Psychiatry - A Dark Art

[lindosfan1]

Mr Plum
I do not like people who categorise everbody with the same brush.
If your opinions were fair I would not criticise, But you call qualified doctors and psychiatrist quacks. These people have taken the time to study and learn there trade and get a qualification. If they do make a mistake they can be sued. They sign the hippocratic oath. You call them quacks, which is in IMO the pot calling the kettle black.
Yes there are some bad doctors not everthing in this world is perfect.
Also you categorised all billionaires immoral sociopaths
All boozers in bars you lumped together.
Everybody is different in this world, and standards vary
Read your last post and your family history and the petty irritations comment, you do not irritate me and your family history is of no interest to me.
But I do suggest you need help, you seem to believe that the medical world is useless but your unqualified advise is not.
Stop clinging to extreme views lighten up and may be you can convince me and others that you have some good things to say.
As niggle said you seem to be an expert in everything, I am not but I do not like attacks that are against groups. Specify doctors billionaires boozers that are bad, name them do not condemn them all.

[JD]

I feel sorry for the mod that has to spend an hour reading each of your posts MrP and then exercise enough mental agility to decide whether it's "in court" or not.



Looks like JD got the short straw tonight.

Jun fun MrP.

Not at all, I understand a lot of what MrP has to say.

Try losing a son that drowned on a school trip. Live through a life where a loving couple decide to destroy each other for no other reason than they feel guilt and grief so much that hurting the person you love is the only outlet for your anger and emotions.

Live through the loss of Son, Mother, Brother and Best Friend over a very short period of time and you will need the help of someone to deal with the insane workings of the mind during such stress.

Do you ever fully recover from such things? - No, I don't think anyone does, I still suffer the same pangs and pains on every anniversary, birthday and even my ex-partners birthday, even after all the pain we both put each other through. We could never be together because it would relive the whole sad occasion time and time again.

Have we forgiven eachother? - Of course, we both realise we have a life to continue even with this experience.

On the medication side, I took Amitriptyline for years. I broke my neck as a youngster, and have suffered sciatica in my neck and lower back for nearly my whole life. I stopped the medication some 20 years ago, I found a more natural herb that I smoked for a while that did a much better job at controlling the pain than any prescription that messed with my mind and daily routine could. I even stopped the 'herb' a few years later because I'd found a method of controlling the pain through meditation. It's a bit like you know something hurts, but you ready your mind for the pain, you still feel it, but it's just that, a feeling, it actually doesn't hurt, it can sap your energy quicky, but it's just there.

This was all a many years ago now. For me, the best way to deal with all of life's problems and the reminders of losses we have suffered before, but never really forgiven ourselves (even if we have others), is to appreciate the good things in our life, everyday.

When I finish a hard day at work, that has been made stressful, by someone, or something, or some misunderstanding, or an anniversary of a past event, or just because I'm feeling generally pissed off and run down. The best, and I mean the BEST medicine, is when I return home from work and I walk through the door, our boy shouts 'PAPA', Wadde Kaps, runs and hugs me, not letting go of me and then twitters away in his own little language, (he is Autistic) talking to me, all the time with a smile on his face and the biggest welcome and gladness in his heart to have me present. Nothing in this world is more potent a remedy to all of life's problems, nothing I go through in my mind is stronger than that bond, nothing will ever make me not want to wake the next day and go through all manner of shit that life can throw at me, just so that I can continue the unconditional love this boy gives me on a daily basis.

Nothing that has happened in my life can ever be changed, Doctors and medicine could possibly help me change the way I think or react to the problems, but the continuation of life and love, (and also in my case - Faith), can only happen with what the future brings. I've found that you need to continue on your path, when life seems lost find another way, find a new beginning whilst always being reverent of your past, don't try and run from it - 'cause it's stuck to ya' better to make the past, and how you dealt with it part of yourself, wisdom comes from such journeys. Windows open, doors are ajar, love awakens and children thrill to your footstep and call, and shout 'PAPA'. I'm so blessed to have come through the other side, I hope that I'm so blessed as to not have to do that journey, or any other new life changing experience again one day, but if I do, I sincerely hope that my life's experiences to date, help, and that I won't be so fucked up, for so long, the next time.

[Spitfire]

My apologies JD, the wrong location for attempted humour, just an effort to "lighten" things up which was probably miserably misplaced.

Nothing intentional or nefarious in any of my post.

There is nothing I can say other than "I'll get my coat."

[JD]

Spitfire, you've no reason to apologise that I can see.

Why do you need a coat? - Is it cold up there in Issan?

[Spitfire]

Why do you need a coat? - Is it cold up there in Issan?

It's from a British comedy show called "The Fast Show", late 90s, I think. A guy that always says the wrong thing at the wrong time and then it all goes quiet and he says "I'll get my coat".

Sure many on here will remember it.

Many thanks for your post.

[MrPlum]

may be you can convince me and others that you have some good things to say.

You need to divest yourself of the notion that I need to convince you of anything. I do not.

“The ultimate ignorance is the rejection of something you know nothing about and refuse to investigate.” - Dr. Wayne Dyer

[MrPlum]

Not at all, I understand a lot of what MrP has to say.

That was a moving post, JD. Thank you.

[Super Joe]

but if someone has just been pulled off the edge of a railway bridge, some happy pills are likely to be more use than an arm round the shoulder, 2 tickets to Majorca, a complimentary bottle of factor 15 and a copy of yoga for dummies

I disagree with one comment you made. SSRIs and some of the other drug treatments take weeks before they start to work. How then would they save the guy leaping off the bridge

MrP, you responded to Jim's hypothetical of saving a bridge jumper with happy pills by quoting SSRI's.
Did you quote SSRI's to:
a) Manage the debate and give the impression you know what you're talking about, or
b) Because you do not know the drugs that would do the job quick time ?

SJ

[lindosfan1]

mr plum said "A pox on ALL 'psychiatrists'. They do far more harm than good. Drug peddlers masquerading as 'experts', picking the pockets of the already wounded"
mr plum said
" OBVIOUSLY not ALL Doctors are corrupt or useless. OBVIOUSLY not ALL billionaires are sociopaths. OBVIOUSLY there are some aspects of the system that are good. It's nonsense to believe otherwise."

So you are now saying there are good Doctors, good Psychiatrists, good billionaires had you said that in the first place I may have said nothing.
That is a good contradiction on your part considering your history of condemning the medical profession.
I enjoy reading this forum and sometimes contributing there are moving and posts that make you think like JD on this thread.
Some other contributions are enlightening including one or two of yours, but reading this thread I have realised that you are using this thread because you have a chip on your shoulder. Being extreme is not clever, extreme views are dangerous. What gets attention is well written without prejudice.
You have failed to answer any of my questions but like to criticise so do not scream and have a fit when it is returned.
Disclaimer the writer takes no responsibility for what he has said.
Sound familiar?

JD thanks for your post enlightening and a good example to all of us. I wish you well.

[MrPlum]

Deleted. Off topic.

[MrPlum]

Deleted. De-cluttering!

[Super Joe]

lindosfan1 - What is wrong with you? Your nitpicking is unbelievable.

Sorry MrP it is not nitpicking and you know it. You make these scathing attacks on the Med profession, generalisations that they are all in the game together, drug-peddling quacks blah blah blah.
In reality you aren't remotely qualified or have the knowledge you allude to, to make such remarks. You don't even seem to know the difference between SSRIs and Benzos judging by the bridge jumping affair.

You have a clear bias, express it in an OP loaded with inflammatory accusations, then back track from it by referring and linking to the odd Doc here and there who shares similar views. I don't see anything credible just your usual anti-Big Pharma bias and that belittling as 'nitpicking' and fake-outrage and you express when aany criticism comes back your way.

SJ

[margaretcarnes]

Mr P - you have referred to people who 'don't research before passing judgement'.
I can see how research on the facts of some physical diseases could provide some knowledge as to how they affect people. But surely psychiatric illnesses can't be pigeon holed in the same way?
Most of us for example will know how it feels to have measles, or a broken bone, from personal experience. Fortunately many of us can't speak from personal experience about psychiatric illness. And can psychiatric patients themselves explain how they feel?
Niggle will have seen his patients in the throws of remissions, or withdrawal from psycotropic drugs, or when effects of ECT have worn off. It isn't a pretty sight. So isn't it understandable that psyhiatrists continue to try different treatments, therapies and yes - drugs?
One of the main problems I believe is that people with severe mental illness simply can't explain how they feel.
Things like severe depression and PTSD are different. JD has bravely explained his own experiences, and admitted there are still the bad times. Therapy - as opposed to psychiatry - helps people to understand, and get through, those times. And although milder drugs may help with depression for a while, psychiatry and therapy shouldn't be confused or seen as the same 'mumbo jumbo' - which you appeared to do.
I do agree with you though on ADD to an extent. There seem to be many more children these days who are diagnosed with ADD and ADHD, and I don't like to see children on Ritalin for example. In my experience the children I have seen who have been diagnosed often have Mothers who are either hyperactive themselves, or simply exercise no control over their children. You feel like saying 'for gawds sake get a grip' to the Mother. And believe me, I've had my office wrecked by one such child, while the Mother sat back and let him get on with it.
That said - I can only hope that GPs see the same things as I do and feel that in their professional opinion Ritalin is the only answer. Because at the end of the day we all have to rely on our GPs judgement to a large extent, and then decide whether or not to go down the route of traditional, or alternative, treatment.
Children, and people with severe psychiatric illnesses, may not have that choice.

[MrPlum]

Mr P - you have referred to people who 'don't research before passing judgement'.
I can see how research on the facts of some physical diseases could provide some knowledge as to how they affect people. But surely psychiatric illnesses can't be pigeon holed in the same way?
Most of us for example will know how it feels to have measles, or a broken bone, from personal experience. Fortunately many of us can't speak from personal experience about psychiatric illness. And can psychiatric patients themselves explain how they feel?
Niggle will have seen his patients in the throws of remissions, or withdrawal from psycotropic drugs, or when effects of ECT have worn off. It isn't a pretty sight. So isn't it understandable that psyhiatrists continue to try different treatments, therapies and yes - drugs?
One of the main problems I believe is that people with severe mental illness simply can't explain how they feel.
Things like severe depression and PTSD are different. JD has bravely explained his own experiences, and admitted there are still the bad times. Therapy - as opposed to psychiatry - helps people to understand, and get through, those times. And although milder drugs may help with depression for a while, psychiatry and therapy shouldn't be confused or seen as the same 'mumbo jumbo' - which you appeared to do.
I do agree with you though on ADD to an extent. There seem to be many more children these days who are diagnosed with ADD and ADHD, and I don't like to see children on Ritalin for example. In my experience the children I have seen who have been diagnosed often have Mothers who are either hyperactive themselves, or simply exercise no control over their children. You feel like saying 'for gawds sake get a grip' to the Mother. And believe me, I've had my office wrecked by one such child, while the Mother sat back and let him get on with it.
That said - I can only hope that GPs see the same things as I do and feel that in their professional opinion Ritalin is the only answer. Because at the end of the day we all have to rely on our GPs judgement to a large extent, and then decide whether or not to go down the route of traditional, or alternative, treatment.
Children, and people with severe psychiatric illnesses, may not have that choice.

Margaret

It may not be well known here in Hua Hin but out in the wider world there are those who do not believe in the practice of Psychiatry. Here is one site where professionals and others present their arguments.

This link addresses your question about Ritalin http://www.antipsychiatry.org/ritalin.htm

This addresses the question 'Does Mental Illness Exist?' http://www.antipsychiatry.org/exist.htm

Be careful now. They are written by the 'odd doc'.

'Rather than helping us deal with troubled or troublesome persons, the myth of mental illness distracts us from the real problems that need to be faced. Rather than being caused by a "chemical imbalance" or other biological problem, the nonconformity, misbehavior, and emotional reactions we call mental illness are the result of difficulties people have getting their needs met and the behavior some people have learned during their lifetimes. The solutions are teaching people how to get their needs met, how to behave, and using whatever powers of enforcement are needed to force people to respect the rights of others. These are the tasks of education and law enforcement, not medicine or therapy.' Lawrence Stevens, J.D.


From http://www.antipsychiatry.org/abolish.htm
'In The Death of Psychiatry, Torrey advanced the idea that most psychiatric and psychotherapeutic patients don't have medical problems. '...most of the people seen by psychotherapists are the 'worried well.' They have interpersonal and intrapersonal problems and they need counseling, but that isn't medicine - that's education. Now, if you give the people with brain diseases (approx 5%) to neurology and the rest to education, there's really no need for psychiatry'" (American Health magazine, October 1991).'

What these articles more politely articulate is 'A pox on ALL psychiatrists'. No?

[hhfarang]

Parts of this thread are making me "mentally ill" but for some reason I can't make myself stop reading it...

The only experience I have on the subject are the following:

A lot of my friends and family think I'm mentally ill for moving here.

Seriously, my father who was very stable, hard working, religious (non-drinking, non-smoking, etc.) had a mental or emotional breakdown once for no apparent reason. They called it a nervous breakdown. They put him in a regular hospital and gave him whatever happy pills were available (legally) in the late 60's and in a couple of weeks he was back to normal and it never happened again. I suppose it was just due to the stress of providing for a family of four on a bus driver's salary, having to work ten hours a day six days a week, 49 weeks a year and it just finally caught up with him. Was it a couple of week's rest or the pills that made him better? That's anybody's guess.

I had an aunt who went what appeared to be completely crazy (late 50's or early 60's) and they put her in a asylum for the mentally ill for about six months where she underwent extensive shock therapy treatments among other things. She came out her old normal self again and still appears to be normal today, so something they did worked.