Beyond Meds Reports disturbing abuse by psychiatrists

I am going to assume the majority of the patients are on Medicaid or Medicare, federal programs which mandates that mental health services, including 'psychiatric services' are to be "client-centered and directed" to be billable by States to the Federal Medicaid program...


Via:  Beyond Meds Alternatives of Psychiatry

Shrinks get patients hooked on drugs and then cut the cord

SEPTEMBER 16, 2011 BY GIANNAKALI

The subject of this post is so important I ask that people share it broadly. You have my permission to copy in full as long as you attribute it to this blog. Freeing the population of drugs is a great goal. I fully support it. But until the seriousness of withdrawal syndromes are recognized doing it wholesale like this is a very scary prospect. As these sorts of policies increase in popularity, it’s vital that those implementing them understand what the fallout might be.

I’ve been sitting on this article for a couple of days, feeling like I should say something but these issues tend to make me feel so deeply nauseous and sickened these days that I often don’t get around to this sort of commentary anymore.

A clinic in Louisville, Kentucky is going to stop prescribing Xanax, a benzodiazepine.

from the New York Times:

Because of the clamor for the drug, and concern over the striking number of overdoses involving Xanax here and across the country, Seven Counties took an unusual step — its doctors stopped writing new prescriptions for Xanax and its generic version, alprazolam, in April and plan to wean patients off it completely by year’s end.

The experiment will be closely watched in a state that has wrestled with widespread prescription drug abuse for more than a decade and is grasping for solutions as it claims more lives by the week. While Kentucky and other states have focused largely on narcotic painkiller addiction, experts say that benzodiazepines, the class of sedatives that includes Xanax, are also widely misused or abused, often with grim consequences.

Okay, not prescribing ANY benzo to any new users is a VERY GOOD IDEA. Taking existing users off it, on the other hand is a scary proposition because the medical establishment is in COMPLETE AND TOTAL DENIAL about the seriousness and severity of WITHDRAWAL SYNDROMES.

At Seven Counties, some of the roughly 3,000 patients who were on Xanax have been switched to clonazepam, a longer-acting benzodiazepine that does not kick in as quickly and is thought to pose less risk of addiction.

“They don’t get the high that’s associated with Xanax,” Dr. Hedges said, “nor the withdrawal associated with it.”  (read the article)

Unfortunately that last bolded section is complete and utter bullshit. The withdrawal from clonazepam is potentially just as ugly, debilitating and serious as it is for Xanax.

You know what is going to happen to this mostly poor and uneducated population when they start weaning people too quickly? Because they’re poor, they’re going to be labeled DRUG SEEKING. They’re going to be blamed for their DOCTOR CREATED AND PRESCRIBED addiction. And they’re going to be disbelieved when they present so sick they can hardly stand or do anything at all. They will be told they are crazy drug addicts. It will be thought that it’s a psychiatric issue and not a serious physical illness caused by medical iatrogenesis. And in fact, there will be great resistance to see the truth because the people treating them in withdrawal will be at fault for their condition.

The withdrawal syndrome creates so many odd and terrible symptoms that for some of us last YEARS. It is much worse than opiate withdrawal from all accounts. Without great sensitivity from caretakers to the extreme nature of these symptoms some of these people will be lost to the system forever. It’s really horrifying to me. I know what social service mental health care is like. I worked in these systems the entire time I was a social worker.

I hope that perhaps if you live in Louisville and can talk to anyone with any influence you might share with them the benzo page on this blog as a first place to get some idea of how SEVERE and DANGEROUS benzodiazepine withdrawal is. There are many news items and from there one can proceed with even more research.

It doesn’t matter which benzo is being withdrawn from. Those of us who are sensitive can get grossly and dangerously ill.

Some of us get hypersensitive to ALL psychoactive drugs as a result of this process and cannot take ANYTHING else including and especially benzos ever again as a result of the particular damage to our brains. So without support that frankly DOES NOT exist at these sorts of clinics, we will have complete and total disaster for some of these people. Complete collapse and utter destruction of lives is  quite likely for some significant percentage of people if they don’t have the proper supports to make it through the ugly nature of withdrawal.

In Overcoming Prescription Drug Addiction: A Guide to Coping and Understanding Rod Colvin quotes Ronald Gershman MD who says:

I have treated ten thousand patients for alcohol and drug problems and have detoxed approximately 1,500 patients for benzodiazepines – the detox for the benzodiazepines is one of the hardest detoxes we do. It can take an extremely long time, about half the length of time they have been addicted – the ongoing relentless withdrawals can be so incapacitating it can cause total destruction to one’s life – marriages break up, businesses are lost, bankruptcy, hospitalization, and of course suicide is probably the most single serious side effect.

I’ve needed 24 hour care for about 3 years. I still need almost that much. This is no joke. I have a sophisticated and loving partner who can tease out what is the drug withdrawal and who I really am. I’m sorry, but uneducated poor people won’t have that luxury. Partners of such people suffering from this illness have it really hard even in the best of circumstances. Even if they can understand. If they have no means of understanding what brain damage looks like everyone will suffer so much more terribly. read here

"I love you too mom"

Isaac has been totally present for a few days.  Sometimes, I wonder if he is psychic. I say this because I have noticed that when we are both occupied, "doing our own thing" and not talking; when I think of him, he will invariably suddenly say, "I love you too mom."  

Today was blood draw day.  When Isaac got up, he took his shower and got dressed.  I told him that I would take him, but he wanted to go on his own.  I went to meet some friends who live close by, just a few blocks away.  Isaac occasionally walks to their house to visit.  Today one of them was excited, in fact she said she felt proud, and had to "brag about Isaac."  She said the last time Isaac came to visit, he walked in and went to the kitchen, then turned around and went back into the living room.   He went back so that he could tell my friend's mom, "It's nice to see you again," and shake her hand.   Later, when my friend's mom came to the kitchen, Isaac asked her for a hug.   My friend's mom is not a "hugger;" my friend told me her mom was honored that Isaac wanted one from her.   

This is huge.  He felt safe, with someone he does not know well---When he is feels safe, he can be present.  It is when he feels threatened, judged or criticized that he retreats; to protect himself.  Acceptance, respect and positive regard allow him to feel safe---He needs help; but how he is helped; e.g. how people talk to him, tone of voice, facial expression, and the words used; all matter.  Equally important, being respected when he talks.  If what he says is respected and validated; he feels safe.  People with a psychiatric diagnosis really are like everybody else you know.  

Food is an issue, and has been since Isaac was first put on psychiatric drugs.  What he preferred to eat immediately changed, and not in a good or healthy way.  Prior to being drugged, a snack was an apple, a carrot or some other fruit.  After being prescribed drugs, it was high fat and sweets that he wanted.  He wouldn't eat what I cooked a lot of the time, food that he once liked, he would no longer eat.  I don't tell him, because he needs and deserves the freedom to make his own choices.  An example of this is tomatoes.  For months, I would ask, "do you want tomatoes" on your salad, burger, etc.; one day he said yes.  He would not eat them in salad, or on a burger, or in soup, or chunks in pasta sauce; but now he eats them in all these dishes.

The first year he was home, I worked really hard "role modeling" how to "eat healthy."  It worked.  I lost forty pounds; he gained 80.  Ok, so it worked out better for me than it did for him that first year.  But he has since made a lot of progress.  After that 80 pound gain, he was wearing a size 46, and they were snug.  He is now wearing a 38.  The progress is due to Isaac wanting to be healthier, and being willing to listen to those around him---most of the time.  There are relapses---and those of us who have struggled with emotional eating or changing unhealthy habits know that progress is seldom linear. 

Isaac takes walks; the other day he went for a jog at the track down the block.  He came home huffing, puffing, and pouring sweat; and asked me, "can you get me a drink of water?"  He knew he needed to drink water!  Just a short time ago, I had to remind him to drink water.

The other thing he has been doing is playing games on the computer, and the more he has done this, the more present he has become.  His sense of humor is for me personally, the best part of how he has been lately.  I made a comment the other day that I needed to get off my behind and get some work done.  He says, "Mom, are you saying you got junk in your trunk?"  I said "you're so funny."  He responded, "I'm freaking hilarious." It may not be stand-up material, but to me, it is.

Tonight he had to have three bowls of this for dinner.  It had green peppers and several small yellow and red sweet peppers, and he never used to eat any peppers EVER:

People Die from Constipation

Everyone, should know the truth about Clozapine, and all psychiatric drugs.  Drugs are approved by the FDA, and the FDA does not require medical professionals to report negative effects, adverse events, including fatalities, that people experience--not even from  the professional who prescribed the drug!  This is not acceptable.  The failure to require  adverse event reporting means  some of the most important information needed to assess the safety and effectiveness of FDA approved drugs in real world practice is purposely not being collected.

Two additional major failings of the FDA are the utter failure to regulate the marketing of prescription drugs so-called "truth in advertising" consumer protection laws are not applicable to prescription drugs--even those that are illegally marketed... Just "Ask your doctor if ___is right for you." 

People have died from chronic constipation caused by Clozapine, but as the following stories demonstrate, it also takes medical negligence. The adverse effect of chronic constipation is  well-documented in the professional literature; as is the cognitive damage Clozapine also causes which that can limit the patient's ability to articulate, or even know where the pain is coming from when they are in pain due to constipation. 

via Georgia Mental Health Consumer Network:
Sarah Crider was among 115 patients in the state's care who might have lived 

Alone in the darkness of a state mental hospital, Sarah Crider, 14, lay slowly dying.

She complained of stomach pain at 4:30 p.m. She vomited about 8:30. When the only physician on call at Georgia Regional Hospital/Atlanta came at 9:20, Sarah had vomited again, but the doctor did not examine her, medical records suggest. She threw up around midnight and once more about 2 a.m., this time a bloody substance that resembled coffee grounds. But hospital workers did not enter Sarah's room again until 6:15 a.m. By then, it was too late.

A few hours later, two hospital employees drove to Cobb County to tell Joyce Dobson, Sarah's grandmother. Dobson adored Sarah for all her complexities: artistic but troubled, challenging but comic. Now she could think only of two nights earlier, when she had last visited Sarah and heard another patient's haunting scream.

I hope nobody killed her, Dobson blurted out.

In fact, what happened to Sarah was beyond anything Dobson could have imagined. here 

via: ISEPP

Florida plaintiff Deidra Sanbourne: Was her death caused by Clozapine-Induced Bowel Obstruction? Readers of the book Crazy deserve to know about the harm psychiatric drugs can cause.

an couple of excerpts:

Although The Miami Herald investigation does reveal many deaths that can be attributed to the neglect in Florida’s ALFs, Diedra Sanbourne’s death, as reported in the book Crazy, occurred from a bowel obstruction while being treated in  a psychiatric unit at Westchester General Hospital and not from neglect in a boarding home.

"A quick search on Medline revealed the medication Clozapine is used to treat severe cases of schizophrenia.  Clinical research suggests Clozapine has caused bowel  obstructions leading to death in schizophrenic patients."  read it here. 

Friday Funny: Webcam 101 for Seniors

I love this!  the video has gone viral, it may be lazy of me to use it, but ...

Champions of Change? God Bless America and Protect Her Defenders...

The NIMH is honored by the White House as "Champions of Change."  I want to scream, cry stomp my feet---How in the hell can an agency with such a seriously  ethically challenged Director be a champion of anything?   How much studying does it take for   Champions, who are Public Servants and  "America's "experts" to see what is right in front of them?  The  research the American People have already paid for holds the answers...

via the NIMH

Back in 2008, the Army came to the National Institute of Mental Health and said, you know, we realize we have a problem, and during this timeframe, the Army had seen a doubling of their risk for suicide. Traditionally, the Army had had a much lower risk of suicide than the general civilian population. But over this time period, from the early 2000s to 2008, this risk for suicide within the military, and within the Army in particular, had continued to grow to the point where it had just then begun to exceed the civilian population’s risk. And so Army STARRS is a basic research project designed to provide the Army with vital information about, you know, what’s going on, what might lie behind this rise in suicide. With the urgency that the Army has and being able to take these findings and turn them into things that are actionable.

The Director of the NIMH, Thomas Insel, knows that psychiatric drugs used to treat PTSD and other psychiatric issues are contributing to the suicide rate. So are multiple longer deployments. These two factors are unique to veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq which have strangely not been mentioned in discussions as to why so many are killing themselves--more commit suicide than die in Afghanistan and Iraq. If Insel is unaware of these facts, then he should not be the Director of the NIMH.

I did not finish High School and have two years of college. At one time, I was majoring in psychology with the intent of going into research. For those who know where to look and how to read with comprehension, the answers are easy to find---I can not help but be very angry about this announcement that there will be three more years of "studying" this issue, because, "you know we realize we have a problem," and now there is a plan to work with researchers about three years to "study" what the cause of drug-induced suicide is!!?

I started writing this blog on September 4, 2010 on September 11, 2011 the post was about Thomas Insel here is a quote from a psychiatrist who blogs: 


"In World War I, we learned from the trench warfare that prolonged, sustained combat causes epidemic mental illness – the longer the exposure, the worse it gets. It was erroneously called Shell Shock in that war.  Then in World War II, we named it Combat Fatigue. In Viet Nam, it became PTSD. Our literature is filled with data supporting this intuitively obvious fact. So as Director of the National Institute of Mental Health, why in the hell wasn’t Tom Insel testifying to Congress and the Joint Chiefs about the insanity in their policy of letting [in fact incentivizing] our adolescents go back for five or more contiguous tours of duty in middle east wars – wars where they live with the constant knowledge that any person on the street might be another human bomb? It may be cleaner than the trenches, but psychologically it’s equally grim."  read the whole thing at 1 Boring Old Man




For an update on the true nature of this program, e.g. Experimental project with no scientific validity The Comprehensive Soldier Fitness Program


November 15,2010 Do Veterans Receive Care and Protection Needed?


November 21, 2010 American Veterans They Made it Back Alive to Die Here at Home


April 14,2011 Putting Troops in Harms Way: it's not accident or oversight

I wrote about this August 23, 2011 Psychiatric Drugs are Killing American Soldiers

March 20,2011 Female Soldier's suicide rate triples when at war--USA Today


May 20, 2011 is First Line Treatment for PTSD Developed From Insufficient Evidence?
This post has a report from the Institute of Medicine on effective PTSD treatment


From the Project on Government Oversight:
A Leader in Ethics Reform at NIMH Doesn't Think the Rules Apply To Him


NIH Needs New Leader On Ethics Reform


One more scandal

A MadMother wonders what happened to the Rule of Law? is everyone corrupt?

About Rob McKenna

I sent Washington State's Attorney General, Rob McK an email this morning...I don't really wonder, I know that I probably will not hear from anyone.  

to rob.mckenna@atg.wa.gov cc Senator Pam Roach , Representative Charles Ross , Representative Norm Johnson bcc Jeanette Barnes , "Moorhead, Ronald (DSHS/HRSA/DBHR)" , Kevin Bouchey date Thu, Sep 15, 2011 at 7:24 AM subject This is some Mental health Transformation... mailed-by gmail.com

Mr. McKenna,

Does it occur to you the class action lawsuits that you joined and got settlements from drug companies for illegally marketing, etc. of psychiatric drugs have real live human victims; that the tax payers are secondary, not primary victims?  My son is a victim.  My once brilliant son is now physically and cognitively impaired and continues to be victimized by Washington State employees and contracted mental health providers.  You are the legal advocate for the State, the State is the people Mr. McKenna, and you are an Officer of the Court, as is the Yakima County Prosecutor.  Both of you have failed in your duties as officers of the Court, in my son's case.  

I can not change what was done to my son and my family by people with no ethics and no integrity, but as God is my witness, I will try to keep it from happening to some one else's child.

Respectfully,

Becky Murphy

http://involuntarytransformation.blogspot.com/2011/04/something-is-and-has-been-very-rotten.html

http://involuntarytransformation.blogspot.com/2011/09/washington-state-and-attorney-

generals.html

http://yakimavalleysystemsofcare.blogspot.com/2011/09/washington-state-has-some-very-strange_15.html

What is the truth about Gardasil?

I am not a medical professional, I am just a mom.  I do not have any inside information, nor have I read any of the clinical trial data for Gardasil; so I can offer no opinion about either it's safety or efficacy.  My heart goes out to the families of these young women who have lost their daughters.  The mother in the video below states that the "auto-immune" adverse effects which her daughter experienced,  were not shared with them prior to her daughter receiving the vaccine.  

These effects are known risks, according to the vaccine developer, Dr. Diane Harper.  Had these effects been shared, once her daughter experienced them, it would have given them the option of not completing the three shot protocol for this vaccine.  There is no way of knowing whether or not receiving all of the shots could have saved her daughter; but the risks should have been told to them in order to obtain an Informed Consent for the vaccine.

Advocacy Program or Progrom?

:
The Deputy Prosecutor and the psychiatrist involved in the violation of my son in late July and early August of 2010 have both lost their jobs... the psych unit is closing...

I was asked by someone I respect very much, if I was certain I did not fill out a court document when I took my son to the crisis center at the end of July. My response was I know absolutely for certain that I did not. I shared that over the years I have filled out and filed court documents.

There is no way in hell I would have filled out a statement in support of my son's Constitutional Rights being diminished or violated! The law that allows for this kind of human rights violation is something that I have been living in fear of. I am a mother, and a person who was given one of the labels that is often used as an excuse to violate people's human rights; my son has already endured the most horrendous ongoing violations of his human dignity and human rights for most of his life. It is an added insult to the injustice that Designated Mental Health Professional, Nancy Sherman perpetrated. She maligned and slandered both my son and myself in Court proceedings. What she did is claim that I asked her to lock up my son. People who know what my son's childhood was like, know that I fought for almost 2 years to rescue him from CSTC, where he had been used in drug trials, know that we as a family endured horrifying experiences which were traumatic in the extreme for all of us. Isaac was tortured and disabled by psychiatric treatment. FYI There is no way in hell I would trust a Mental health Professional or a State authority to take care of a dead animal-- and I would die and go to hell before I trusted any of them to take care of my son. There is no way I could.

In her testimony, under penalty of perjury, she alleges that Isaac threw a television. The TV was not smashed, or even damaged. My son is seriously impaired from massive amounts of neuroleptic drugs he was forced to take. He was told that if he didn't take them he would never get to leave and go home. A kid in a locked facility who wanted to go home, he took the drugs. One of the adverse effects and the iatrogeinic harm he experienced causes him to lose his balance easily. What Sherman described, is not something Isaac is physically capable of doing.

Unfortunately, this lie is repeated by Dr. Jeffrey Jennings, who is, as the petition he filed instructs: only to state facts he knows "first hand," to be true; as testimony. Dr. Jennings commits Perjury in his petition. He did not speak to me, he had no "first hand" knowledge of the events that occurred for which Isaac went to the crisis center. He did not in the time he "treated" my son speak to my son's primary physician, his psychiatrist, his brother, or his mother. As a physician, how can he believe he actually has any ethical integrity? I say this because the reason cited for the court order's necessity, "To protect the integrity of the Medical Profession" I asked Isaac if he remembered Dr. Jennings, he said, "he wanted to talk to me but I was tired and asked him to leave me alone, but he kept trying to talk to me. Mom, I asked him 4 times to leave me alone, then I screamed, get the fuck out of my room." Well, who wouldn't want their wishes respected in the hospital? The patient rights list given to Isaac upon admission gave him the right to tell Jennings to leave him alone...Jennings simply chose not to respect those rights.

This event is recorded by Jeffrey Jennings in Isaac's hospital chart as, Isaac became agitated and needed to be medicated. Jennings doubled the dose of a benzodiazepine that Isaac had to take and that he had been tapered totally off, due to "cardiac risk," and increased a neuroleptic drug by 250 mg and Jennings made it a part of the Court Order which was in effect for six months. The drugs have caused my son iatrogenic illness and iatrogenic neurological impairments. The neuroleptic drug is, according to it's manufacturer, is only to be increased by 50 mg at a time, no more frequently than twice a week to minimize risk of death among other things. My son has yet to recover from this psychiatrist's assault. Apparently, Jennings had never heard of the Hippocratic Oath.

I am a mother, it is my duty to protect my son from harm. I am his caretaker I make sure he takes what is prescribed, and he has never refused to take what is prescribed. It is because the drugs have caused profound iatrogenic injuries that disabled Isaac, that he needs assistance in his daily life. I'm gratful he trusts me, and that he listens when I tell him he can't just stop taking them; he's humble and knows it's ok to need help. He believes me when I tell him that there are people who are trustworthy. But, believing what your mom says, and knowing something for yourself as a young man, is not at all the same thing. I hope he doesn't end up thinking I lied about there being people who are trustworthy.

The two thugs who are mental health "professionals" must be members of NAMI, an organization that purports to be a "grassroots" advocacy movement, it refers to itself as, "The Nation's voice on mental illness." It was one of NAMI's affiliates that disseminated a "Tip Sheet" written by D.J. Jaffe and E. Fuller Torrey, the so-called co-founders of The Treatment Advocacy Center, "TAC" D. J. Jaffe's Tip Sheet appears to be advising people to exaggerateto syptoms and behaviors, to tip over furniture when attempting to have have a family member committed. This, "Tip Sheet" was developed to advise family members who are calling on Law Enforcement to assist them. In effect, it advises people to file false police reports, which is a crime. More than once E. Fuller Torrey, has been quoted in the media and in NAMI literature as saying it is necessary to lie; and advises family members in NAMI to do so in order to have a person committed. It is criminal as a matter of fact.

Has anybody else noticed a pattern in this yet? This is all smoke and mirrors. The drugs are falsely billed as effective and necessary medical treatment for treating "brain diseases" without any disease actually being identified. The drugs can in fact cause iatrogenic diseases, particularly when used in high doses and for long periods. A group of people who are purportedly advocating for me and my son; and for everybody who has ever had or who may be suspected of having a psychaitric diagnosis. The grassroots advocates do not speak for me. No one can pretend to speak for me with a voice that advocates treating any human being who is creatively maladjusted, a trauma survivor, with neurodiverse, unique human qualities as if they are unworthy of their Human Rights--My son has Human rights that so-called advocates and mental health providers have no interest in. No interest in what the truth is, what happened to him, or what it's done to him physically or emotionally. The self-appointed grassroots advocates, The Voice on "mental illness" has no interest in helping the people who are harmed by the forced treatment that NAMI endorses; so NAMI is not in fact qualified to speak for, let alone be THE VOICE for my son whom they have helped to de-voice by refusing to acknowledge his existence or the profound iatrogenic injuries he sustained as a victim of the progrom of forced treatment that NAMI advocates for. NAMI advocates for an agenda regardless of it's detrimental effect on the people NAMI claims to be advocating for.

As advocates, with a government, pharma, and private foundation funded pharma fear-based forced treatment agenda marketing machine, NAMI marched it's grassroots progrom of advocacy "for the seriously mentally ill" across the nation. The people who are targeted for "special treatment" are just like everybody else, advocates say. The methods, the tools this progrom uses are distortortion of current and historical events, feeding individual fears, using innuendo, gossip, and traumatic events to polarize groups of people to fuel innate ignorance and biases to promate bigotry and create an US and THEM dichotomy. These are the building blocks and the tools of propaganda. These advocates are using a progrom that made man's inhumanity to man public policy, and then the law in Germany leading up to WWII. The neuroleptic drugs used for "necessary medical treatment" of schizophrenia in use since the mid fifties have killed far more individuals than the Third Reich did. We just don't bother to count the bodies; victims who were stripped of their human dignity in life, don't count once they're dead...because drug induced death is totally "natural."

Here, we have grassroots advocates "for the seriously mentally ill" enlisting the general public, law enforcement, medical professionals, schools, churches and government agencies help further the goal of the treatment advocacy agenda: To identify every human being who "needs special treatment" whether they, or anyone who knows them knows it or not...This special treatment progrom, requires family and friends to help advocates by referring family, neighbors, and friends, for special treatment "for their own good" because they just don't know what's good for them at all! NAMI has endorsed and lobbied for the legislation that legally mandates a diminished social and political status and stripping the Human Rights that the advocates take for granted, from the people they advocate for---but of course you know, "it's for their own good" we have to do it, to protect the public is the fear-based mantra used to justify torture, and trauma as medical treatment, essentially Crimes Against Humanity.

This purposeful overt victimiztion of people based on subjective opinions, errors of attribution, distortions of known facts and histrical events, is blatant bullying, systematic discrimination and calling it medical treatment does not change the nature of what is being done, and it certainly does not ameliorate the harm done. People being drugged with terotogenic drugs and given electric shock treatments will cause a statistically significant percentage to die within the first year; and will disable and kill a statistically significant percentage of the people taking the drugs on an ongoing basis either willingly or under court order, regardless of age or psychiatric diagnosis.

If this progrom was for the primary benefit of the mentally ill; there would at least be a show of civility, if not actual compassion for the people who have been and are being harmed and the family members who mourn the loss of loved ones who are killed. Indeed, it seems that assistance being offered and preventative measures would be taken to avoid further harm, and efforts made to ammeliorate the harm that's already been done...NAMI and no other "patient advocacy" group does anything like that...It seems that it is more important when advocating for "special treatment" that any adverse and fatal effects of the treatment being advocated for are ignored; because it would divert attention away from the "benefits" of the special treatment! When you advocate for a progrom to Court Order people to take neuro-toxic drugs and/or get electric shock treatments, it's important to focus on the safety and effectiveness of the special treatment...

The adverse effects caused by neuroleptic drugs and electic shock treatment are direct effects; i.e. they are the mechanism of "how the special tratment works." Calling these direct adverse effects "side-effects," is analogous to saying decomposition a "side-effect" of death.

Neurleptics increase mortality from heat attack, heat stroke and sudden brain death.

First published October 21, 2010
update Sept. 13, 2011

What really bothers 1 Boring Old Man

 Could it be the influence of  

via 1 Boring Old Man

In today's post,  the hell where youth and laughter go… the  doc shares what is bothering him about  a speech Thomas Insel, Director of NIMH gave at the Royal Society in London on August 31.  I'm thinking it should bother everybody greatly that Insel the leader of our Nation's research unit for mental illness has so far shown himself to be A BAD DOCTOR,  and lousy scientist without ETHICS or a clue about Evidenced-Based medicine...

The whole post is worth your time I am sharing the most important part:

"His whole speech had been about clinical neuroscience and future breakthroughs – a plea for more brain research. But when he uses the fact "that suicide killed more soldiers in the US military than enemy combat" to make his point, my mind calls "foul!". I see that piece of information as an indictment of an abject failure of modern organized psychiatry [the American Psychiatric Association and theNational Institute of Mental Health] rather than as something to use in a call to arms for more support for brain research. 

In World War I, we learned from the trench warfare that prolonged, sustained combat causes epidemic mental illness – the longer the exposure, the worse it gets. It was erroneously called Shell Shock in that war.  Then in World War II, we named it Combat Fatigue. In Viet Nam, it became PTSD. Our literature is filled with data supporting this intuitively obvious fact. So as Director of the National Institute of Mental Health, why in the hell wasn’t Tom Insel testifying to Congress and the Joint Chiefs about the insanity in their policy of letting [in fact incentivizing] our adolescents go back for five or more contiguous tours of duty in middle east wars – wars where they live with the constant knowledge that any person on the street might be another human bomb? It may be cleaner than the trenches, but psychologically it’s equally grim." 

Wounded Warriors Weekend

Each summer Rockaway, Queens remembers 9/11,

 honoring veterans who served since the attack.

Wounded Warriors Weekend - Video - NYTimes.com:

'via Blog this'

"While there is life, there is hope."

"While there is life, there is hope." Cicero

via SAMHSA The National Center for Trauma Informed Care:

"SAMHSA's National Center for Trauma-Informed Care (NCTIC) is a technical assistance center dedicated to building awareness of trauma-informed care and promoting the implementation of trauma-informed practices in programs and services.

Traumatic experiences can be dehumanizing, shocking or terrifying, singular or multiple compounding events over time, and often include betrayal of a trusted person or institution and a loss of safety. Trauma can result from experiences of violence. Trauma includes physical, sexual and institutional abuse, neglect, intergenerational trauma, and disasters that induce powerlessness, fear, recurrent hopelessness, and a constant state of alert. Trauma impacts one's spirituality and relationships with self, others, communities and environment, often resulting in recurring feelings of shame, guilt, rage, isolation, and disconnection. Healing is possible. 

Although exact prevalence estimates vary, there is a consensus in the field that most consumers of mental health services are trauma survivors and that their trauma experiences help shape their responses to outreach and services."

There is no doubt in my mind that the difficulties that my children who are now grown men, and I have that are labeled as "mental illnesses" are the effects of traumas we have experienced.  It is more than a little sad that more often than not, when seeking help, these traumatic experiences and the impact they had were not seen from our perspective.  It is what it is, and all I can do now is try to move forward; reflecting on this part of our lives, causes a tremendous amount of pain and overwhelming grief.  It is difficult for me at times to transcend the mind-set of being a victim; which when thoughtfully considered, is not really all that surprising.   

The damage is most apparent in my youngest son, Isaac.  I can tell you that the repeated trauma that he has endured, had a traumatic impact on his brother and me as well, how could it not?  It is impossible not to take what was done to my son personally.  I have been treated with disrespect by people in authority who were negligent; later would actually demand my respect.  I can't respect a person who has harmed my son;  how could I respect people who had a duty to protect and help him; but chose to abdicate their responsibility forgeting the ethics of their professions and caused him further harm?  I don't believe I am supposed to either.  I will do everything in my power to keep my son from being further harmed.


The reality is, in my experience, those in authority seem to have no recognition that they work primarily for the people who come to them for help, as a public service to all of us. (not the government office or social service agency they get a paycheck from)  It is these individuals who commit crimes with impunity then continue to collect a paycheck, that are the biggest risk my son faces, indeed any child or vulnerable adult in the state biggest risk and the states biggest liability is the lack of legal accountability to follow the RCWs and WACs  that are codified. We can't have legally mandated reporters who routinely fail to file police reports as required by law; it is a Gross Misdemeanor crime. Police should be conducting investigations not social workers who have training in criminal investigation, legally preserving procedural and substantive due process rights, folloing the rules of evidence, and Standard Court Procedures. Dishonesty and lack of integrity does not prevent some professionals from continued "professional success" rising to positions above their individual levels of incompetence--public servants who who fail to report are failing to act with due diligence to the duty owed to the child or vulnerable adult, and they will do it again. THIS is the biggest most broken part of the system.  


The people who work in "the system," who were helpful to us had the spirit of being our partners,  although we didn't sign their paychecks, they worked with us as a team. The reality is they were not informed about trauma informed care, the important point is they were working in human services out of a genuine desire to help people, out of a love for humanity. These individuals may have been employed by a social service agency, or been a State employee; but the good ones were very easily distinguished from the rest.  The good ones know they really are working for the public to serve the individuals they provide services to. In my opinion, the good ones have a sense of mission, and a recognition of the true relationship between themselves and the public who come into their office and who directly benefit from the services provided by a public servant. Some just collect a check...


Some of the people who have failed my son have committed felony crimes which have caused him grave harm; none have been held accountable.  Some are still employed by the State of Washington or it's contractors; some have retired with pensions.  

Many of these experiences, "induce powerlessness, fear, recurrent hopelessness, and a constant state of alert" and often result "in recurring feelings of shame, guilt, rage, isolation, and disconnection" for me.  I have absolutely no doubt that they have, shaped my "responses to outreach and services."  I came here to heal and raise my children, because I was born here and felt connected to this place.  After eighteen years, I don't know that I believe healing is possible at least not here. I love the people and this valley; but I don't believe healing is possible here...


God Bless America and God save me from being angry...The thing I am most grateful for is the love my sons and I have for one another.  It is the bond I have with my children that makes life worth living, and the hope I have for all of us enables me to get through the day.  

photo credit Randy Wang