Professor Joanna Moncrieff and Dr Mark Horowitz 3pm GMT on Friday 10th February 2023 IIPDW Conference, 'Withdrawal from Psychiatric Drugs 2' Introduced by IIPDW Board Member Dr Ruth Cooper
I was also sold the chemical imbalance story. I was originally prescribed Citalopram aged 26 after a relationship break up. I’ve always been an emotional person & so I struggled with ‘heartbreak’ following the relationship break up. I’m now 58 and still take Citalopram, however I am withdrawing from it currently. It’s been a struggle but I have persevered and have managed to reduce my dose gradually from 30mg to 10mg per day. I’ve done this without GP support as I feel that I’ve educated myself well enough to manage the reduction and withdrawal of Citalopram by myself. The last daily dose of 10mg of Citalopram will be reduced over the next 3 months by cutting the 10mg in half. 5mg will then be reduced to nil. Thank you to all who have contributed to educate us all, I’m so very grateful.
I’m a PAWS survivor and glad I’m still alive 5 years on. It’s stupid that Doctors aren’t taking this serious. Like most I didn’t even need SSRIs. I just had some really bad things happen in my life.
Psychiatrists do take their Freudian ideology & Mental Health Industry - pharmaceutical co-franchise seriously. Along with career building! @@brendansmyth5053
For over a year I no longer take anti depressant. Before it was fluoxetine. I pinpointed the source of my depression which is mg bad relationship with my father. Two years ago he passed away. Before he died we had patched things up. He was happy then so am I. The only drug I take is abilify. I don't take it religiously. Only when I feel bad. After my second breakdown with schizophrenia. I have no more episode. For almost 24 years now.
It's the same with adhd now. I took Ritalin for only a week and after 19 months I'm still not the same. In fact, stimulant medication (such as methylphenidate/ritalin) has a serotonergic effect, which I was never told about. In comparison to other doctors I've had precribing medicine psychiatrists seem almost uninterested and nonchalant about prescribing. Neither do they seem to have any conception of the effects of psych drugs within the brain. As is evident when they simply asy that lingering symptoms cannot be due to the drug as the drug has "left the system" within 72 hours. A toxin has lasting effects even after leaving the system - but this simple fact seem impossible to grasp.
My main problem with the serotonin hypothesis is that it is supposedly meant to help signalling between neurons etc, but a depressed person is not numb - on the contrary they feel intensely, to the point that that feeling is numbing out other feelings. So, evidently (imo) there can't possibly be a serotonin deficiency. When antidepressants (or other psych drugs relating to serotonin) are introduced, the signalling is instead impaired; much in the same way an anti-inflammatory drug is a steroid (does this not induce an inflammatory reaction to the point that it's function is impaired? My thinking and my own experience is that introducing these drugs (as have been said) instead causes the deficiency as mood is leveled by the receptors being numbed out. I butchered this, but hopefully people get my point (which is much the same as the author's).
To me the bottom line here is that these drugs will likely cause tolerance, dependence, negative side effects and a reduction in effectiveness over time, regardless of how beneficial they initially were. Leading to the eventual need to not only manage your underlying condition still, but now also have to manage the consequences of dealing with drug dependency.
If you're talking about the SSRIs/SNRIs, yes in some cases after years of taking them, people do notice that they aren't as effective as they used to be. In these cases, for some people - increasing the dose, and/or adding another antidepressant, or switching to a different SSRI/SNRI does the trick and they feel good. But for the others, none of these steps seem to help at all. I absolutely agree with you that these antidepressants have this particular and countless other side effects, but I don't see any other option. You?
@@matovicmmilan Because of the parabolic curve, the higher the dose the less of an increase in affect and a greater issue with negative side effects. Changing from one SSRI/SNRI to a new one can first cause withdrawal from the first drug and other side effects from the new drug. Science has never made a correlation between low serotonin, norepinephrine or dopamine in causing anxiety/depression. The cause(s) have however been correlated to; recent negative life circumstances, psychological ability to handle negative life circumstances and childhood trauma that shapes your ability to handle these current circumstances. Getting therapy (CBT, etc) and doing the hard work of changing how you process stress and grief and improving life circumstances is the only long term solutions we really have, at least so far.
@@mattw-cx50 I'm afraid very few people experience meaningful improvement with CBT alone around 20-25% at best and this doesn't include the more serious depression cases. Changing one's life circumstances is difficult enough to achieve even for the mentally healthy individuals, for those suffering from depression it borders the impossible. Thanks for answering!
@@matovicmmilan I don't know where you're getting your statistics because I see 50-75%. With antidepressants it's on 20-30% compared to a placebo. Besides I'm not saying if you're really depressed you shouldn't maybe try antidepressants for the short-term. They can work but it's by numbing and narrowing the entire spectrum of emotions and can cause other dysfunctions, which affects whether therapy can even be useful. That's what I experienced and it eventually made my situation way worse! It's also not just CBT. It's meditation, it's exercise, it's fixing vitamin and hormonal deficiencies. Yes it can all be very difficult. It can be even more difficult when you have long-term severe withdrawal symptoms from stopping meds.
