Comments by Luisa Castagnaro, MA

Showing 16 of 16 comments.

  • Carrie, your article touched me insofar as you struck a tender cord about how we can never return to being who we once were; “recovery” is a misnomer, in that respect. I have had my own issues with traditional methods of recovery and have gone the spiritual route of addressing my problems. Oftentimes, psychiatry relegates spirituality to the desperate among us who have no other way of coping, but this is absolutely not true. I have found many alternate methods for recovery on my own which have worked, and I would like to share them with you.

    Despite a difficult life of taking psychotropic medication for 38 years and being hospitalized nine times in 31 years, I have been blessed through yoga and an experience of awakening to my inner self. This is what keeps me going, the memory of a unified state, that I use as a backdrop for handling the vicissitudes of life. There are many resources available to support the struggle and substantiate a new way of handling “recovery.” The human potential movement has a plethora of books and programs that can fulfill you and give you the sense of self that traditional recovery methods may not be able to provide. I recommend my favorite online programming at http://www.gaia.com/.

    There is also a CD program from SoundsTrue.com you might want to look into for inspiration about getting in touch with your innate perfection, which Dr. Candace Pert, the author, says is your birthright: “To Feel Go(o)d: The Science and Spirit of Bliss.” Dr. Pert is a psychopharmacologist, neuropeptide researcher and author of the bestselling “Molecules of Emotion.”

    I would also suggest a supplement that has really cured bipolars and depressives, known as “EmpowerPlus” which restores neurochemistry to its homeostatic state before the onset of problems. There are dozens of success stories of people who got off their meds and whose lives were turned around by EmpowerPlus. Here is the link: http://www.truehope.com/.

    One must never lose hope in this battle. I wish you all success in your journey.

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  • Dear Avril,

    I am so thrilled you resonated with my article as much as you did! Speaking of OBE’s, I always wished I could have a conscious one, but never did, so you are very experienced in this world of unseen realities. I once took an OBE course with Rick Stack, a Jane Roberts Seth Material expert in 1991, and learned OBE techniques, but did not have one. Here is Rick’s website in case you would like to hook up with someone in this reality field: https://sethcenter.com/collections/out-of-body-experiences-rick-stack

    Also, I empathize with your experience in publishing. I have issues with what I would like to eventually publish, but in case you need a mental health publisher who can acknowledge your writings, have you heard of Chipmunka? It’s right by you, in the UK: http://chipmunkapublishing.co.uk/

    I hope this can help you with your future publications. Thank you so much for sharing about the fact that unseen realities comprise so much of what is misunderstood about the human mind-brain.

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  • Dear Fiachra,

    Thank you for acknowledging my article. I am glad it was of some use to you. I think psychiatry could implement a more metaphysical perspective in addressing voice-hearing rather than relegating everything to physical causes. Matter is just another form of energy and originates from it, so if we want to get to the root cause of diseases that emanate from the body-mind complex, we have to look more deeply than neurochemistry. I found that outsmarting the voices by talking back to them when I pleaded to God to stop the chatter did help. As the saying goes, for every problem there is a solution. It does not have to be a conventional one, though.

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  • Dear Someone Else, thank you for your more than comprehensive comment. I remember your commenting on my first article last year as well. It is good that you bring up the fact that most every other religion acknowledges the unseen realms. Clearly, psychiatry is outnumbered, and does not have the self-awareness for self-doubt: that is, can it ask itself if something is missing within its set of beliefs? The fact that psychiatry eschews the soul and believes the brain creates consciousness instead of acknowledging the nature and being of consciousness per se, beyond and prior to the brain’s transmission of it, is enough to know that psychiatry is a “consensus validated delusional system” as an anti-psychiatry psychologist friend of mine has called it.

    Also, I agree with you and know that neuroleptics, if not carefully administered, can procure secondary illness or a psychosis all their own. Not only with exacerbated voice-hearing, as you experienced, but with very uncomfortable psychological states of desperation, causing suicidal ideation. The misguided psychiatrist who overmedicated me when I was with an ACT Team in 2010 misinterpreted these as symptoms of the illness itself when in fact, these symptoms were actually horrible side-effects caused by the medication which mimicked the so-called illness. These boundaries can get very fuzzy. I feel much better, in terms of having fewer of these side-effects, since my meds were decreased. Again, less is more with medication. Only in acute cases would I recommend increases, but only temporarily to avoid chemical dependence and difficulty tapering off, or in getting “anticholinergic intoxication syndrome” as you call it.

    You do know more than you think about the religions, and your experience can serve as a template of recognition for learning more through your exploration of science and metaphysics. Good luck with your continued research.

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  • Hi, CatNight, is this the link: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/the-unexpected-math-behind-van-gogh-s-starry-night-natalya-st-clair

    I just watched it, and yes, the turbulence captured in Van Gough’s paintings correlates with the turbulence, denoted as a term used in physics in this TED ED video, as seen in nature, which Van Gough reflected through the genius of his paintings in states of psychosis. Would this imply that nature is always in an altered state, and that we, as humans, have separated from this experience with our rational minds? Thus it seems to be the privilege of the mad to experience the psychosis that brings about the “natural” altered state? So experiencing altered states should not be looked upon askance, but as a sought-after process of life. Thank you for bringing this up. Yes, it is more on topic than you think…

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  • Thanks for acknowledging this article. You put it generously about my having broken through the veil. I have often thought of this, though not in these exact words; thank you, they are very descriptive. But this comes with a price: constant surveillance by a mechanically-oriented subliminal vocal presence that is posited outside my window, and is embedded in environmental noises, particularly aircraft. If I have in fact, broken through the veil, “they” don’t like it, and try to keep me down with auditory hallucinations. This puts me in a permanently caustic altered state, although I am very functional: keep the house clean, cook all my meals, work online many hours a day and try to get some exercise, even if I need a cane to walk. And yes, your advice not to share this stuff with the wrong person is very well-taken. Generally, people are just too stuck in 3D to imagine a life of this kind–being in two worlds at once. No wonder I am obese, even though I eat lightly, aside from my meds causing weight gain; it is the perpetual stress that causes the weight gain, also! I think it is about time, however, that a discussion of the paranormal explanation of these experiences be broached instead of belaboring the current abnormal explanation of them.

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  • Thank you for the compliment. The DSM is brutal and inhumane. It pathologizes the most ordinary of human conflicts. I have come to the conclusion that if one were to pathologize any of the medical specialties, ironically, it would be psychiatry. If there is a socially sanctioned way for humans to express their evil streak, it is through coercive psychiatric treatment. Somehow, the primitive sense that people are sitting around a table tearing people’s identities to shreds only demonstrates the childishness of the general sense psychiatrists hold dear to their hearts: the idea that they are better off than their patients, because they are not the crazy ones. This sense of superiority is a passing phenomenon for the course of their lives; the tables inevitably get turned in future incarnations, when the psychiatrists become the “mental patients” and perhaps, vice versa.

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  • I couldn’t help suggesting EmpowerPlus, by http://www.truehope.com, a supplement used by bipolars and depressives to get off their medication and maintain balance in their lives. It is worth giving the website a look. Double blind placebo controlled studies have been done for this supplement, so it works for most. Even if you are off meds, this supplement will bring better balance to the brain. I am sure Chaya would recommend it.

    Good luck,
    Luisa

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  • Dear J, thank you for your support. My journey began in 1978 before I became aware of alternatives, although there was a “mental patient” rights movement even then. I did not start waking up to the reality beyond medication until after I started a yoga practice in 1986 which transformed everything for me, even though now I manage to meditate occasionally, but the impression about conspiracy theory as not being theory became embedded in my mind as one of the results of that awakening (I was bullied in grammar school for three years, so I have personal experience of what being scapegoated means). Continual stress between the ages of 10 and 18 drew the last straw when I finally broke down, but now, after my voice-hearing decade in my 40’s and a period of being overmedicated from 2006-10 after I had weaned myself practically off meds by 1996, led to this ricoheting reality and now, I am just settling into an early retirement in my mid-50’s, relaxing with my cats and resting a lot. I am a homebody and go out basically just for health care appointments. Dr. Seth Farber, my friend, author of “The Spiritual Gift of Madness: The Failure of Psychiatry and the Rise of the Mad Pride Movement,” who is a famous activist and anti-psychiatry psychologist calls it the “mental death system” which I am sure is a phrase you will coin with pleasure. You got out sooner since the information was more readily available.

    Anyone and everyone can write a story about their ordeal with the mental death system. I have put the faces of the ignorant, smug residents who treated me into the astral recycle bin. One resident had the audacity to say that my new paradigm or new age philosophy was a symptom of my mental illness. I cannot express the injustice of some of these occurrences, or how in 1981, six stellazine tablets did not work, so even the nurse was “sorry to do this to me” when the psychopharmacologist ordered 12 stellazine tablets at once. Those days are gone. If I had a difficult karma to pay off, then psychiatry helped me do it, as a Buddhist friend tells me, who advises I pray for others in similar situations.

    Thank you for your comment, Luisa

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  • OK, Subvet416, sounds great. Maybe this will help me wean off the meds even further. I just take the dosage I am on now, which includes 135 mg of thorazine, because of my weight. In December I was on 60 mg, and then stopped sleeping, so I would have to be closely monitored by the tissue mineral analysis. Will look into it and Dr. Charles Parker’s youtubes. Thanks for sharing, Luisa

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  • Well, thank you very much, Subvet416 for your suggestions. I will look into them. I dieted on green vegetable juices and organic foods and got colonic hydrotherapy in the 1990’s (I still get a monthly colonic) and became slim and healthy by 1996 when I was on a teeny bit of risperdal, just to allow me to sleep, but I got overconfident when the prescription was not refilled and my doctor was on my vacation, and stopped the meds completely. For six weeks I managed, but then stopped sleeping, hallucinated, and my mother “dumped me in the hospital.” Then I started gaining the weight, and eventually doubled in size from 124 lb to 250 lb. I am now 218 lb. I saw a holistic doctor in 1986 who put me on megavitamin therapy and vitamin C drips, but he got me off my meds too fast, and I had a relapse with one series of ten shock treatments in 1987. So I am wary to get off meds, no matter what the protocol. But I do have a new holistic primary care physician and I will bring up your Analytical Research Labs reference and see what he says about trying it out. If it costs hundreds of dollars, I might have to pass it up. I hope they take my insurance. Yes, I have a book on “Nutrition and Mental Illness: An Orthomolecular Approach to Balancing Body Chemistry” by Carl C. Pfeiffer, M.D. I will look into this further to get back on track–these days I enjoy food more and am not so strict with my diet, although it is still vegetarian.

    Have you looked into Truehope.com and the EmpowerPlus formula for getting off medication? It works for many bipolars and depressives in stopping their meds and in supplying the brain with necessary nutrients.

    Thank you for your concern,
    Luisa

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  • Dear Fiachra,

    Aren’t you glad to share experiences with others? Do not let your fear grip you in this case, if there is a similarity, but know that you are not alone in your journey. I suggest writing about your experiences, as I have, to release the burden of any fear, and to serve as a record to see how far you will have come once you look back on your past journal entries. Courage is just not being bashful about putting one foot in front of the other and taking the next step. I hope you can start writing, too.

    Best wishes,
    Luisa

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  • Dear Someone Else,

    What a coincidence about mentioning MLK, Jr.’s quote and that it is also your birthday! As per the RLS, I had vicious attacks of it in the hospital in 2006 when I was mega-dosed on clozapine, and manage it now, even though it is to a lesser degree, with requip and Clear Products Restless Leg Relief or NatraBio Restless Legs. These homeopathics, except for the requip, which is a drug, can be found discounted at vitacost.com. They might help you and I use them.

    I don’t know if I would ever get off the drugs, because I have taken them for such a long time, or 37 years. The downside has been obesity, kidney disease and fatigue. I was so scared by an insomnia attack last December that I relied on temporarily increasing the meds to sleep in order to avoid the hospital, so what can I tell you? If I could take only natural things and sleep, and get off the drugs, I would, but I have not been able to do so. I always hope, but have reached the end of my rope, since I have had eight relapses between 1980 and 2009 while weaning myself off the drugs, so obviously, I did not do it correctly or I am just a hopeless medication addict. I realize there is no comparison, but like diabetics who need to take medication, I need to take these drugs to sleep. If something changes in the future before I kick the bucket, I would be willing to try it.

    Thanks for your good wishes, Luisa

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  • Dear Someone Else,

    Thank you for sharing what we have in common. It is true that psychiatric drugs, if given to so-called normal people can result in symptoms of so-called mental illness. Everyone has a unique reaction to them, so the science behind their administration is pseudo-scientific. I had once taken too much of one medication that exacerbated my hallucinations. You may have heard of adolescents hallucinating on Paxil. But I have always felt protected and healed by my spirit guidance, that does a general detox on my astral and etheric body as I sleep, so my physical body can wake up in the morning more healed from the silent warfare in the brain caused by the medication. What happens is my thoughts are not to my liking, so I live with this kind of mental itch. Things have slowly gotten better, however, and I take low dosages now, without which I cannot sleep. But I get restless leg syndrome from the meds, so I take lots of homeopathy and some requip medicine for the RLS. Yes, you are right that journal writing is a great help. I am sorry your drugs caused symptoms–that does happen to some individuals, so psychiatry should tread lightly and undermedicate instead of overmedicate as you say. Let the future be in the hands of the creatively maladjusted as Martin Luther King, Jr. once said. Good luck. Luisa

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