One year ago....

[Tricia DiMaio]

This is my one year anniversary of being hauled away by the men in white coats. I had escaped reality because of extreme anxiety from a crisis of a stalking boyfriend, which made me smoke more and sleep less. I became paranoid and delusional, but not a eminent threat to myself or others.

So this thing with crisis and the way the mental system dictates that crisis is actually a symptom of a brain disease really bothers me..... A fellow psych survivor told me that one crisis is depression, and that two or more is bipolar. So if you have a loved one die and are having a hard time dealing with it, you are labelled depressed. If your loved one dies and then you get into a car wreck the next week and having difficulty with these situations, you are now bipolar. Some people just have better coping skills and better support systems. But those who don't are diagnosed mentally ill.

I still attend NAMI peer to peer support groups. Basically I attend these meetings so I can say that I don't need medication. To show others that it is possible. I have ridden the Haldol needle and have learned a great deal about overcoming traumatic experiences. The NAMI poster says that : "We believe mental illnesses are medical illnesses with environmental triggers." Last week I asked what that meant. I said "Is that like allergies? You know, when pollen season kicks in your allergies (a real medical condition) flare up?"  You can actually use tools to listen and look at the symptoms of allergies. Runny noses, red eyes, wheezing. What about mental illnesses and the chemical imbalance? What tool is used? Symptoms become the illness with the mentally ill. You are anxious, that is anxiety. We dont' tell people with runny noses, that you are rhinitis and will need medication the rest of your life.

If mental illnesses are triggered by environmental factors, shouldn't those factors be evaluated? Everyone who I have met with a mental illness has had some traumatic event happen to them that they just have not resolved. Most of them have self medicated with illegal drugs or alcohol which makes the problem worse by adding brain damage. So why do we still continue to drug and sedate and chemically restrain people who are experiencing as NAMI calls mental illness: "traumatic events"?

And now I am looked at even crazier because I believe that the chemical imbalance theory is ridiculous. Yet my peers cannot show me any medical or biological tests they have had to determine they had a chemical imbalance. It's just because the man in the white coat said it was true. He's a doctor, he knows.

What has happened to humanity and morality? Love and Empathy? God? We have replaced paradise with a parking lot. We have replaced recess with Ritalin. We have replaced traumatic experiences with chemical imbalances. We have replaced faith and spirituality with health insurance and the need to be cured, not healed. God forbid we get sick and die. We are plagued with fear of getting sick, losing money, losing loved ones, and reaching our death date.

Sometimes I feel like I woke up into another world, one which I do not want to associate with. I want to save the world, or perhaps just find a cave to live in. Today my 86 yr old friend said he would rather live in an institution than under a bridge. But he expressed he never was in an institution. I told him I would rather live under the bridge...but eventually, they will catch you and institutionalize you anyway.

[Heather Howes]

Hi, have a look at a book called Madness Explained by Richard Bentall (2003)  He investigates each trial that suggests a brain chemistry imbalance and shows how the data does not even support the theory in the ones they put forward as demonstrating it.  Its all a big sales pitch, the biggest crime against humanity and movies put out by CCHR detail it all.  You are right on the button, emotions and trauma have been left out altogether along with toxic overload within the environment.  Avoid processed foods, soft drinks, fluoridated tap water, medication and areas that have crop spraying at all costs. Yes we have been woken into another world and it is way more sane that the one people in authority are living in. Hang in there and wake others where you can.

[Tricia DiMaio]

Thanks! Keep fighting! WE need to react to this situation at hand. Children are being drugged, women during pregnancy, and adults are being robbed of life and liberty.

[Lori B.]

Congratulations, Tricia!  I'm coming up on my fourth year anniversary off of the antipsychotics!  It's a liberating and empowering feeling to retake the the helm of one's mental life.  Like you, I was swallowed up the "certainty" of psychiatry and all of the "studies and trials."  Then, I began to read the purported evidence in detail.   And, as I'm sure you can imagine, a lot of theories without sustained real-world results.  And, like you, I exited stage left.

 

Thankfully, Dr. Breggin's book, Toxic Psychiatry, supported all of my theories about the psychiatric industry;  no drugs, no business.  Period.  

 

Best of luck with your continued skepticism and success!

[Mary Ashcroft]

To finish, some reactions actually fit the situation a person encounters.  Grief, fear, depression when they are environmentally based are not mental illness.  The world we live in is not perfect, nor is it "safe."  I was recently told by a psychiatrist that environmentally based was nonsense and that reactions of a certain type always indicated an underlying physical problem, ie. mental illness.  I told him that that stance was ridiculous.  A person suffering physical trauma often goes into shock.  Why is mental trauma not also recognized as capable of producing a temporary reaction which fades as the person comes to terms with the problem?  He told me that I had no idea what I was talking about:)  I told him I was putting it into my will that no psychiatrist was to be allow within 500 feet of me at any time while I was still living:)  I don't think he appreciated my making light of his credentials:)  But I was taught by my father that an educated idiot was still an idiot:)  The only person who can really know if your reaction was excessive is you.  You know the level of trauma your environment was producing.  I really don't know when psychiatry began passing out dangerous drugs like candy.  I know that when I was a student such drugs were treated as a last resort.  Now, the majority of psychiatrists do not take the dangers of these drugs seriously.

[Mary Ashcroft]

I don't know when response to traumatic events became uncurable mental illness.  Until recently, I didn't know that enviromentally created reactions had become mental illness.  If I am threatened by a grizzly, I climb a tree.  If I am threatened by a black bear, I run.  I will react to both situations.  If my family or I am threatened by a human, I will also react.  Preferably, I will contact the police.  In a dark alley at night, I will fight.