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Very few people really seem bothered about all this -

 

Pollution, Invasive Aliens, & Mass Extinction: 20,000 Scientists 'Warn Humanity' The End Is Nigh

www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-03-10/pollution-invasive-aliens-mass-extinction-20000-scientists-warn-humanity-end-nigh

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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I was a professional natural scientist for 50 years, and try not to be bothered much by all this.  A lot of it is interesting - and I try to see it that way!

 

There is a lot of negativity on the internet, and a lot of sites and individuals try to whip us up into a frenzy.  Don't get me wrong, I think the internet is amazing, but believe one has to police oneself to avoid being caught into unhelpful ways of thinking.  Kind of like trying to avoid those toxic individuals we may know.

 

Mankind is resilient IMO, certainly, we may be wiped out someday by something of our own making or a natural phenomenon, but maybe not for a while.

 

The reasons I can, and continue to try to hold onto these beliefs, include:

1 - I am old at 72.

2 - My philosophy tells me not to focus on all the bad stuff, it just gets you down.  Do I ever get down?  You bet!

3 - Why let yourself take on all the problems of the world (universe?) - Our primeval selves are not designed for that.  We should not really be shouldering the problems hitech has brought to our living rooms, pcs, laptops, phones, etc. almost as they arise.

We have evolved to be concerned only with ourselves, our family/tribe and our local environment.  Before the industrial revolution, one never heard much news - good, bad or trivial - of the outside world for months, maybe years, mostly never. 

 

I know we all get into our own ruts and habits, particularly when confined due to having to look after someone, or oneself. My own mother lived to be 93, I did not get on with her very well and we had to have her living with us for a few years before she went to a care home in the town.  (My conscience tries to not let me be too hard on her as she was widowed suddenly, at 35 south of the border, hundreds of miles from her home town with a 9-year old boy to raise.)

 

Maybe, you can change some destructive habits, cpu?  I find all the stuff you send us links to mostly interesting from an academic viewpoint, but it does tend to focus on the dark side of things.  My daughter tells me I focus that way, too.

 

I can tell you, one of the most brilliant(!) things that caught my eye about you, is where you live.

Maybe you take it for granted, but I can assure you the climate of your county and city is one of the best in the land.  I did spend a few years in the south and my wife comes from southern England.

Only this morning, on the radio in a lengthy interview, one of our Scottish comediennes said, "Of course you have to have a sense of humour if you live in Scotland.  For a start, there's the climate!  Here, our workmen are comedians, it can be a comedy theatre just standing at a bus-stop!

 

Our ancestors were obsessed with the passing of the seasons and the path of the sun.  There are, as you will know, massive standing stones from near where you are, and all the way up to the Orkney Islands, marking important points on the horizon, e.g,  where the sun is at the winter solstice.

 

It is the belief of many, including myself, that our loss of touch with nature does not help us.

I do know, too, though, from personal experience, that alternative benefits seem tiny compared with the overwhelming power of psychotropic drugs.

Never mind, maybe there is something in exposing one's self to more sunlight, green and blue space and getting away from hitech screens for a spell.

 

Best wishes, for now, maybe catch you later.

 

PS - Forgive me if I have trod on your toes with any of my views - please regard the message as an attempt to help.

Born 1945. 

1999 - First Effexor/Venlafaxine

2016 Withdrawal research. Effexor.  13Jul - 212.5mg;  6Aug - 200.0mg;  24Aug - 187.5mg;  13Sep - 175.0mg;  3Oct - 162.5mg;  26Oct - 150mg 

2017  9Jan - 150.00mg;  23Mar - 137.50mg;  24Apr - 125.00mg;  31May - 112.50mg holding;  3Sep - 100.00mg;  20Sep - 93.75mg;  20Oct - 87.5mg;  12Nov - 81.25mg;  13 Dec - 75.00mg

2018  18Jan - 69.1mg; 16Feb - 62.5mg; 16March - 57.5mg (-8%); 22Apr - 56.3mg(-2%); CRASHED - Updose 29May - 62.5mg; Updose - 1Jul - 75.0mg. Updose - 2Aug - 87.5mg. Updose - 27Aug - 100.0mg. Updose - 11Oct 112.5mg. Updose - 6Nov 125.00mg

2019 Updoses 19 Jan - 150.0mg. 1April - 162.5mg. 24 April - Feeling better - doing tasks, getting outside.  7 May - usual depression questionnaire gives "probably no depression" result.

Supps/Vits  Omega 3;  Chelated Magnesium;  Prebiotics/Probiotics, Vit D3. 

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20 minutes ago, peng said:

Best wishes, for now, maybe catch you later.

 

PS - Forgive me if I have trod on your toes with any of my views - please regard the message as an attempt to help.

 

Thank you Peng & you are right with it all. i need to try & spend less time on-line, try & smoke less tobacco & get out around nature a bit more. 

 

What happened to me age 17 that started everything off in a big way was a very powerful vision of 'the end of the world' & i have never been able to really switch it off.

 

i don't feel that there has ever been the appropriate psychological help to go into & work through it all. i just find a lot that corroborates it all.

 

i hate the current Global socio-economic & mental health system. i find it very hard to forgive what was done to me, & the subsequent trajectory my life took & find it very hard to deal with the realities of my overall circumstances.

 

There have been & are also very in depth, extremely difficult & complex aspects to my overall circumstances that i can't discuss on-line, concerning other people that are close to me.

 

For lack of better descriptors i do see it all as a case of severe schizophrenia with very likely complex PTSD, although the only thing which is diagnosed is the schizophrenia.

 

i have found an excellent psychologist, but have to wait close to 18 month before i can see her.

 

 

 

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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Looks like an interesting book / author -

An Integral Foundation for Addiction Treatment: Beyond the Biopsychosocial Model by Guy du Plessis

 

http://guyduplessis.com/

 

https://www.calsouthern.edu/content/articles/psychology-articles/guy-du-plessis-guide-to-addiction-recovery

 

Currently there is such a cornucopia of conflicting theories in the field of addiction studies that it has become exceedingly difficult for treatment providers, therapists, and policymakers to integrate this vast field of knowledge into effective treatment. Many countries are on the brink of medical and economic crisis from struggling with the excessive burden of addiction treatment on health care.

 

Scholars have pinpointed two foremost problems in addiction treatment science: confusion over the treatment definition and treatment ineffectiveness. Since such a chaotic overabundance of treatment theories, styles, and definitions cloud the field of addictionology, many therapists claim their field is in need of a paradigm shift.

 

In the last 20 years an integrative and compound model has emerged known as the biopsychosocial model, but without a solid and comprehensive meta-framework, syncretistic confusion can result when therapists pick and choose techniques without direction or an overall rationale. To address this problem, Guy du Plessis applies integral theory as a conceptual framework for understanding addiction, as well as a meta-therapeutic framework for therapists. The Integral foundation of addiction outlined in this book provides researchers, academics, and therapists with a conceptual architectonic of addiction and its treatment that is integrative, inclusive, and practical. An Integral Foundation for Addiction Treatment belongs on the shelf of every addiction treatment therapist, and anyone else who is impacted or influenced by the topic.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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My father's brother was an alcoholic, cpu.

From your, clearly, extensive reading, do you think my 40 years of (misguided, I believe) being prescribed psychotropic drugs and my chronic ill health since the age of 32 could be related?

The genetic thing? 

I have never been addicted to alcohol, AFAIK

My stomach/gullet could never handle it.  I have drank to excess, by my modest standards, scores of times, though, in the years up to about 2003, growing up as I did, in a post-industrial Scottish city.

Born 1945. 

1999 - First Effexor/Venlafaxine

2016 Withdrawal research. Effexor.  13Jul - 212.5mg;  6Aug - 200.0mg;  24Aug - 187.5mg;  13Sep - 175.0mg;  3Oct - 162.5mg;  26Oct - 150mg 

2017  9Jan - 150.00mg;  23Mar - 137.50mg;  24Apr - 125.00mg;  31May - 112.50mg holding;  3Sep - 100.00mg;  20Sep - 93.75mg;  20Oct - 87.5mg;  12Nov - 81.25mg;  13 Dec - 75.00mg

2018  18Jan - 69.1mg; 16Feb - 62.5mg; 16March - 57.5mg (-8%); 22Apr - 56.3mg(-2%); CRASHED - Updose 29May - 62.5mg; Updose - 1Jul - 75.0mg. Updose - 2Aug - 87.5mg. Updose - 27Aug - 100.0mg. Updose - 11Oct 112.5mg. Updose - 6Nov 125.00mg

2019 Updoses 19 Jan - 150.0mg. 1April - 162.5mg. 24 April - Feeling better - doing tasks, getting outside.  7 May - usual depression questionnaire gives "probably no depression" result.

Supps/Vits  Omega 3;  Chelated Magnesium;  Prebiotics/Probiotics, Vit D3. 

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43 minutes ago, peng said:

My father's brother was an alcoholic, cpu.

From your, clearly, extensive reading, do you think my 40 years of (misguided, I believe) being prescribed psychotropic drugs and my chronic ill health since the age of 32 could be related?

The genetic thing? 

I have never been addicted to alcohol, AFAIK

My stomach/gullet could never handle it.  I have drank to excess, by my modest standards, scores of times, though, in the years up to about 2003, growing up as I did, in a post-industrial Scottish city.

 

Good morning. i always come back to the point of view that everything is involved - individual & multi-factorial. Mind, body, soul, spirit & environment. Everything matters, everything impacts health in 'good & bad' ways. All areas of biology, psychology, sociology & the spiritual / transpersonal is valid & matters (imo). It is all interrelated, interdependent & interconnected.

 

In my view there is the Absolute / The Great Spirit / God / Source - God Worlds / Realms - there is the Creator - the Spiritual Realms / Realities & there is the ordinary / everyday / mundane / physical reality / World / Cosmos / Universe. There is the psychic / mythological / underworld (unconscious) reality as well. Reality exists at many levels & in many different ways.

A lot of genetic functioning / gene expression is based on environment. i don't see how a lot of biology, psychology & sociology / environment / relational areas can be rationally separated.

 

The question of psychiatry / medication i feel is so in depth, individual, complex & nuanced.

 

i am all for there being a primary focus on far more comprehensive, humane & healing psychological / social approaches to what comes under mental health difficulties.  & a focus on a genuinely integrated health model, & shift away from the primary biomedical model, & dividing physical & mental health.

 

i was in serious addiction / alcoholism for 17 years - now over 16 years T-Total. But also see the schizophrenia diagnosis as valid. Within my own case i do see it as dual diagnosis (addiction & mental illness). But i also see the mental illness as differential (mental illness & what comes under spiritual crisis).

What i have found for me that helps is a harm reduction approach & embracing as much as possible complimentary healing modalities.

 

Gut health is very important, & there is a lot that can be done to promote healing within all those areas. i am sure that you have looked into it all? i have been using Kefir recently & also took a course of Bifidobacterium. i do my best to have a healthy diet.

 

i'm Not anti a wise use of pharmacology. Yes a majority of current prescribing is likely unnecessary & there are likely far better alternatives for most people, but i wouldn't deny a very valid role for a wise use of medications in certain individual cases.

 

It sounds like you have done very well to have got to the age that you are with everything that you have been through.

 

i have still Not got round to reading Lanark by Alasdair Gray which a friend recommended to me - have you read it?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanark:_A_Life_in_Four_Books
 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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Peng - i would say that the primary factors within most physical, psychological / emotional, social health is stress / trauma.

 

There has been & is a huge amount of research being done around all this area. Pre / perinatal & early brain / emotional / personality development (first 0 to 3 / 6) years of life i would feel are fundamentally significant within the overall lifetime health trajectory of the individual. 

 

Diathesis-stress model -

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diathesis–stress_model

 

Hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis -

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal_axis

 

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) -

 

https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/acestudy/index.html

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adverse_Childhood_Experiences_Study

 

This Video Dispels Every "Nature VS Nurture" Myth You've Ever Heard. The Implications are Profound -

 

https://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/this-video-dispels-every-nature-vs-nurture-myth-youve-ever-heard/

 

The main driver of a lot of this stress is in my view the socioeconomic system itself which is in ways structurally violent. It's Not a healthy society / system.

 

On level everyone is effected by it all. Very hard for a society / establishment / Government / medical system to fully acknowledge that the system / society itself is part of the problems concerning public health &  to do something to seriously & genuinely address it all for the better.

 

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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i do feel that we are moving towards & will end up with a genuinely integrated / integral health Model, at some stage. i was looking into this guys work this morning -

 

An Integral Foundation for Addiction Treatment: Beyond the Biopsychosocial Model by Guy du Plessis

guyduplessis.com/

www.calsouthern.edu/content/articles/psychology-articles/guy-du-plessis-guide-to-addiction-recovery
 

i posted about it above.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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  • Moderator Emeritus

Hi again.  B)  And oh man........in recovery, practicing recovery...........the words and definitions continue......:)  I'm referring to the article above.  Seems so complicated and then so very simple.  And then at some point or points throughout the day I suppose it just "becomes one".......makes perfect sense without further discussion?  Maybe that .......cease the battle thing, and seeking to understand others first and foremost.........and then peace within?

Talk about it, write about it, meditate or pray about it comes to mind.

 

Blessings in anycase.

Love, peace, healing/morphing/changing what have you?/inrecovery......doing recovery, practicing recovery..........working recovery, and grrrowth,

Exactly where I'm supposed to be,

mmt

 

 

Late 2023- gone to emeritus status, inactive, don't @ me, I can check who I've posted on, and I'm not really here like I used to be......thanks.

Started with psycho meds/psychiatric care circa 1988.  In retrospect, and on contemplation, situational overwhelm.

Rounding up to 30 years of medications(30 medication trials, poly-pharmacy maximum was 3 at one time).

5/28/2015-off Adderal salts 2.5mg. (I had been on that since hospital 10/2014)

12/2015---just holding, holding, holding, with trileptal/oxcarb at 75 mg. 1/2 tab at hs.  My last psycho med ever!  Tapered @ 10% every 4 weeks, sometimes 2 weeks to

2016 Dec 16 medication free!!

Longer signature post here, with current supplements.

Herb and alcohol free since 5/15/2016.  And.....I quit smoking 11/2021. Lapsed.  Redo of quit smoking 9/28/2022.  Can you say Hallelujah?(took me long enough)💜

None of my posts are intended as medical advice.  Please discuss any decisions about your medical care with a knowledgeable medical provider.  My success story:  Blue skies ahead, clear sailing

 

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21 minutes ago, manymoretodays said:

Hi again.  B)  And oh man........in recovery, practicing recovery...........the words and definitions continue......:)  I'm referring to the article above.  Seems so complicated and then so very simple.  And then at some point or points throughout the day I suppose it just "becomes one".......makes perfect sense without further discussion?  Maybe that .......cease the battle thing, and seeking to understand others first and foremost.........and then peace within?

Talk about it, write about it, meditate or pray about it comes to mind.

 

Blessings in anycase.

Love, peace, healing/morphing/changing what have you?/inrecovery......doing recovery, practicing recovery..........working recovery, and grrrowth,

Exactly where I'm supposed to be,

mmt

 

 

 

Hi. Probably as simple as living our lives as fully as we can in the present moment. Nothing else.

 

It is a complex World, but in ways it always has been.

 

Yes, seeking to understand others & allowing them to be as they are - allowing the World / Universe / Life to be as it is - acceptance of what is.

 

i thought that this was a nice article that i came across the other day -

 

The Gift of Presence, The Perils of Advice

by

Parker J. Palmer
 

https://onbeing.org/blog/the-gift-of-presence-the-perils-of-advice/

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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i liked these articles as well & i like the web site they are from in general -

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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An update on Monica Cassani's Blog -

(video) New pharmaceutical brain injury and anniversary
March 12, 2018 By Monica Cassani

beyondmeds.com/2018/03/12/video-new-pharmaceutical-brain-injury-and-anniversary/

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NXe2Cy88y0

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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On 3/11/2018 at 11:43 AM, peng said:

I was a professional natural scientist for 50 years, and try not to be bothered much by all this.  A lot of it is interesting - and I try to see it that way!

 

You must have a lot of knowledge & wisdom. i bought a copy of The Principia Mathematica a while ago. i have been reading more on science, i am especially interested in areas of astrophysics - But the whole area of science i find fascinating. i am very interested in the Theosophical / Universal Wisdom / Perennial philosophical ideas of studying all human knowledge - science, philosophy & spirituality.

 

i am Not trained in science / medicine - my qualifications were in art, catering & computers. A lot of my understandings are from a layman's perspective.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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Well, many thanks for all that, cpu.  I will browse through your links in due course.

Funnily, I was browsing stuff about ACE yesterday.  I did not know what it was until yesterday.

 

You modestly call yourself a layman, but you are, clearly, also a self-educated academic.  

The senior lecturer at a national college where I studied my specialism (1967 and 1973) was a gentleman who left school at 14, worked in a shoeshop, got his scientific qualifications via The Open University, and thus became, as I say, the senior lecturer at an esteemed scientific college.  Indeed, students came there from many parts of the world, sponsored by their governments, to study, such, was its reputation.

 

Of course, myself, as a guy who grew up in a council tenement with a widowed mother, left school to work straightaway without wanting to go to uni like my mates, such was my impatience to get stuck in and hands on a science, I loved the story of the shoeshop boy!

 

"Connections?"  Well I am currently reading "Lost Connections" by Johann Hari.  (Mentioned on this website) It is controversial I suppose but I read books like that and take on board what sounds reasonable to me.  Heck, what a "mental illness" library I have built up in the last couple of years - about 10 books now.

 

Re "Lanark"/Alasdair Gray.  Our youngest son studied English (!) literature at Edinburgh Uni and mentioned it to me a few times.  I suppose I must read it, too!  I am more of a scientific geek than an artist/poet, though, as you will have seen.  Music & some films are the arts that speak to me most clearly in a spiritual(?) way.

 

By the way, and I am scared to ask! - did you find Ken Dodd "life-enhancing" as many are saying or implying? -  I certainly did.

From the sublime to the ridiculous - spy assassinations in Salisbury?  Whatever next?  We are living in a science fiction comic, I am sure you, too, will feel. 

Do try to find it fascinating rather than depressing.  Too much information on constant tap is curse of modern life, I believe.

 

Best wishes, to you for now.

 

 

Born 1945. 

1999 - First Effexor/Venlafaxine

2016 Withdrawal research. Effexor.  13Jul - 212.5mg;  6Aug - 200.0mg;  24Aug - 187.5mg;  13Sep - 175.0mg;  3Oct - 162.5mg;  26Oct - 150mg 

2017  9Jan - 150.00mg;  23Mar - 137.50mg;  24Apr - 125.00mg;  31May - 112.50mg holding;  3Sep - 100.00mg;  20Sep - 93.75mg;  20Oct - 87.5mg;  12Nov - 81.25mg;  13 Dec - 75.00mg

2018  18Jan - 69.1mg; 16Feb - 62.5mg; 16March - 57.5mg (-8%); 22Apr - 56.3mg(-2%); CRASHED - Updose 29May - 62.5mg; Updose - 1Jul - 75.0mg. Updose - 2Aug - 87.5mg. Updose - 27Aug - 100.0mg. Updose - 11Oct 112.5mg. Updose - 6Nov 125.00mg

2019 Updoses 19 Jan - 150.0mg. 1April - 162.5mg. 24 April - Feeling better - doing tasks, getting outside.  7 May - usual depression questionnaire gives "probably no depression" result.

Supps/Vits  Omega 3;  Chelated Magnesium;  Prebiotics/Probiotics, Vit D3. 

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35 minutes ago, peng said:

Well, many thanks for all that, cpu.  I will browse through your links in due course.

Funnily, I was browsing stuff about ACE yesterday.  I did not know what it was until yesterday.

 

You modestly call yourself a layman, but you are, clearly, also a self-educated academic.  

The senior lecturer at a national college where I studied my specialism (1967 and 1973) was a gentleman who left school at 14, worked in a shoeshop, got his scientific qualifications via The Open University, and thus became, as I say, the senior lecturer at an esteemed scientific college.  Indeed, students came there from many parts of the world, sponsored by their governments, to study, such, was its reputation.

 

Of course, myself, as a guy who grew up in a council tenement with a widowed mother, left school to work straightaway without wanting to go to uni like my mates, such was my impatience to get stuck in and hands on a science, I loved the story of the shoeshop boy!

 

"Connections?"  Well I am currently reading "Lost Connections" by Johann Hari.  (Mentioned on this website) It is controversial I suppose but I read books like that and take on board what sounds reasonable to me.  Heck, what a "mental illness" library I have built up in the last couple of years - about 10 books now.

 

Re "Lanark"/Alasdair Gray.  Our youngest son studied English (!) literature at Edinburgh Uni and mentioned it to me a few times.  I suppose I must read it, too!  I am more of a scientific geek than an artist/poet, though, as you will have seen.  Music & some films are the arts that speak to me most clearly in a spiritual(?) way.

 

By the way, and I am scared to ask! - did you find Ken Dodd "life-enhancing" as many are saying or implying? -  I certainly did.

From the sublime to the ridiculous - spy assassinations in Salisbury?  Whatever next?  We are living in a science fiction comic, I am sure you, too, will feel. 

Do try to find it fascinating rather than depressing.  Too much information on constant tap is curse of modern life, I believe.

 

Best wishes, to you for now.

 

 

 

i wouldn't call myself an academic. i am biased in certain areas, & there is so much that i don't understand or know.

 

i have collected over one thousand books, i love collecting them. Mainly books on mental health, psychology, comparative religion & spirituality, but a whole variety of stuff. With the resources, money & space i could easily create a large private library.

 

Ken Dodd was amusing & an interesting character.

 

i don't know what to make of the spy assassination or current global geopolitics - who knows exactly what goes on? i try & keep on top on global events. i have very closely followed a lot that has gone in within the Middle East.

 

We are drowning in information. You are right to try & see it all as fascinating rather than depressing.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Peng - the psychiatric hospital i used to be sent to was in Salisbury - now long closed down -

 

The Old Manor -

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Manor_Hospital,_Salisbury

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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We met and befriended an elderly couple who moved here in retirement.

The husband was originally from Guernsey - he left there as a 9 year old as the Nazis were bombing the harbour.

He was relocated to Glasgow as an evacuee and went to uniuversity there.  Eventually he worked as a scientist at Porton Down.

 

Just seen a young professor from an English university speaking on RT news.  They were covering the assassination story and Mae's response.  He was actually doing us down.  Never mind, he has a nice well paid job to go back to.

You could not make it up. 

Born 1945. 

1999 - First Effexor/Venlafaxine

2016 Withdrawal research. Effexor.  13Jul - 212.5mg;  6Aug - 200.0mg;  24Aug - 187.5mg;  13Sep - 175.0mg;  3Oct - 162.5mg;  26Oct - 150mg 

2017  9Jan - 150.00mg;  23Mar - 137.50mg;  24Apr - 125.00mg;  31May - 112.50mg holding;  3Sep - 100.00mg;  20Sep - 93.75mg;  20Oct - 87.5mg;  12Nov - 81.25mg;  13 Dec - 75.00mg

2018  18Jan - 69.1mg; 16Feb - 62.5mg; 16March - 57.5mg (-8%); 22Apr - 56.3mg(-2%); CRASHED - Updose 29May - 62.5mg; Updose - 1Jul - 75.0mg. Updose - 2Aug - 87.5mg. Updose - 27Aug - 100.0mg. Updose - 11Oct 112.5mg. Updose - 6Nov 125.00mg

2019 Updoses 19 Jan - 150.0mg. 1April - 162.5mg. 24 April - Feeling better - doing tasks, getting outside.  7 May - usual depression questionnaire gives "probably no depression" result.

Supps/Vits  Omega 3;  Chelated Magnesium;  Prebiotics/Probiotics, Vit D3. 

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Dr Gabor Maté - Why Capitalism Makes Us Sick

 

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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12 hours ago, peng said:

We met and befriended an elderly couple who moved here in retirement.

The husband was originally from Guernsey - he left there as a 9 year old as the Nazis were bombing the harbour.

He was relocated to Glasgow as an evacuee and went to uniuversity there.  Eventually he worked as a scientist at Porton Down.

 

Just seen a young professor from an English university speaking on RT news.  They were covering the assassination story and Mae's response.  He was actually doing us down.  Never mind, he has a nice well paid job to go back to.

You could not make it up. 


i don't trust the Government / Establishment / mainstream media / system. i got rid of the TV 10 years ago. i agree with what Corbyn said about it all.

 

i don't know what happened with it all & who was behind it all?

 

It just seems that 'everyone' is singing from the same script & whipping up a fever with it all - same as they did with 9 / 11 & the Iraq War / Terror War.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Gabor Maté is a Hungarian-born Canadian physician who specializes in neurology, psychiatry, and psychology, as well as the study and treatment of addiction.

 

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Why Does Modern Medicine Have a Big Problem with Natural Health?

March 12, 2018

 

http://www.wakingtimes.com/2018/03/12/why-does-modern-medicine-have-a-big-problem-with-natural-health/

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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New Study Concludes that Antidepressants are “Largely Ineffective and Potentially Harmful”

 

https://www.madinamerica.com/2018/03/new-study-concludes-antidepressants-largely-ineffective-potentially-harmful/

 

Methodological Flaws, Conflicts of Interest, and Scientific Fallacies: Implications for the Evaluation of Antidepressants’ Efficacy and Harm

 

Department of Applied Psychology, Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW), Zurich, Switzerland

 

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2017.00275/full

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Whose interests does the Royal College of Psychiatrists really serve?

 

http://cepuk.org/2018/03/16/whose-interests-royal-college-psychiatrists-really-serve/

 

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Neuroscience Has a Lot To Learn from Buddhism

A scientist and a monk compare notes on meditation, therapy, and their effects on the brain

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/12/buddhism-and-neuroscience/548120/

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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This Idea Can Literally Change the World: Partial Basic Income through Universal Carbon Dividends
A Bipartisan Free Market Solution to Climate Change Through Atmospheric Justice

There’s an idea out there with a large and growing consensus of support. Experts long focused on climate change like James Hansen and Bill McKibben see it as an absolute no-brainer of a policy at this point, which is why about 90 countries included some version of it in their plans as part of the Paris Climate Agreement. Despite its absence so far in the Republican platform and its only just recently being added to the Democratic platform, a survey done by Stanford in 2015 found that 67% of adults in the US approved of the idea as long as it was revenue-neutral. This means the revenue raised by it would not be spent by government. Instead, all revenue would be refunded to everyone equally, which it can and arguably should be, so as to transform it from regressive to progressive, and to gain necessary support from both ends of the political spectrum.

So what’s the idea?

[Rest in Link]

medium.com/basic-income/this-idea-can-literally-change-our-world-107cbc94057a

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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"If you find yourself walking around in a fog you will also find
yourself walking uncomfortably. You can't see where you’re going,
you don't know what direction you’re heading in and there's an
urge in you to do one thing, to get out of the fog so that you can
see where you’re going. Maybe you’ve had that experience down at
the seashore or somewhere else.
 
Now that’s a physical experience. There’s also, very parallel to
that, an inner, psychological, spiritual experience in which human
beings are lost in a fog. Would you agree with that - what’s your
life like? Would you agree perhaps that you’re wandering around
and stumbling over things and unable to see where you’re going,
and it’s a very uncomfortable experience? Well, when you’re out
in the fog down at the beach or in London, you have the urge to
get out of it.
 
What has happened inwardly is that most human beings never stop and
say to themselves, just a minute, my mind isn’t thinking clearly,
I’m not seeing, I don’t know where I’m going. So my question to
you right now is this: Have you ever suddenly stopped, wherever
you’re going in life, in that business of yours, in that home, in
those plans you’ve got, have you ever slowed down and asked your-
self, where am I going? Probably not, and I’ll tell you why.
Because, very unfortunately for human beings, imagination has
taken the place of seeing."
 
Vernon Howard
 
    Seeing is Winning
        DVD #19, talk 1  Blu-ray #7, talk 5

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Within areas of mental health there are multiple factors implicated in cause & effect & different biological, psychological, sociological & spiritual / transpersonal weightings within each case is Not known. The aetiology (causes) is Not known. But mental illness is real & exists & within some cases, especially with what comes under schizophrenic psychosis does have biological factors that can be helped with medication in cases. In some people we are dealing with no fault severe mental illnesses, that in some cases very likely is at least in part, however caused a brain condition.
 
Anatomical Features Linked To Multiple Types Of Schizophrenia
 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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"The secret of spiritual success is to be utterly discouraged

but continue to work."

 

Vernon Howard

 

A Treasury of Trueness, # 1757

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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Are there any works in particular by Thomas Szasz that you would recommend for someone not familiar?

April / 2016: Cipralex 10 mg, Mirtazapine 30 mg, Lyrica 600 mg, Diazepam 20 mg, Bystolic 5 mg

2018: Lots of polypharmacy which is undocumented here. Started and stopped several drugs and changed doses of existing ones

August / 2018: Back on track! Cipralex 15 mg, Mirtazapine 7.5 mg, Diazepam 15 mg

September 2018: Cipralex 15 mg -> 12.5 mg

October 2018: Cipralex 12.5 mg -> 10 mg, Mirtazapine 7.5 mg -> 3.75 mg -> Stopped, Diazepam 15 mg

November 2019: Cipralex 5 mg, Diazepam 10 mg

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1 hour ago, degen12 said:

Are there any works in particular by Thomas Szasz that you would recommend for someone not familiar?

 

Personally i can't stand him. But the 2 that are worth reading are 'The myth of mental illness' & 'Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences' - all the rest are basically just rehashing the same thing.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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4 minutes ago, cpuusage said:

 

Personally i can't stand him. But the 2 that are worth reading are 'The myth of mental illness' & 'Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences' - all the rest are basically just rehashing the same thing.

 

Thanks. I'm just looking for something new to read and anti-psychiatry has peaked my interest. Not necessarily sold on him in particular.

April / 2016: Cipralex 10 mg, Mirtazapine 30 mg, Lyrica 600 mg, Diazepam 20 mg, Bystolic 5 mg

2018: Lots of polypharmacy which is undocumented here. Started and stopped several drugs and changed doses of existing ones

August / 2018: Back on track! Cipralex 15 mg, Mirtazapine 7.5 mg, Diazepam 15 mg

September 2018: Cipralex 15 mg -> 12.5 mg

October 2018: Cipralex 12.5 mg -> 10 mg, Mirtazapine 7.5 mg -> 3.75 mg -> Stopped, Diazepam 15 mg

November 2019: Cipralex 5 mg, Diazepam 10 mg

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4 minutes ago, degen12 said:

 

Thanks. I'm just looking for something new to read and anti-psychiatry has peaked my interest. Not necessarily sold on him in particular.


It is certainly good to get an idea of the field & what all the different arguments, ideas & positions are.

 

i prefer critical psychiatry, critical realism, & people who have taken a more centre ground politically. i think it's wrong to state that mental illness is a myth.

 

i like Carl Jung, & Laing, people who saw mental illness as real, but wanted people to be treated far more humanely.

 

David Smail, Erich Fromm & others i feel are better in their analysis of the pathology of society.
 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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David Pilgrim i feel speaks a lot of sense -

 

The Failure of Diagnostic Psychiatry and Some Prospects of Scientific Progress Offered by Critical Realism

http://dxsummit.org/archives/1186


Generally i have found it's the more 'obscure' writers, researchers, & academics that i feel have more of an accurate grasp on things.

Correlating certain alternative & academic fields, within certain areas of integral theory, i do feel that a lot has been generally worked out. It's just the vast majority of people will Never do the reading & research to put it all together.

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

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i spent a lot of time at one stage researching all the authors, books & web sites that were anti / critical / alternative of psychiatry - there are some here - some may repeat as i am copying from my forum -

 

“People recover from psychotic disorders all the time, all over the world.” Our mental health system’s denial of this costs lives -

beyondmeds.com/2012/04/23/recoverschizophrenia/

Reconstruction: A Recovery Narrative -

www.madinamerica.com/2012/04/reconstruction-a-recovery-narrative/

"Alternatives Beyond Psychiatry" -

www.mindfreedom.org/kb/mental-health-alternatives/mary-maddock-review

[Outlines of Madness/experiences of Anomalous/non-ordinary states; from the understandings of depth/trans-personal/process orientated psychology & spiritual emergence/emergency. Of those who have pioneered & looked at holistic; & more in depth psychological/social approaches to Madness]

Toxic Psychiatry & other work by Peter Breggin.

Mad in America & Anatomy of an Epidemic by Robert Whitaker.

Madness Explained & Doctoring the Mind by Richard Bentall.

The work of R D Laing, Thomas S. Szasz & Gregory Bateson (double bind/Family Dynamics/social constructs/communication).

Dantes Cure by Daniel Dorman.

Agnes Jacket by Gail Hornstein.

The necessity of Madness by John Breeding.

The work of Arnold Mindell & process orientated psychology.

The field of spiritual emergence & emergency – trans-personal psychology – the work of Stanislav Grof. Also Isabel Clarke & Catherine Lucas.

The work of Daniel Mackler.

The Far Side of Madness, Trials of the Visionary Mind & The Self in Psychotic Process by John Weir perry; & Diabasis.

Loren Mosher & the Soteria Project.

Open Dialogue, Windhorse, & CooperRiis healing communities.

The work of Carl Jung – Symbols of Transformation (Collected Works Volume 5), Psychology and Alchemy (Collected Works Volume 12).
The Red Book, Psyche & Symbol, & many others.

Awareness Teachings – Anthony De Mello, Eckhart Tolle, Pema Chodron, John Kabat-Zinn, Adyashanti (& many others).

Healing from Trauma – Peter Levine, Dr. Clancy McKenzie, & Gabor Mate.

Quaker Approaches to Madness.

Moving onto the field of past life/inter life research (past life traumas/samskaras) – With Authors such as Ethan Vorley, Kubler Ross, Andy Tomlinson, Ian Lawton, Brian Weiss, Robert M. Schwartz & Dolores Cannon.

Theosophy & associated areas – including the authors Violet Starre, Alice Bailey, Vera S. Alder, & Joshua David Stone.

Those working in the scientific, environmental, medical, political, social, & economic arenas at the forefront of paradigm shift; & focused on systemic change. Such as Rupert Sheldrake, Alan Wallace, Terence McKenna, Karl H. Pribram, Michael Talbot etc (too many to list).


Paris Williams -
Rethinking Madness: Towards a Paradigm Shift in Our Understanding and Treatment of Psychosis

beyondmeds.com/2012/04/26/rethinking-madness/

www.rethinkingmadness.com/

& - Psychiatric Drugs as Agents of Trauma — “Drug Stress Trauma Syndrome” -

beyondmeds.com/2012/04/25/psychdrugsagentoftrauma/

A few others that have said similar (a few among many) -

Joanna Moncrieff -

A Straight Talking Introduction to Psychiatric Drugs
The Myth of the Chemical Cure: A Critique of Psychiatric Drug Treatment
De-Medicalizing Misery: Psychiatry, Psychology and the Human Condition.

John Weir Perry -

Trails of the Visionary Mind
The Far Side of Madness
Lord of the Four Quarters
Self in Psychotic Process
Roots of Renewal
Heart of History – Individuality in Evolution

Richard Bentall -

Reconstructing Schizophrenia
Doctoring the Mind: Why Psychiatric Treatments Fail
Madness Explained: Psychosis and Human Nature
Think You're Crazy? Think Again: A Resource Book for Cognitive Therapy for Psychosis

Peter Breggin -

Toxic Psychiatry: Why Therapy, Empathy and Love Must Replace the Drugs, Electroshock, and Biochemical Theories of the "New Psychiatry".
Your Drug May Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Medications.
Medication Madness: A Psychiatrist Exposes the Dangers of Mood-Altering Medications.
Brain-Disabling Treatments in Psychiatry: Drugs, Electroshock and the Psychopharmaceutical Complex.
The Heart of Being Helpful: Empathy and the Creation of a Healing Presence.
Beyond Conflict: From Self-Help and Psychotherapy to Peacemaking.

Irving Kirsch PhD -

The Emperor's New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth.

Loren R. Mosher -

Soteria: Through Madness to Deliverance.
Models of Madness: Psychological, Social and Biological Approaches to Schizophrenia (The International Society for the Psychological Treatments of the Schizophrenias and Other Psychoses).

Thomas S. Szasz -

The Myth of Mental Illness.
The Medicalization of Everyday Life: Selected Essays.
Cruel Compassion: Psychiatric Control of Society's Unwanted.
Ideology and Insanity: Essays on the Psychiatric Dehumanization of Man.
The Manufacture of Madness: Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement.
Coercion as Cure: A Critical History of Psychiatry.
Psychiatry: The Science of Lies.
The Heart Too Long Suppressed: A Chronicle of Mental Illness.

Robert D. Hinshelwood -

Beyond Madness: Psychosocial Interventions in Psychosis.

Daniel Carlat -

The Trouble With Psychiatry: An Insider's Expose.
Unhinged: The Trouble with Psychiatry - A Doctor's Revelations about a Profession in Crisis.

John Breeding -

The Necessity of Madness: Explaining How Psychiatry is a Clinical Construct and Madness is a Metaphor.
The Wildest Colts Make the Best Horses.

Mary Boyle -

Schizophrenia: A Scientific Delusion?

Lucy Johnstone -

Users and Abusers of Psychiatry: A Critical Look at Psychiatric Practice.

David Healy -

Pharmageddon.
Let Them Eat Prozac: The Unhealthy Relationship Between the Pharmaceutical Industry and Depression.
Dying for a Cure.

More Books -

www.successfulschizophrenia.org/resource.html

In The Grip of Paranoid Schizophrenia - One Man's Metamorphosis through Psychosis

"Non-fiction autobiographical account by the author of his surviving 30+ years with Paranoid Schizophrenia. From onset and early years of illness through his eight-year delusion that he was John Lennon in a CIA covert operation that he was back from the dead, this book shows the intimate workings of a psychotic mind..... Includes portions of his U.S. Secret Service file and other documentation showing the story is true in how this untreated illness affects society, as well as the individual. Contains factual accounts of how the author finds wellness. An excellent, intelligent, and insightful look at the mysterious bizarre illness of Paranoid Schizophrenia."

Madness, Heresy and the Rumor of Angels: The Revolt Against the Mental Health System -

Seth Farber has collected seven true stories of individuals insulted and injured by themental health system, individuals who then fought back, broke free, and rebuilt their lives. He challenges the delusional belief system known as psychiatry.

Welcome to the Dance: Caffeine Allergy - A Masked Cerebral Allergy and Progressive Toxic Dementia -

Welcome to the Dance explains the biochemical imbalances caused by caffeine allergy and caffeine poisoning that are responsible for the diagnosis of mental illness, the symptoms of so-called mental illness. It tells the authors story and shares stories of other persons allergic to caffeine.

Exuberance: The Passion for Life -

Expert in the arena of mood and temperament, Jamison (An Unquiet Mind; Night Falls Fast; Touched with Fire) detours from her usual analysis of mood disorders in favor of the livelier side of personality. She examines the contagious nature of exuberance, which she defines as "a psychological state characterized by high mood and high energy," offering diverse examples that range from John Muir and FDR to Mary Poppins and Peter Pan. Having in mind the simply put idea that "those who are exuberant act," the author details the energetic efforts of scientists, naturalists, politicians and even her meteorologist father. (Review courtsey of Publishers Weekly.)

The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason -

"Sam Harris delivers a startling analysis of the clash between reason and religion in the modern world. He offers a vivid, historical tour of our willingness to suspend reason in favor of religious beliefs--even when these beliefs inspire the worst of human atrocities. While warning against the encroachment of organized religion into world politics, Harris draws on insights from neuroscience, philosophy, and Eastern mysticism to deliver a call for a truly modern foundation for ethics and spirituality that is both secular and humanistic."

a Beautiful Mind -

a Beautiful Mind is a biography of John Forbes Nash, a mathematicla genius, prodigy and legend by the age of thirty. Nash suffered a catastrophic mental breakdown, slipping into insanity for nearly three decades, but miraculously recovered and went on to win a Nobel prize in economics in 1994. Read this amazing story....

Models of Madness -

Models of Madness summarizes the research showing that hallucinations and delusions are understandable reactions to life events and circumstances rather than symptoms of a biologically-based illness or genetic predisposition. Twenty-three international contributors: • critique the "medical model" of madness • examine the dominance of the "illness" approach to understanding madness, from historical and economic perspectives*• document the adverse role of drug companies • outline a range of research-based psychosocial treatment approaches, and*• identify the urgency and possibility of prevention of madness.

Warning: Psychiatry Can Be Hazardous to Your Mental Health -

In the last 20 years, psychiatry has changed completely. The vast majority of psychiatrists who used to counsel, now gather together lists of symptoms, such as depression, anxiety and compulsions, wrongly call them mental illnesses and claim they should be treated with the "brain drugs"-- Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil, and Ritalin among them. Compassion, counseling and mental health have been reduced to tiny blips on the current psychiatric screen. This book brings together Dr. Glasser's ideas about mental illness and what you can do for yourself.

How to Become A Schizophrenic: The Case Against Biological Psychiatry, 3rd edition -

How to Become a Schizophrenic is divided into three parts. In Part I the author utilizes the ideas of Harry Stack Sullivan, Theodore Lidz, Gregory Bateson, R.D. Scott and P.L. Ashworth, W. Ronald D. Fairbairn, Anton Boisen and others--as well as his own experiences-- to construct a comprehensive theory which explains how and why people become schizophrenic.

Trials of the Visionary Mind: Spiritual Emergency and the Renewal Process -

This book examines what the acute "psychotic" experience stirs up in the psyche and how to empathetically respond. Understanding the function of mythic themes is reached through the author's historic investigation into myth and ritual of prophets and social reformers in various ages and parts of the world.

Mad in America -

Medical journalist Robert Whitaker reaveals an astounding truth: Schizophrenics in the United States currently fare worse than patients in the world's poorest countries, and quite possibly worse than asylum patients did in the early 19th century. Whitaker argues that modern treatments for the mentally ill are just old medicine in new bottles, and that we as a society are deeply deluded about their efficacy.

Punishing the Patient: How Psychiatrists Misunderstand and Mistreate Schizophrenia -

The underlying nature of schizophrenia is shrouded in mystery. There are no laboratory tests available to confirm a diagnosis, and psychiatrists have many divergent and contradictory theories about its cause. The central, confronting question posed by Punishing the Patient is whether people with schizophrenic systems have a right to refuse psychiatric treatment. This book is bound to lead to a re-examination of schizophrenia by patients, ex-patients, parents, psychiatrists, politicians, and the State.

Mistaken Identity: Surviving tragedy and misdiagnosis -

"When tragedy strikes... what happens if, when you seek the help you need, you are misdiagnosed and allowed to suffer from depression and anxiety for years on end while further lossses accumulate? This is what I experienced as a result of analytical psychotherapy and it's a timely warning...."

Blaming Our Genes: Why Mental Illness Can't Be Inherited -

After searching the whole human genome over and over agian for years, not one single gene has ever been found that causes any mental illness. How then have scientists convinced the public and fooled themselves that the inhereitance model of mental illness is valid? This book tells you how and why.

Rape of the Soul: How the Chemical Imbalance Model of Modern Psychiatry has Failed its Patients -

Using scientifically sound evidence, Rape of the Soul convincingly demonstrates that NO chemical imbalances exist for any so called mental illness, and that psychiatric drugs do not cure mental illness. Instead, this book explains how drugs "work" by blocking out emotional pain, thereby robbing the soul of its fullest potential for healing and wholeness. Also clearly demonstrated is the fact that psychotherapy is superior to drug treatment for all disorders, including schizophrenia.

The Bridge Between Two Worlds: A Shaman's View of Schizophrenia and Acute Sensitivity -

Not anyone can be a shaman, however we are all able to walk the path of the shaman and gain valuable tools to assist us in surviving the more dark and challenging times of our lives. The Path of the Shaman teaches us to stay balanced and grounded on this earth, to honour and understand the laws of nature and to keep our core self whole. Walking the Shamans path is a wonderful adventure once you learn the laws and tools to keep you protected whilst on your journey.

Blaming the Brain: The TRUTH About Drugs and Mental Health -

"Valenstein reveals how, beginning in the 50s, the accidental discovery of a few mood-altering drugs stimulated an enormous interst in psychopharmacology, resulting in staggering growth and profits for the pharmaceutical industry. He lays bare the commercial motives of the drug companies and their huge stake in expanding their markets. "

PCCS Books listing of Critical Psychology titles -

Escape From Psychiatry -

ESCAPE FROM PSYCHIATRY is a very powerful story! I am awed by Clover's strength and courage in being able to go back and relive all of her experiences of psychiatric abuse in order to write about what she went through. Her story is very important because it shows how the core of so-called "schizophrenia" often traces back to feeling desperate for love and yet very afraid of it. Mostly, however, her story documents how the pessimistic expectations that psychiatrists have for people who are extreme mental cases can become self- fulfilling prophecies for people who remain trapped as "patients" in the "mental health" system. When Clover found different people who gave her kindness, love, and hope, she recovered and healed. This is the kind of story that most psychiatrists can't stand hearing about because it shows how they contribute to the very conditions they claim they are trying to cure, and it shows that their beliefs about "chronic mental cases" can be totally wrong. --Al Siebert, PhD (Resiliency Center Director)

Mental Illness: Opposing Viewpoints -

"Renowned psychiatrist Peter Breggin documents how psychiatric drugs and electroshock disable the brain. He presents the latest scienttific information on potential brain dysfunction and dangerous behaviorial abnormalitites produced by the most widely used drugs including Prozac, Xanax, Halcion, Ritalin, and lithium."

Users and Abusers of Psychiatry -

"A radically different critical account of the day-to-day practices of psychiatry. Using real-life examples and her own experience as a clinical psychologist, the author argues that the traditional way of treating mental breakdown can often exacerbate people's original difficulties leaving them powerless, disabled aned even more distressed."

Reclaiming Our Children: A Healing Plan for a Nation in Crisis -

"From recasting our attitudes as parents and getting more involved in schools as volunteers, to restructuring class size, limiting homework, and fostering honest dialog about the pressures in our society, Reclaiming Our Children shows us the way to lasting peace with and among our children."

Your Drug May be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Medications -

"Psychiatric drugs are given upbeat names like antidepressent, tranquilizer, sleeping pill, stimulant, and mood stabalizer. They are prescribed to more than 20 million Americans to help with problem called 'depression,' 'anxiety,' 'panic disorder,' and 'attention deficit hyperactive disorder; But can these drugs do you more harm than good? Can they make you feel worse than you did before you took them or when you stop?"

I'll Carry the Fork: Recovering a Life After Brain Injury -

Death didn't find Kara Swanson the day the minivan careened into her own car, but the head injury she sustained changed her life forever. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is not a laughing matter, but the author presents her painful tale in an Erma Bombeck-like style that wraps the hard information in humor and gentle playfulness. Alongside Kara's inspirational sense of humor, medical and legal professionals offer technical input and practical advice to those dealing with or helping someone through the aftermath of brain injury. This funny and informative book will help countless others find their way to a new life, and know that they are not alone on the journey.

Natural Healing for Schizophrenia: A Compendium of Nutritional Methods -

An overview of the wide varieties of conditions which contribute to, cause, or are often mislabelled as schizophrenia. A reported 80-85% of individuals given nutritional treatment for biotype-based biochemical balances recover, or are greatly improved. Results gleaned from over 40 years of research by hundreds of physicians. This book is a must for any library.

Reality Therapy in Action -

"Sit with Dr. Glasser as he counsels a variety of clients and reveals the explicit core of his established counseling method, sharing his thoughts with you as the counseling proceeds."

We Don't Live Under NORMAL CONDITIONS -

In June of 1996, six people with histories of depression were brought together to discuss their experiences with, and opinions about "mental disorder." The result is a unique cinematic experience that will change the way you think about "normal."
Dancing with God Through the Storm: Mysticism and Mental Illness
Jennifer Elam, a licensed psychologist, describes her experiences hearing people's stories about God. She herself has had a personal experience that by some measures could have been considered psychotic. Read her letter to Successful Schizophrenia and why she has stopped practicing psychology until she can find a way to treat them without doing harm.

A Wrongful Death: One Child's Fatal Encounter with Public Health and Private Greed -

A book about the suicide of a teenage girl, Christy Scheck, in a mental hospital run by National Medical Enterprises.

Brain Disabling Treatments in Psychiatry: Drugs, Electroshock... -

"Renowned psychiatrist Peter Breggin documents how psychiatric drugs and electroshock disable the brain. He presents the latest scienttific information on potential brain dysfunction and dangerous behaviorial abnormalitites produced by the most widely used drugs including Prozac, Xanax, Halcion, Ritalin, and lithium."

Toxic Psychiatry: Why Therapy, Empathy, and Love Must Replace the Drugs, Electroshock and Biochemical Theories of the New Psychiatry

The War Against Children

Beyond Conflict

The Wildest Colts make the Best Horses -

"This timely book calls for a halt to the epidemic drugging of young people in our society today for so called ADHD (Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder)." What to do when your child is labeled a problem by the schools. Includes "All About Children": Selected quotations compiled by Leonard Roy Frank.

They Say You're Crazy: How the World's Most Powerful Psychiatrists Decide Who's Normal -

"How are decisions made about who is normal? As a former consultant to those who construct the 'bible of the mental-health professions,' the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), Paula Caplan offers an insider's look at the process by which decisions about abnormality are made. Cutting through the professional psycho-babble, Caplan clearly assesses the astonishing extent to which scientific methods and evidence are disregarded as the Handbook is developed. A must read for consumers and practitioners of mental-health services."

Psychiatric Nursing: Ethical Strife -

Psychiatric nursing is fraught with more ethical dilemmas than any other area of nursing practice. This collection of reflections on ethical issues for psychiatric nurses and society features 'real life' everyday experiences of practitioners, and breaks new ground in the field of psychiatric nursing ethics. Features both new and seasoned writers with moving experiences to share. Read more about Psychiatric Nursing: Ethical Strife.

Insanity Inside Out: The personal story behind the landmark Supreme Court decision -

Read the story behind the late Ken Donaldson, the namesake to the Kenneth Donaldson Archives for the Autobiographies of Psychiatric Survivors. "Insanity Inside Out is a tragic story of fifteen wasted years, stolen from Donaldson as a result of involuntary commitment to a Florida state mental hospital. For fifteen years he sought to procure his release, to assert his sanity, to demand his constitutional rights."
Cruel Compassion: Psychiatric Control of Society's Unwanted

Re-examining psychiatric interventions from a cultural-historical and political-econmic perspective, Szasz demonstrates that the main problem that faces mental health policy makers today is adult dependency. Millions of Americans, diagnosed as mentally ill are drugged and confined by doctors for non-criminal conduct, go legally unpunished for the crimes they committ, and are supported by the state--not because they are sick, but because they are unproductive and unwanted.

Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences

The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement -

Dr. Szasz examines the similarities between the Inquisition and institutional psychiatry.

Exploring Madness: Experience, Theory, and Research, Second Edition -

"Innovative and radical approaches to the investigation, understanding and treatment of madness. Included are personal and literary accounts, theroetical viewpoints, and research findings."

From Placebo to Panacea: Putting Psychiatric Drugs to the Test =

This new book contains devastating critiques of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), of drug studies and the placebo effect. This overview contains broad yet pointed critique of the various types of biases introduced by drug company funding of drug research.

Shock Treatment Is Not Good For Your Brain: A Neurologist Challenges the Psychiatric Myth -

"Seven painful first-hand interviews with victims of electroshock thereapy. With Dr. Friedberg's guidance, patients tell in their own words the frightening effects--pain, memory loss, confusion and fear--of this throwback to the Inquisition."
Schizo T-A-N-G-O: Disarming Madness

Wisdom, Madness and Folly -

The Far Side of Madness -

by John Weir Perry

"First published in 1974, this pioneering work reframes acute psychotic episodes in the context of visionary experience and describes the resulting innovative methods of handling them. This book recounts experiences of individuals undergoing visionary 'upheavals,' discussing at length the sense of messianic callings and programs, the renewal of the self and its relation to creativity, and finally a philosophy and method of treatment."

Going Crazy: The Radical Therapy of R.D. Laing and Others -

"Radical approaches to the art of soul healing from the experts. R.D. Laing, David Cooper, Claude Steiner, Joe Berke, Antonin Artaud et al debunk the sacred profession of psychiatry as practiced--and usurped--by today's medical Establishment."

Kundalini - Psychosis or Transcendence -

"Kundalini is a psychophisiological transformation process, which, under suitable guidance and conditions, can lead to psychological balance, strength, and maturity. If the process is not recognized when it occurs, its proper development may be inhibited, and its psychotic-like features exaggerated."

Schizophrenia: Medical Diagnosis or Moral Verdict? -

"This book breaks with the traditional uncritical acceptance of the 'disease model' of assumed schizophrenic behavior, and demonstrates its failure to explain the basis of norm-violating behavior. The authors provide a systematic analysis of contemporary schizophrenia research from paradigm to model to hypothesis, including the history of the 'disease model' and the origin of schizophrenia as a metaphoric concept."

Labeling Madness -

"How many people are sane but remain confined in our mental institutions because their sanity is unrecognized? And how many patients might be sane outside the psychiatric hospital but seem insane in it? This book shows dramatically that we can no longer treat the mentally ill as social lepers. Instead we must find more effective viewpoints and procedures."

Labeling Deviant Behavior: Its Sociological Implications -

"Schur studies the labeling aspect of mental-health to help place it in proper sociological perspective. He incorporates such questions as what does labeling assert and what does it not assert; its actual and potential contributions; its limitations; and how it fits in with other major approaches to the analysis of deviance and control."

Blue Jolts: True Stories from the Cuckoo's Nest -

"How does it feel to be labeled 'insane': to be institutionalized against your will; to awaken in a barren hospital room, drowsy and twitching from medication; to watch helplessly as the attendant turns the lock outside your door; to be denied employment for carrying the stigma of 'mental illness'? For thousands of people entering mental hospitals each year, scenes like these are not from a bad dream but a frightening reality."

Cry of the Invisible -

"This book seeks to give voice to two of the most silent groups in our society: the homeless, and psychiatric survivors. It represents one of the few times in history that we hear from such people first hand. What happens behind the walls of a mental institution is rarely publicized or revealed. The fact is there are startling inadequacies. First person accounts reveal the failure of the mental health system to ask the most basic questions."

The Right to Refuse Mental Health Treatment -

Part of the APA's series on "The Law and Public Policy, Psychology, and the Social Sciences."

Periodicals:

Mind Freedom Journal (Previously called Dendron News). PO Box 11284, Eugene, OR 97440.
 
Jung – Symbols of Transformation (Collected works 5).
Anton T Boisen – The Exploration of the Inner World.
John Weir Perry – The far side of madness & trials of the visionary mind.
John Watkins – Unshrinking Psychosis.
Schizophrenia: The Positive Perspective: Explorations at the Outer Reaches of Human Experience - Chadwick, Peter

 

Various psychiatric drug treatments since 1990. Prozac & Stelazine in 1994 for a few years. 1200mg Amisulpride in 1998 for a year. 1999 to current time have maintained 200mg of Amisulpride & increased to 300mg a few years ago, with 2 stopping attempts in 2001 & 2003/4. i stopped all medications 5 times, for around 8 years in total, but the last 3 withdrawal/stopping attempts were disastrous. Am very unsure about stopping medication again. Have recently (in Winter 2018) had to increase the Amisulpride to 400mg. 

Healing Sanctuary - http://healingsanctuary.proboards.com/

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