Anti-depressants my personal story and questions (moved from general conspiracies)

I've noticed thier has always been a huge debate on Marijuana, legalization etc. along with all these other conspiracies around it, but what about anti-depressants and other medical drugs.

I was diagnosed with depression at age 7 and although that was very young, I was always a fast thinking child that new my stuations around me unlike most and was simply not happy with my normal existance.

At the age of 12, I was prescribed a drug called Zoloft to fix my "chemical imbalance", it didn't last long due to headaches, nausea, and insomnia, and I continued on with my life. When I hit 16 they tried another SSRI cant remember the name as I wasn't on it very long and my parents took care of it, needless to say that didn't last long either. I later learned that teenagers dont mix well with anti-depressants due to obvious issues with hormones and the growing of the body and brain that is still going on. Thanks for telling me first

At the age of 18, I later was pushed by my parents to go see a doctor again, I was very against it, but they pushed constantly til I finally gave in. After talking to my doctor he prescribed me with a newer drug, an SNRI called Effexor, started me at 34 mg and off I went, I actually felt really good on them but still was under what most consider happy and they bumped my dosage up to 75mg which was the plan from the beginning. Again I felt great, I never felt this happy just at life itself and couldn't help but smile which was something I rarely did then.

After 9 months of effexor things began to change, I started to feel depressed again but not the usual consistent way as before, I was having huge moodswings, and when I got depressed it was to an extreme, I went back to the doctor and what did they do? well they decided it would be better to double me up to 150mg, After that things started getting foggy I felt great at first again but my thoughts were fuzzy my memory was failing, and I started getting major shakes, whcih really scared me and my parents, but everything was well according to my parents, I was quiet did my own thing and didn't complain about anything, sounds great to them i guess, then things went majorly south, I was 19 now turning 20 and, my girlfriend of 2 years and I started fighting, she left, and suprisingly I got more depressed, so now what.

The doctors decided it would be great to move me up to 300mg!, double the max pill size and supposed max dose, but nobody questioned it, as with the 150 but worse, I could no longer think straight, My memory was horrible, I was forgetting simple words, and started shaking uncontrollably like a person on severe street drugs, or someone with parkinsons. it was horrible i felt like i was in hell and after 3 months became extremely depressed & suicidal at all times. ended up in a psych ward and was given MORE pills, I was now on 300mg of Effexor and 150 mg of a mood stabilizer called seroquel, I now can't believe how bad my memory was, and I barely remember the last year and a half of my life before I quit everything.

It all ended when i became suicidal and attempted taking my life 3 times, the first I ended up in a psych ward, the second I was an inch from death and was rushed to hospital and they actually let me go home the same day ?wtf, and then the 3rd I fought a roomful of police officers who came to my home after an "incident" got pepper sprayed oulled a knife, and had 3 guns pointed at my head. After a couple weeks in hospital i knew i had to quit the meds, I wasn't myself at all and it was my last hope, my family was afraid of me and I was pretty much already dead to them.

I quit all my meds cold turkey, it was a month of hell, the pills werent addictive the doctors kept saying, but it was the worst withdrawals i had ever had, it was like a 2 week long stretch of the worst hangover youve ever had, followed by 2 week of what felt like my brain being rewired, my memory came back, I felt happy towards life, and had my thoughts back, and the shakes were gone, I went from 125 lbs to 165 in 3 months, and thats for a person who is 6'0". I have never felt better, being clear headed and completely healthy with no meds.

I later found out that effexor was getting a bad rep, and had been liked to violence, memory loss, and many other issues which are easily findable if you google side effects. I also found out that many doctors were being paid off by big companies and pushing thier drugs for profit, doctors were also relying on pills instead of therapy to address underlying problems cause it was "faster".

So that was my experience and really stopped my trust of doctors or my will to ever be in a hospital again for anything.

My biggest question is, why is this allowed to continue? I've recently heard many stories similar to mine, and the fact that depending what you read 40%-60% of americans are being given anti-depressants, not just for depression but basically anything the doctors feel it will "help" them with.

Also then does it become a perfect mind control drug?, making people forget and become careless for the environment and people surrounding them, its obviouslly very harsh not just from my experience but many others.

I now am very happy, am living very healthy, and ignoring almost any new trend that the government and/or doctors try to push on people to be healthy, it also got me huge into the flouride debate and many other conspiracies

Did not realise thier was a medical thread so moved thiis sorry first thread

Atleast they didn't give you xanax. That # is worse than heroin in addiction & withdrawals. Most anti-depressants are addictive IMO and bad for you in the long-term. They should be used for a short period of time coupled with psychotherapy.

They should NEVER give it to you as a "permanent" solution to your depression.

I do not do drugs to you people know.. This is a sorta unbiased thought on what i am going to say..

I wonder about natural drugs sometimes, like marijuana and a few others. What i wonder is how people can put synthetic crap in thier body and not really think of some natural things that are out there to help people deal with whatever the big pharm places are giving..

I say this because so many of these drugs they are supposed to be helping, I have noticed recently adds on tv that state something along the lines of.. may cause suicidal thoughts or actions. I thought the whole point in taking these drugs to make you feel better, not worse.

Marijuana has been proven to help alot of cases out in how they react, people with aids, glaucoma, cancer, and a slew of other issues and has never killed anyone.
Adderall xr was banned in Canada because it killed i think 17 people under 18 and gave some more heart attacks.. I don't understand the thought process behind all this..

I will say i do no do drugs, any drugs. maybe aspirin or something once in a long while but that's it. I can honestly say what i think about because i have no bias against either side. But from where i stand if i were to have to take something because i HAD to. I would pick something natural because the stuff people make is way worse of than if you were to just smoke some weed.

reply to post by Somehumanbeing


Hm idk about that.

I'm glad the OP was able to get through all that and come out alive. Being an end-user of the mental health system myself, what struck me as odd in the post was the lack of reference to psychiatrists monitoring, regular counseling, not even group therapy. It takes a combination of effort to tame the tiger and calm the demons.

The medication and awareness of today was absent in my youth. I didn't crash and burn until I was nearly 40. Bad went to worse before it got better. Ten years later I'm faring well.

I'm opposed to the thought of psychiatric medication for a young growing body unless it is deemed absolutely necessary. Too many young people have paid a high price because of medication and improper monitoring.

Keep in mind that in the field of medicine all cures and diagnostics have unwanted side effects (to varying degrees); some barely noticeable, others really unpleasant. But a doctor needs an x-ray to properly examine a broken arm. The patient is exposed to x-rays, but the doctor can set the bone and choose the optimum protective wrap. You give a little to get a little.

Someone else mentioned the use of marijuana in medicine. Leave it to the wealth & power behind the USA government to dictate policy that protects their business interest at the cost of benefit to the citizens. Think about it - how arrogant does a man have to be to declare a gift from Mother Nature to be anything less than wonderful? The manipulation of hemp and the illegalization of marijuana in America is well documented and makes an interesting read.

I'm kinda like LargeFries in that I didn't break until age 49. I eventually discovered through hindsight that I had many depressive symptoms throughout my youth and adult life. My understanding is that people don't fully "break" until a true crisis situation occurs. That crisis point is different for each of us, depending on our personalities, our upbringing, our emotional underpinnings, our Spirituality,and genetic pre-dispositions. These problems are not "one size fits all".

Any Doc that gives you psychotropic medicine but doesn't refer you for therapy just doesn't know what they are doing. Family Docs need to refer more of their troubled patients to Psychiatrists, who understand the diagnoses and medicines more intimately. The caveat is getting the sufferer to understand that they play a big part in their own treatment and healing. It isn't like appendicitis, where you have that sucker taken out and the body heals itself. It takes great courage and desire to tear yourself down to square one and start all over again. I've heard it said that real Insanity is repeating the same behavior over and over again and expecting a different outcome. Let's also remember that some folks don't really want to be well. For me, it's a simple matter of wanting to be as well as I can be on any given day. All I can take care of is today, not yesterday, not tomorrow.

Originally posted by LargeFries
I'm glad the OP was able to get through all that and come out alive. Being an end-user of the mental health system myself, what struck me as odd in the post was the lack of reference to psychiatrists monitoring, regular counseling, not even group therapy. It takes a combination of effort to tame the tiger and calm the demons.

If I wrote everything that happened, nobody would probably read my story as it would be way to long, I had 2 Psychiatrists, 1 Psychologist, and 2 Counsellors, as well as a handful of GP's who for the most part went to thier prescription pad's right away, I did however participate, in DBT sessions, and was told by the counsellor running that, whom I had a very long talk with, That I already knew what she could teach and she didn't know how to help my personal situation. It didn't help me and I felt it was unnecessary in my post, though I'm glad to answer questions.

I learned myself that you have to want help to be helped and you can also do it all yourself, which is what I did and now take no meds and feel perfectly fine with life now, Eating healthy, and Exercise also helped alot

The OP is enough to make me weep. How in heaven's name can anyone justify giving a 7yr old, developing in body and mind, chemicals? It simply defies belief and yet is becoming an ever more common sign of the times. An adult prescibed anti-depressants may be able to measure theur efficacy to some degree - but a child has no experience to measure anything against.

We're all keenly aware of the hormonal and emotional rollercoaster that is a part of adolesence - it is a normal part of the process of growing up. Is it any wonder that as a younster you didn't smile very often - I can appreciate why not.

A close friend of my son's is going through a very similar experience. His friends have been worried about him since they were all about 10 years of age. Not because of the lad himself - because of the 'care' he was receiving from his parents - which was severely inhibiting. His father was a much older man and the lad was simply not permitted to socialise with his friends outside of school. He was plonked in front of a games console and simply left to it.

By the time they all reached high school their worry became extreme concern as he simply disappeared - for almost a year when they were all about 13 - and never rejoined them in the classroom again. It seems he was removed because of problems at home and the medics were brought in. He was prescribed ritalin. Once he was weaned onto the drug he returned to school. Starting 20 minutes after the rest of the school and leaving 20 minutes earlier. They never found out where he was being taught - because they never had another opportunity of talking with him as all information surrounding him was 'confidential.'

After leaving school the lad was seen with a professional health worker being taken around our village attempting to 'normalise' him. His friends are still waiting for him and I am certain would be far better at normalising the lad than any professional. He was admitted to the local psych unit in early adulthood - and he enjoyed it! Why - because he was relatively free to do as he please compared to his homelife.

His mother has now built up a social life and semi-career around his purported illness. This lad will never be allowed to live. Always - but always - it should have been his parents who were treated and not the lad.