Posted by huxley on September 23, 2010, at 18:36:30
In reply to Re: Have our brains been permanently damaged? » olivia12, posted by SLS on September 23, 2010, at 7:25:34
Hi Scott,
You seem to be pretty switched on and have a good insight into the field of psychiatry. Maybe you can help me out here.
Why do a large majority of doctors deny that there is withdrawal from medications. Even when the evidence is staring them right in the face.
I and many other have experienced horrible withdrawal from SSRI/NIs and Neuroleptics. I have read horror stories about TCAs, MAOIs and mood stabalisers.
Why do doctors continue to deny this and cling to the line that it is our original symptoms returning.
There are many cases where people have been put on SSRIs for pain relief or other off label reasons.
Once these people quit they are struck down with severe depression and anxiety even though they have never experienced it before.
Could it be the case, that many of us would not be in a better place mentally if we never took medication? I think that there could be some merit to that claim.
Most of us have a similar story. We take an SSRI for our original problem. It works great at first. 2-3 years down the track it stops working and we are often worse of than we were before we started. Doctors claim that this is the illness progressing. But is it? What is to say that the SSRI has not thrown our brains out of balance?
Have there been any long term studies done comparing people who get treatment with meds vs people who don't?
Will this 'illness progressing' theory be as valid as the 'chemical imbalance' theory?
If someone is on a neuroleptic, (which I think are quite dangerous medications)and they try to stop only to me met with horrible physical and mental withdrawal syndromes. They are then told that this is their original condition returning. This is what they are like without their medication and are hence condemmed to a life on neuroleptics when in fact they could be fine without them.
Interested on your insights into this. Why are doctors so stubborn with refusing to believe that people suffer serious withdrawal. Who is educating them? I just am totally bamboozeled by their denial of withdrawal even when faced with overwhelming evidence.Doctors are not stupid people, they are often highly intelligent, the cream of the academic crop. How can they be so blind in this instance? Is it an ego or personality thing? Or is it something more sinister and they are being taught to deny it?
Also you mentioned in an earlier post that they can see the damage to the brain from depression through brain scans.Is this a new development? Can they take an image of 10 peoples brains, 5 who have depression and 5 who don't and identify the ones with depression?
I thought the signs of depression they could identify were not consistant and contradicted others findings.I thought that it was a pretty fledgling science and nothing conclusive had come out of it yet.
poster:huxley
thread:962635
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20100917/msgs/963550.html