I didn’t know Stephen Gilbert, but after reading about him I would have liked to be the person he was.
Rest in Dignity, Stephen……….
Rachel777. Yes I saw the “matrix”. And your analogy to the “blue pill” is right on.
bcharris. It was in the late 80’s and the Orthomolecular Psychiatrist had nothing to do with the Brain Bio Center.
But he did believe in extremely large doses of vitamins, and hair testing for mineral levels and other tests. None of which were covered by insurance.
I investigated these techniques as a later PhD trained in research Biopsychology and found no scientific proof of any Orthomolecular Psychiatry methods, either then, or now.
Bothandneither33
My points still stand. Don’t evaluate people by their degrees (nothing un examined reveals self-awareness), be specific when you refer to people with advanced degrees, and please update your theory on medium.com, since your theory has a good beginning.
bcharis. I saw an orthomolecular psychiatrist whose methods, diagnosis, and tests were even worse than “traditional” psychiatry, which I also experienced. Have you been seen by or “experienced” an orthomolecular psychiatrist?
bothandneither33. I assume you are referring to me since I have a PhD in Biopsychology and am a male.
I tried to reply directly to your comment but there was no “reply” option after your comment as there was for other comments.
Please don’t judge my book by it’s cover.
I am also a college dropout, a licensed massage therapist, and have been/am a factory worker, construction worker, jazz flutist, potter, teacher in medical school, advocate of both female and male rights, sexual abuse victim, 8 time psychiatric patient in a hospital I worked in, “mental patient”, writer for many corrupt pharmaceutical companies, volunteer investigating a rare genetic disorder ( Lowe Syndrome), experienced scientific researcher, co-creator and leader of an eclectic dance group (www.hcdance.org), a potter, a jazz flute player, someone who taught himself to play guitar and saxophone, and someone who attempted suicide.
So I have a varied background especially with our US mental health system.
I read (took a gander at) your piece on medium.com and feel it is a good start, but hope you will “finish” what you began at least a year ago adding additional material which you have learned.
As a PhD my “cover” does not represent “myself” Does yours?
Take good care bothandneither33.
I_e_cox. Very well said.
pacificdawn
YES. Let’s not forget psychotherapists.
fnert777
SO MANY people “miss the point” and are overall optimistic.
fnert777
Do much truth in your comment!!
Oldhead
Very good way to put it, “In the halls of the oppressor”.
oldhead
A good comment, as usual!
Dear Bob
I picked you to ask this question to because you often have very intelligent and relative comments. The question based on this article and others is: So how do we change the current mental health system? Thanks.
Redcat. The pharmaceutical company who made the drug knew!
PacificDawn. Very very well said. I know all too well.
Gavin. PLEASE don’t forget/neglect the sexual abuse of boys/men by WOMEN!!
Julie. Actually the people at Elgin are unethical and themselves have issues that they never addressed.
O.H. None of what you say is surprising. I’m sure that there are people who see the movies you mention and say, “No this is absurd, and the people in the films who kill or request brain damaging “therapies” are “crazy”!
Rachel. The term “Mental Illness” is so misunderstood. ESPECIALLY, by the legal system. True of typical medical diagnoses as well by MDs.
Pacific Dawn: EXACTLY like that!!
Dear Steve. Yes, NO MATTER WHAT…….The drug(s) is/are ALWAYS “exonerated”. That is the real tragedy.
Dear Susannah
Very true especially “Having the courage to go against the flow”
Anon5498
I understand exactly. The Institute of Living in CT should be shut down as well and it’s staff prosecuted.
Dear Julie
Yes, whistleblowers do not do well on “Mental “Health”
Rachell777
Yes, it causes many of us to want a peaceful sleep
redcat
Some of us don’t want to keep going and just wish for “death with dignity” please………………
Dear Redcat
I understand what you are saying. I wish I could say more to add to what you have said in your posts but even I am ethical enough not to use curse words.
Dear Frank
I understand what you mean and “survivors” is a better word than “heroes” for the reasons you mention. And I too am mad as hell about having to feel like a survivor.
Dear Julie. Yes, I understand. In my case the whole world cut me off especially the person who would say “Just try something different”
Oldhead. Why would we expect it to be different in the USSR today with Putin as leader and Trump supporting him.
Dear Rachel777
Yes, we are not “mad” or “psychiatric survivors” but those still alive should be referred to as “psychiatric heroes”
Catalyzt
Sorry you found this out the hard way, but you stood /stand up for your student clients. Something my many therapists as a student and as an adult never did.
Wish I had some ideas for you should this happen again but I don’t.
Dear Catalyst
Now that is truly criminal and since they are your clients I’m sure you speak the compassionate truth.
Dear Oldhead
What do I think? I agree with you completely especially about the police.
Dear Slaying the Dragon of Psychiatry
Antipsychiatry…….Yes, truth, common sense, and justice! Well said!
Dear Sylvian
Good quoting of laws and good laugh in our sleeves.
Dear Out
You are so very very right.
Dear Rachel777
Good use of Animal House.
Dear Frank
A good example of an oxymoron!
Dear Steve
EXACTLY!
Dear Someone Else. ASHAMED indeed.
Dear Kindredspirit. You say it so well when you say, “What is needed is restoration of the social contract”. If only more professionals knew what you know.
Dear Alex. So very well said. You said it better than I ever could. Thanks.
Dear Teresa: Yes we should all encourage the so-called expert to go FAR “away”.
Interestingly it has been proven that a therapist’s personal philosophy/experiences in CBT or any other therapy is more important than their training, no matter what school they attended.
Dear Slyvain. Yes definitely a form of unethical corruption!
Dear Vitas. Yes what happened to “Do No Harm”??
Dear Vitas. Thank you for your bravery in recounting your story.
Dr Joseph. Thank you for a very thorough discussion of a controversial topic. Job well done.
Dear Oldhead. Your thinking is critical.
Have you come up with anyways to unify survivors around a common platform and an analysis of psychiatry based on material reality and not wishful thinking?
I am a Phd in Biopsychology and please email me at: zelig@snet.net.
Thanks for your rational thinking.
I agree with most of what the other commenters say or imply. The ideas the blog poster Mr. Nikkel mentions are complex and seem impossible to implement in our current society.
When will we see a valid, scientific publication in a psychiatric journal that documents proven ways to ween from multiple psychiatric medications that have no proven efficacy or safety and are often prescribed on top of each other?? This is just one of many concerns with what the poster has to say.
As far as the male in the 2nd AOT article, he killed himself because he was so distraught with what happened to him. How will our current psychiatric system prevent that?
Information is important but action that the money driven system will implement is essential.
How, and more importantly “when” will that implementation happen especially with our current political process that has very very much on their hands.
“Slowly” is simply not good enough for those who are currently suffering, including their families, and people who everyday are beginning to suffer.
Dear Steve
Yes I do understand it is a daunting task involving much time and money, especially now. Where is that time, money and the professional psychiatric community which is also critical. Why have we waited so long?
People have been suffering for many many years and yet advocates say it is possible to make meaningful changes.
As someone who has suffered for years “daunting” means “impossible” to me and a huge number of others.
Steve, we are in “checkmate” IMHO.
Dear Steve
I am not an extreme person, but having worked for pharmaceutical companies for 13 years and also having been severely injured by psychiatric drugs how does one pull themselves out of terror by realization or discussion?
How does a small group of injured people combat a pharmaceutically based huge system that has vast amounts of money, control, supporters, credibility, attorneys and reluctance to listen to views counter to their own which threaten their livelihood? Those who have concerns are looked at as sick especially if they have a diagnosis. How many people subscribe to MIA compared to those who wield huge power, money and control.
So Steve, as a moderator for MIA what is your solution or the solution by those who work for MIA, or even the solution by Dr. Wood? Thanks.
Dear Truth
Thank you for your posts that “speak truth to power”. For those of us severely injured by “psychiatry” what do we do??
Dear Antonia
My gosh. I can identify with almost everything you say and I’m a 66 year old male. Since I can identify I think I can also say I understand especially when you say “Monster doctor”. From the point of view of the “disillusioned psychiatrist” it is not enough to help psychiatrists since it is imperative to help those who feel that psychiatric drugs and their other “treatments” destroyed their lives. So I would ask the “disillusioned and guilty psychiatrist”. How are you and the psychiatric community helping those whose lives have been extremely altered or destroyed by their “profession”?
Dear Dr. Wood
Thank you for speaking up, but what are you doing to change or abolish psychiatry that has destroyed many lives including mine and continues to do so??
Dear Sanderella
I feel exactly the way you do (angry as hell) and I am a 66 year old male and a former professional whose life was destroyed by Psychiatry.
Dear Leighgage and others
Yes as a former 66 year old male “client” plied with a plethora of drugs and who as a former professional I am sorry for your loss and am also sorry that Psychiatry as a profession even exists since it destroyed my life.
Dear bcharris
I may have responded to your comment about how well orthomolecular psychiatry works but re-read your comment and have to say how much it irreversibly Damaged me with stigma and it’s also unproven approach. It was no better than the many psychiatrists I saw throughout my life and I am now a disabled 66 year old former professional male.
Dear Locostanzo
Welcome to the Twilight Zone .
Bcharris. I too tried Orthomolecular Psychiatry including high does of vitamins especially Niacin. It cost me a fortune, and did nothing to prevent me from dropping out of school.
PacificDawn
Agreed. Enough debating. It is time to act in any way we can.
Dear Lawrence
Thank you as a Psychiatrist for speaking the truth. Very few do. I’m from NY too and one of the “crickets” who happens to be a PhD in Biopsychology.
Fiachra
Very well said.
Dear PacificDawn:
“Then we have to protect those next in line to be victimized”.
The most important and cogent statement of all the comments.
Dear Cole
I know exactly how you feel. Psychiatrists are indeed Charlatans. Zel
Jclaude
No we are not really disagreeing. Thank you so much for your post.
Yes. His work should continue to inspire all of us!
The cat
I wish someone felt like that for me.
The cat and Someone else
Why haven’t people done so already? Making YouTubes and speaking up, etc. Perhaps they’re afraid of reprisals?? I would be!!
Jclaude
I’m sorry. From what I have seen and experienced and continue to see in my 66 years I don’t believe it is a question of time before the media gets involved in this. That is why I cited a few of the things the media is involved in. Perhaps you are younger and more optimistic than I? No real need to respond. I don’t really want to go back and forth with our points of view. However, I do respect your thinking. Thanks.
Zel
Michael Simonson, Old head, Steve, Jclaude
I don’t mean to be critical of your comments about the media or your extensive efforts to contact them. I am just confused by assertions of their lack of interest in the survey as being due to “advertisers”, “lack of compassion”, “their agendas”, etc.
It seems odd or at 66 years old perhaps I am just naive?
The media sources I am familiar with including: MSNBC, CNN, NPR, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, various local newspapers, various local televised news, etc seem to report on all types of topics including:
1. Priests abusing young boys
2. Unfair and abusive conditions of workers at Amazon
3. Continuing sexual abuse and harassment of girls and women by celebrities, high power people, and Trump
4. Abuse and mistreatment of dogs
5. Documentary about FDA abhorrent approval process for medical devices
6. The opiate crises especially overdoses
7. The serious issue of climate change
Unfortunately there are many others.
The words of respondents to Michael’s survey ring in my ears. “I was treated worse than a dog”, and other unbelievable comments.
I am forced to conclude once you receive a psychiatric diagnosis, which have no scientific basis, and how I was treated, you are probably considered less than human and not worth reporting about.
Michael went with a respondent of the survey to a meeting with a political representative in CT and videotaped this meeting which was heartbreaking. He and she made suggestions about changes they would like to see. I asked if he thought any of their suggestions to the reprentative would illicit action and he said he didn’t think so.
Zel Dolinsky, PhD in Biopsychology
To All
I just wanted to say that probably all of us (including me who filled out the survey) and the nearly 500 people who took the survey, want to see the survey results widely distributed beyond MIA.
I spoke with Michael Simeonson who did an excellent job creating, administering, summarizing the data and presenting the survey results about getting the survey results, especially the respondent comments, to the media.
He told me he tried with the support of Robert Whitaker (The creator of MIA) to get the media interested in the survey results.
He said he contacted 300 media sources but heard back from none.
What is the media afraid of??
Zel Dolinsky, PhD in Biopsychology
Dear Manuela
I will try to keep this short. Thank you for the courage to post your comment. At least you are young and have the hope and energy to change our broken US Mental Health Care System.
As a 66 year old Biopsychologist I have much to say but will leave it up to the nearly 500 psychiatrically hospitalized individuals from the recent survey done by Mad In America (MIA). SEE BELOW.
Manuela and others please see all their comments. They are relevant because they also relate to other aspects of our US Mental Health Care System.
Dear Manuela
I will try to keep this short. Thank you for the courage to post your comment. At least you are young and have the hope and energy to change our broken US Mental Health Care System.
As a 66 year old Biopsychologist I have much to say but will leave it up to the nearly 500 psychiatrically hospitalized individuals from the recent survey done by Mad In America (MIA). SEE BELOW.
Manuela and others please see all their comments. They are relevant because they also relate to other aspects of our US Mental Health Care System.
For 13 years I worked for pharmaceutical companies via a CRO called SCIREX. I headed the medical writing division. I can’t tell you how many times people in the CRO were angry at me for slowing up the writing process when I wanted answers about various issues with data. This was not even for studies involving psychiatric medications!!
Samruck2
I’m so sorry that MIA doesn’t seem to be interested in listening to you. You have helped me. I thought MIA was about change? The things you say seem to be in keeping with many ideas expressed by Open Dialogue? As both someone extremely traumatized by the US mental health system including abusive hospitalizations (I filled out the survey) and poly pharmacy, I also try to do my best truely accepting and trying to relate to someone like your spouse. I am a 66 yo male PhD Biopsychologist with over 30 years of experience who no longer can work. I would like to give someone from MIA a chance to comment on your insights and about your take on their interactions with you like the moderator of the MIA comments (Steve McCrea) or especially Bob Whitaker the head of MIA. And ask them what they are doing to try to get the information from the hospitalization survey out to the general public via a respected and non-biased form of media?
Maradel and others
Here is a recent podcast done by an MD from NPR called 2nd opinion explaining about the Semmelweis issue and how it still exists today
As a 66 year old PhD Biopsychologist who was a participant in the survey and because of my traumatic hospitalizations no longer work I agree with all you say. At least you have at least 1 supporter on this site. I realize that we are trying to fight a highly medically educated hierarchy who believe they have the answers. Have we not learned anything from the long ago story of Semmelweis who tried to confront his medical community with clear proof yet was an MD and was ostracized and placed in a psychiatric hospital by threatened MDs where he died.
Old head
Yes, exactly
Samruck2
I have read many of your posts and consider you a very brave man. Please don’t leave those who listen to your insights and have some experience with what you have dealt with.
Michael (the author of the survey)
I wonder why there are only 64 MIA commenters submitting comments about this important survey??
Old Head. I am doing the best I can to make it day to day since I am also dealing with Poly psych drug withdrawal that I was on for 30 yrs as well as the polypharmacy from the hospitalizations. However I will do the best I can to stick around and publicize the survey (I agree with you that not much has changed) however I find the majority of the comments from the survey totally shocking. I would like to also somehow? get the word out about the importance of trauma and ethics in the workplace which I experienced and being very very careful about trusting what pharmaceutical companies say including about medical devices as well as their data by so called “experts”. Only in the US and New Zealand is there direct to consumer marketing of all types of drugs on the TV by non other than pharmaceutical companies!! Take care
Old head I misspoke. At 66 I still have a PhD in Biopsychology and worked in that field teaching medical school for 10 years and then worked for pharmaceutical companies as a medical writer for 13 years. I realize now that most of what I taught or did was incorrect/false. I was deemed psychiatrically disabled 10 years ago and no longer work. I was the person whose comment in the survey was “Too painful to discuss”
The_Cat. Thanks so much for listing the sites to list complaints. I was someone who filled out the survey and as a professional feel terribly traumatized by several of my forced hospital experiences. Is there any assurance that if I list experiences at the well known psych hospital in CT regarding various forms of abuse that they won’t try to retaliate against me in some way?
Thank you. I am very scared now. People tell me not to lose hope and to keep on trying and not act like a victim. That I am not helpless and should act as a responsible adult.
Alex
Your utube is not available?
Mik
Yes I am very noise everything sensitive too and use ear plugs. Thank you for responding. It is hard to maintain hope. I feel very Overwhelmed alone and powerless. Goodnight for now.
Dear MIK
Thank you. I wish I could find anything that calms me but after being hospitalized 6 times via police and ambulance I can’t sleep anymore. I have been taken fro tm my condo because I wasn’t caring for it or myself after being returned there after being hospitalized. I had been a successful PhD researcher who at 50 lost his 13 year job through no fault of his own and an intimate relationship left me with no warning who because of a very complicated situation I had to see several times a week though I didn’t want to have anything to do with her. and after trying to hold it together for 5 yrs broke down in my Psychiatrists office because I was frustrated that meds were not working. I was not violent just very scared. Next thing he leaves the room and says it’s done and an ambulance and police take me to the hospital. In hospital I was taunted by staff and patients. One patient followed me around for 2 weeks telling me about judgement day and saying he would stick pencils in my ear. Another patient said he was the devil and referenced trying to help me in the past but now he was going to kill me and throw me in a dumpster. These were not hallucinations though I was heavily drugged. I’ve been placed in a “retirement” home single room and outside my window is a dumpster which is emptied many times a day night with loud noises that remind me of what the person in hospital told me. I am afraid to leave my room. I can’t think clearly anymore. I panic whenever I see an ambulance or hear a police siren which is often since older residents are being taken to the hospital daily. I feel like I am living in hell or feel I must be being punished. What scares me most is that I have been unable to sleep and am having violent thoughts when in the past I was a gentle introverted person.
I feel the same way after 6 hospitalizations. Now I can’t sleep at all and people tell me I am just playing the victim role. I now suffer from intense anxiety and physical symptoms due to loss of appetite. I’m scared to death of hospitals and doctors and can’t function. I’m a 65 yo male who is now anorexic and don’t feel well and am afraid I’ll be hospitalized again?
Mik
I am very sorry for your experience. I can identify with you. I too have suffered irreversible damage at the hands of psychiatrists my whole life. I too had a successful career but am now a basket case. Don’t trust anyone or anything. God help us. People tell me you can’t change the past and just need to move forward. Or pray and God will help you. I don’t feel I can do that anymore and now even blame myself.
Career Psych Subject
Yes you are right. I was horribly damaged by the system and I worked right within it. I had a psychiatrist as a boss who was as manipulative a person who you could find. The problem was I bought into all his nonsense and did not quit until the damage was done.
Yes I identify with this article but at 65 yo and given the additional label as disabled I fell hook line and sinker into the trap. Labeled at an early age as schizophrenic when I was just reacting to living in a family where I was psychologically and physically abused by my father and bullied and beat up by next door neighbors and given every single drug available up to haldol which caused me as an adolescent to have muscle spasms at work. I went on to gather other labels and be treated with additional drugs throughout my life. Interspersed with this I somehow managed to obtain a PhD in Biopsychology and went on to hold responsible positions looking for the cure for being me. However I never really escaped the labels since I was never a truly happy person and sought out jobs and relationships that just replicated my victim state. Over time when I had subsequent problems coping I continued to turn toward medication and then ended up involuntarily hospitalized several times where I got more medication and was tormented by staff as well as patients. I became more and more disabled. Unfortunately I also developed physical problems and unrelenting insomnia. I don’t really feel any hope for recovery now. I do accept some responsibility for my actions but my early labeling and subsequent acceptance of and treatment has led me to where I am now. Lack of sleep and damage to my body by self abuse are too much to bear. It was not until I began reading MIA that I had any real perception of what was going on.
Thank you Catnight. My story is more involved than I wrote but kept it short. I have tried many of your suggestions over the course of 8 yrs as well as untold friends and family that have tried to help. I am exhausted physically, mentally and spiritually and once a professional very responsible active person am literally afraid of my own shadow and have been unable to work or concentrate. I have acted in very irresponsible ways and have not slept in yrs. I appreciate your caring and suggestions.
I’m leaving this comment in hopes that it may help someone in the future. I’ve lost most of my hope. At 14 yrs old I was diagnosed as schizophrenic even though I met none of the criteria. I was dosed with every available drug including Haldol which caused me to have neck spasms at work. I went on to drop out of college. I fought back and eventually went back to college but felt I would never have children or a family because of this diagnosis and others I received later in my life with more drugs and later traumatic hospitalizations. To this day I wonder if my young brain body may have been affected by that drug and subsequent drug treatment.
Svava
Glad you made it. I was not so lucky. My story began like yours but back 50 yrs when I was misdiagnosed as schizophrenic and dosed with everything under the sun including Haldol which gave me seizures at work. I was just a very very sensitive boy in a very dysfunctional family where I was labeled the sick one. I ended up dropping out of college with a nervous breakdown. I struggled back without meds and eventually accomplished many things but took on the victim role replicating my family for the rest of my life and always went back to meds thinking that there was always something broken in me when I ran into trouble. I’m now a 65 yo disabled professional who has lost everything. I hope others learn from our stories.
Dr Shipko.
As a former psychopharmacologist Who is now on disability perhaps from withdrawal of long term psych med use. I am wondering if you have any insight into why some people have little or no trouble withdrawing from SSRIs and or Benzos even after yrs of use in a short time with no ill after effects. I know several and there is scientific literature that documents this and for others it is such a devastating experience. How can we explain the differences?
Do you have any experience with withdrawal from Parnate?
I feel it is too late for me. I was a 65 yo professional male who is now on disability. I was mislabeled as a schizophrenic when a young person from a family that physically emotionally and sexually abused me and then treated me as the sick one. I was heavily drugged as a young boy to treat my illness and believed I was irreparably damaged. I ended up fighting back from serious depression and anxiety several times in my life usually from issues associated with relationship breakups or sexual issues given many drugs and allowed myself to become the victim in many many situation including at the hands of a psychiatrist who was my boss. I’ve now been hospitalized 6 times all with police involved. I am an extremely introverted sensitive person and was extremely frightened by being in a psych ward. The first time against my will where I was not a danger to myself or others but raised my voice out of frustration that the many drugs I had tried did not help my depression. The others for being suicidal or because I was not functioning. In the hospital I was taunted by staff and patients and heavily drugged. Taunted Especially by staff who seemed to bring up my professional background. Patients who followed me around 24/7 told me this was a safe place but could stick a pencil in my ear and many other stories that upset me too much to tell. I was told by a psychiatrist recently there was nothing wrong with me and just needed to have an epiphany and later asked by the same pdoc what drugs I thought I should be on because ironically I have a PhD in biological Psychiatry and insisted I get treatment because I had been hospitalized. Another Psychiatrist told me I just needed to get a part time job and not be angry. I have lost everything I worked my whole life for. I have managed to work for the majority of my life despite many “breakdowns” It is only recently reading the many pieces on MIA that I realize I was fed psychological and psychiatric lies most of my life. When I tried to reject them or displayed my sense of agony I was ridiculed or rejected. I now trust no one and hide from the world afraid of my own shadow. Sorry I am not one of the success stories on MIA.
I didn’t know Stephen Gilbert, but after reading about him I would have liked to be the person he was.
Rest in Dignity, Stephen……….
Rachel777. Yes I saw the “matrix”. And your analogy to the “blue pill” is right on.
bcharris. It was in the late 80’s and the Orthomolecular Psychiatrist had nothing to do with the Brain Bio Center.
But he did believe in extremely large doses of vitamins, and hair testing for mineral levels and other tests. None of which were covered by insurance.
I investigated these techniques as a later PhD trained in research Biopsychology and found no scientific proof of any Orthomolecular Psychiatry methods, either then, or now.
Bothandneither33
My points still stand. Don’t evaluate people by their degrees (nothing un examined reveals self-awareness), be specific when you refer to people with advanced degrees, and please update your theory on medium.com, since your theory has a good beginning.
bcharis. I saw an orthomolecular psychiatrist whose methods, diagnosis, and tests were even worse than “traditional” psychiatry, which I also experienced. Have you been seen by or “experienced” an orthomolecular psychiatrist?
bothandneither33. I assume you are referring to me since I have a PhD in Biopsychology and am a male.
I tried to reply directly to your comment but there was no “reply” option after your comment as there was for other comments.
Please don’t judge my book by it’s cover.
I am also a college dropout, a licensed massage therapist, and have been/am a factory worker, construction worker, jazz flutist, potter, teacher in medical school, advocate of both female and male rights, sexual abuse victim, 8 time psychiatric patient in a hospital I worked in, “mental patient”, writer for many corrupt pharmaceutical companies, volunteer investigating a rare genetic disorder ( Lowe Syndrome), experienced scientific researcher, co-creator and leader of an eclectic dance group (www.hcdance.org), a potter, a jazz flute player, someone who taught himself to play guitar and saxophone, and someone who attempted suicide.
So I have a varied background especially with our US mental health system.
I read (took a gander at) your piece on medium.com and feel it is a good start, but hope you will “finish” what you began at least a year ago adding additional material which you have learned.
As a PhD my “cover” does not represent “myself” Does yours?
Take good care bothandneither33.
I_e_cox. Very well said.
pacificdawn
YES. Let’s not forget psychotherapists.
fnert777
SO MANY people “miss the point” and are overall optimistic.
fnert777
Do much truth in your comment!!
Oldhead
Very good way to put it, “In the halls of the oppressor”.
oldhead
A good comment, as usual!
Dear Bob
I picked you to ask this question to because you often have very intelligent and relative comments. The question based on this article and others is: So how do we change the current mental health system? Thanks.
Zel Dolinsky,PhD. zelig@snet.net
Steve. And some psychiatrists believe in exorcism
Redcat. The pharmaceutical company who made the drug knew!
PacificDawn. Very very well said. I know all too well.
Gavin. PLEASE don’t forget/neglect the sexual abuse of boys/men by WOMEN!!
Julie. Actually the people at Elgin are unethical and themselves have issues that they never addressed.
O.H. None of what you say is surprising. I’m sure that there are people who see the movies you mention and say, “No this is absurd, and the people in the films who kill or request brain damaging “therapies” are “crazy”!
Rachel. The term “Mental Illness” is so misunderstood. ESPECIALLY, by the legal system. True of typical medical diagnoses as well by MDs.
Pacific Dawn: EXACTLY like that!!
Dear Steve. Yes, NO MATTER WHAT…….The drug(s) is/are ALWAYS “exonerated”. That is the real tragedy.
Dear Susannah
Very true especially “Having the courage to go against the flow”
Anon5498
I understand exactly. The Institute of Living in CT should be shut down as well and it’s staff prosecuted.
Dear Julie
Yes, whistleblowers do not do well on “Mental “Health”
Rachell777
Yes, it causes many of us to want a peaceful sleep
redcat
Some of us don’t want to keep going and just wish for “death with dignity” please………………
Dear Redcat
I understand what you are saying. I wish I could say more to add to what you have said in your posts but even I am ethical enough not to use curse words.
Dear Frank
I understand what you mean and “survivors” is a better word than “heroes” for the reasons you mention. And I too am mad as hell about having to feel like a survivor.
Dear Julie. Yes, I understand. In my case the whole world cut me off especially the person who would say “Just try something different”
Oldhead. Why would we expect it to be different in the USSR today with Putin as leader and Trump supporting him.
Dear Rachel777
Yes, we are not “mad” or “psychiatric survivors” but those still alive should be referred to as “psychiatric heroes”
Catalyzt
Sorry you found this out the hard way, but you stood /stand up for your student clients. Something my many therapists as a student and as an adult never did.
Wish I had some ideas for you should this happen again but I don’t.
Dear Catalyst
Now that is truly criminal and since they are your clients I’m sure you speak the compassionate truth.
Dear Oldhead
What do I think? I agree with you completely especially about the police.
Dear Slaying the Dragon of Psychiatry
Antipsychiatry…….Yes, truth, common sense, and justice! Well said!
Dear Sylvian
Good quoting of laws and good laugh in our sleeves.
Dear Out
You are so very very right.
Dear Rachel777
Good use of Animal House.
Dear Frank
A good example of an oxymoron!
Dear Steve
EXACTLY!
Dear Someone Else. ASHAMED indeed.
Dear Kindredspirit. You say it so well when you say, “What is needed is restoration of the social contract”. If only more professionals knew what you know.
Dear Alex. So very well said. You said it better than I ever could. Thanks.
Dear Teresa: Yes we should all encourage the so-called expert to go FAR “away”.
Interestingly it has been proven that a therapist’s personal philosophy/experiences in CBT or any other therapy is more important than their training, no matter what school they attended.
Dear Slyvain. Yes definitely a form of unethical corruption!
Dear Vitas. Yes what happened to “Do No Harm”??
Dear Vitas. Thank you for your bravery in recounting your story.
Dr Joseph. Thank you for a very thorough discussion of a controversial topic. Job well done.
Dear Oldhead. Your thinking is critical.
Have you come up with anyways to unify survivors around a common platform and an analysis of psychiatry based on material reality and not wishful thinking?
I am a Phd in Biopsychology and please email me at:
zelig@snet.net.
Thanks for your rational thinking.
I agree with most of what the other commenters say or imply. The ideas the blog poster Mr. Nikkel mentions are complex and seem impossible to implement in our current society.
When will we see a valid, scientific publication in a psychiatric journal that documents proven ways to ween from multiple psychiatric medications that have no proven efficacy or safety and are often prescribed on top of each other?? This is just one of many concerns with what the poster has to say.
As far as the male in the 2nd AOT article, he killed himself because he was so distraught with what happened to him. How will our current psychiatric system prevent that?
Information is important but action that the money driven system will implement is essential.
How, and more importantly “when” will that implementation happen especially with our current political process that has very very much on their hands.
“Slowly” is simply not good enough for those who are currently suffering, including their families, and people who everyday are beginning to suffer.
Dear Steve
Yes I do understand it is a daunting task involving much time and money, especially now. Where is that time, money and the professional psychiatric community which is also critical. Why have we waited so long?
People have been suffering for many many years and yet advocates say it is possible to make meaningful changes.
As someone who has suffered for years “daunting” means “impossible” to me and a huge number of others.
Steve, we are in “checkmate” IMHO.
Dear Steve
I am not an extreme person, but having worked for pharmaceutical companies for 13 years and also having been severely injured by psychiatric drugs how does one pull themselves out of terror by realization or discussion?
How does a small group of injured people combat a pharmaceutically based huge system that has vast amounts of money, control, supporters, credibility, attorneys and reluctance to listen to views counter to their own which threaten their livelihood? Those who have concerns are looked at as sick especially if they have a diagnosis. How many people subscribe to MIA compared to those who wield huge power, money and control.
So Steve, as a moderator for MIA what is your solution or the solution by those who work for MIA, or even the solution by Dr. Wood? Thanks.
Dear Truth
Thank you for your posts that “speak truth to power”. For those of us severely injured by “psychiatry” what do we do??
Dear Antonia
My gosh. I can identify with almost everything you say and I’m a 66 year old male. Since I can identify I think I can also say I understand especially when you say “Monster doctor”. From the point of view of the “disillusioned psychiatrist” it is not enough to help psychiatrists since it is imperative to help those who feel that psychiatric drugs and their other “treatments” destroyed their lives. So I would ask the “disillusioned and guilty psychiatrist”. How are you and the psychiatric community helping those whose lives have been extremely altered or destroyed by their “profession”?
Dear Dr. Wood
Thank you for speaking up, but what are you doing to change or abolish psychiatry that has destroyed many lives including mine and continues to do so??
Dear Sanderella
I feel exactly the way you do (angry as hell) and I am a 66 year old male and a former professional whose life was destroyed by Psychiatry.
Dear Leighgage and others
Yes as a former 66 year old male “client” plied with a plethora of drugs and who as a former professional I am sorry for your loss and am also sorry that Psychiatry as a profession even exists since it destroyed my life.
Dear bcharris
I may have responded to your comment about how well orthomolecular psychiatry works but re-read your comment and have to say how much it irreversibly Damaged me with stigma and it’s also unproven approach. It was no better than the many psychiatrists I saw throughout my life and I am now a disabled 66 year old former professional male.
Dear Locostanzo
Welcome to the Twilight Zone .
Bcharris. I too tried Orthomolecular Psychiatry including high does of vitamins especially Niacin. It cost me a fortune, and did nothing to prevent me from dropping out of school.
PacificDawn
Agreed. Enough debating. It is time to act in any way we can.
Dear Lawrence
Thank you as a Psychiatrist for speaking the truth. Very few do. I’m from NY too and one of the “crickets” who happens to be a PhD in Biopsychology.
Fiachra
Very well said.
Dear PacificDawn:
“Then we have to protect those next in line to be victimized”.
The most important and cogent statement of all the comments.
Dear Cole
I know exactly how you feel. Psychiatrists are indeed Charlatans. Zel
Jclaude
No we are not really disagreeing. Thank you so much for your post.
Yes. His work should continue to inspire all of us!
The cat
I wish someone felt like that for me.
The cat and Someone else
Why haven’t people done so already? Making YouTubes and speaking up, etc. Perhaps they’re afraid of reprisals?? I would be!!
Jclaude
I’m sorry. From what I have seen and experienced and continue to see in my 66 years I don’t believe it is a question of time before the media gets involved in this. That is why I cited a few of the things the media is involved in. Perhaps you are younger and more optimistic than I? No real need to respond. I don’t really want to go back and forth with our points of view. However, I do respect your thinking. Thanks.
Zel
Michael Simonson, Old head, Steve, Jclaude
I don’t mean to be critical of your comments about the media or your extensive efforts to contact them. I am just confused by assertions of their lack of interest in the survey as being due to “advertisers”, “lack of compassion”, “their agendas”, etc.
It seems odd or at 66 years old perhaps I am just naive?
The media sources I am familiar with including: MSNBC, CNN, NPR, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, various local newspapers, various local televised news, etc seem to report on all types of topics including:
1. Priests abusing young boys
2. Unfair and abusive conditions of workers at Amazon
3. Continuing sexual abuse and harassment of girls and women by celebrities, high power people, and Trump
4. Abuse and mistreatment of dogs
5. Documentary about FDA abhorrent approval process for medical devices
6. The opiate crises especially overdoses
7. The serious issue of climate change
Unfortunately there are many others.
The words of respondents to Michael’s survey ring in my ears. “I was treated worse than a dog”, and other unbelievable comments.
I am forced to conclude once you receive a psychiatric diagnosis, which have no scientific basis, and how I was treated, you are probably considered less than human and not worth reporting about.
Michael went with a respondent of the survey to a meeting with a political representative in CT and videotaped this meeting which was heartbreaking. He and she made suggestions about changes they would like to see. I asked if he thought any of their suggestions to the reprentative would illicit action and he said he didn’t think so.
Zel Dolinsky, PhD in Biopsychology
To All
I just wanted to say that probably all of us (including me who filled out the survey) and the nearly 500 people who took the survey, want to see the survey results widely distributed beyond MIA.
I spoke with Michael Simeonson who did an excellent job creating, administering, summarizing the data and presenting the survey results about getting the survey results, especially the respondent comments, to the media.
He told me he tried with the support of Robert Whitaker (The creator of MIA) to get the media interested in the survey results.
He said he contacted 300 media sources but heard back from none.
What is the media afraid of??
Zel Dolinsky, PhD in Biopsychology
Dear Manuela
I will try to keep this short. Thank you for the courage to post your comment. At least you are young and have the hope and energy to change our broken US Mental Health Care System.
As a 66 year old Biopsychologist I have much to say but will leave it up to the nearly 500 psychiatrically hospitalized individuals from the recent survey done by Mad In America (MIA). SEE BELOW.
Manuela and others please see all their comments. They are relevant because they also relate to other aspects of our US Mental Health Care System.
https://staging-madinamerica.kinsta.cloud/2018/12/mia-survey-force-trauma-sexual-abuse-mental-hospitals/
Dear Manuela
I will try to keep this short. Thank you for the courage to post your comment. At least you are young and have the hope and energy to change our broken US Mental Health Care System.
As a 66 year old Biopsychologist I have much to say but will leave it up to the nearly 500 psychiatrically hospitalized individuals from the recent survey done by Mad In America (MIA). SEE BELOW.
Manuela and others please see all their comments. They are relevant because they also relate to other aspects of our US Mental Health Care System.
https://staging-madinamerica.kinsta.cloud/2018/12/mia-survey-force-trauma-sexual-abuse-mental-hospitals/
Ratchel777
For 13 years I worked for pharmaceutical companies via a CRO called SCIREX. I headed the medical writing division. I can’t tell you how many times people in the CRO were angry at me for slowing up the writing process when I wanted answers about various issues with data. This was not even for studies involving psychiatric medications!!
Samruck2
I’m so sorry that MIA doesn’t seem to be interested in listening to you. You have helped me. I thought MIA was about change? The things you say seem to be in keeping with many ideas expressed by Open Dialogue? As both someone extremely traumatized by the US mental health system including abusive hospitalizations (I filled out the survey) and poly pharmacy, I also try to do my best truely accepting and trying to relate to someone like your spouse. I am a 66 yo male PhD Biopsychologist with over 30 years of experience who no longer can work. I would like to give someone from MIA a chance to comment on your insights and about your take on their interactions with you like the moderator of the MIA comments (Steve McCrea) or especially Bob Whitaker the head of MIA. And ask them what they are doing to try to get the information from the hospitalization survey out to the general public via a respected and non-biased form of media?
Maradel and others
Here is a recent podcast done by an MD from NPR called 2nd opinion explaining about the Semmelweis issue and how it still exists today
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/second-opinion/id73331693?mt=2&i=1000423073412
Marandel
As a 66 year old PhD Biopsychologist who was a participant in the survey and because of my traumatic hospitalizations no longer work I agree with all you say. At least you have at least 1 supporter on this site. I realize that we are trying to fight a highly medically educated hierarchy who believe they have the answers. Have we not learned anything from the long ago story of Semmelweis who tried to confront his medical community with clear proof yet was an MD and was ostracized and placed in a psychiatric hospital by threatened MDs where he died.
Old head
Yes, exactly
Samruck2
I have read many of your posts and consider you a very brave man. Please don’t leave those who listen to your insights and have some experience with what you have dealt with.
Michael (the author of the survey)
I wonder why there are only 64 MIA commenters submitting comments about this important survey??
Old Head. I am doing the best I can to make it day to day since I am also dealing with Poly psych drug withdrawal that I was on for 30 yrs as well as the polypharmacy from the hospitalizations. However I will do the best I can to stick around and publicize the survey (I agree with you that not much has changed) however I find the majority of the comments from the survey totally shocking. I would like to also somehow? get the word out about the importance of trauma and ethics in the workplace which I experienced and being very very careful about trusting what pharmaceutical companies say including about medical devices as well as their data by so called “experts”. Only in the US and New Zealand is there direct to consumer marketing of all types of drugs on the TV by non other than pharmaceutical companies!! Take care
Old head I misspoke. At 66 I still have a PhD in Biopsychology and worked in that field teaching medical school for 10 years and then worked for pharmaceutical companies as a medical writer for 13 years. I realize now that most of what I taught or did was incorrect/false. I was deemed psychiatrically disabled 10 years ago and no longer work. I was the person whose comment in the survey was “Too painful to discuss”
The_Cat. Thanks so much for listing the sites to list complaints. I was someone who filled out the survey and as a professional feel terribly traumatized by several of my forced hospital experiences. Is there any assurance that if I list experiences at the well known psych hospital in CT regarding various forms of abuse that they won’t try to retaliate against me in some way?
Thank you. I am very scared now. People tell me not to lose hope and to keep on trying and not act like a victim. That I am not helpless and should act as a responsible adult.
Alex
Your utube is not available?
Mik
Yes I am very noise everything sensitive too and use ear plugs. Thank you for responding. It is hard to maintain hope. I feel very Overwhelmed alone and powerless. Goodnight for now.
Dear MIK
Thank you. I wish I could find anything that calms me but after being hospitalized 6 times via police and ambulance I can’t sleep anymore. I have been taken fro tm my condo because I wasn’t caring for it or myself after being returned there after being hospitalized. I had been a successful PhD researcher who at 50 lost his 13 year job through no fault of his own and an intimate relationship left me with no warning who because of a very complicated situation I had to see several times a week though I didn’t want to have anything to do with her. and after trying to hold it together for 5 yrs broke down in my Psychiatrists office because I was frustrated that meds were not working. I was not violent just very scared. Next thing he leaves the room and says it’s done and an ambulance and police take me to the hospital. In hospital I was taunted by staff and patients. One patient followed me around for 2 weeks telling me about judgement day and saying he would stick pencils in my ear. Another patient said he was the devil and referenced trying to help me in the past but now he was going to kill me and throw me in a dumpster. These were not hallucinations though I was heavily drugged. I’ve been placed in a “retirement” home single room and outside my window is a dumpster which is emptied many times a day night with loud noises that remind me of what the person in hospital told me. I am afraid to leave my room. I can’t think clearly anymore. I panic whenever I see an ambulance or hear a police siren which is often since older residents are being taken to the hospital daily. I feel like I am living in hell or feel I must be being punished. What scares me most is that I have been unable to sleep and am having violent thoughts when in the past I was a gentle introverted person.
I feel the same way after 6 hospitalizations. Now I can’t sleep at all and people tell me I am just playing the victim role. I now suffer from intense anxiety and physical symptoms due to loss of appetite. I’m scared to death of hospitals and doctors and can’t function. I’m a 65 yo male who is now anorexic and don’t feel well and am afraid I’ll be hospitalized again?
Mik
I am very sorry for your experience. I can identify with you. I too have suffered irreversible damage at the hands of psychiatrists my whole life. I too had a successful career but am now a basket case. Don’t trust anyone or anything. God help us. People tell me you can’t change the past and just need to move forward. Or pray and God will help you. I don’t feel I can do that anymore and now even blame myself.
Career Psych Subject
Yes you are right. I was horribly damaged by the system and I worked right within it. I had a psychiatrist as a boss who was as manipulative a person who you could find. The problem was I bought into all his nonsense and did not quit until the damage was done.
Yes I identify with this article but at 65 yo and given the additional label as disabled I fell hook line and sinker into the trap. Labeled at an early age as schizophrenic when I was just reacting to living in a family where I was psychologically and physically abused by my father and bullied and beat up by next door neighbors and given every single drug available up to haldol which caused me as an adolescent to have muscle spasms at work. I went on to gather other labels and be treated with additional drugs throughout my life. Interspersed with this I somehow managed to obtain a PhD in Biopsychology and went on to hold responsible positions looking for the cure for being me. However I never really escaped the labels since I was never a truly happy person and sought out jobs and relationships that just replicated my victim state. Over time when I had subsequent problems coping I continued to turn toward medication and then ended up involuntarily hospitalized several times where I got more medication and was tormented by staff as well as patients. I became more and more disabled. Unfortunately I also developed physical problems and unrelenting insomnia. I don’t really feel any hope for recovery now. I do accept some responsibility for my actions but my early labeling and subsequent acceptance of and treatment has led me to where I am now. Lack of sleep and damage to my body by self abuse are too much to bear. It was not until I began reading MIA that I had any real perception of what was going on.
Thank you Catnight. My story is more involved than I wrote but kept it short. I have tried many of your suggestions over the course of 8 yrs as well as untold friends and family that have tried to help. I am exhausted physically, mentally and spiritually and once a professional very responsible active person am literally afraid of my own shadow and have been unable to work or concentrate. I have acted in very irresponsible ways and have not slept in yrs. I appreciate your caring and suggestions.
I’m leaving this comment in hopes that it may help someone in the future. I’ve lost most of my hope. At 14 yrs old I was diagnosed as schizophrenic even though I met none of the criteria. I was dosed with every available drug including Haldol which caused me to have neck spasms at work. I went on to drop out of college. I fought back and eventually went back to college but felt I would never have children or a family because of this diagnosis and others I received later in my life with more drugs and later traumatic hospitalizations. To this day I wonder if my young brain body may have been affected by that drug and subsequent drug treatment.
Svava
Glad you made it. I was not so lucky. My story began like yours but back 50 yrs when I was misdiagnosed as schizophrenic and dosed with everything under the sun including Haldol which gave me seizures at work. I was just a very very sensitive boy in a very dysfunctional family where I was labeled the sick one. I ended up dropping out of college with a nervous breakdown. I struggled back without meds and eventually accomplished many things but took on the victim role replicating my family for the rest of my life and always went back to meds thinking that there was always something broken in me when I ran into trouble. I’m now a 65 yo disabled professional who has lost everything. I hope others learn from our stories.
Dr Shipko.
As a former psychopharmacologist Who is now on disability perhaps from withdrawal of long term psych med use. I am wondering if you have any insight into why some people have little or no trouble withdrawing from SSRIs and or Benzos even after yrs of use in a short time with no ill after effects. I know several and there is scientific literature that documents this and for others it is such a devastating experience. How can we explain the differences?
Do you have any experience with withdrawal from Parnate?
I feel it is too late for me. I was a 65 yo professional male who is now on disability. I was mislabeled as a schizophrenic when a young person from a family that physically emotionally and sexually abused me and then treated me as the sick one. I was heavily drugged as a young boy to treat my illness and believed I was irreparably damaged. I ended up fighting back from serious depression and anxiety several times in my life usually from issues associated with relationship breakups or sexual issues given many drugs and allowed myself to become the victim in many many situation including at the hands of a psychiatrist who was my boss. I’ve now been hospitalized 6 times all with police involved. I am an extremely introverted sensitive person and was extremely frightened by being in a psych ward. The first time against my will where I was not a danger to myself or others but raised my voice out of frustration that the many drugs I had tried did not help my depression. The others for being suicidal or because I was not functioning. In the hospital I was taunted by staff and patients and heavily drugged. Taunted Especially by staff who seemed to bring up my professional background. Patients who followed me around 24/7 told me this was a safe place but could stick a pencil in my ear and many other stories that upset me too much to tell. I was told by a psychiatrist recently there was nothing wrong with me and just needed to have an epiphany and later asked by the same pdoc what drugs I thought I should be on because ironically I have a PhD in biological Psychiatry and insisted I get treatment because I had been hospitalized. Another Psychiatrist told me I just needed to get a part time job and not be angry. I have lost everything I worked my whole life for. I have managed to work for the majority of my life despite many “breakdowns” It is only recently reading the many pieces on MIA that I realize I was fed psychological and psychiatric lies most of my life. When I tried to reject them or displayed my sense of agony I was ridiculed or rejected. I now trust no one and hide from the world afraid of my own shadow. Sorry I am not one of the success stories on MIA.