incomprehensible easier to put in context. I found Dr Peter Bregginās āfinest hourā interview with Judy Mikovits on YouTube (not MIA) before it was taken private. It might have been Breggin’s worst hour. Bregginās great 2020 MIA essay was my intro to this site so it was a big disappointment to see that interview.
Which means what? The nature of reality and disinformation with or without COVID is nasty. David Icke was kicked off YT which should have happened years ago. As for P-doc and ālife coachingā channels on YT? Many build up their views and subscriptions with mostly reasonable information…but when a black swan event like a pandemic comes along they show who and what they are. Then they go back to their brand of outsider but reasonable sounding personality driven word bombs to thousands of subscribers. A big improvement over the tsunami of TI mind control troll content before YT updated their algorithm.
All of which has nothing to do with Audreyās article but has much to do with how I see the alt-information landscape.
The word in the above second paragraph is *BEST* placement of relevant research. Nothing to do with EST, Eastern Standard Time.
Klaatu Barada Nikto (Klaatu your *Brother* is nix and needs resurrection reanimation pronto)
My impression of the original movie: Gort as AI is likely to be āonlyā semi sentient. It took orders from humanoid alien Klaatu as well as acting on its own.
Translating from fiction to what I hear internally… robot group repetitions give way to singular more human-like statements.
This long YT video via UCSF is pretty damn good IMO. Does not touch on schizophrenia or psychosis but has much to do with immunity and my previous posting.
A decade ago I had psychosis & now I donāt. I donāt take prescriptions. I still hear voices & tinnitus along with a different way of experiencing things.
This particular article may or may not be the EST place to outline 2019 research.
Do I read Psychology Today? No I do not. I donāt idealize or dismiss any of the following:
The study of immune alterations and the microbiome in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder is in its infancy. Two recent investigations of the oro-pharyngeal microbiota in schizophrenia found differences between cases and controls. Other studies have found increased gastrointestinal inflammation in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder based on measures of microbial translocation. Several studies have also found an association between the receipt of antibiotics and an increased incidence of psychiatric disorders, perhaps due to alterations in the microbiome.
Another trial of probiotic supplementation is underway in psychiatric patients, this one in mania. This trial is based on a longitudinal observational study of individuals with acute mania, which found that levels of immune makers, IgG antibodies to gliadin, a measure of gluten sensitivity and levels of antibodies to the NR2 peptide of the NMDA receptor, were significantly increased during the acute manic episode but did not differ from the levels of controls at a 6 month follow up. In addition, a combined inflammation score, calculated by factor analysis of the levels of class specific antibodies to the NR peptide of the NMDA receptor, gliadin, Mason-Pfizer monkey virus protein 24, and Toxoplasma gondii, differed from the controls during the acute episode but not at the 6 month follow up(F. Dickerson et al., 2013). In addition, within the mania group, an elevated inflammation score during the acute episode predicted rehospitalization for a new mood episode during the follow-up period. Clinical trials of therapeutic agents which alter gut microbiota or gastrointestinal inflammation will be the ultimate test of the role of the microbiome and immune-mediated pathology in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder
ā…studies to date in individuals with psychiatric disorders also point to the possible role of viruses and fungi as well as the involvement of other mucosal body sites such as the nasopharynx. Critical research needs include prospective studies to define risk prior to the onset of therapeutic interventions as well as methods for the accurate assessment of the microbiome at different mucosal sites in a practical manner. There is also a need for effective modalities for the modulation of the microbiome and the control of inflammation in a population of individuals who are taking a range of psychiatric medications.ā
Eric Coates writes a gutsy article. I had to laugh when I first saw the reference to Fermiās Paradox. Uh oh, here it comes. The metaphors then became apparent even to slow learner me.
I experience voices. From my limited perspective there arenāt any interstellar aliens visiting Earth. Regarding aliens? I think of the recycling death scenes in the movie āAvatar.ā The same metamorphosis likely happens here on Earth. Aliens are us and apart from us. Their immaterial proximity to average humans (ie: proles, nomaj) generates chaos.
Interdimensionals or angels, IMO, are and arenāt hiding. In human form they hide in plain sight. They are us and apart from us. Like voices. As humans itās likely they come with an inborn program or geas wherein itās impossible to reveal their duel existence. Usually depicted with wings and as a benign positive influence. Thatās not been my experience. The wings suggest instant communication and movement. Temporal displacement is real and not the product of disordered thinking. And no, that canāt be proved and I donāt share any of the above superpowers. Iām not one of the select and nothing important is ārevealedā by way of the particular mumblings or slamming door sounds heard as I type.
I get the impression said entities donāt like being described too closely like Iām doing here. Which means Iām probably completely wrong. In my minority view Orwell tried in ā1984.ā Itās more than a cautionary about future Hitlerās and Stalinās. He considered it a parody and no big deal while posthumously selling over 50 million copies. Lots of people project onto 1984. It definitely goes against accepted opinion to say that āBig Brotherā is actually an all seeing omnipresent cognitive dictatorship. Apart from paranoia, psychosis, projection and DSM labels.
In the movie āDay The Earth Stood Stillā all you have to do is combine the two aliens Klaatu and Gort and you get at least one aspect of what āaliensā in question might look like. A nasty robotic semi sentient AI and a āI come in peaceā posthuman. AI program with an occasional human-like voice whose default setting is to distort and lie like hell.
The same idea was presented in the movie Tomorrowland. A nasty AI āMonitorā hooked into the neural matrix of each human while delivering a constant stream of bad news. Combined with a human looking Gov. Nix whose name was meant to match one of the moons of Pluto, Nix, the mythical god of shadow and darkness. The movie release date and New Horizons satellite probe arrived at Pluto at the same time. Ahead of its time and generally panned whose ending kinda matches the positive side of todayās worldwide demonstrations.
I mentioned the word chaos. IMO, the machine-like negativity manifests externally these days in RW QAnon political chaos. Including 5G towers falsely said to cause pandemics.
Both psychiatric & psychological models for the cause of voice hearing are inadequate & self-limiting. Neither can they be excluded.
Physical causes are not popular on this site. The āno proof of chemical imbalanceā both true and…
Author Susannah Cahalan was diagnosed as bipolar & schizoaffective psychotic until an MD went way out on a limb & did a spinal tap. Instead of going to a psychiatric hospital it was found that her immune system was being attacked by autoantibodies. She had autoimmune encephalitis. She recovered. She was lucky.
Famous Sanford social psychologist Lee Ross contracted Gillian BarrĆØ Syndome. His eyelids were paralyzed, he couldnāt close his eyes & couldnāt sleep. He became psychotic. Over time the condition cleared up as his immune system improved.
I had insomnia & threatening voices. No visual hallucinations. I had a full menu of anti-psych meds while working 2 jobs. The meds made everything worse. I had to retire. Climaxing with an extremely long period of complete sleeplessness. During which various physical conditions hit me, arthritis, angina, pains in the back of my neck, hissing tinnitus. All temporary but Iām stuck with voices & tinnitus. There were immune factors mixed in that none of my doctors were capable of even approaching.
As for what causes these things generally? Neither of the two models mentioned can be dismissed as limiting as they are. I favor physical causes to be found eventually.
During extended sleeplessness I had what might be called a cerebral spinal flush where my insides lit up for a couple of seconds. Capped off with a glimpse of a grasshopper for whatever reason. No visions of dead ppl, aliens, God, Jesus, Buddha or devils for me.
All the above affects my interpersonal interactions. However I can read long novels like Thomas Pynchonās āAgainst The Dayā (of all the writers. Over the top amazing) without interference from āthemā that are part of me and apart from me. āTheyā are machine/ child-like repetitive & in group unison both inside & heard simultaneously as external to me. Itās a condition that bleeds into my outside life in ways subtle & not. All of which might get me an officiously stupid labels of being āwithout insightā from the DSM orthodoxy. In a time of pandemic or not, seeing them again isnāt even a question. But Iām always ready to be surprised.
Iāve been hearing voices for close to 20 years. Gave up on psychiatry & meds a decade ago. As mentioned two comments before this I also find MIA & psychiatry to be different sides of the same coin in too many areas. The same tired anti-psychiatry dogma carried forward for decades vs psychiatric arrogance and corruption along with Big Pharma & for profit insurance. Insurance companies now reporting huge profits assert their control over politics and medicine in equal measure. So far it doesnāt effect me.
Just finished āThe Great Pretenderā by Susanna Cahalan about the Sanford psychologist āsuperstarā David Rosenhan. Consummate charmer, lecturer and con-artist whose 1970ās article on the infiltration of psych hospitals (by himself and āothersā) that indirectly forced DSM changes (to avoid embarrassment), calling the publicās attention to conditions in and eventually the closing of many psych hospitals for better & much worse.
Cahalan was wrongly diagnosed Bipolar & then schizoaffective. An exceptional MD found the true cause as neurological, autoimmune encephalitis. She was one of the lucky ones. She was cured. Psychosis hasnāt reoccurred but she sees it as a constant threat.
My point? The BBB is no longer impermeable. Thatās a big deal (its possible even CV-19 gets through). The brain has its own immune system and links with the lower body which is now old science. So-called breakthroughs which arenāt, like psychosis as being categorized on a spectrum. Giving people the false impression of scientific medical neurological progress marching forever on-ward. I gave up on all of it and resort to making small changes, like complete 35 hour fasting once a week, cold showers, stopping coffee and alcohol (since April Fools Day, hah)
What is it about hearing voices and over consuming coffee? TCM claims just overdoing fluids makes you overly sentimental & emotional. Iāve heard hints that auditory hallucinations are said to be offset or eliminated by physical regimentation and planning every aspect of life. IOW, the opposite of the effects of hearing voices which tends to make me lazy. Sounds great but I refuse to turn my life into a tactical warrior boot camp.
Now itās CV-19 in NYC. I was pretty much self isolating even before CV-19. Persistent voices, sudden heart jumping slamming doors, loud scrapping & base pounding auditory hallucinatory sounds etc even as I type. Street drugs, alcohol not wanted or needed. At best itās called āspiritual emergencyā (forget the spiritual part) at worst, lose of grey matter. You should see what itās like just to compose this comment with iPad batteries cutting out. Even with that I have it relatively easy. The 7PM clapping and banging of pots and pans right now is happening in my apartment complex. Both real, upbeat and CV-19 first responder surreal.
Jordan Peterson would likely word bomb anyone calling him right wing. He sees himself as a counter to the Sanders & Canadian PC Marxist post-mod PC academics etc. I see him as right wing, libertarian or not. Seeing him on Tucker Carlsonās show discussing āMale Youth In Crisesā or some such loaded Fox āNewsā topic was not the deciding factor for where he stands politically in my estimation. Peterson is very smart, very good debater & knows how to bate & monetize the SJW left. He also knows where his book audience gets their news. Given the topic on Carlsonās show it was ironic that Peterson himself looked zombified & in very bad shape. Now we know why. Given his speaking & book schedule & his wifeās illness itās not surprising he had to take something to keep going. He knew what he was doing, he has his best seller, heās very rich & I hope his wife is ok.
I spent a week taking Benzos before I threw them out. The first Tweet I saw about Peterson in Russia was a rant that Peterson is lying & treatment in Russia is a scheme to park his money tax free offshore. I would guess a little bit of each. Heās sick, heās rich, heās getting treatment while parking his money who knows where. Russians are specialists in this area for sure.
Went to a Hearing Voices site yesterday that someone here left a link for. The site had no updated comments since 2015. Back in the days when Russian state sponsored troll farms & the RW Alex Jones, David Icke psy-war lexicon consisted of terms like TIās, perps & gangstalkers everywhere, in your hair & underwear. Synthetic telepathy, voice to skull (V2k) & government (Which Gov.? The U.S. but never Big Brother troll farm Russia) was out to get us all. Back then there was no bs about the *Soros Deep State.* The polite label is to call them conspiracy theories. Which they are but that shouldnāt need saying. The above named troll farms & individuals aligned their anti-U.S. anti-Western government troll message by either agreement or by accident. The uniformity of message was labeled by media friendly psychiatrists as the product ppl with paranoia & delusion communicating with others who shared their view of the world. Good for business. Some of it was but that was submerged by a title wave of weaponized psy-war propaganda.
2007 – 2016 the formula for these conspiracy websites, videos & their supportive comments seemed to say that they be made as intentionally bazaar as possible. Making up for their content with shear numbers of videos & even more paranoid style bot or troll comments to degrade the YouTube platform & jam the *all is lost* NSA is mind controlling everyone message.
(80,000 troll factory videos per Jon Albright of the Columbia U Tor Project, Wired 2018. The only ones with the nerve to take Google algorithms to task as the source for Facebook links)
In 2020, religious right Mandela Effects are out, anarcho Q-Storms, Covid19 conspiracies are in calling a very real virus a āhoax.ā Updated fake reincarnation documentaries where all the women look like they stepped out of adverts are in the āshifts in consciousnessā categories. All the above could be labeled as deep state or the product of āelitesā working for Big Pharma or Big Gov or that Iām the one whoās paranoid working with the aliens etc.
I read books by Alexander Lowen MD back in the 1970ās. Everyone hated him, mainstream P-docs, progressives, feminists, gays etc. He agreed with controversial theories regarding early man routinely hearing voices & gods etc. Depression And The Body & A Course In Miracles were good influences.
2002 was when I started hearing overhead pounding sounds. Then combined loud air raid siren & human screaming similar to sounds produced by so-called Aztec death whistles on YouTube. Which led to Gestalt Therapy then P-doc anti-psych drugs. I no longer take prescriptions, non-prescriptions & donāt see therapists. Still hear sounds & voices, no visual distortions.
Voices are heard in group unison always self referring as āus.ā āItā is heard as a robotic Big Brother-type cognitive gestalt. At times a singular voice. Both sound as originating from outside when indoors and from overhead directions. Doesnāt happen that much in public. I donāt hear anything when reading or online. When any difficulty hits thatās when things get noisy. Sleeping & anxiety are another matter. Total extreme sleeplessness beyond insomnia hit me after I retired. It can be called spiritual emergency. Nothing spiritual about it. Itās metaphysically nasty. Reality as anomaly. Connected to other external realities via neural networks. No talking to God. No space aliens, no drugs wanted or needed, no devils or governments out to get me. Two contradictory realities, one that conveniently considers all the above as psychosis, mental illness and disordered thinking while the other labels that for what it is, gaslighting.
Just had my 1st batch of washed broccoli sprouts with just salad dressing. Not bad not good. It needs the dressing. Will supplement with the powder when I get it.
I try not to think about horrendous forever chemicals but I donāt cook on or ignore them. I have a constant thirst which seems to go with big time insomnia, alcohol & the MI territory in general. Stayed away from alcohol so far in January.
Dr Patrick reminds me all too much of some1 I met up with last year. Must be my disordered or wishful thinking. Except there was nothing disordered abāt it then or now. Famous last words. You should catch her latest on NAD. She says the jury is still out. Been trying to find the Dave Asprey link to NAD supplements I read about 6 months ago.
Edward Bullmore (great name) is in the news again with a quote on fMRI developing adolescent brain scan models. That would raise all kinds of hackles on this site. Still reading his damn book. Insomnia screws up my reading habits.
Latest Alzheimers research on rats. Crossing the old BBB with very low dose lithium stops early stage. Positive results from low dose lithium for other conditions is also not new.
āFrom a practical point of view our findings show that microdoses of lithium in formulations such as the one we used, which facilitates passage to the brain through the brain-blood barrier while minimizing levels of lithium in the blood, sparing individuals from adverse effects, should find immediate therapeutic applications,ā says Dr. Cuello. āWhile it is unlikely that any medication will revert the irreversible brain damage at the clinical stages of Alzheimerās it is very likely that a treatment with microdoses of encapsulated lithium should have tangible beneficial effects at early, preclinical stages of the disease.ā
https://youtu.be/zz4YVJ4aRfg
Something different from 2016 having nothing to do with drugs or P-docs from Room 101. Saw this video for the 1st time, saw her before. Another too good to be true non-miracle non-drug I first heard about last year.
Then thereās this per Wiki: āAlthough there has been some basic research on how sulforaphane might exert beneficial effects in vivo, there is no high-quality evidence to date for its efficacy against human diseases.ā Her background is biomedical research and she basically quotes the research of others. I can almost anticipate, āWhat? Sprouts? You use Wiki? Whereās your proof deuterā
I donāt dismiss it, havenāt tried it, I will try sulforaphane in the form of sprouts and powder after listening to her on different venues for the 5th time. Sheās good to look at also. 28:00 minutes in she starts talking about, guess what? Inflammation, SCZ, depression. 38:00 Dr Patrick does a recap.
āSo now itās inflammation?ā Where have you been? Nothing new about it. Functional MDās have been going on about it for many years. I mentioned previously the āall is lostā āend-times all the timeā pervasiveness I saw swamping YouTube and the Internet around 2007. That *nasty* book by the Glaxo guy I mentioned pushes hard against closely held BBB dogma within medicine and psychiatry. It also pushes against dogma closely held on this site. Would I see a P-doc again? A functional neurologist? Or figure it out myself?
Just like last year Iām probably still recovering from the flu shot I got in Dec. How is that possible? Am I now anti-Vaxx? No. My previous comment might explain it. Iām probably still recovering from breathing in crap for years and the jab makes it worse for awhile. Yup, my fault. Not the flu shot, not the P-doc, not the bogeyman or God(ot)etc. Still in Room 101. 1984 wasnāt just a cautionary about future dictators. I donāt listen to the cognitive dictatorship Big Brother pessimism in or outside my head. Sometimes that aināt so easy.
The problem with that is thinking thereās no physical correlation to mental illness. Which immediately summons more scripted counter arguments around for decades about missing chemical imbalances. Itās been pretty much accepted in theory that SCZ is several conditions combined. Among those are inflammatory processes as cause not just effect.
I stopped anti-psychs long ago. I recently found a mote of dust under a heavy piece of furniture. I am sensitive to dust and have been breathing it in for years. Iāve always had asthma so when I was short of breath 4 yrs ago on my way to the gym I used my inhaler but then also stopped the gym. I took a calorie loaded coffee drink with collagen bc I liked the taste. Anti-inflammatory effects were a distant second. A month later I stopped needing the inhaler. It wasnāt psychosomatic. I made the mistake of using the drink with a meal when it was supposed to be a meal substitute. I was not exercising while breathing in all that dust and suppressing breathing symptoms which meant all kinds of accreted crap accumulating internally in reaction.
Long run-on story short, multiple factors get lost while thinking that I had relieved asthma (no, I didnāt think Iād found the cure) which is an inflammatory condition while along the way making things worse. (Lungs made of different kinds of collagen proteins vs collagen protein gets digested so therefore couldnāt be a factor etc) 3 years later vitamin shelves are loaded down with all kinds of keto collagen powders some of which might actually work. Which means thereās something to it and also means the cheaper stuff has impurities etc.
All of that involving a physical condition and the fact that I didnāt like taking a prescription spray 2 or 3x a week. Mental factors that I still contend with have correlations likely much more complicated. But still solvable.
I also read that recent article. This inflammation idea has been floating around mainstream for 10+ years. That thereās less of a divide between brain and body. In traditional oriental medicine it was assumed. I was reading the book when I read the article and Iām still reading the book. Itās not filled with hair-on-fire indictment exclamation points and heās not breaking any new ground. Which means heās not going on about stigma bc thereās nothing else to say and heās not in the āall is lostā burning down his own professional house.
Why so slow? Bc there might not be any big breakthrough new exciting drug to cause exponential increases in some stock price. Thatās the easy explanation. Anyway the wheels have been turning long enough to force improvement. Iām just as tired of hearing the inflammation argument as I am the ālock up the P-docsā and force them to take their own prescriptions scripted lines.
Rachel777, I also read that recent article. This inflammation idea has been floating around mainstream for 10+ years. That thereās less of a divide between brain and body. In traditional oriental medicine it was assumed. I was reading the book when I read the article and Iām still reading the book. Itās not filled with hair-on-fire indictment exclamation points and heās not breaking any new ground. Which means heās not going on about stigma bc thereās nothing else to say and heās not in the āall is lostā burning down his own professional house.
Why so slow? Bc there might not be any big breakthrough new exciting drug to cause exponential increases in some stock price. Thatās the easy explanation. Anyway the wheels have been turning long enough to force improvement. Iām just as tired of hearing the inflammation argument as I am the ālock up the P-docsā and force them to take their own prescriptions scripted lines.
The author is definitely an insider Cambridge guy. A Neuropsychiatrist with a PhD in philosophy. Heās a skeptic who (way too low key for many on this site) takes his profession and prescriptions (depression, anti-psychs) to task. He says anti-inflammatory drugs *as a starting point* might be a whole lot better for depression than whatās available now. (No kidding) He goes on about the conservative nature, frustration and slow to no progress of his profession.
How long have I been following the whole brain inflammation argument? Its nothing new for me both in functional physical medicine and glial cell brain immunity. Depression prescriptions for me were a brain fog joke. Same with the 3 days I was on Benzos and they actually worked for anxiety. That said, Iām not in the, āthose Glaxo guys are all in on itā bubble.
I was a ātrue believerā in Szasz long ago. It kinda gets old. I recommend you read āThe Inflamed Mindā by Edward Bullmore (yup, Bullworth-like Brit name and all).
I spent the last 10 yrs watching different platforms and comment sections get swamped by āall is lostā angry end-timer burn-it-down anarcho types. Here itās toxic this, criminal psychiatry that, SCZ doesnāt exist etc. IOW, the same stuff I was reading in 2007.
The best that mainstream can do is what they were doing 15 yrs ago, going after stigma bc they havenāt got anything better to say. Itās a good thing to go after stigma, very safe. Everybody gets the feels. Both extremes repeating repeating and subconsciously waving to each other.
Yup, everybody thinks they know what āthe truthā is. Iām not neutral Iām skeptical and stay away from the lingo of the moment.
To better summarize what I just wrote, Iām skeptical of all sides of the argument, mainstream psychiatry, alternatives & indictments of the existence of certain entries in the DSM & those applying it. Which also means I might find things that are useful in each of the categories mentioned.
I used to think Psychiatry couldnāt be categorized in up down, wonderful or toxic terms. I still donāt think in either of those extremes. But given the choice of sounding like a fear & doom, all is lost type so common everywhere these days & defending P-docs, I lean towards seeing psychiatry as my P-doc described in 2007 when committing the sin of truth regarding anti-psych prescription drugs, āweāre still in the dark ages.ā This was before prescribing Provigil for someone with insomnia. Which drove me into sleep deprived delusions even after I stopped taking it.
Thanks Robert Whitaker for this article on lumateperone. The only thing impressive about the drug was the phenomenal rise in stock price. No one will be selling me on this ānewā drug no matter how bad things get.
In my 50ās I quit anti-psych drugs. That was 14 years ago bc they didnāt work. Over months of increased dosage & different drugs nothing improved. I was still working & in fact the drugs effected my job performance & made everything worse. After low dosing on one very ānewā anti-psych I had to crawl up the stairs of my walk-up on all fours.
One voluntary trip to a hospital ward made everything worse. Iād never used street drugs, didnāt abuse alcohol & still donāt. Never had thoughts of suicide until after entering the ward of a NYC hospital that happened to be in financial straights & about to close. A big mistake.
The back story of the Soderbergh movie, Unsane was likely applicable to what happened to me inside. That movie took on corporate hospitals & short term āstressed outā rehab that then gets magically turned into long term with good insurance being the determining factor. This is extreme untouchable territory in society generally among the left in particular. A great movie regardless of reviewer fixation on camerawork.
I mentioned my hospital stay to my GP. Another big mistake. His overdone reactions were meant to be seen as almost comical. He did the āIām not a psychiatristā routine etc.
Good to hear from Dr Breggin to start off 2020. For some reason the backstory to the Soderburgh movie āUnsaneā comes to mind after reading some of the articles on this site. The corporate rehab, Big Pharma symbiosis. Iām not strictly against either one but the corruption seems to be ignored by too many except for the rare long NYT or magazine article.
Iāve had auditory hallucinations since 2003. In my 50ās I had the usual menu of anti-psych drugs followed by what I would call extreme states beyond insomnia caused delusions and then managed to come out the other side still alive and in decent shape. All the prescriptions made things exponentially worse. My one voluntary hospitalization was a major mistake. (My insurance may or may not have had something to do with the length of my stay.) My version of āextremeā 10 years ago might be called something milder by a professional. Today, no anti-psych prescriptions for 10+ years, no prescriptions for anything.
Back then the professional emphasis was compliance and stigma. 10 years later? Little change except for high concept brain ghial cell inflammation as either cause or effect. Depression drugs are said by an ex-girlfriend to have improved. Good for them and her.
I made the mistake of briefly mentioning the above to my GP. Amazing to see the change in his attitude. To him I am now one of āthem.ā
Good hearing from you again Audrey.
Everything I relate in the above comments occurred late in life. A big difference from someone just starting out.
Ecotherapy sounds good. Physical activity, walking, running. Therapy sessions outdoors. Almost sounds like things are coming full cycle.
The first psychotherapy book I read was āDepression and The Body.ā The author Al Lowenās emphasis was the same as EcoT only he called it being grounded in the body. He knew way back that the whole idea of therapy needed a radical upgrade. Sitting on a couch and talking was only 50% of his session. His Bioenergetic exercises adapted from yoga were made to facilitate body and vocal expression and *grounding.* Such things were ridiculed and considered a breech of orthodox professional practice & decorum.
Much later I moved away from that and tried the traditional route. The Gestalt therapist I mentioned was good. But that led to the psychopharmacologist MD and anti-psychs. Extended insomnia, voices, working too many hours led to a routine of nasty learned helplessness and compliance (OBEY, comply) with proscribed methods. Compliance is ok up to a point. If it leads to observable psychical and mental progress. Sometimes being sedated is progress when things are really bad. As long as the āside effectsā arenāt worse, long lasting and traumatizing.
I saw the movie Donny Darko in 2001. Fictional Donny was taking medication for depression. Bad things sometimes happen when messing with the neural matrix. Meanwhile in 2020 another Donny likely hyped on something is making people like me depressed but thatās very much beside the point.
Instead of the terror of Akathisia I had the complete sleepless equivalent extended over a 9 month period a decade ago. No street stims wanted or needed. Likely the result of abruptly discontinuing Seriquel & Provigil. Very nasty. Later at a hospital ward a dozen of the staff gave my psychiatrist a naughty naughty for proscribing Provigil to someone with insomnia. Where was my brain when I actually took it? Anything can happen when sleepless even for more than 3 days.
I was glad to see that someone, in this case Audrey, came close to how I look at meds, psychiatry and experts generally.
I try not to take on an identity wrapped in victimhood and complaint. I can say that bc I āonlyā hear voices along with occasional thumping, slamming, closed door effects and mild tinnitus when indoors. I can read anything I want without interference. The fact that my external reality is completely changed is mostly just a footnote at this point. I got off easy even though huge chunks of my life went out the window.
A decade after stopping anti-psychs and now all prescriptions I donāt even consider going back to see a psychiatrist. And not only bc they default so quickly to their prescription pads. The former head of psychiatry at a large hospital chain was charging me $300 per session a decade ago. After one session he told the simple truth for a change, that there was nothing he could do. He didnāt charge me and gave me printed affirmations that I never used. Theyāre not all bad guys.
Per Kristen Freedās comment:
psychotherapy is still an alternative. The American Gestalt therapist I saw in 2002 who recommended I see a psychiatrist was pretty good. He was also a Zen teacher who gave me the simple 4 words divided between the inhale and exhale to slow down breathing which interfered with and to a certain extent controls voices. āTheyā, the auditory hallucinations, mostly imitate and repeat which means repeating in the background the 4 words as Iām saying them for however long. Very simple and direct.
Mention anything about Zen Gestalt and mainstream eyes roll up in the heads of people who think that anything outside their practice automatically means quackery, anti-vaxx or Health Ranger magic pills to cure viruses etc. Mainstream psychiatrists exaggerate about this stuff for effect, for insurance and for legal reasons. And then prescribe an entire menu of drugs including Provigil for a person who worked 2 jobs and who had, among other things, insomnia. At least one psychiatrist did exactly that. The results were massive and were a massive waste of time and money.
Good article. This is basically how I feel about medication: āI am not anti-medication. I am anti-lack of choices. Lack of options, alternatives, education. I am anti-lack of self-trust and self-worth. I am anti- āthe experts always know better, and this is why.āā
I do not idealize or ignore experts. The slowness of medical progress, lack of R&D funding, symbiosis of psychiatry and Big Pharma regarding the selling of opioids and anti-psychs is pretty damning. So as Audrey says, I rely on myself for finding answers in and out of the mainstream. That can be difficult.
For me, everything got worse the more I relied on psychiatric prescriptions. Extreme sleeplessness beyond insomnia was the result. That was a decade ago. Still have voices and tinnitus but nasty delusions are gone. So I stopped all psych prescriptions a decade ago. Even asthma spray prescriptions 3 years ago.
I donāt agree with most of the articles on this site but some are useful. Eric Coates takes big chances to make the incomprehensible easier to put in context. I found Dr Peter Bregginās āfinest hourā interview with Judy Mikovits on YouTube (not MIA) before it was taken private. It might have been Breggin’s worst hour. Bregginās great 2020 MIA essay was my intro to this site so it was a big disappointment to see that interview.
Which means what? The nature of reality and disinformation with or without COVID is nasty. David Icke was kicked off YT which should have happened years ago. As for P-doc and ālife coachingā channels on YT? Many build up their views and subscriptions with mostly reasonable information…but when a black swan event like a pandemic comes along they show who and what they are. Then they go back to their brand of outsider but reasonable sounding personality driven word bombs to thousands of subscribers. A big improvement over the tsunami of TI mind control troll content before YT updated their algorithm.
All of which has nothing to do with Audreyās article but has much to do with how I see the alt-information landscape.
The word in the above second paragraph is *BEST* placement of relevant research. Nothing to do with EST, Eastern Standard Time.
Klaatu Barada Nikto (Klaatu your *Brother* is nix and needs resurrection reanimation pronto)
My impression of the original movie: Gort as AI is likely to be āonlyā semi sentient. It took orders from humanoid alien Klaatu as well as acting on its own.
Translating from fiction to what I hear internally… robot group repetitions give way to singular more human-like statements.
This long YT video via UCSF is pretty damn good IMO. Does not touch on schizophrenia or psychosis but has much to do with immunity and my previous posting.
https://youtu.be/XCaTQzjX2rQ
A decade ago I had psychosis & now I donāt. I donāt take prescriptions. I still hear voices & tinnitus along with a different way of experiencing things.
This particular article may or may not be the EST place to outline 2019 research.
Do I read Psychology Today? No I do not. I donāt idealize or dismiss any of the following:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry/201903/psychosis-and-symbiosis-microbiome-and-schizophrenia#comments_bottom
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5503102/
The study of immune alterations and the microbiome in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder is in its infancy. Two recent investigations of the oro-pharyngeal microbiota in schizophrenia found differences between cases and controls. Other studies have found increased gastrointestinal inflammation in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder based on measures of microbial translocation. Several studies have also found an association between the receipt of antibiotics and an increased incidence of psychiatric disorders, perhaps due to alterations in the microbiome.
Another trial of probiotic supplementation is underway in psychiatric patients, this one in mania. This trial is based on a longitudinal observational study of individuals with acute mania, which found that levels of immune makers, IgG antibodies to gliadin, a measure of gluten sensitivity and levels of antibodies to the NR2 peptide of the NMDA receptor, were significantly increased during the acute manic episode but did not differ from the levels of controls at a 6 month follow up. In addition, a combined inflammation score, calculated by factor analysis of the levels of class specific antibodies to the NR peptide of the NMDA receptor, gliadin, Mason-Pfizer monkey virus protein 24, and Toxoplasma gondii, differed from the controls during the acute episode but not at the 6 month follow up(F. Dickerson et al., 2013). In addition, within the mania group, an elevated inflammation score during the acute episode predicted rehospitalization for a new mood episode during the follow-up period. Clinical trials of therapeutic agents which alter gut microbiota or gastrointestinal inflammation will be the ultimate test of the role of the microbiome and immune-mediated pathology in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder
ā…studies to date in individuals with psychiatric disorders also point to the possible role of viruses and fungi as well as the involvement of other mucosal body sites such as the nasopharynx. Critical research needs include prospective studies to define risk prior to the onset of therapeutic interventions as well as methods for the accurate assessment of the microbiome at different mucosal sites in a practical manner. There is also a need for effective modalities for the modulation of the microbiome and the control of inflammation in a population of individuals who are taking a range of psychiatric medications.ā
Eric Coates writes a gutsy article. I had to laugh when I first saw the reference to Fermiās Paradox. Uh oh, here it comes. The metaphors then became apparent even to slow learner me.
I experience voices. From my limited perspective there arenāt any interstellar aliens visiting Earth. Regarding aliens? I think of the recycling death scenes in the movie āAvatar.ā The same metamorphosis likely happens here on Earth. Aliens are us and apart from us. Their immaterial proximity to average humans (ie: proles, nomaj) generates chaos.
Interdimensionals or angels, IMO, are and arenāt hiding. In human form they hide in plain sight. They are us and apart from us. Like voices. As humans itās likely they come with an inborn program or geas wherein itās impossible to reveal their duel existence. Usually depicted with wings and as a benign positive influence. Thatās not been my experience. The wings suggest instant communication and movement. Temporal displacement is real and not the product of disordered thinking. And no, that canāt be proved and I donāt share any of the above superpowers. Iām not one of the select and nothing important is ārevealedā by way of the particular mumblings or slamming door sounds heard as I type.
I get the impression said entities donāt like being described too closely like Iām doing here. Which means Iām probably completely wrong. In my minority view Orwell tried in ā1984.ā Itās more than a cautionary about future Hitlerās and Stalinās. He considered it a parody and no big deal while posthumously selling over 50 million copies. Lots of people project onto 1984. It definitely goes against accepted opinion to say that āBig Brotherā is actually an all seeing omnipresent cognitive dictatorship. Apart from paranoia, psychosis, projection and DSM labels.
In the movie āDay The Earth Stood Stillā all you have to do is combine the two aliens Klaatu and Gort and you get at least one aspect of what āaliensā in question might look like. A nasty robotic semi sentient AI and a āI come in peaceā posthuman. AI program with an occasional human-like voice whose default setting is to distort and lie like hell.
The same idea was presented in the movie Tomorrowland. A nasty AI āMonitorā hooked into the neural matrix of each human while delivering a constant stream of bad news. Combined with a human looking Gov. Nix whose name was meant to match one of the moons of Pluto, Nix, the mythical god of shadow and darkness. The movie release date and New Horizons satellite probe arrived at Pluto at the same time. Ahead of its time and generally panned whose ending kinda matches the positive side of todayās worldwide demonstrations.
I mentioned the word chaos. IMO, the machine-like negativity manifests externally these days in RW QAnon political chaos. Including 5G towers falsely said to cause pandemics.
Both psychiatric & psychological models for the cause of voice hearing are inadequate & self-limiting. Neither can they be excluded.
Physical causes are not popular on this site. The āno proof of chemical imbalanceā both true and…
Author Susannah Cahalan was diagnosed as bipolar & schizoaffective psychotic until an MD went way out on a limb & did a spinal tap. Instead of going to a psychiatric hospital it was found that her immune system was being attacked by autoantibodies. She had autoimmune encephalitis. She recovered. She was lucky.
Famous Sanford social psychologist Lee Ross contracted Gillian BarrĆØ Syndome. His eyelids were paralyzed, he couldnāt close his eyes & couldnāt sleep. He became psychotic. Over time the condition cleared up as his immune system improved.
I had insomnia & threatening voices. No visual hallucinations. I had a full menu of anti-psych meds while working 2 jobs. The meds made everything worse. I had to retire. Climaxing with an extremely long period of complete sleeplessness. During which various physical conditions hit me, arthritis, angina, pains in the back of my neck, hissing tinnitus. All temporary but Iām stuck with voices & tinnitus. There were immune factors mixed in that none of my doctors were capable of even approaching.
As for what causes these things generally? Neither of the two models mentioned can be dismissed as limiting as they are. I favor physical causes to be found eventually.
During extended sleeplessness I had what might be called a cerebral spinal flush where my insides lit up for a couple of seconds. Capped off with a glimpse of a grasshopper for whatever reason. No visions of dead ppl, aliens, God, Jesus, Buddha or devils for me.
All the above affects my interpersonal interactions. However I can read long novels like Thomas Pynchonās āAgainst The Dayā (of all the writers. Over the top amazing) without interference from āthemā that are part of me and apart from me. āTheyā are machine/ child-like repetitive & in group unison both inside & heard simultaneously as external to me. Itās a condition that bleeds into my outside life in ways subtle & not. All of which might get me an officiously stupid labels of being āwithout insightā from the DSM orthodoxy. In a time of pandemic or not, seeing them again isnāt even a question. But Iām always ready to be surprised.
Iāve been hearing voices for close to 20 years. Gave up on psychiatry & meds a decade ago. As mentioned two comments before this I also find MIA & psychiatry to be different sides of the same coin in too many areas. The same tired anti-psychiatry dogma carried forward for decades vs psychiatric arrogance and corruption along with Big Pharma & for profit insurance. Insurance companies now reporting huge profits assert their control over politics and medicine in equal measure. So far it doesnāt effect me.
Just finished āThe Great Pretenderā by Susanna Cahalan about the Sanford psychologist āsuperstarā David Rosenhan. Consummate charmer, lecturer and con-artist whose 1970ās article on the infiltration of psych hospitals (by himself and āothersā) that indirectly forced DSM changes (to avoid embarrassment), calling the publicās attention to conditions in and eventually the closing of many psych hospitals for better & much worse.
Cahalan was wrongly diagnosed Bipolar & then schizoaffective. An exceptional MD found the true cause as neurological, autoimmune encephalitis. She was one of the lucky ones. She was cured. Psychosis hasnāt reoccurred but she sees it as a constant threat.
She interviewed Stanford social psychologist, Lee Ross who had hallucinations from contracting Gillain-BarrĆ© syndrome. His eyelids were paralyzed, couldnāt close his eyes, was severely sleep deprived with the resulting auditory hallucinations. Rossā quote in the book, āthey like to say everybodyās about six degrees Fahrenheit from hallucinating.ā
My point? The BBB is no longer impermeable. Thatās a big deal (its possible even CV-19 gets through). The brain has its own immune system and links with the lower body which is now old science. So-called breakthroughs which arenāt, like psychosis as being categorized on a spectrum. Giving people the false impression of scientific medical neurological progress marching forever on-ward. I gave up on all of it and resort to making small changes, like complete 35 hour fasting once a week, cold showers, stopping coffee and alcohol (since April Fools Day, hah)
What is it about hearing voices and over consuming coffee? TCM claims just overdoing fluids makes you overly sentimental & emotional. Iāve heard hints that auditory hallucinations are said to be offset or eliminated by physical regimentation and planning every aspect of life. IOW, the opposite of the effects of hearing voices which tends to make me lazy. Sounds great but I refuse to turn my life into a tactical warrior boot camp.
Now itās CV-19 in NYC. I was pretty much self isolating even before CV-19. Persistent voices, sudden heart jumping slamming doors, loud scrapping & base pounding auditory hallucinatory sounds etc even as I type. Street drugs, alcohol not wanted or needed. At best itās called āspiritual emergencyā (forget the spiritual part) at worst, lose of grey matter. You should see what itās like just to compose this comment with iPad batteries cutting out. Even with that I have it relatively easy. The 7PM clapping and banging of pots and pans right now is happening in my apartment complex. Both real, upbeat and CV-19 first responder surreal.
Jordan Peterson would likely word bomb anyone calling him right wing. He sees himself as a counter to the Sanders & Canadian PC Marxist post-mod PC academics etc. I see him as right wing, libertarian or not. Seeing him on Tucker Carlsonās show discussing āMale Youth In Crisesā or some such loaded Fox āNewsā topic was not the deciding factor for where he stands politically in my estimation. Peterson is very smart, very good debater & knows how to bate & monetize the SJW left. He also knows where his book audience gets their news. Given the topic on Carlsonās show it was ironic that Peterson himself looked zombified & in very bad shape. Now we know why. Given his speaking & book schedule & his wifeās illness itās not surprising he had to take something to keep going. He knew what he was doing, he has his best seller, heās very rich & I hope his wife is ok.
I spent a week taking Benzos before I threw them out. The first Tweet I saw about Peterson in Russia was a rant that Peterson is lying & treatment in Russia is a scheme to park his money tax free offshore. I would guess a little bit of each. Heās sick, heās rich, heās getting treatment while parking his money who knows where. Russians are specialists in this area for sure.
Went to a Hearing Voices site yesterday that someone here left a link for. The site had no updated comments since 2015. Back in the days when Russian state sponsored troll farms & the RW Alex Jones, David Icke psy-war lexicon consisted of terms like TIās, perps & gangstalkers everywhere, in your hair & underwear. Synthetic telepathy, voice to skull (V2k) & government (Which Gov.? The U.S. but never Big Brother troll farm Russia) was out to get us all. Back then there was no bs about the *Soros Deep State.* The polite label is to call them conspiracy theories. Which they are but that shouldnāt need saying. The above named troll farms & individuals aligned their anti-U.S. anti-Western government troll message by either agreement or by accident. The uniformity of message was labeled by media friendly psychiatrists as the product ppl with paranoia & delusion communicating with others who shared their view of the world. Good for business. Some of it was but that was submerged by a title wave of weaponized psy-war propaganda.
2007 – 2016 the formula for these conspiracy websites, videos & their supportive comments seemed to say that they be made as intentionally bazaar as possible. Making up for their content with shear numbers of videos & even more paranoid style bot or troll comments to degrade the YouTube platform & jam the *all is lost* NSA is mind controlling everyone message.
(80,000 troll factory videos per Jon Albright of the Columbia U Tor Project, Wired 2018. The only ones with the nerve to take Google algorithms to task as the source for Facebook links)
In 2020, religious right Mandela Effects are out, anarcho Q-Storms, Covid19 conspiracies are in calling a very real virus a āhoax.ā Updated fake reincarnation documentaries where all the women look like they stepped out of adverts are in the āshifts in consciousnessā categories. All the above could be labeled as deep state or the product of āelitesā working for Big Pharma or Big Gov or that Iām the one whoās paranoid working with the aliens etc.
I read books by Alexander Lowen MD back in the 1970ās. Everyone hated him, mainstream P-docs, progressives, feminists, gays etc. He agreed with controversial theories regarding early man routinely hearing voices & gods etc. Depression And The Body & A Course In Miracles were good influences.
2002 was when I started hearing overhead pounding sounds. Then combined loud air raid siren & human screaming similar to sounds produced by so-called Aztec death whistles on YouTube. Which led to Gestalt Therapy then P-doc anti-psych drugs. I no longer take prescriptions, non-prescriptions & donāt see therapists. Still hear sounds & voices, no visual distortions.
Voices are heard in group unison always self referring as āus.ā āItā is heard as a robotic Big Brother-type cognitive gestalt. At times a singular voice. Both sound as originating from outside when indoors and from overhead directions. Doesnāt happen that much in public. I donāt hear anything when reading or online. When any difficulty hits thatās when things get noisy. Sleeping & anxiety are another matter. Total extreme sleeplessness beyond insomnia hit me after I retired. It can be called spiritual emergency. Nothing spiritual about it. Itās metaphysically nasty. Reality as anomaly. Connected to other external realities via neural networks. No talking to God. No space aliens, no drugs wanted or needed, no devils or governments out to get me. Two contradictory realities, one that conveniently considers all the above as psychosis, mental illness and disordered thinking while the other labels that for what it is, gaslighting.
Just had my 1st batch of washed broccoli sprouts with just salad dressing. Not bad not good. It needs the dressing. Will supplement with the powder when I get it.
I try not to think about horrendous forever chemicals but I donāt cook on or ignore them. I have a constant thirst which seems to go with big time insomnia, alcohol & the MI territory in general. Stayed away from alcohol so far in January.
Dr Patrick reminds me all too much of some1 I met up with last year. Must be my disordered or wishful thinking. Except there was nothing disordered abāt it then or now. Famous last words. You should catch her latest on NAD. She says the jury is still out. Been trying to find the Dave Asprey link to NAD supplements I read about 6 months ago.
Edward Bullmore (great name) is in the news again with a quote on fMRI developing adolescent brain scan models. That would raise all kinds of hackles on this site. Still reading his damn book. Insomnia screws up my reading habits.
Latest Alzheimers research on rats. Crossing the old BBB with very low dose lithium stops early stage. Positive results from low dose lithium for other conditions is also not new.
āFrom a practical point of view our findings show that microdoses of lithium in formulations such as the one we used, which facilitates passage to the brain through the brain-blood barrier while minimizing levels of lithium in the blood, sparing individuals from adverse effects, should find immediate therapeutic applications,ā says Dr. Cuello. āWhile it is unlikely that any medication will revert the irreversible brain damage at the clinical stages of Alzheimerās it is very likely that a treatment with microdoses of encapsulated lithium should have tangible beneficial effects at early, preclinical stages of the disease.ā
https://youtu.be/zz4YVJ4aRfg
Something different from 2016 having nothing to do with drugs or P-docs from Room 101. Saw this video for the 1st time, saw her before. Another too good to be true non-miracle non-drug I first heard about last year.
Then thereās this per Wiki: āAlthough there has been some basic research on how sulforaphane might exert beneficial effects in vivo, there is no high-quality evidence to date for its efficacy against human diseases.ā Her background is biomedical research and she basically quotes the research of others. I can almost anticipate, āWhat? Sprouts? You use Wiki? Whereās your proof deuterā
I donāt dismiss it, havenāt tried it, I will try sulforaphane in the form of sprouts and powder after listening to her on different venues for the 5th time. Sheās good to look at also. 28:00 minutes in she starts talking about, guess what? Inflammation, SCZ, depression. 38:00 Dr Patrick does a recap.
āSo now itās inflammation?ā Where have you been? Nothing new about it. Functional MDās have been going on about it for many years. I mentioned previously the āall is lostā āend-times all the timeā pervasiveness I saw swamping YouTube and the Internet around 2007. That *nasty* book by the Glaxo guy I mentioned pushes hard against closely held BBB dogma within medicine and psychiatry. It also pushes against dogma closely held on this site. Would I see a P-doc again? A functional neurologist? Or figure it out myself?
Just like last year Iām probably still recovering from the flu shot I got in Dec. How is that possible? Am I now anti-Vaxx? No. My previous comment might explain it. Iām probably still recovering from breathing in crap for years and the jab makes it worse for awhile. Yup, my fault. Not the flu shot, not the P-doc, not the bogeyman or God(ot)etc. Still in Room 101. 1984 wasnāt just a cautionary about future dictators. I donāt listen to the cognitive dictatorship Big Brother pessimism in or outside my head. Sometimes that aināt so easy.
The problem with that is thinking thereās no physical correlation to mental illness. Which immediately summons more scripted counter arguments around for decades about missing chemical imbalances. Itās been pretty much accepted in theory that SCZ is several conditions combined. Among those are inflammatory processes as cause not just effect.
I stopped anti-psychs long ago. I recently found a mote of dust under a heavy piece of furniture. I am sensitive to dust and have been breathing it in for years. Iāve always had asthma so when I was short of breath 4 yrs ago on my way to the gym I used my inhaler but then also stopped the gym. I took a calorie loaded coffee drink with collagen bc I liked the taste. Anti-inflammatory effects were a distant second. A month later I stopped needing the inhaler. It wasnāt psychosomatic. I made the mistake of using the drink with a meal when it was supposed to be a meal substitute. I was not exercising while breathing in all that dust and suppressing breathing symptoms which meant all kinds of accreted crap accumulating internally in reaction.
Long run-on story short, multiple factors get lost while thinking that I had relieved asthma (no, I didnāt think Iād found the cure) which is an inflammatory condition while along the way making things worse. (Lungs made of different kinds of collagen proteins vs collagen protein gets digested so therefore couldnāt be a factor etc) 3 years later vitamin shelves are loaded down with all kinds of keto collagen powders some of which might actually work. Which means thereās something to it and also means the cheaper stuff has impurities etc.
All of that involving a physical condition and the fact that I didnāt like taking a prescription spray 2 or 3x a week. Mental factors that I still contend with have correlations likely much more complicated. But still solvable.
I also read that recent article. This inflammation idea has been floating around mainstream for 10+ years. That thereās less of a divide between brain and body. In traditional oriental medicine it was assumed. I was reading the book when I read the article and Iām still reading the book. Itās not filled with hair-on-fire indictment exclamation points and heās not breaking any new ground. Which means heās not going on about stigma bc thereās nothing else to say and heās not in the āall is lostā burning down his own professional house.
Why so slow? Bc there might not be any big breakthrough new exciting drug to cause exponential increases in some stock price. Thatās the easy explanation. Anyway the wheels have been turning long enough to force improvement. Iām just as tired of hearing the inflammation argument as I am the ālock up the P-docsā and force them to take their own prescriptions scripted lines.
Rachel777, I also read that recent article. This inflammation idea has been floating around mainstream for 10+ years. That thereās less of a divide between brain and body. In traditional oriental medicine it was assumed. I was reading the book when I read the article and Iām still reading the book. Itās not filled with hair-on-fire indictment exclamation points and heās not breaking any new ground. Which means heās not going on about stigma bc thereās nothing else to say and heās not in the āall is lostā burning down his own professional house.
Why so slow? Bc there might not be any big breakthrough new exciting drug to cause exponential increases in some stock price. Thatās the easy explanation. Anyway the wheels have been turning long enough to force improvement. Iām just as tired of hearing the inflammation argument as I am the ālock up the P-docsā and force them to take their own prescriptions scripted lines.
The author is definitely an insider Cambridge guy. A Neuropsychiatrist with a PhD in philosophy. Heās a skeptic who (way too low key for many on this site) takes his profession and prescriptions (depression, anti-psychs) to task. He says anti-inflammatory drugs *as a starting point* might be a whole lot better for depression than whatās available now. (No kidding) He goes on about the conservative nature, frustration and slow to no progress of his profession.
How long have I been following the whole brain inflammation argument? Its nothing new for me both in functional physical medicine and glial cell brain immunity. Depression prescriptions for me were a brain fog joke. Same with the 3 days I was on Benzos and they actually worked for anxiety. That said, Iām not in the, āthose Glaxo guys are all in on itā bubble.
I was a ātrue believerā in Szasz long ago. It kinda gets old. I recommend you read āThe Inflamed Mindā by Edward Bullmore (yup, Bullworth-like Brit name and all).
I spent the last 10 yrs watching different platforms and comment sections get swamped by āall is lostā angry end-timer burn-it-down anarcho types. Here itās toxic this, criminal psychiatry that, SCZ doesnāt exist etc. IOW, the same stuff I was reading in 2007.
The best that mainstream can do is what they were doing 15 yrs ago, going after stigma bc they havenāt got anything better to say. Itās a good thing to go after stigma, very safe. Everybody gets the feels. Both extremes repeating repeating and subconsciously waving to each other.
Yup, everybody thinks they know what āthe truthā is. Iām not neutral Iām skeptical and stay away from the lingo of the moment.
To better summarize what I just wrote, Iām skeptical of all sides of the argument, mainstream psychiatry, alternatives & indictments of the existence of certain entries in the DSM & those applying it. Which also means I might find things that are useful in each of the categories mentioned.
I used to think Psychiatry couldnāt be categorized in up down, wonderful or toxic terms. I still donāt think in either of those extremes. But given the choice of sounding like a fear & doom, all is lost type so common everywhere these days & defending P-docs, I lean towards seeing psychiatry as my P-doc described in 2007 when committing the sin of truth regarding anti-psych prescription drugs, āweāre still in the dark ages.ā This was before prescribing Provigil for someone with insomnia. Which drove me into sleep deprived delusions even after I stopped taking it.
Thanks Robert Whitaker for this article on lumateperone. The only thing impressive about the drug was the phenomenal rise in stock price. No one will be selling me on this ānewā drug no matter how bad things get.
In my 50ās I quit anti-psych drugs. That was 14 years ago bc they didnāt work. Over months of increased dosage & different drugs nothing improved. I was still working & in fact the drugs effected my job performance & made everything worse. After low dosing on one very ānewā anti-psych I had to crawl up the stairs of my walk-up on all fours.
One voluntary trip to a hospital ward made everything worse. Iād never used street drugs, didnāt abuse alcohol & still donāt. Never had thoughts of suicide until after entering the ward of a NYC hospital that happened to be in financial straights & about to close. A big mistake.
The back story of the Soderbergh movie, Unsane was likely applicable to what happened to me inside. That movie took on corporate hospitals & short term āstressed outā rehab that then gets magically turned into long term with good insurance being the determining factor. This is extreme untouchable territory in society generally among the left in particular. A great movie regardless of reviewer fixation on camerawork.
I mentioned my hospital stay to my GP. Another big mistake. His overdone reactions were meant to be seen as almost comical. He did the āIām not a psychiatristā routine etc.
Good to hear from Dr Breggin to start off 2020. For some reason the backstory to the Soderburgh movie āUnsaneā comes to mind after reading some of the articles on this site. The corporate rehab, Big Pharma symbiosis. Iām not strictly against either one but the corruption seems to be ignored by too many except for the rare long NYT or magazine article.
Iāve had auditory hallucinations since 2003. In my 50ās I had the usual menu of anti-psych drugs followed by what I would call extreme states beyond insomnia caused delusions and then managed to come out the other side still alive and in decent shape. All the prescriptions made things exponentially worse. My one voluntary hospitalization was a major mistake. (My insurance may or may not have had something to do with the length of my stay.) My version of āextremeā 10 years ago might be called something milder by a professional. Today, no anti-psych prescriptions for 10+ years, no prescriptions for anything.
Back then the professional emphasis was compliance and stigma. 10 years later? Little change except for high concept brain ghial cell inflammation as either cause or effect. Depression drugs are said by an ex-girlfriend to have improved. Good for them and her.
I made the mistake of briefly mentioning the above to my GP. Amazing to see the change in his attitude. To him I am now one of āthem.ā