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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 12 of 12. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by Judy on December 31, 1999, at 15:00:41
Hi
I have had a particularly bad 2 years of rapid cycling- manic, hypomanic and depressive episodes. After my pdoc gave up, I went through hospitalization, and several more psychiatrists and came to the conclusion that all the different med combos weren't helping and perhaps worsening my course. I have found a sympathetic psychologist but wasn't able to find a psychiatrist willing to help me in this withdrawal- instead I received threats of hospitals and consevatorship. I am on depakote, lamictal, wellbutrin, ativan and zyprexa. Has anyone been through something similar and how did you proceed? I got some info from Dr. Breggin's new book, and I'm looking forward to being drug free.
Posted by Cn. Michele on January 1, 2000, at 3:46:27
In reply to drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by Judy on December 31, 1999, at 15:00:41
> Hi
> I have had a particularly bad 2 years of rapid cycling- manic, hypomanic and depressive episodes. After my pdoc gave up, I went through hospitalization, and several more psychiatrists and came to the conclusion that all the different med combos weren't helping and perhaps worsening my course. I have found a sympathetic psychologist but wasn't able to find a psychiatrist willing to help me in this withdrawal- instead I received threats of hospitals and consevatorship. I am on depakote, lamictal, wellbutrin, ativan and zyprexa. Has anyone been through something similar and how did you proceed? I got some info from Dr. Breggin's new book, and I'm looking forward to being drug free.check out the Dr. Jensen threads - could be something there for you. Your pain is very great and I send an enormous hug to you.
Michele
Posted by Abby on January 2, 2000, at 13:33:28
In reply to drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by Judy on December 31, 1999, at 15:00:41
I don't want to upset Judy or be unsupportive, but
her decision to quit all medications really
concerns me. Certainly there are people who have
problems which could benefit from psycotherapy
alone and shouldn't be on any drugs. There are
other cases which are less clear cut, but rapid
cycling manic depression isn't one of them.
Someone with that condition should be on
medications. My mother has a variant of the
condition combined with delusions and she managed
to make our lives a living hell for years. I do
understand the perspective of the patient as well,
but please consider the consequences of your
actions on others.Having said that, finding the right combination can
be tricky. One place to contact might be the
Stanley center at Case Western reserve; you might
be able to find them on NAMI's web site.Dr. Breggin talks about the great conspiracy of
biological psychiatry, but I don't think it's
anything so concerted. He talks about drugs as
simply crutches for those who don't want to do the
hard work of sorting through their problems. He
sees us all being drugged with the modern "opiates"
prozac and paxil so that we won't care about
oppression.He is dead wrong on his theories about relapse
being simply withdrawal. I've seen many people
express reservation about anti-depressant
medicine, but even someone as devoted to natural
health as Andrew Weil says that manic-depressives
should be on mood stabilizers.He may believe what he says, but his presentation
of facts is distorted at best. For example, he
says that more psychiatrists are sued for giving
inappropriate and damaging drugs than for
witholding medication. This may be true, but the
reason is probably a legal one and not medical.
It is harder to prove by legal standards that
someone harmed you by neglect (i.e. not doing
something) than it is to prove that someone's
action e.g. giving you an antipsychotic
inappropriately caused damage.Moreover, in the case of untreated patients it is
probably their families who are most concerned;
they are either too discouraged or their resources
too depleted to consider a suit, or they have been
told that they probably won't win.The brain *is* difficult to understand and we are
still in the dark, but we don't really understand
cancer for that matteror non-steroidal
anti-inflammatory drugs--like aspirin or
ibuprofen.Sorry for the rant, but Breggin is still a medical
doctor and he ought to know something about how
scientific evidence is evaluated.
Posted by Scott L. Schofield on January 2, 2000, at 13:51:31
In reply to Dr. Breggin infuriates me, posted by Abby on January 2, 2000, at 13:33:28
> Sorry for the rant, but Breggin is still a medical doctor and he ought to know something about how scientific evidence is evaluated.It is ironic that he had previously worked for the NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health), an institution that is committed to using scientific research to support their conclusions and recommendations.
- Scott
Posted by Zeke on January 2, 2000, at 21:20:15
In reply to Re: Dr. Breggin infuriates me, posted by Scott L. Schofield on January 2, 2000, at 13:51:31
If find this review written by Russell Barkely, PhD most insightful of Breggin...
( full review at http://www.chadd.org/news/Russ-review.htm )
from the review of Talking Back to Ritalin: What Doctors Aren't Telling You About Stimulants for Children (Monroe, ME: Courage Press, 1998, $24.95), Peter Breggin, M.D.
For more than 15 years, Breggin has written books that attack established psychiatry, psychology, and now pediatrics, for their approaches to the diagnosis and treatment of children and adults with mental and developmental disorders.
Literally from its opening pages, this book makes contorted attempts at the appearance of scholarship, replete with quotes, footnotes, and references to scientific papers and other sources. Throughout, any quote is mustered from scientific papers that can be taken out of context to support the author's biases along with every exaggerated fact and figure he can flnd to support his call to alarm, no matter the credibility (or lack of it) of his sources. However, the flaws of both his research methods and his arguments are evident to any scientist even slightly familiar with the scientific literature on the topics covered here. Lacking any sense of perspective and proportion, this book fails to place its facts and figures in their rightful context and history, and eschews any attempt at a balanced and thoughtfully reasoned approach to its major topics. We are left, then, with what appears to be a carefully and cleverly crafted piece of artful propaganda against the diagnosis of ADHD and its treatment with Ritalin.
[W]e are asked to take Breggin's subjective and biased impressions over the available scientific research on the matter, no doubt because that research would not support his call to alarm about the issue. Such distortions of fact, dismissives of the scientific literature (tucked away in footnotes), and citations of exaggerated statistics await the reader on every page thereafter.
This book further accuses leading scientists, physicians, the Food and Drug Administration, NIMH, and established psychiatry and psychology of withholding negative or critical information about stimulant medication and ADHD from the public. Meanwhile, the author does precisely this very same sort of thing himself. Breggin draws upon quotes, facts, figures, and the personal musings of laypeople from many sources in the popular media. Never is their accuracy or credibility challenged. Yet this book almost ceaselessly criticizes scientific research that supports the validity of ADHD as neurodevelopmental disorder and on the use of stimulant medications as safe and effective treatments for it. This nit-picking at the petty faults of the clinical studies and the investigators quickly grows tiresome when there is no equally balanced critical treatment of the sources Breggin wishes to cite in support of his own prejudices. It is a lack of balance so lop-sided as to invite disbelief.
Not until the last fifth of this book are we finally told what Breggin believes is the cause of children's developmental disorders, such as ADHD and autism, and behavioral/emotional problems such as oppositional defiant disorder and depression. The causes are said to be: (1) lack of parental love, (2) lack of parental attention, (3) lack of parental discipline, (4) family stress, (5) poor educational methods, and (6) a mental health profession that is prejudiced toward neurobiological explanations for behavior over psychosocial ones. The recommendations proposed for parents to follow are, of course, the inverse of these causes; love more, pay more attention, use more discipline, reduce family stress, work to reform your child's educational system, and avoid getting help from organized psychiatry and psychology. While there may be nothing inherently wrong with some of these admonitions, there is nothing inherently right about them either. Some may even ring with the sound of common sense about them, but common sense is often just that, common and often misinformed. ... Breggin's ... is outdated psychoanalytic thinking, discarded decades ago by the scientific community for its explanatory uselessness not to mention its cruelty toward parents seeking help for their children.
The propaganda Breggin offers here -- will be easily dismissed by the scientific and clinical professional communities as having nothing to add to the important issues related to understanding and managing ADHD. But to the lay reader, such misguidance as Breggin provides in Talking Back to Ritalin can do real harm. Breggin instructs parents to seek outdated, unscientific, and ineffective pop-psychological views of disorders and their treatment. What was so dismaying to me as a professional by the end of the book was the knowledge that Dr. Breggin took an oath as a physician to "first, do no harm." In my opinion, his book has violated that sacred oath.
Posted by saint james on January 3, 2000, at 1:56:59
In reply to drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by Judy on December 31, 1999, at 15:00:41
> Hi
> I have had a particularly bad 2 years of rapid cycling- manic, hypomanic and depressive episodesJames here....
I have never heard of a rapid cycler doing well off meds. I don't think it is possible. Also rapid
cycling is one of the most difficult things to treat. No doubt some of the meds you have tried have made things worse...to me it sounds like you have never found a good pdoc. Please do some reading on your condition, it is well est. that mood disorders (esp. rapid cyclying) are progressive if not treated. Sticking one's head in the sand is not a treatment method. Stoping ones meds is a good way to get locked up, that you can bank on! Find a pdoc that treats rapid cyclers, please !j
Posted by judy on January 3, 2000, at 11:43:31
In reply to Re: drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by saint james on January 3, 2000, at 1:56:59
Dear saint james and Michele and other posters,
Thank you for your input. Michele, I looked into Dr. Jensen's site and may call him. I feel so demoralized from my treatment by psychiatrists and hospitals. Maybe I'm not being rational about my actions. One of the posters was angry at Dr. Breggin and felt since he was a doctor, "first do no harm". I had e-mailed Dr. Breggin and he was kind enough to give me a couple of names of psychologists who would help me in tapering with medical supervision. I feel the mainstream, supposedly bipolar experts that I have seen have done me harm. One, whom I trusted for 2 years, informed me that there was nothing else he could do for me (and he had been treating bipolar disorder for 30 years). That plunged me into a suicidal depression, a hospital stay where I was strapped down, a series of doctors who refused to treat me without ECT, and the final one who threatened conservatorship- which panicked me so much that I spent 2 days looking out the window for the police. I won't bore you with other details, but I feel I can no longer deal with psychiatrists, quite frankly I'm afraid of them. Perhaps I will have to be on some kind of medication in the future, but I don't know who I am under all these layers of meds, and I'm really not functioning. I hope this makes sense, and again I appreciate everyone's opinion.
Posted by dove on January 3, 2000, at 12:13:57
In reply to Re: drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by judy on January 3, 2000, at 11:43:31
My heart goes out to you, and you have good reason to be afraid of the doctors, after the way you feel they treated you. I almost agree with the taper and withdrawal from the med-cocktail. BUT, I truly believe you should then try one mood-stabilizing med and make decisions from there. Rapid-cycling bipolar is not something to fool around with, the facts show a worsening if left untreated, yet you cannot go on with all the meds you're on currently. So, find a nonthreatening P-doc if possible, maybe a female? And attempt to express Your wishes and ask for some support in your quest to withdraw from all the meds, some doc out there should be willing to assist you and hopefully guide you to a med that will help and not make you feel out-of-yourself and buried under a blanket of meds.
I know what you're feeling is probably really out-of-control, all the different meds doing different things, I have had that feeling. I cut out the ones I thought were the guilty parties and I am still in the stage of recovering from the sadistic meds (SSRI in this case) and I am dxed with bipolar also. My best wishes to you!
dove
Posted by Abby on January 3, 2000, at 17:18:41
In reply to Re: drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by judy on January 3, 2000, at 11:43:31
> Dear saint james and Michele and other posters,
> Thank you for your input. Michele, I looked into Dr. Jensen's site and may call him. I feel so demoralized from my treatment by psychiatrists and hospitals. Maybe I'm not being rational about my actions. One of the posters was angry at Dr. Breggin and felt since he was a doctor, "first do no harm". I had e-mailed Dr. Breggin and he was kind enough to give me a couple of names of psychologists who would help me in tapering with medical supervision. I feel the mainstream, supposedly bipolar experts that I have seen have done me harm. One, whom I trusted for 2 years, informed me that there was nothing else he could do for me (and he had been treating bipolar disorder for 30 years). That plunged me into a suicidal depression, a hospital stay where I was strapped down, a series of doctors who refused to treat me without ECT, and the final one who threatened conservatorship- which panicked me so much that I spent 2 days looking out the window for the police. I won't bore you with other details, but I feel I can no longer deal with psychiatrists, quite frankly I'm afraid of them. Perhaps I will have to be on some kind of medication in the future, but I don't know who I am under all these layers of meds, and I'm really not functioning. I hope this makes sense, and again I appreciate everyone's opinion.
Judy,Please see a psychiatrist. Where are you? Dr. Ivan Goldberg has a web site which lists several people who specialize in the treatment of modd disorders. It was inappropriate for your doctor to say that he couldn't do anything more.
http://www.psycom.net/depression.central.htmlOtherwise you might want to try e-mailing Dr. Ivan himself. Dr. Goldberg specializes in rapi cyclers, and he might be able to get you in touch with some help. His e-mail is Psydoc@PsyCom.Net
Send him copies of your posts about being afraid of psychiatrists. It can't hurt; he won't know your street address from an e-mail and can't commit you, but he might just be able to help.Abby
Posted by JohnL on January 3, 2000, at 17:37:14
In reply to Re: drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by judy on January 3, 2000, at 11:43:31
Hi Judy. Reading your post was heartbreaking. Finding the right drugs is tough enough, but finding the right doctor is even tougher a lot of times. Sounds like your docs were rather worthless. That doesn't mean they all are though. There's an expert somewhere near you who can fix things up nicely. Probably by using fewer drugs instead of more too. Using the right drugs. The hard part is finding him/her. In the meantime, I give Jensen credit for this one thing...providing hope. If he's the only source of hope right now, then so be it. Any hope is better than none in my world.
I can relate to wanting to strip away the drugs to discover the person underneath it all. I've done that a couple times. When I was on three, four, or five drugs at a time and not doing much better than I had been on just one, I weened off them all just to wash out and start from scratch. I find it helpful to know what my baseline is. I don't stay off drugs for long though, because it only takes a week or two for the depression to return with a vengeance. It is dangerous and scary. But it reminds me very quickly why I was taking drugs in the first place. And I return to treatment with renewed strength, hope, and determination.
I hope you too will find renewed hope, strength, and determination in treatment. Kind regards, JohnL.
Posted by judy on January 4, 2000, at 19:06:27
In reply to Re: drug withdrawal from bipolar meds -Judy, posted by JohnL on January 3, 2000, at 17:37:14
Dear JohnL,
Thank you for your compassionate post; I was reading through some of the other posts on the forum and I realized I have been on every drug mentioned and many more. I sometimes think I was treated for symptoms of other drugs and it's all one big mess now. I know if I physically went to a pdoc I would be hospitalized and they would blaim this "disorder" and not what they've given me. Again, thank you for understanding.
Posted by juniper on January 4, 2000, at 23:03:36
In reply to Re: drug withdrawal from bipolar meds, posted by judy on January 3, 2000, at 11:43:31
judy,
i do not think that any doctor should refuse to treat you unless you agree to be treated in a specific way, ie. ECT. but i do want to let you know that my cousin had great success with this method. she became bipolar after her pregnancy and went on and off medication after medication. often she would stop taking her medications because of their numbing effect on her. after about 2 years her disorder was too severe to be treated on an outpatient basis and she was hospitalized. the doctors told the family that this was the most serious case of bipolar disorder they had come across. she received several ECT sessions and is now almost completely "cured". she actually had a positive response soon after the first treatment.
just a little case study to ponder when deciding your next step. best of luck to you.peace,
juniper
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