Posted by Quintal on February 5, 2007, at 18:44:51
In reply to Re: Just a question » Quintal, posted by Meri-Tuuli on February 5, 2007, at 15:54:11
>I didn't know I was older than you!! I always imagined you to be older (alot?) than me.
Hmmm.......I'm pretty sure you wouldn't if you met me in real life :-)
>Its strange the misconceptions we get in our heads.
It is indeed!
>To be fair, and in my opinion, it seems abit harsh that a potentially useful drug is withheld from people who need it. I mean, I know Ashton says that you can get benzos for no more than 4 weeks, but in reality GPs won't really presribe them, if you see what I mean.
GP's do prescribe them - that's how I became addicted to benzos myself.
>Isn't it up to the indivdual to make these sort of choices about their lives?
Up to a point, but medicine is not yet a utilitarian service. Doctors and pdocs et al certainly need to learn to do their homework become healers if they are to avoid that.
>Lots of things are addictive -- and you get withdrawal syptoms etc like coffee, cigarettes etc, but that doesn't nesscarily mean that they're banned or whatever.
As I've said before, benzos aren't banned. Almost all powerfully addicting drugs are controlled though. The incongruences of alcohol and tobacco annoy me - especially since most people addicted to those drugs don't usually consider themselves to be addicts in the same way as those addicted to other drugs of abuse, despite the fact they have a damaging and potentially fatal habit. My own mother was one of them. I mean, she died of lung cancer, which to my mind was the direct result of her drug addiction - tobacco, yet we don't think of her death in the same way you might someone dying of a heroin overdose.
>How did that guys life get wrecked by benzos?
I'm not sure, but this has nothing to do with Heather Ashton's work. People like that often seem to exaggerate their problems, and I suspect benzo addicts tend to understate or deny the extent to which they're impaired as well - I know I did. Six and two threes! I might post my old rating of clonazepam from RemedyFind and let you see just how strongly pro-benzo I was at one point and how much I despised Heather Ashton.
>I'm sure alot of people could say the same thing about say, alcohol, an addiction to sex/gambling/chatlines/whatever.
Yes, they could. Look, I think there's some confusion about what exactly I am saying and Heather Ashton's motives. When she says that these drugs are not good for you - that you may be healthier without them - she's simply telling the truth. I've seen no judgement from her about people who do choose to take benzos long term, but as a scientist she must report facts, and that's all she's doing. In fact she has gone to considerable lengths to defend people who might have their benzos withdrawn against their will, as shown by the letter in my original post. Maybe it's because she's so terse and formal that to some 'ears' (especially American ears) she might sound militant and uncompromising. But she isn't. Really, just have a good look at a broad section of her work (not just on benzos) without prejudice and I think you'll see what I mean.
>And another thing, I'm just curious, how does a taper from a benzo differ in the suffering caused that from an AD for instance? For me, withdrawal from celexa and venlafaxine was no fun, it was miserable in fact. And was pretty much unsupervised by any GP. In fact, I don't think they offered any withdrawal advice whatsoever. I've never withdrawn from a benzo, so I have no comparison.
I've withdrawn from both benzos and venlafaxine cold turkey. As you say, neither of them were fun. It's hard to compare them because there's a different quality of awfulness between them. They are in the same ballpark, except with benzos there's the seizure risk of course. Heather Ashton has also provided some good work on tapering off SSRIs and she gives some advice on them here: http://www.benzo.org.uk/ssri.htm. Please try to see it for what it is - a very terse and dense appraisal of the facts by an experienced psychopharmacologist, and not as though she has some hidden agenda.
Heather Ashton was a qualified doctor before Valium was even a twinkle in Leo Sternbach's eye, she saw these things coming into being and has most likely a more thorough, balanced and reasonable view of benzos than any of us posting here. Many people have no problem with slagging SSRIs for causing awful withdrawal syndrome (and bloody awful side effects too during treatment), yet it's almost as though benzos can do no wrong here. As you'll see, Heather takes the same approach to antidepressants as she does to benzos. If she seems to be obsessed with them that's because they were the most widely used (and therefore most widely problematic) psych drugs during her career, and she devoted a large part of her career to helping people who had problems with them. Would we really feel so strongly about her if she was quoted saying the same things about SSRIs as she does about benzos? Yes - most likely some would, but since you have experience with antidepressants yourself maybe you'll be better able to judge her position when you've read her article: 'SSRIs, Drug Withdrawal and Abuse: Problem or Treatment?'.
You might recall that I encouraged you to take the oxazepam when you posted here asking for advice?
http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20061123/msgs/707905.htmlI am not anti-benzo though for most of this thread I seem to have spent a lot of time and energy probably seeming that way for defending Heather Ashton against malicious snipers (and I don't mean you, Phillipa or Squiggles).
Q
poster:Quintal
thread:729587
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20070201/msgs/730120.html