I was a lab rat for Big Pharma Prescriptions, physicians, psychiatrists and Big Pharma.
An Unholy Alliance OR well-intentioned medical people using the only strategy they know?
In the early 1980s, after years of issues, I was diagnosed with clinical depression by the leading psychiatrist at the University of Alberta. The apparent “cause” of my depression? A chemical blood imbalance.
I wasn’t smart enough to ask about the science behind this diagnosis. If you read I, the Woman, Planted the Tree, you know my story of journaling, meditation, dreams, prayer, Catholicism, women’s groups, reading a few hundred books and …. I was healed of clinical depression in a transcendent meditative experience February 7, 1989. I learned of preverbal childhood molestation. The “clinical depression” disappeared. My menstrual cycle became normal. Life is “normal.” 32 years have passed. I am an author of Memoir. I have spent thousands of hours of writing, reading, journaling, meditation and prayer.
About a year ago, I read a medical journal article explaining there is no such diagnosis as chemical blood imbalance. It is at best using drugs to “Carpet bomb my brain and hope something sticks” A neuroscientist at John Hopkins University.
I am asking for your HELP. You can read my story. You can tell my story. You can tell the story of time to develop some alternatives to drugs, drugs, and more drugs. Why?
I just listened to CBC, IDEAS with Nahlah Ayed. She spoke with Anne Harrington, author of Mind Fixers: Psychiatry’s Troubled Search for the Biology of Mental Illness with references to Marya Hornbacher, author Madness: A Bipolar Life.
I listened with deepening intent.
I can’t decide the emotion I most feel at this very moment. Utter and complete anger? Total relief? Some variation of disgust? Perhaps overwhelming sadness? Or, gratitude that health professionals and researchers like Anne Harrington, John Hopkin University are speaking out? I decide on all of the above. But most of all? Hope. I am asking you to please listen to the podcast. Share it widely with anyone you know with a depression diagnosis. The conversation ranged through a lot of my life.
Ever hear of chemical blood imbalance? What do you know about phenobarbital? How about other drugs prescribed by doctors and psychiatrists? Or, what about Zoloft, advertised as a cure for depression?
Or, how about Sertraline, Paroxetine, Escitalopram, Citalopram, Bupropion, Alprazolam, Duloxetine, Venlafaxine, Fluvoxamine, Quetiapine, Clonazepam, Amitriptyline, Aripiprazole, Buspirone, Mirtazapine, Risperidone, Diazepam, Lorazepam, Lamotrigine, Gabapentin, Methylphenidate, and … Prozac.
Do you have a family member, friend, child, sibling, spouse or partner prescribed anti-depressants? Someone with bi-polar? Or some other “disease” with a “biological” explanation?
I do. Sadly. Depression and mental illness don’t only hurt. They kill. They Impacts families and friends. So, I speak out. AGAIN. I don’t care much about the supposed shame of mental illness. I do care about the lives of many suffering from depression, mental illness, bi-polar disease and ….
I have not yet begun the process of trying to access my medical records from the 1980s. I don’t even know if I have the energy left to do that.
Chemical blood imbalance. No such thing. Anti-depressants prescribed but many report no helpful impacts. Some folks report improvements. I didn’t.
Side effects? Oh yea. Brain fog? Check. Losing words? Check. Weight gain? Check. Mood swings? Check. Anxiety? Check. Frenetic energy? Check. Memory loss? Check.
A Story of Hope. Somehow, I am one of the lucky ones. I discovered the Way through. You can read my Memoir of the Journey through hell to healing. And you can support alternatives such as meditation, journaling, dream work and psychotherapy.Books available on Amazon or through my website at www.dreamsalongtheway.com
I, the Woman, Planted the Tree: A Journey through Dreams to the Feminine.
Authoring Self: A Journey through Dreams to the Feminine.
Soon to be published. Cauldron of the Feminine: A Journey through Dreams.
