Posted by fachad on March 21, 2005, at 0:27:32
In reply to Do Meds Create More Problems?, posted by Phillipa on March 19, 2005, at 20:28:27
"There was an old woman who swallowed a fly. I don't know why she swallowed a fly, Perhaps she'll die."
That children’s song pretty much describes the longitudinal course of psycho-pharmacotherapy, IMHO.
You start out with a medication for a diagnosis that is realy just a technical name made up by the drug company for some type of emotional suffering that is really inherent to the human condition.
The medication causes some side effect, either right away or gradually over time. So a second med is added to counter this undesirable effect of the first med.
Of course, the second med has some unexpected unpleasant side effect, which, lucky for you, can be treated with a third med.
Now this third med is not generic and is not covered by your insurance, so it's gonna cost you a bundle, but that's better than suffering the side effect of med 2, which, all things considered, is worth it to get the (alleged) benefit of med 1. On and on it goes.
If you should decide to discontinue any of your meds, you will then have rebound symptoms of whatever that med was doing (e.g., if it was a sleep med, you will have rebound insomnia; if it was an anxiety med, you will have rebound anxiety) plus you will have all the weird physical symptoms that come along with d/cing a psych med, plus you will have the inevitable emotional destabilization (aka, coming apart, meltdowns, etc.) that accompany an even ultra-gradual taper of a psych med.
The Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly (children's song)
http://www.poppyfields.net/poppy/songs/oldwoman.htmlBrain Candy (1996 film on the psycho-pharmacetuical industry and it's customer base)
http://imdb.com/title/tt0116768/
poster:fachad
thread:472991
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050317/msgs/473430.html