By most accounts Jose Mario Bergolio is a remarkable person. It came as a shock to his fans then a few months ago when he visiting Chile he came out against victims of child abuse. The issue centered on one bishop whom survivors of abuse fingered as complicit with what had happened. JMB obviously liked the man and took the position he was innocent until proven guilty.
When it comes to us, you have to believe in us but for us to believe in you we need proof.
This is the same dynamic as found in establishment (Royal College of Psychiatrists, APA, WPA and other physician organizations) responses to Drug Wrecks such as antidepressant dependence. The plural of anecdotes is not data, they say. We have the data, all you have is anecdotes.
When power is at play, those with power are innocent until proven guilty, those without it are guilty until proven innocent. It has been ever thus.
What the Chile case and the Antidepressant Withdrawal Saga bring out is the horrific consequences of not being believed.
The injury caused by being dismissed even ridiculed by a doctor when you know full well you are right and he is wrong is often a more difficult injury to bear than the difficulties caused by withdrawal from an antidepressant or other drug – debilitating though these injuries can be, lasting in some cases for decades.
The injury caused by being dismissed even ridiculed by a priest, or a bishop or even a pope when you know full well that you are right and he is wrong is often a much more difficult injury to bear than the difficulties caused by an original abuse.
One Giant Step for Man-Kind
Many years ago I used to sit on interview panels at a time when it became compulsory to ask the same question of every candidate. I ended up with – tell me about one mistake you’ve made and how you handled it afterwards.
To my surprise, all of the women asked this question could instantly offer answers about not just one mistake and what they had done as a result. But the men looked blank – me, mistake? Let me think……
So something quite remarkable happened last week. JMB apologized for his mistakes in Chile. It looks fairly genuine. This was not an apology on behalf of the Church for all the cases of abuse there have been over decades, perhaps centuries. This was not an English politician apologizing for the Irish Famine or a US President apologizing for slavery, or a German president apologizing to Israel.
This was JMB apologizing for his own recent mistakes in Chile and recognizing the pain and injury he had caused. See Here.
Man Up?
The New York Times recently ran an article on Antidepressant Dependence and Withdrawal. This was dissed by British College of Psychiatrist figures from Wendy Burn to Simon Wessely.
It was surprising the NYT ran this article given they – like the guardian – have become active promoters of statins and vaccines but they did.
It was jaw-dropping to find Psychiatric Times, a periodical that offers a voice to American Psychiatric Association members, offer just as punchy an article as the NYT or even more so. Psychiatric Times acknowledged that we don’t know what is going on and that psychiatry needs to wake up fast or its congregation are going to stop believing in it and turn to other sources like Surviving Antidepressants.
Time for Wendy, Simon, Dinesh and others to Man Up? They can’t say this is news. Successive presidents of the British Psychiatric College have been told about this problem for over 20 years since Charles Medawar first wrote to them. They are in great part personally responsible for ongoing injuries from disbelief to thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people.
If anyone knows of any psychiatric church that has behaved differently please let us know.
Jose can do it; can they? Do they have a Jos-b? They’ve had 20 years to prepare one.
Psychiatric Times.
This publication has consistently promoted psychotropic drugs to the point where I felt that the intensity of the propaganda made the Psychiatric Times unreadable to me.
I was giving it a brief scan before deleting when my jaw did indeed drop!
“PERSISTENT WITHDRAWAL REACTIONS CAN LAST YEARS”
“UNAVOIDABLE SEVERE WITHDRAWAL SYMPTOMS MAY OCCUR DESPITE SLOW WITHDRAWAL OVER SEVERAL MONTHS OR YEARS”.
Might this vital prescriber information be added to The British National Formulary urgently in order to immediately protect patients and prescribers?
(I don’t think that I have missed an amendment to the prescribers bible?)
Do the NICE Guideline writers read the Psychiatric Times?
Where does this leave the R.C.Psychs. ministers of propaganda?
The doctrine of Joseph Goebbels:
1) “If you tell a lie that is big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it”
2) The group wishing to promote the lie must also: – “Use all of its powers repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie”.
This article continues with what can only be perceived as integrity and even humility: —
“When the risks of treatment are not identified in the clinical trials that bring them onto the market, these risks are not cautioned against in widely circulated medication guidelines.
As a result, the prescribing physician will overestimate potential benefits and neglect patients’ vulnerabilities to the adverse effects of treatment”.
Have these three authors, one a trainee, discovered the DUTY OF CANDOUR demanded of our profession, and yet so blatantly denied (by mainstream psychiatry) to those who write and comment within the Online Communities for Drug Withdrawal?
Or – will this insightful and empathetic Rosetta Stone of a publication, apparently acknowledging prescription psychiatric drug dependency, and unbearable withdrawal syndromes be hastily withdrawn?
Evening Standard.
Business
Business focus: Confronting corruption claims is toughest pill for Glaxo to swallow
JIM ARMITAGE
4 hours ago
But in the background lurks another crucial matter that needs sorting out: numerous allegations from around the world of corruption at the group.
https://www.standard.co.uk/business/business-focus-confronting-corruption-claims-is-toughest-pill-for-glaxo-to-swallow-a3817031.html
For such a high profile case as GSK’s, it’s likely the organisation will wait for the newcomer to review the evidence and make a decision on whether to fine, prosecute or drop the probe.
But the decision will surely be landing in Walmsley’s busy in-tray soon
On the hunt for R&D deals, GSK raids Roche’s executive cupboard again
https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/hunt-for-r-d-deals-gsk-raids-roche-s-exec-cupboard-again?utm_source=internal&utm_medium=rss
Sin…will now report to…Barron..
Maya Angelou said, “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story witin you.” An unbelieved story is even worse because there’s no relief, no opening for the story to escape. It remains inside you to perpetuate the agony. It becomes trauma. As said, the truth will set you free–but not everyone wants the truth or wants you to be free.
Kate
You are so insightful. I have firsthand experience regarding these feelings.
Do you?
It has been the deepest sense of betrayal I have ever in my life experienced, the betrayal by the medical profession, the profession I worked with for 20 years. I understand why I was prescribed drugs, I even understand why they were prescribed for many years unnecessarily, though that does not make it right or acceptable. What I will never accept is the fact that a succession of doctors have sat opposite me, lying to my face, knowing full well that my health has been destroyed by drug withdrawal, not from antidepressants but from a benzodiazepine, that well known horrendous phenomenon of benzodiazepine withdrawal. GPs, psychiatrist, neurologist .. they lied to me or pretended not to know .. after years of training at public expense they pretended not to know. I will never trust a doctor again as long as I live, I will avoid doctors now as far as is humanly possible, I will dissect their every word and will probably disbelieve every one. I no longer expect them to protect me, in fact I fully expect them to harm me at the earliest opportunity. The hell and torture I endured for three years, never seeing a doctor, will stay with me forever. It was beyond imagination. I have been offered no empathy, no apology, no concern. I have finally been given a full acknowledgement that I have been harmed but I had to fight for four years to get it. I campaign every day and I witness the appalling behaviour of leading psychiatrists in this country. They have deliberately set out to mislead the public in the press, no apology for or retraction of the letter in the Times. I watch RCPsych churn out their biased slogans on Twitter refusing to engage with harmed patients. I witness the silence from RCGP who has now blocked me. With every week that passes it becomes more intolerable. But what is certain is that patients know exactly what is going on, we are not fools, far from it. Our politicians now know exactly what is going on. The online community knows, the press knows, the information is being circulated to the US, Canada, Australia, and yes I have been in touch with the New York Times, two years ago. And we will keep spreading the word about British psychiatry wherever we possibly can until we are heard and patients are given the help and support they need to recover from the devastation and destruction of their health and their lives. I have nothing better to do, my life is already destroyed, I have plenty of time, I can do this every hour of every day, until something is done. My life is over …and those who could have helped did nothing. It was not how I had planned to spend my retirement, far from it but every day I spend my time helping distressed and suicidal patients, suffering from drug damage, whilst those with the power to help and who pretend to be concerned about patients do absolutely nothing to end this appalling devastation of human life. I make no apology for my passion or my mission. But it is not I who should be doing this, it is not the prescribed harmed community who should be doing this. I speak for the very many patients who have no voice so badly damaged they dare not, they cannot speak, they remain in the shadows, silent, suffering. This is what has been done. How utterly shameful.
With you all the way, Fiona, on every intelligent, honest, truthful word you have written. EVERY HEARTBREAKING WORD.
Fiona, the same in Ireland if not worse – No access to Justice – No accountability – The Patients discarded in the Pharma War of today against The Patients…’in the valley of darkness’ we struggle to live within the torture of Pharma Profit Margins…
Fiona, you are one of the best.
My own horror story of psychiatry. I was abused in “care”, every agency and organisation which ought to have helped me has let me down, including mental health services. I finally got diagnosed with CPTSD and acknowledged that I had been damaged by the institutional child trafficking cover up. That is the most helpful thing any psychiatrist has ever done for me, I won’t name the psychiatrist because I know damned well he would be persecuted for doing anything to help someone like me. And that’s the problem isn’t it. The corruption of the entire system means that instead of psychiatry being used to help and heal broken souls it’s used as a weapon!
I can’t use any NHS service any more. Like Fiona, I don’t trust doctors, why would I, why should I, I’ve been systematically abused again and again and again. And like Fiona, I’m not young any more. I feel my life has been blighted, I can’t say destroyed because I’m still here, I survived, with broken wings yes but I’m still here, and I should have been helped by the services. There was an attempt to help me in the 90s, but it was stamped on by higher authorities. It’s almost ALWAYS orders from above that cause the damage, there are some decent and lovely people working in mental health services, I know because I’ve met them, but they get squeezed out by the Common Purpose brigade. I just think one thing that might help us if the staff room in every psychiatric hospital had a massive unmissable plaque bearing the words “FIRST DO NO HARM” to remind the people working there what their actual job is meant to achieve.
One wonders what it will take to change received wisdom in psychiatry.
You may read thousands of patient-authored case histories of psychiatric drug withdrawal here. http://survivingantidepressants.org/forum/3-introductions-and-updates/
Case in point.
https://fiddaman.blogspot.com/2018/04/stop-it.html#.WtfUj4gbNdg
I was started on paroxetine (Seroxat) for social anxiety. This was during the UK’s “Defeat Depression Campaign” which was sponsored by the pharmaceutical industry and embraced by my college, the Royal College of Psychiatrists. Furthermore, from this time on, paroxetine, based on case studies began to be prescribed for all sorts of symptoms and was widely prescribed off-label (the market was widened and psychiatry held hands with pharma promotion). This short film tells the story of this:
Powerful Embrace: https://vimeo.com/101303835
I was defined thereafter (even by medical colleagues) as living with a Disorder. Many seemed to see the “Disorder” first and not me.
After 6 months of paroxetine I stopped it (I need not explain the consequences: the withdrawal symptoms and sudden dropping of mood – though I had never been seriously depressed before).
I want to keep this post short, so I won’t tell you the rest of the story, apart from 2004-2005, which is the period covered in this film.
Paroxetine tablets [Film-Coated]: https://vimeo.com/265051140
In this film I talk about being defined by a disorder, re-defined by its harmful effects, being unbelieved (even by my colleagues) and the effects on this for myself and my family.
kind wishes
Dr Peter J Gordon
GMC number 3468861
Peter
These links are powerful. Thanks for posting
David
Thanks David,
I have put together this short post following the Royal Society of Medicine podcast on antidepressants:
https://holeousia.com/2018/05/05/this-dichotomy-is-an-extraordinary-one/
aye Peter
Dr. Peter Gordon: Addressing the Divide Between the Arts and Medical Sciences
By
James Moore
May 17, 2018
https://www.madinamerica.com/2018/05/dr-peter-gordon/
‘Renaissance of Generalists’ ..
‘Listen to all experience’ ..
Seroxat in 1998 for social anxiety ‘defeat depression campaign’
I stopped it…liquid over 12 monthss..suicidal thoughts
Almost cried in a professional meeting ..
He’s still on Paroxetine
Ethical science relies on listening to people ..
Emotions – they fill the world with meaning
Lived Experience is really important
Urge a rethink from senior members in psychiatry ..
A rare account of a Scottish Doctor taking Seroxat with its trials and tribulations, and, also, a rare breed of person whose films are so worth taking the time to dip in to – poignant and understated and powerful, every one a little work of art ..
https://holeousia.com/
Teddy Travels, Too ..
This!… Listen to Peter Gordon! A Psychiatrist with a conscience and a soul! A rare thing…
Truthman30 @Truthman30 19h
Simon Wessely @WesselyS 5hr
Simon Wessely Retweeted Jon Stone
Now The Two Professors Carson and Stone join other legendary double acts – Morecambe and Wise, Laurel and Hardy, Little and Large, Wallace and Gromet, Fortnum and Mason…..
In 1962 a sleeping pill called thalidomide caused a horrific drug disaster whose emblematic images of limbless and handicapped babies born to distraught mothers linger to this day. The United States Congress swung into action. They wanted to prevent such a tragedy happening again. They were also determined to rein in the marketing excesses of the pharmaceutical industry. Three steps were taken.
https://davidhealy.org/pharmageddon-is-the-story-of-a-tragedy/
Tha lid o mide ..
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=david+healy+and+thalidomide&&view=detail&mid=1FB8B71E66C0FF99408D1FB8B71E66C0FF99408D&&FORM=VRDGAR
Dance with the Pythons .. Hearts and Minds ..
Just to say thanks also to Dr Peter Gordon. Very powerful.
Oh, I think they DO believe us. But they don’t want us to KNOW that they do believe us. They don’t want us to get together in droves and pin them against the wall. So they use every available tactic to shut us up and quieten us down, defeat our spirit, and like Peter’s excellent film states, they are hiding behind so-called ‘education’, implying they really do know best. They will eventually no doubt, when enough of us manage to change the power balance and chickens fly home to roost, trot out the well used and sickening phrase, “we were guilty of no wrong doing”.
Fiona French’s piece is, for me, a perfect description of how I feel. I would never trust a doctor or a drug again. Like she says, we have all the time in the world (till we die) to keep spreading the word, trying to save and support others. But it’s a dangerous game we are playing. Make no mistake, the other side will stop at nothing to undermine our efforts and frustrate our every move. So they DO know the truth (else why would they bother protesting louder and louder) and must do all they can to stop it getting out there, mostly by discrediting us, their critics, who they imply, ‘ need educating’.
But, like the old saying goes, you can’t fool all of the people all of the time. You may turn thousands into zombies, but the human spirit is resilient and the urge for self preservation in many still fights to overcome. The Guardian’s attitude is shameful, Government’s attitude is weak and spineless, but we are the people and we matter more than any institution. Good for the New York Times. To hell with the Guardian, never thought I’d say that, really sad.
Bob -thankyou for the links – I think the Wessley duo are a nightmare. Do you have any concerns that Simon Wessly will be chairing the review of the Mental Health Act under the banner of the Mental Health Alliance? Suzanne Hudson as chair of the alliance is not responding to e mails from the chair of the critical psychiatry network – if that information had not been blogged we would have no way of knowing any requests have been blocked and there’s no telling how many others have been blocked. Without blogging there would no possibility of changing anything – ‘They’ hadn’t realised how powerful it has all become until recently . I guess there will be meetings to discuss ways of ‘dealing with’ the independant blogging now people can no longer be silenced. Tweets from the duo won’t do it .
Susanne
That is exactly what all this FAKE NEWS hullabaloo is about – it is designed to give a monopoly on news to the bought out mainstream media.
http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/digital-culture-media-and-sport-committee/fake-news/written/73097.html
http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/digital-culture-media-and-sport-committee/fake-news/written/76219.html
Yes John but we don’t know how they will be dreaming up ways to try to further undermine or try to corral independent bloggers now it’s being taken more seriously- it’s happened to so many ‘user/survivor ‘ independent groups who were lured away with offers of funds /status .
There are plenty of ‘Cassandras’* out here challenging the unfolding disasters being caused by the pharmaceutical industry, we are ignored and ostracised.
We are on the edge of an abyss, facing the enormous damage being caused by the over-use of a welter of medical products, e.g. anti-depressants, opioids, antibiotics, vaccines etc.
What is truly shocking is to discover the web of ‘authorities’ protecting the status quo. The public good is not being protected, rather the pharmaceutical industry, and its acolytes wedded to its lucrative ideologies, is being allowed to trample over citizens’ best interests.
There aren’t many heroes ‘on the inside’ willing to challenge the hegemony of industry. It seems to me most of the doctors and academics are only too happy to go along and feather their own nests at the expense of the rest of us.
*What does it mean to be a Cassandra…1. (Greek mythology) a daughter of Priam and Hecuba, endowed with the gift of prophecy but fated never to be believed 2. anyone whose prophecies of doom are unheeded. https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/cassandra
‘Not being believed’….yes, the worst thing of all.
After a series of ADRs resulting in our son’s death, we followed up with the usual complaints to our Health & Care Trust, and eventually too, the GMC.
When our son was near the end of his life, I had explained that I could understand some of what he was describing as overwhelming anxiety as I too had experienced this just once in my life, aged 27, when I’d been given a hormone tablet treatment for several days which had immediately caused symptoms of shaking, unexplained terror, nightmares etc. I’d been offered Valium for this, had taken it for 3 months and found it helpful. I asked whether Valium might help him, to lessen his shaking, pacing, and agitation.
It was, it turned out, a HUGE mistake to have mentioned this about my hormone treatment and its following side effects to the psychiatric social worker and psychiatrist treating our son. On reading his Notes, once we managed to get hold of them, (after a long wait and many requests), I read there words to the effect that anyway….‘ the mother had been diagnosed with lifelong anxiety ‘, (no mention of the hormone treatment which caused it) implying that the son was likely to have been bound to manifest anxiety because he’d grown up with a mentally ill mother. It also implied that our version of events should not be taken too seriously because of this ‘medical history’ too, making me an unreliable witness. I had never had mental illness or anxiety, I had had a reaction once in my life to a hormone drug, which actually was wrongly prescribed for me. But this fact was carefully omitted.
We got nowhere in our complaints, both to the NHS Health and Care Trust, and to the GMC. Not being believed, or having the evidence skewed to imply you are not worth listening to, but pitiable, is heinous in these situations. Leaving out a few facts can easily create a false impression. We have to fight and check to make sure the true story is told at all times. Not easy, but vital.
In 1980 my son spent 16 days in the neonatal unit of my local hospital. He suffered a convulsion at 8 hours after birth and continued to have convulsions for 53 hours. They were diagnosed as being caused by withdrawal from Anafranil, a tricyclic antidepressant I was prescribed in the latter stages of pregnancy. I remember feeling incredibly distraught that I’d placed my trust in a psychiatric drug and it had gone so catastrophically wrong. Thankfully, there was no equivocation on the part of my psychiatrist. He accepted the drug was the cause and was as devestated as I was. He hadn’t known that Anafranil posed any kind of risk in later pregnancy. That decision made without full benefit of knowledge has had lasting consequences for my son. He has the same profound cog fog that many of us experience on prescribed psychotropic drugs and has been subsequently diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.
Over the course of 30 years I’ve taken Anafranil, Seroxat and Effexor. In 2011 I discovered antidepressant withdrawal hell when I tapered off Effexor. I looked for and expected not only help from psychiatry but some honesty. Initially I had some reason to hope but it became clear that psychiatrists don’t believe in protracted withdrawal. I ended up on a whole cocktail of pharmaceuticals. It was made clear to me that the long term prognosis demanded drug treatment and nothing else. I can’t tell you how cruel it is not to be believed. As of now I’m drug free and I intended to be for as long as I can possibly help it.
I am so very sorry about your son, Alyne. We had the same psychiatrist, almost 40 years ago, and we were prescribed the same drug. I had grand mal fits, the only time I ever had them. At first the psychiatrist did not think it was the drug but later on he acknowledged that it probably was. He was an honest and, I believe, genuine man. He tried drugs for 6 months and when he say they were not working he passed me onto someone else, a psychotherapist who wasn’t so keen on drugs. However, on balance, I kept taking them. I wonder what has happened in the intervening years. At that time, there was no rush to prescribe me drugs to begin with, it was a couple of years before drugs were tried as I did not respond to group and individual therapy. Now doctors have done everything they possibly could to deny the fact that I have suffered damage from benzodiazepine withdrawal. Something has gone very far wrong indeed. I do not blame them so much now, they clearly work in what is now a terrible system.
David,
The subject matter and timing of your blog are exquisite. One of the many common themes in the written evidence sent in by people to the Welsh Petition is the horror and damage of not being believed. Reference to this blog and your quote: “They can’t say this is news. Successive presidents of the British Psychiatric College have been told about this problem for over 20 years since Charles Medawar first wrote to them. They are in great part personally responsible for ongoing injuries from disbelief to thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people” has perfectly rounded off this particular section of my reply to the Petitions Committee.
Ongoing injuries from disbelief. Says it all, really.
Stevie
Absolutely, Stevie
The tales from the Scottish Petition are pretty harrowing, if you read them all, interspersed with a few ‘Doctors’ ..
I decided not to write a ‘harrowing’ tale and made a rather cheeky report about ‘Those on High’ and was really pleased to have an interesting discourse and extremely helpful person help me round off the edges; you write extremely well ..
http://www.parliament.scot/GettingInvolved/Petitions/PE01651
as do all those who describe so lucidly, the horror of what happened to them ..
Thank you, David. You have nailed the issue, yet again. Being disbelieved over many years by medical professionals has not only left me knowing where I am in supposed to be in the pecking order of health “care” (the BOTTOM), it has more than likely denied me (and the thousands of others living through this hell) any tiny chance there might have been to receive well-reasoned treatment to catch my withdrawal condition early – and not lead to years of battling “waves” that eventually led to a physical breakdown. This latter event, accompanied by 24/7 anxiety, brought me to the doors of the local mental health service and the psychiatrist – who flatly denied that I was suffering drug damage and offered a panoply of treatments – antidepressants, lithium, anti-psychotics, ECT (I escaped most of them). Denial by the professionals is infantile, irresponsible, insulting, frightening and dangerous.
A wonderful Post touching the hearts of many hurt patients/people to Respond as if we have been “given permission to tell” the reality. Yet it is not just about “Not being Believed” it is about being “stitched up” “Lied about” “Ostracised” & “Labelled”.
All of this to protect the Pharmagods of Prey where no human life is accepted as worthy of human rights or choices. I recall Dr Healy’s book “Pharmagaddon” and it being referred to as a “Tragedy”. Indeed it is a Tragedy because Pharma drugs affect people and so many of us have been “chosen” without our consent to be human subjects for a corrupt Industry who are all protected by Government, Army, Medical Professionals, Universities & in Ireland also by Catholic Church to criminal levels.
This is not an Untold Story or a Hidden Story from decades ago – it is an “allowed” Story of crime, time and time again and there are countless “Stolen Lives” as the Tragedy spreads throughout Nations.
My dear mother Clare used to say “A good Liar needs to Remember his Lies”. With the Theory of “Good Practice” “Patients Safety” “Patients Rights” “Ethics” “Informed Consent” filling the Files of NHS & HSE with even
Patient Safety Managers set up to ensure “Good Practice” I think we all can agree that the Medical & Psychiatric Profession are the “Good Liars who remember their Lies”
Jesus cried out in despair “They have pierced my hands and my feet, they have numbered all my bones” and that alone tells of the torture that Pharma & Medical Profession do today. Here in Tullamore Co Offaly Ireland we have an Orthopaedic Surgeon doing “projects” for “The Book of Numbers” it truly is beyond belief that Surgeons today are carrying out crimes to the Human Body for BioEngineering Trials for the Pharmaceutical Industry. Sure who would believe such a story? Yes, it is indeed about being believed and Patients do NOT Lie – so Doctors why do you Lie!
We thought to be good citizens. We thought to Educate our Children and yet it is all Universities especially in Ireland that promote Pharma Medical Devices and here we have again students of Science & Medicine promoting Pharmagods instead of being “allowed” to research Science for their own Growth all of what they have studied to do. We have Nurses who will go to criminal lengths to Protect the Pharma owned doctor rather than stand in safety with and for “The Patient”.
How innocent we all were. How trusting us “good patients” were. Decades ago, I guess I had warnings but I just did not think about it then, I just thought “that is a bad doctor, sure I can go to another” but the underlying thread shows through eventually that even the “Good Doctor” has to bow to the pharmagods and the corrupt NHS & HSE that is.
Teri, I don’t quite agree that the ‘good doctor’ HAS to bow – surely, it’s more of a case that most of them make that choice. They have a choice to speak up – as some do, or to simply follow the trend of ‘bowing to the pharma gods’. We do not know the pressures under which they work but we can imagine that it’s way, way easier to just follow the majority line rather than stand firm for what you believe. What I fail to understand is how those who follow like sheep manage to sleep at night knowing of the damage that is being caused. We hear more and more about ‘stress levels’ of practising doctors – is it any wonder? Ignoring the truth, or refusing to listen to it, is stressful surely; caring for patients showing signs of reactions that you dare not mention must add to their anxiety. Being open to discussion, at the very least, would possibly give the majority of them a far calmer lifestyle. We do not ask each and every doctor to believe what we say unquestioningly – but simply to LISTEN to what we have to say and ACT upon what they hear rather than discount it all as ‘lies’.
Mary, I used the word “Has” as what other word could I use – I could use “forced” or any other such word…Yes, I agree with you “how do they sleep at night?”
Sadly in Ireland it is only the patients who speak out and who are ridiculed & ostracised for doing so. We have also had a Junior Minister who did speak out about drug side effects warned by Irish Psychiatry “to reconsider his position”.
Another Minister stated on a Television Debate that he had heard from several members of staff in the Department of Health that they were “terrified” when a Pharma Company came on the ‘phone.
Patients do not Lie but Doctors sadly do – so what is their motive? It is simple really. Their motive is to cover up Pharma drug side effects and the injuries drug reactions cause. This is why I wrote “has to bow to pharmagods of prey”.
Here in Ireland also we have over 450 girls suffering injuries from the HPV Vaccines. Their “injuries” are being stated by the HSE as “coincidences”. The deaths of the two young doctors as they too were referred to as “coincidences”. It is time that we state the facts and challenge “the Lies” and the “coincidences”.
HPV Vaccine: more questions than answer
Jonathan Irwin
#HPV/Vax World Conference yesterday was a real eye opener.Front rank speakers delegates from across Europe USA.Very far from “safe vaccine”.Denmark no less than 5 clinics dedicated to treatment of girls damaged by Gardasil/Cervarix.
Morag Livingstone
Unreported World
https://unreportedworldonline.wordpress.com/2018/04/22/hpv-vaccine-more-questions-than-answers/
Jonathan Irwin
#Gardasil.Now that US court has ruled Gardasil vaccine cause of young girls death inconceivable that HSE will continue with their 2018 promotional campaign of this vaccine”Totally safe”
#HPV/GARDASIL.Recent legal Judgement in USA that Gardasil Vax reason young girl died is a mighty & long overdue decision.Floodgates Cld open.Certainly v important Harris/HSE to bring their files uptodate before promoting another year of Gardasil.
Jonathan Irwin
Founder Jack & Jill.home care for +2500 babies since 1997. Irish & Global Fundraiser of the year 2011. Originator Equine Unit Castlerea Prison.2018
Morag Livingstone, who founded this blog, is an award winning writer, director, producer, film-maker and investigative journalist who collaborates with others to get to the heart of the matter. The aim being to turn complex issues into an understandable narrative that highlight the personal impact of those affected – and why these issues are important to the wider population.
Yes, it is painful to know what has caused me 20 years (and counting) of suffering.
The pain is exponentially inflated when my doctor just said ‘no’.
What use is it for me to know? I lived a life in ‘nothingness’ before 2014, when I first discovered what other people had experienced on Seroxat. But that ‘nothingness’ was less painful than to know my prescribing doctor stood silent at the sideline as my life fell apart.
In ‘nothingness’ I thought it was my fault, that I had just better accept my future no matter how surreal it felt.
Now I’m bitter and full of vengeful thoughts that cannot be realized, because any doctor can get away with blaming me.
Dismissing alarming questions about Seroxat has worked for them, it takes a #meetoo to change this.
Ove 2018
A few further thoughts on this.
Who do we want to be believed by?
Those in power have put us in the horrendous position we find ourselves in, in the first place, haven’t they? So how are we going to turn them round? There was a Westminster Conference on how to improve the NHS last week, chaired by Lansley, with key speakers like Jeremy Hunt. One or two parents from our RoAccutane group went, and tried to talk to as many speakers as they could afterwards. They were not able sadly to put a question from the floor. Jeremy Hunt made the speediest exit afterwards that could be imagined, but apparently one of our intrepid ladies ‘chased him with the speed of a whippet’ and gave him one of our ‘dying for clear skin, ‘before you take that drug, read this’ leaflets. I expect he will have crumpled it up in his taxi, unread, but at least she tried.
But if they don’t want to believe us, how can we change their opinion? We’ve all written to JH and MHRA et al so many many times.
I think I’d like my family to believe what’s going on. But they too may have their own agenda of fixed opinions. Only those who suddenly find themselves really in the same position as the protesting sufferer, can really believe, as well as maybe those like DH who see the damage first hand, day after day. I’d like my GP to believe, and I think they do, in fact, but they are running scared. They daren’t openly join our club.
But lots of the most worthwhile folk on earth DO believe, and thank goodness for them. They know, they’ve been there, they’ve got the tee shirt. By the way, what about RxISK tee shirts? Are there any available to purchase, funds towards the RxISK Prize?
A lot of resources have been put in to the Rxisk Prize from Rxisk.org.
The videos, hours of painstaking written work, all voluntary from Rxisk.org.
Crowdfunding and Justgiving raise thousands and thousands from a very generous public, well over £80,000 for the London Marathon runner who died.
To my knowledge Rxisk.org have not had an article written in the media with a Donation Tag.
May be I am overestimating David’s clout, but he has friends in the media.
Katinka for one. Shelley for another. There are others.
We need a huge push to get this off the ground and in the public eye.
What public would be immune to young men and even middle aged men and some women whose sexuality has been destroyed for a lifetime.
And as we all keep saying, finding a cure for PSSD could lead to a huge development in the crisis of addiction, withdrawal, and other associated serious problems which have never had a real investigation and a real possibility of finding a cure.
All everyone keeps saying is that nobody knows how they work, and this comes from the .. Top..
Pharma don’t know how they work.
They have invented a Cure for Depression and it has taken over with no basis of FACT and with no basis of PROOF and no basis of SCIENCE.
All us Givers have a vested interest in this.
We are like a Co operative.
We are the Part and we are the Future.
We need $60,000.
When our village playgroup almost went under, 21 years ago, I was appointed the fundraiser.
An Association provided our playgroup with a list of Charities.
I wrote a seriously pleading letter on our old Olivetti begging for monies to keep us afloat.
Every week at playgroup, I arrived with cheques, sent from caring Charities who were aghast at our plight and this kept the playgroup afloat until the whole committee changed when our children went to primary school and they then started on fundraising activities and it all kept going, until one day it just ran out of steam and that was the end of the playgroup.
There are thousands if not millions of people in the world awash with money, from celebrities to business mogels.
How do we attract them.
And if we did, $100.000, could turn in to $1,000,000 …
Excellently written Annie.
I believe – correct me if I’m wrong – that to turn to charities asking for support, RxISK.org would need to have charity status itself. There must be reasons why Rxisk is not a charity and we should respect those reasons without questions I guess. Crowdfunding is a different matter I presume.
Having said that, maybe it would be helpful for us all to understand whether or not there is a ‘plan B’ if ‘plan A’ proves unattainable. I cannot see how a prize of $100 000, as offered, can possibly result in a lesser amount being handed over should a viable plan which could lead to a cure be forthcoming.
David, I’m pretty sure that you have said at one point that if each person that receives the Rxisk newsletter donated a certain amount – a fairly low amount if I remember rightly – then that would boost the total to $100 000 in one fell swoop.
Is there any way of encouraging these readers further? I cannot understand their interest in the newsletter if they fail to donate to such a worthy cause.
Great article but I wish we would stop focusing on Just SSRI withdrawal. The vocabulary should be SSRI injury. There are hundreds of cases in the support groups of adverse reactions, Serotonin Syndrome, suicides and permanent disability from these Meds. Luckily there is more articles supporting this as well as documentaries.
This is one of my most hated things about doctors and phyciatrist now the fact that I have been to so many and reported the damage that I have been subjected to over the last 5 years and not one of them is prepared to admit that it’s the medication that has caused me so much harm and suffering yet when you look into their eyes you can see that they know the damage is from the medications and yet the reply that most of them give is try another antidepressant to help you cope with the overwhelming feelings this is horrendous behaviour
I now don’t trust any doctor anymore which is a shame that it has come to this I also tell my friends and family about the harm that these meds do many of them are on them but none for depression or anxiety or mental health problems but for headaches menopause sweating etc many of them have told me they have tried to stop many times but they have felt so awful that they will stay on them for life how sad is that doctors hoodwink people into taking these powerful medications for reasons that they were never designed 3 of my friends are having trouble with depression now from medications who untill they started had no history of any mental health now the doctors are labelling them bi polar etc again so sad but this is what is happening doctors rather than tell you it’s drug related or withdrawel label you with a mental disorder then add further drugs as they say they work well in combinations
It’s about time this was addressed yes people need medication for the right reasons yes people suffer with mental health problems and medication can be life saving but inform the patients of the pitfalls that come with taking such medication learn to acknowledge the discontinuation effects so that people are treated properly and not forced on to many other medications to which the persons develop serotonin syndrome akathisia suicidel tendency’s and all the other horrors that come with these powerful drugs they took a oath to do no harm and maybe they don’t intentionally set out to do harm but they need to recognise it when it happens and and treat it properly so as not to harm the patient even more and mostly listen to the patient not just take what it says in the text book Manuel or the pharma literature
I am severely damaged now after 30 years of being polydrugged severe bad practise by my doctor taking me on and off 8 medications in the space of 16 months no tapering his ability not to recognise akathisia and serotonin syndrome I am currently of all medication for 19 months now and I am worse than ever i have no one to turn to as doctors dismiss me phyciatrist don’t want me because I try to educate them so they call me probmatic and non compliant they don’t want to listen to me but I’m the sufferer they think I’m lying I didn’t choose to live like this no one should live like this but untill this is properly addressed it will get worse
On a sad note one of my friends who was placed on a antidepressant for the menopause who had never had anxiety or depression before meds and tried many times to come of has committed suicide the doctor said to the family that she had been suffering depression and that’s what he was treating her for . I know this to be untrue and she had told me many times that the worst day of her life was listening to that doctor who said the med was used as a off labelled treatment that it was safe and no side effects yeah right Stop the lying now please and listen to us when we need help not being believed is more damaging than anything