If I hear one more person say they have a 'chemical imbalance' I'll....

[darcyb]

Just kidding, but a great thread title for content I found at www.drugsandyourmind.com:

THE "CHEMICAL IMBALANCE" MYTH

"Patients have been diagnosed with 'chemical imbalances', despite the fact that no test exists to support such a claim, and that there is no real conception of what a correct chemical balance would look like." - David Kaiser, "Commentary: Against Biologic Psychiatry," Psychiatric Times, December 1996.

“"In medicine, strict criteria exist for calling a condition a disease. In addition to a predictable cluster of symptoms, the cause of the symptoms or some understanding of their physiology must be established. ... Psychiatry is unique among medical specialties in that... We do not yet have proof either of the cause or the physiology for any psychiatric diagnosis. ... In recent decades, we have had no shortage of alleged biochemical imbalances for psychiatric conditions. Diligent though these attempts have been, not one has been proven. Quite the contrary. In every instance where such an imbalance was thought to have been found, it was later proven false. ... No claim of a gene for a psychiatric condition has stood the test of time, in spite of popular misinformation." - Joseph Glenmullen, M.D., clinical instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, in his book Prozac Backlash (Simon & Schuster, New York, 2000), pages 192-193, page 196, and page 198

"There is no scientific evidence proving that a chemical imbalance in the brain is responsible for the symptoms attributed to ADHD, or that ADHD is a "brain-based disease," yet this is repeatedly claimed as fact by psychiatrists. In 1998, a U.S. National Institutes of Health Conference of the world's leading ADHD experts, was forced to conclude that there is no data confirming it as a brain dysfunction". - Kelly Patricia O'Meara, "Doping Kids," Insight, June 28, 1999.

"Although each of the SSRI manufacturers admit they do not know how their respective drugs work, each claim that they help to correct a chemical imbalance of the brain. The assumption for each of these drugs is that if a person is depressed (each and every depressed person), they have a reduced number of neurotransmitters in the brain called serotonin. As one well-known psychiatrist put it: “[SSRIs] are not correcting a biochemical imbalance, these drugs create severe imbalances in the brain. ... The idea that human suffering, psychological suffering, is biochemical is strictly a promotional campaign, perhaps the most successful in the history of the world, created by the drug companies. We do not even have a technology, a scientific technology, for measuring what happens inside the brain ... it is literally a fabrication.”

The next time you see a Zoloft, Prozac, or Paxil commercial, watch carefully. You will see that, when the drug company explains that depression is a serious medical illness caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain, it will be prefaced with the word "may" i.e., "depression may be caused by a biochemical imbalance in the brain." They must preface this statement with "may" because this theory has not been scientifically established. This unproven theory has been propagated by the pharmaceutical industry in order to sell psychotropic (mind-altering) drugs.

In May 2003, GlaxoSmithKline (“GSK”), the maker of Paxil, an antidepressant in the same class as Zoloft, announced in Ireland (The Irish Times, Saturday May 10, 2003) that it was withdrawing claims contained in Paxil (called Seroxat in Ireland and the UK) brochures that the drug worked by normalizing the levels of serotonin. GSK was forced to acknowledge that the link between depression and serotonin levels is unproven and that its claims “were not consistent with the scientific literature.”

If your doctor tells you that these drugs will correct an imbalance in your brain chemicals, please realize that more than likely your doctor got this from drug company representatives as part of the drug companies’ marketing activities. There is no scientific evidence to support such a statement. Just because you are depressed does not mean that there is something wrong with your brain chemicals." - Zoloft side effects web site

"The fact of the matter is that there is no such thing as a "chemical imbalance" diagnosed by psychiatrists; this was a market-place concept invented in 60's put forth at a Congressional hearing in 1970 and ever since, the stuff of a "big lie"…"chemical imbalances" for which to prescribe and sell "chemical balancers" …pills. What's more the FDA is a full partner in this. They know all drugs as foreign compounds are poisons who's benefits are to be carefully weighed against the risks of the disease to be treated. They at the FDA know there are no diseases/physical risk in the psychiatry risk vs. benefit analysis and yet, along with the psychopharm cartel they push the fraudulent notion of psychiatric "disease"/"chemical imbalance."

"All "biological psychiatry" that claiming every negative emotion and behavior is a "disease"/"chemical imbalance" needing--requiring "treatment" is no less a pseudoscience, its imposition by government, through the schools, hardly less totalitarian than the Nazi imposition of eugenics. 17% of the nations school children on psychiatric drugs, our children consume 90% of the world supply of schedule 2 stimulants. The Zoloft ad pictures the "chemical imbalance" and its re-balancing by Zoloft, the chemical balancer. This simple little twist of science, a total, 100% lie and abrogation of informed consent is behind every psychopharm prescription." - Fred A. Baughman Jr., MD Neurology & Child Neurology

"The simple fact is that there is absolutely no reliable test that accurately distinguishes between children that are supposed to have "ADHD" and those that are not. The simplest way to counter this statement is to ask for a medical test to prove that your child has "ADHD." Many physicians will respond to your request by saying that the test is too expensive. You must persevere and ask that your insurance company pay for those tests. You can also ask any professional to show you the article or articles in the scientific literature that proves the existence of a confirmatory physical or chemical abnormality that validates the existence of ADHD as a medical disease. The plain truth is that no such article exists. If someone gives you an article, please share and discuss it with someone who can critically analyze it." -

"The brain does have chemicals that help cells "talk" to each other that are called neurotransmitters. However, when a professional says that one of these chemicals, usually a variety of something called Dopamine, needs some kind of correction, and that they have just the right kind of medicine to do this, you are being misled. This idea assumes that nerves only "talk" to nerves that use the same chemicals. That is absolutely positively false. It is a lie at worst, a gross oversimplification at best. It is unethical for a medical professional to state or imply otherwise." Breeding, J. The Wildest Colts Make The Best Horses. Bright Books, 1996 & Breggin, P. Talking Back To Ritalin. Common Courage Press, 1998.

"Remember that no biochemical, neurological, or genetic markers have been found for attention deficit disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, depression, schizophrenia, anxiety, compulsive alcohol and drug abuse, overeating, gambling, or any other so-called mental illness, disease, or disorder." - Bruce Levine, Ph.D. (psychologist), Commonsense Rebellion: Debunking Psychiatry, Confronting Society (Continuum, New York 2001), p. 277.

"In The Broken Brain, University of Iowa psychiatry professor Nancy Andreasen, M.D., Ph.D also describes what she calls "the most widely accepted theory about the cause of depression...the `catecholamine hypothesis.'" She emphasizes that "the catecholamine hypothesis is theory rather than fact" (p. 231). She says "This hypothesis suggests that patients suffering from depression have a deficit of norepinephrine in the brain" (p. 183), norepinephrine being one of the "major catecholamine systems" in the brain (pp. 231-232). One way the catecholamine hypothesis is evaluated is by studying one of the breakdown products of norepinephrine, called MHPG, in urine. People with so-called depressive illness "tended to have lower MHPG" (p. 234). The problem with this theory, according to Dr. Andreasen, is that "not all patients with depression have low MHPG" (ibid). She accordingly concludes that this catecholamine hypothesis "has not yet explained the mechanism causing depression" (p. 184).

Another theory is that severe unhappiness ("depression") is caused by lowered levels or abnormal use of another brain chemical, serotonin. A panel of experts assembled by the U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment reported in 1992 that "Prominent hypotheses concerning depression have focused on altered function of the group of neurotransmitters called monoamines (i.e., norepinephrine, epinephrine, serotonin, dopamine), particularly norepinephrine (NE) and serotonin. ... studies of the NE [norepinephrine] autoreceptor in depression have found no specific evidence of an abnormality to date. Currently, no clear evidence links abnormal serotonin receptor activity in the brain to depression. ... the data currently available do not provide consistent evidence either for altered neurotransmitter levels or for disruption of normal receptor activity" (The Biology of Mental Disorders, U.S. Gov't Printing Office, 1992, pp. 82 & 84).

Even if it was shown there is some biological change or abnormality "associated" with depression, the question would remain whether this is a cause or an effect of the "depression". At least one brain-scan study (using positron emission tomography or PET scans) found that simply asking normal people to imagine or recall a situation that would make them feel very sad resulted in significant changes in blood flow in the brain (Jose V. Pardo, M.D., Ph.D., et al., "Neural Correlates of Self-Induced Dysphoria", American Journal of Psychiatry, May 1993, p. 713). Other research will probably confirm it is emotions that cause biological changes in the brain rather than biological changes in the brain causing emotions.

A serotonin deficiency for depression has not been found. ... Still, patients are often given the impression that a definitive serotonin deficiency in depression is firmly established. ... The result is an undue inflation of the drug market, as well as an unfortunate downplaying of the need for psychological treatments for many patients." Joseph Glenmullen, M.D., clinical instructor in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, in his book Prozac Backlash (Simon & Schuster, New York, 2000), pages 197-198." - Lawrence Stevens, J.D

"There is no evidence that any psychiatric or psychological disorder is caused by a biochemical imbalance." - Peter Breggin M.D., in his book Reclaiming Our Children (Persues Books, Cambridge, Mass., 2000), page 139.

"First, no biological etiology has been proven for any psychiatric disorder (except Alzheimer's disease, which has a genetic component) in spite of decades of research. ... So don't accept the myth that we can make an 'accurate diagnosis.' ... Neither should you believe that your problems are due solely to a 'chemical imbalance.'" - Edward Drummond, M.D., Associate Medical Director at Seacoast Mental Health Center in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in his book The Complete Guide to Psychiatric Drugs (John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York, 2000), pages 15-16.

"I am constantly amazed by how many patients who come to see me believe or want to believe that their difficulties are biologic and can be relieved by a pill. This is despite the fact that modern psychiatry has yet to convincingly prove the genetic/biologic cause of any single mental illness. However, this does not stop psychiatry from making essentially unproven claims that depression, bipolar illness, anxiety disorders, alcoholism and a host of other disorders are in fact primarily biologic and probably genetic in origin, and that it is only a matter of time until all this is proven. This kind of faith in science and progress is staggering, not to mention naive and perhaps delusional." - Dr. David Kaiser, M.D. Psychiatrist

"MYTH: That depression is a chemical imbalance in the brain.

The increase in the rate of depression revealed in epidemiological studies makes it clear that depression is not a biological disease. Genes do not change that quickly. (Despite the explosion in genetic research and gene mapping, and high hopes of finding a gene for everything, no ‘depression gene’ exists because genes don’t work that way.) Over the last three decades conclusive evidence has mounted to show that the vast majority of depressions are learned, created by the way we interact with our environment. We now know that depression is not an event-driven phenomenon – it is not caused by specific events per se. The majority of people exposed to adverse life circumstances do not develop depression. The reaction of depression is caused by how individuals have learned to respond to adverse life experiences.

Further support for the environmental or learned view of depression is the evidence that depression responds well to certain kinds of psychotherapeutic intervention. Moreover, such interventions greatly reduce the rate of relapse compared to drug treatments based on the biological model. The brain is sufficiently conditionable by experiences, and reconditionable, that depressed people can be helped to adapt more effectively to the pressures and uncertainties of modern living, whatever their history. They can learn to respond to adverse life circumstances in better ways.

That there is a biological component to depression is undisputed since all our emotions are expressed in the language of biochemistry. Also, depression affects our biology by, for example, impairing our immune system. But the idea that depression is the result of a chemical imbalance in the brain, so disempowering and yet so fervently promoted by drug manufacturers, is wrong. It is now clear that changes in serotonin levels in the brains of depressed people are a consequence of depression, not the cause of it. Serotonin levels fluctuate constantly and are directly correlated with the effectiveness with which we live our lives. Life enhancing experiences raise serotonin levels at least as effectively as drugs and more instantaneously and with none of the inherent risks that taking antidepressant drugs involve." - Human Givens Institute

"The claim is continually made that the drugs repair chemical imbalances in the brain. This claim is false. It is still not possible to measure the exact levels of neurotransmitters in specific synapses within the human brain. How, then, is it possible to make claims about chemical imbalances?" - Philip Owen, psychologist "Sad script for the stressed," Daily Telegraph (Sydney, Australia) Letters to the Editor, 2 Sept. 2003.

"Contrary to what is often claimed, no biochemical, anatomical, or functional signs have been found that reliably distinguish the brains of mental patients." - Elliot S. Valenstien, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Michigan, in his book Blaming the Brain: The Truth About Drugs and Mental Health (The Free Press, New York, 1998), p. 125.

"...there are no external validating criteria for psychiatric diagnoses. There is neither a blood test nor specific anatomic lesions for any major psychiatric disorder." - From a letter dated December 4, 1998 by Loren R. Mosher, M.D., a psychiatrist, resigning from the American Psychiatric Association.

"A disease is a condition that has a known cause and can be identified by one or another set of laboratory tests." - Miryam Ehrlich Williamson, Fibromyalgia: A Comprehensive Approach, 2000, Chapter 1.

"We really do not know what causes any psychiatric illness." - Jack M. Gorman, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry at Columbia University, in his book The Essential Guide to Psychiatric Drugs - Third Edition (St. Martin's Press, New York, 1997), p. 314.

The ego, the thing that depressed and anxious people recede into unintentionally, is the part of the illusory self that NEEDS TO SEE ITSELF AS BROKEN. Otherwise, it can't exist. It desparately tries to find a way to make experiences things that happen to IT, and not that it's just an observer. It wants the rest of the being to believe it is the source and receiver of all. It's greedy like that.

Marketing is DESIGNED to go after the 'me', the 'who I am', or more obviously the 'who I think I am'. This chemical imbalance stuff, is absolute genious. It plays directly on the addiction and obsessions of the ego. And since ego very easily makes a link between, "I am insufficient, and I have money/health coverage", CHA-CHING pharmcos get fat. And since depression/anxiety/etc. is a state in which one lives more from their ego than not, the money-for-broken'ness seduction is all the greater.

Get out of your minds, everyone (the self proclaimed ill or not). There's only relative insanity in there. Get back to your senses and realize that although your awareness enables you to have depressed and anxious experiences, they are not who you are and are transitory. Chemicals have nothing to do with it. Be accountable and seek growth of your physical tool, and not throw on a quick coat of paint on top of it. It just gets heavier and more alien. Too much makeup and you look like a cheap right? Too much aftershave and pickup lines and you stink/disgust right?

And if you really must paint/stink to hide your other colors/odors, at least be AWARE that you're painting to modify your experiences and the stage performance you put on for others, and not because you think you "are" them. If you know you're playing and dancing, you can at least enjoy it and not become a victim of it.

[scotty]

Another theory is that severe unhappiness ("depression") is caused by lowered levels or abnormal use of another brain chemical, serotonin. A panel of experts assembled by the U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment reported in 1992 that "Prominent hypotheses concerning depression have focused on altered function of the group of neurotransmitters called monoamines (i.e., norepinephrine, epinephrine, serotonin, dopamine), particularly norepinephrine (NE) and serotonin. ... studies of the NE [norepinephrine] autoreceptor in depression have found no specific evidence of an abnormality to date. Currently, no clear evidence links abnormal serotonin receptor activity in the brain to depression. ... the data currently available do not provide consistent evidence either for altered neurotransmitter levels or for disruption of normal receptor activity" (The Biology of Mental Disorders, U.S. Gov't Printing Office, 1992, pp. 82 & 84).


And yet the FDA approves new neurotransmitter altering drugs!!

[MizzT]

GRRRRRREAT! SITE!
GRRREAT article!
that site is awesome and links to foodkills.org. im very excited about all this additional info. I might send those links to fambly who are not bery well informbulated.
muchas gracias!

...yeah , but whether there is a chemical imbalance or not is not really the issue, if there is a chemical imbalance , then it is a symptom of the depression which triggers it, and depression being an emotional/spiritual reaction to trauma usually . So treating the 'chemical imbalance' (if it exists?) would be treating the symptoms and not the cause of the 'illness' .....

As we have all said of SSRIs, it is a chemical straight jacket .....
A band aid that masks the real cause but it certainly aint no cure!

[MA2KKgumgrey]

wanted to ask if anyone knows if zoloft works? i cant figure how to post my own thing

[mdladie]

Yes, Darcy is right. I saw a commercial on TV today for Depression.com and had to check it out. What do you know..the very 1st paragraph states "It's caused by an imbalance of brain chemicals, along with other factors." And guess who is bringing us this enlightening information? Our old friend known as GSK!

[scotty]

Zoloft is an ssri, just like paxil. Same actions,same side effects, same adverse effects, same suicidal warnings.

[hope]

Sorry Darcy, I'm to wiped out now to read the whole article - I'll try tomorrow. Would you be upset if I just said "Brain Damage" instead of "Chemical Imbalance"??????

[killingmeslowly]

i have a chemical imbalance - i'm on SSRI's..

[scotty]

Originally Posted by killingmeslowly

i have a chemical imbalance - i'm on SSRI's..

Now THATS the truth!!

[rdjanis]

What is sad is the fact that desperate people looking for answers accept this garbage....

[time to move on]

Okay, well, not to play devil's advocate here, but I think that SSRIs have their place. Certainly, it's not the huge gaping hole that the drug company and doctors make it out to be, but it exists. I would have killed myself if I had not been able to get the temporary relief band aid that Paxil brought. Regardless of what sort of chemical imbalance it fixed or created, or neither, it gave me the break I needed to work on things that I couldn't even think about before I was on it. The drug companies may be lying to us about why these drugs work, and that's important to know and to tell the world. But, if you think about it, I would be dead if they hadn't. So, I guess I can't be quite that quick to villify whatever it was that gave me my life back.

[darcyb]

Originally Posted by scotty

Zoloft is an ssri, just like paxil. Same actions,same side effects, same adverse effects, same suicidal warnings.

It's not *just* like Paxil, otherwise they wouldn't have a patent of their own and would be paying royalties to GSK for use of their molecule, which I don't think they're doing.

Experientially, I found what Zoloft "felt like" to be VERY different than Paxil. I remained somewhat useful while on Paxil, whereas with Zoloft, I could do little else but pace, cramp, panic intensely, and feel incredibly spacy and distant. It was a friggin' nasty drug that my whole system rejected with passion. Paxil wasn't like that but no less nasty. It sabbotaged with greater subtlety, which is 10 times worse because I was harming myself without noticing.

[eileen]

Darcy,
According to this paper then, I do not have changed brain chemistry. I was told this by the first psychiatrist I ever saw to get something for sleeping, while I was going through a tragedy. When I left there I had Post Traumatic Stress, because of his terrorizing me. He then told me that I would have to take medication all of my life, becaused of altered brain chemistry. I believed it up to this point. You don't know what this post has done for me. I can settle down to my work now, knowing that I don't have altered brain chemistry, I have a drug altered brain. Thank you, this a big moment in my life.
eileen

[elisa]

Great article Darcy and right up my alley!!

Proclaiming that depression/anxiety etc is a "chemical imbalance" thing is downright fraud!!

It was a great invention by Big Pharma because without that term, people wouldn't have accepted these drugs. They played on the techology age and "proof" to mislead the public.

The chemical imbalance theory cheats people from getting the non drug treatment they really need and hinders the return to their wellbeing.

The "may" word removes all the responsibility from what they claim.

Ofcourse, biopsychiatry accepted it to protect their self-interest.



I believe that the sentence by Sasz (in my signature) tells it like it is.

[darcyb]

Originally Posted by eileen

I can settle down to my work now, knowing that I don't have altered brain chemistry

Whoah. "Altered" and "balanced" are two completely different ideas. Your brain is a dynamic thing that modifies its own chemistry constantly as part of autonomous processes and response to daily experiences. If you have intimacy with a loved one, pet an animal, eat a lot of sugar or caffeine, you can easily find yourself having VERY different (altered) brain chemistry for whatever numbers of hours to years (depends on repetition).

What I've quoted doesn't say the brain is a static thing. It says that:

-balance doesn't exist
-therefore, no drug can "make" it exist

It's a pop-cultural delusion to think that whenever you feel well, you are in some kind of balance. That's not so. Look at a drug or orgasm induced high. Feels great, but it's hardly anything resembling a balance. You simply feel a certain way, and have labeled the experience as "being well", or preferable to others you've had.

I know what you're saying though, and it would do your confidence and ability to explore greater health well to abandon the idea that you are a broken or can be broken person. That's too black & white for the human experience. You have simply had difficult experiences and your body has echoed it.

[darcyb]

Originally Posted by time to move on

I would have killed myself if I had not been able to get the temporary relief band aid that Paxil brought.

Conjecture very similar to the belief that people wouldn't kill themselves while on an SSRI, because of the SSRI

I hear what you're saying, and I agree fully that they do have their place. I haven't seen the "saved my life" position empower people while ignoring that to try other solutions, would require one to choose to be alive to try them, and having not attempted them, be without an experience driven conclusion.

You're here breathing. You made the choices that produced that reality. Phew! We're all glad for it! You can't know that the drug was the only way, ever, to have kept you physical in that particular situation, because you'd have to undo it all and try something else first, which is impossible. So admit that you accept and appreciate the experience, but don't give a commercial product too much of a pedestal (inanimate objects tend not to worry about status anyway). It takes away from your OWN accountability and miraculous nature.

Instead of saying Paxil saved you, say YOU SAVED YOU, because you made the choice that produced the experience that you then judged and labeled yourself as "life saving". In this perspective, Paxil has its place, and you're not disempowered from knowing that your reality is always and truly yours to create regardless of what chemical high/health you seek.

[MizzT]

Originally Posted by darcyb

It's a pop-cultural delusion to think that whenever you feel well, you are in some kind of balance.

or preferable to others you've had.

it would do your confidence and ability to explore greater health well to abandon the idea that you are a broken or can be broken person. That's too black & white for the human experience. You have simply had difficult experiences and your body has echoed it.

that concept of "balance" is so interesting to me. the whole yin/yang workings of the universe. as you acheive a perceived "balanced" or calm state.....you are actually probably reaching a full yin state or a full "non-chaos" state.....which is actually a very volatile state and yearning to shift yet again into yang. and same as the tides flow....that fully chaotic state will also shift back to a calm state. so no....there is rarely ever balance or calm that is permanent and lasting. there are too many variables in the world to assume you will just always be happy and even keeled.

the work...is becoming someone who can float in the waves and ride out whatever may come. paddle yourself out of the lows....and keep yourself from falling over on the highs. but the human brain/body/observer....has all it needs to acheive that. has all it needs to heal fully and be healthy. you just have to learn to tap into it (excuse the beverly pun) and utilize the abilities that may be hidden from us either by those difficult experiences, wrong chemicals, toxicity, negative emotional experiences, lack of spiritual connection etc.

[eileen]

Thanks Darcy, I know now that I will get off the drugs. It does make me feel better. Right now, I can smell hot gingerbread and coffee. That is a delicious smell and makes me feel good. Eating it will make me feel better.
eileen

[darcyb]

A hammer saved my life.

It kept the boards together of my roof and stopped them from coming crashing down from an elevation imbalance.

Or was it my choice to live in a home constructed with hammered metal between boards that keeps me alive?

Or was it the construction crew that wouldn't get paid if they didn't follow the blueprints that required the hammered nails?

Or was it prior experience that drove the contractors to repeat an experience where they spent less time in jail from people dying, because they hammered nails?

One cannot equate "saved my life" with "Paxil". The relative life we live here has no absolutes. No one single thing saves our life. There are only things which "partially create an experience", but they are never the ONLY things that would have. To ignore the realm of possibility and give all credit absolutely to one thing, is delusion.

[killingmeslowly]

i may or may not have a chemical imbalance.

there may or may not be better solutions for my disorder(s).

i may or may not have been misled.


although, when i first took 40mgs of Paxil, i felt 'normal' for the first time in months and months. i could leave the house without throwing up, i could look after my own well-being (shower, eat etc) and face domestic paper-work/admin.

basically it enabled me to 'function' and, for that reason, i will always believe SSRI's have a rightful place and i am grateful for this.

of the options available to me at the time, Paxil was a godsend. with regards to 'saving my life', all i know is that i was "dying" before i took it. i didn't empower myself from within (there was nothing there) i just simply allowed myself to accept another medication.

[time to move on]

"One cannot equate "saved my life" with "Paxil". The relative life we live here has no absolutes. No one single thing saves our life. There are only things which "partially create an experience", but they are never the ONLY things that would have. To ignore the realm of possibility and give all credit absolutely to one thing, is delusion." -DarcyB

Okay, Darcy, first of all I can barley understand what you say sometimes, which is sad becuse I would like to understand. But from what I can, you are suggesting that it is delusion for me to believe that Paxil saved my life, rather any number of other things that went on inside of my head at the time. If that's what you have decided to beleive, then that's fine. I can't say that I agree with your choice to tell someone who is trying to shake the lable of crazy (which we all are on this site, to some degree) that their ignorance is delusional. It seems a bit strong and agressive. I tried to see if you meant it in another way, but I can't see that you do. As for your main claim, that paxil cannot be equated with saving my life. Well, yes it can. I tried a million things to calm my anxieties, natual and behavioral. I had tried everything but medication, and nothing had worked. I couldn't work, I couldn't sleep, I couldn't interact with anyone without becoming hysterical. I couldn't even concentrate enough on one thing to know what relaxation was, let alone how to calm mind enough to achieve it. I was so sick of myself and spiritually exhausted that I planned to kill myself. I planned exactly how. My doctor convinced me to give Paxil a shot before I did. It dulled my immediate reactiveness enough for me to take a long, hard, look inward to changing things inside myself, something my mind couldn't seem to give me on its own. So, Darcy, I DO equate Paxil with saving my life. If you think that's delusional, then so be it.

[eileen]

When I needed answers, I reached out
For help, that was not there,
Foolishness and extreme were said.

When I felt down and confused, I reached out
For help, that was not there,
Somebody else’s anger, I found here
Brokenness and thoughts of dying I found there

When my soul was stripped and
I was trapped and had no where to go
Drugs were pushed on me, so I wouldn’t talk
Paxil was the worse I know

When I was in physical pain, I reached out
Paxil is not your cause, I was told there
Where to next, do I go, who will help now
No one I know.

When I need help and I reached out
To Paxil Progress, I was sent
The door was open , in I went

Help was immediate; Elisa was by my side,
Darcy’s manuals to read, Laurie cheering on
Delyn to make me laugh and I sighed
Help is now at my side.
eileen

[elisa]

I need to tell you a little about myself and the past 10 years.

I was told that I needed to stay on antidepressants for life due to a chronic depression. I guess it was decided that it was chronic because these meds didn't do what they were supposed to do. The depression got worse over the years while ON the drugs. Ofcourse, the "chemical imbalance" theory was rehashed over the years.

I started talk therapy in 1998 which didn't help for quite some years on a cognitive basis because I was a drug induced fogbrain which was as thick as molasses. It was good though to get my issues and emotions out during those years. After that the real work started and is still ongoing.

One day I decided I had ENOUGH. Enough about being diagnosed as being crippled for life and the consequences in accepting that sentence. It made me feel like a victim and unable to do anything about it. I abhorred being a victim, that was/is my nature.

I decided that I would go off the drugs and as of the very moment that I made that decision, it CHANGED MY LIFE!! I started feeling the POWER IN ME!! I was THRILLED to realize that I had a CHOICE.....

That discovery (freedom) in itself could have been the "serotonin boost" what I needed. That was late 2003.

Started to taper off the drug "cocktail" in January 2004 and am almost finished.

Around June/July 2004 I discovered paxilprogress and have been posting ever since. I love the site, in part because of the spirit of having a choice. It reflects my feelings exactly. We do have choices even when we don't see any.... yet!!

Sofar I'm feeling pretty good, much better moodwise than the past decade, because I tweaked the serotonin MYSELF through my OWN ACTIONS and CHOICES and NOT with any meds.

[Scott]

in order to sell a product effectively you have to make people believe they need it...