Everything matters: Beyond Meds ~ navigation menus etc.

The URL everyone knows and loves is back. Here is an updated navigation menu for saving and/or sharing. Navigating close to 6,000 posts gets complicated! 

Psych drugs harm. Let’s get high profile MDs and celebrities – spreading the message

There are quite a few relatively mainstream doctors now talking about the harms of benzodiazepines and anti-depressants on social media. As usual other psychiatric drugs (neuroleptics, anti-convulsants, — called anti-psychotics and mood stabilizers, etc) are given short shrift. This is about informed consent. If people don’t know about the very serious potential risks involved in…

Retaining agency is not resistance to treatment…it is in fact a sign of health

The catch – 22 I thought about the other day: The mental health system tells clients/patients/consumers that they need better boundaries while expecting them to ignore their boundaries.

This is how we get locked up and forcibly drugged for no good reason

Woah, everyone who has never seen the cops (or mental illness professionals) out of control for no good reason whatsoever should watch this. Yeah, this is like what happens to us when they don’t understand our altered states as well…things just start happening and it’s all out of your control. Next thing you know you’re in four point restraints and they’re shooting you up with drugs to shut you up and disable you. Literally. People have no idea unless it’s happened to them. It’s ugly, it’s violent, it’s traumatic. (video included)

UPDATE: the bill is doing well – Support the B*e*n*z*o Bill ~ Massachusetts HD.4554

UPDATE from Geraldine: I want to update everyone on the final support we got on HD4554 a bill regarding benzodiazepines here in Massachusetts. We received 36 co-sponsors from both the House and the Senate, Republicans and Democrats to the proposed bill; a very impressive number. From here this will now receive an official bill number and then be assigned to a committee. We are hoping to testify in front of the committee before this legislation ends in July. What we need to happen when we testify is for the bill to pass at that point. That still doesn’t make it law if it passes. Once we are at this step, I will update again where it goes from there and how it becomes law.

Call To Action: Massachusetts Bill H4062 for Informed B*e*n*z*o Use is Official

By Alison Page — On February 24th, 2016 Bill HD4554 – An Act relative to benzodiazepines and non-benzodiazepine hypnotics was filed by Representative Paul McMurtry in the Massachusetts State House. The bill received 47 co-sponsors during the seven-day open period in which legislators can co-sponsor. This is an impressive and promising turnout.

Engage in one another’s differences in a way that is redemptive…

“I want there to be a place in the world where people can engage in one another’s differences in a way that is redemptive, full of hope and possibility. Not this “In order to love you, I must make you something else”. That’s what domination is all about, that in order to be close to you, I must possess you, remake and recast you. ” … [click on title to read and view more]

No, I was not #MedicatedAndMighty but I sure as heck was medicated

In a nutshell the updates: The point is not to compete but to make clear that all our voices matter whether we find ourselves using psych drugs or not. Being pragmatic and recognizing that the context of every life is unique is the most important thing. Diversity is real. It’s about learning to understand that we can have what seem to be contradictory experiences and both be legit #MedicatedAndMighty or not. Yes, diversity is real…it’s not about whose experience is right or wrong… One persons medicine is another’s poison. It’s clear that people have experience of being helped by and harmed by drugs both.

What does it mean to say that the psych drugs “work?”

We need to ask what does it mean when people say that psych meds “work”… Because when they “work” that does not change the fact that they are also neurotoxic substances that often gravely harm people – sometimes to the point of death. (not altogether rarely, either) … For me, this fact is held together with the fact that if other options are not offered there can be no reasonable judgement against those who, in a system that doesn’t offer choice, choose to use these drugs. …

Robert Whitaker’s new book: Psychiatry Under the Influence

Psychiatry Under the Influence investigates how the influence of pharmaceutical money and guild interests has corrupted the behavior of the American Psychiatric Association and academic psychiatry during the past 35 years. … [click on the title to read and view more]