I've deleted much of what I've written........

Do you know what pisses me off most about a certain Psychiatrist.  He would quip at me "Use it or lose it!" in reference to the mind whilst giving me medication that shrinks the Brain.  Olanzepine...
I believe it must be one of the most DANGEROUS drugs on the market for mental health care and yet it is touted as a wonder drug because it shuts their patients up.  Why not just put us in cages, throw us bananas and watch us scratch under our armpits for entertainment if anti-psychotics are actually frustrating our humanity to the point where we actually become violent from the very same drugs that are SUPPOSED to be calming us down!!!

I don't want to be Euthanised but I don't want to live like this either.  Instead of being Suicidal I just feel like lashing out.  I had little Social Skills as it was without those being taken away by medication and illness associated with medication just compounds the suffering.  To bear the Stigma of Mental Illness is to endure a life time of being talked down to and treated as a third class citizen.  Who wouldn't feel resentful.  Most people are wise enough to bite the bullet and be grateful for small mercies....we all know that there are so many people that cower from Human interaction with their fellow human beings yet light up when we even notice them.

Where is the KINDNESS in patting ourselves on the back for TOLERANCE when we know full well that tolerance doesn't give them a place in the community.  It only emphasises the PITY!

I didn't want to be pitied for my entire life.
I didn't want to have to walk away from my own Son without even fighting for him because I knew that even in a Court of Law I would have no Rights because of the Stigma of mental illness.  Even though my own Doctor was prepared to stand up in Court and say that I WAS a Good Mother.  Is everyone just allowed to help themselves....when will the RIGHTS of the Mentally Ill actually be considered?

At the Sheep Station...

I remember watching another woman, a Maori Woman, carrying a Carcass over her shoulder on a desolate Winter's day.  I felt for her, she looked so miserable.  But maybe she was HAPPY....I certainly wasn't.

Oh that's Right......HOPE....What HOPE?

My first suicide attempt was over a man
At Sweet Sixteen
A man I had waited four years for...
My Older brother's younger friend
Five years my senior
When I found out he'd had
Another girlfriend within a month
I nearly Shot myself with a double barrel
The Practise shot was enough to put me off....
That was my first real depressive incident
I think I went to bed for a week
My Sister and her girlfriend Kim
Tried desperately to coax me out of the bedroom.
After that I went Psychiatric Nursing
A Nurse called Bob Monk
Took me on a date
Apparently I went to a Sauna Parlour
And threw my engagement ring
Down the toilet
I don't remember anything of the night
I was only told this much later by my Sister
Who knows, I could have been gang raped....
That would explain my suddenly, very promiscuous, behaviour.
Who knows...perhaps Bob Monk would like to tell me
I found out that Bob already had a girlfriend
I got a Lecture from my first love's Uncle
That had been a Priest
And Sacked for being Bi-Polar
Even though I got an A in the theory
And the Practical was a doddle
I was told to become an Artist
My first love's Sister
Who was Head Nurse
At Kingseat
Warned me never to admit to a Mental Illness
When I rang her for help
She informed me that I might never get a job, etc, etc.
And this is all coming from the Head Nurse of the Institution
Already I knew I had virtually a life-time ahead of me of
"Fornicating with Spiders"
I went with my first love to a Sheep Station
And tried to commit Suicide with Pain Killers and Alcohol.
Hope was not my Best Friend!
Hope is a fairy tale that with kid Our Psychiatric Sufferers with...
Whilst we condescend with every platitude in the Book!

I thought about Crawling back.....

To my New Psychiatric Nurse
But I decided to try going without Medication
And distancing myself from my toxic relationship
With my Sister
She's the one that rocks my Boat
She says she wants to help
Whilst condemning me
And judging me
By being bullying and abusive
And always blaming my behaviour
To take advantage
And then twist the finger of blame
Onto me
It is almost Sociopathic
She spends her time
Sabotaging my relationships
And it takes enormous Courage
To walk away from her Shadow
but I feel the weight lifting off me already
No amount of Psychiatric Medicine
Could put paid to the damage
She has wreaked in my life anyway
No Drug can protect you from thirty years
Of Character Assassination
Because your father Raped you
And they took his side for the money!
Utterly Disturbed it took me thirty years
To realise what a dangerous and precarious
Situation I had got myself into
God Bless my father
For in spite of what he did
He was KIND by Comparison
Lust is a Deadly Sin
But Greed is even Uglier!

I remember....

Coming home to my mother
In bed every afternoon
On a diet of Antipsychotic
Largactol
To be precise
Now my little brother
Is going the same way
Can't remember to put lids on buckets, etc.
I'm so sick of the Platitudes
The put downs
And the Degradation
I would plant myself
Outside Parliament
Waiting to be Euthanised
If it wasn't for my Son
But the point is
This can't go on forever
Not to Our Children's Children!!!

I'm Still Nauseous

When Epilim is known to cause nausea and itching
I'm advised to go off my Anti-depressants
Have Quetiapine
Which makes me even itchier
And now I've got the Restless leg Syndrome
That Olanzepine caused
Along with the Tardive Dyskinesia
When your own Son coins a phrase for you
That your occupation is
"Fornicating with Spiders"
Because that is how little you do...............
And even he notices the Tardive Dyskinesia
And the Psychiatrist doesn't
When your mind "Echoes"
Because it is so stuck
From Antipsychotics shutting down the Dopamine in your Brain
Haven't I the right
To ask Questions
And point out the
Obvious failings of the
Psychiatric System
We're all so HOT on
PLATITUDE
When it comes to the Mentally Ill
And covering up
Our mistakes
Is basically all we do here
In New Zealand
I feel like "An enraged Weasel in a Cage"
And I am far from a "Happy Camper"

HELP
HELP
HELP
S
O
S
TO TINKERMAN

And now I'm off

Anti Depressants
Was that in the best interests
Am I Manic?

Is it Right?

To Bury the victim
And Watch from Afar
Nobody Nobody even reads
For everyone is 
Too Ashamed to talk
About Mental Illness
We are only Allowed to be happy
Isn't it Better to be Honest
To farm Our Brothers
And Sisters
as Guinea Pigs
Everyone is Ashamed to even Comment
What is going on??????
When I am Dust
I am your Equal
For What difference
Is there between Humans
We all wake to enjoy the Day
No matter what
Creed or Colour
Or State of Health
Shouldn't We all enjoy this Earth?
Upon this Earth
I have only
Ever Known
Shame
For being 
Born to Mental Illness
to Live with Mental Illness
And to Die
With Mental Illness
If you respected what was Right
In the first place
I would not be left
Mindless at an Early Age
This is How We must NOT treat Our Fellows
I BELIEVE
+
+
+

And the Truth is.....That We don't like the TRUTH

How can we go on
Invalidating Our Fellow Human Beings?
How can we do this?
I have only Injustice
I was accused of having a good Brain once
Once Upon a time when I can't remember
I can only
Attest 
That We are going the 
WRONG WAY
In treating the Mentally Ill
This is a Global Issue
That Our fellow Humans
Are literally Deprived
Of their Minds
And left to fend for themselves
In Hostile Communities
The Lone Wolfs
The Nutters with their Nervous Twitches
When will We Acknowledge the
RIGHTS
Of Our Fellow Human Beings
Alexa
I still Love your friendship
But I hide my lost mind
I grow
Queerer
And Angrier by the Week
Because drugs
Introduce a State of
Permanent Angry Psychosis
I didn't possess a Switch Blade
I was Gentle
We must Nurture the Mentally Ill
Not Reduce them to Shells???

I just sacked my Psychiatric Nurse

I got a new Nurse but she was so obviously in Support of her Colleague and talking down to me that I told her not to bother coming to see me.  Peter Skilton was like a broken record trying to accuse me of still smoking truck loads of marijuana, playing down Tardive dyskinesia, and trying to farm me out to a G.P. before they'd even settled me on to a Psychiatric Drug that suited me.  When I told my new nurse this she told me to let it go.  They cause serious damage and don't give a damn for their patients suffering and then they tell me to let it go.  If I had some of my father's gelignite I would be tempted to light it in the Manaaki Centre today.  Poor Dr Essali...........

Quetiapine and Epilim

I've been put on Epilim and Quitiapine
They are all DANGEROUS to your physical health
But at least I have the most vivid wonderful dreams
on Quetiapine
Dream't of my old boyfriend Simoon in Hamilton
Apparently I was taking up work in the Coal Mines
And was going back to my old flat
Didn't want to wake up to a Cold, dreary day

The Culture of Psychiatry

The Culture here in New Zealand
Has ACC at the basic "Health Care"
Does it help the Client
I'm stepping into
Dangerous territory here
But if We can get away with
Causing Cancer in Our clients
Simply because they are
Psychiatric
If as a Human Being
I do not measure on the Radar
And can be
Inadvertently
Agreed
Directed to
Chronic Brain Impairment
We Simply cannot
go on doing this
Talk to Big brother
America
Come up with
Something 
FAIR
Something
Equal
For the Mentally Ill
Please don't
Forever
Kick them when they are down
That is why Suicides Happen
I'm just One
Isolated Human Being
But there are
Thousands and Thousands
Of them
Spare the ones
Living Cold on the Streets
The babies in Cars
Those in Garages
Living cheap
Because We place
Little value on their lives
The Disadvantaged
This is not a Game
We have to be
HONEST
to Our Own failure
It's a Hostile Environment to Raise Our Young
As if We must somehow Crawl over each other
to get to the TOP
When We should Value One another
As equals to God's Rights on Earth
We cannot stand by and Punish
the Mentally Weak
We must Protect them
That is my Plea

Your Honour

Hypocrisy

The Psychiatric Nurses work, by far, the hardest, and get much less credit than the Psychiatrists that they work for.  But they say that they are working for the patient whilst firmly remaining the Pets of the Psychiatrists.  I suppose if they challenged the Psychiatrist they would lose their jobs.  It's REALITY I suppose.  No matter how sick you get on the Psychiatric Medicines they will put it down to anything other than their "Blessed Virginal Drugs".  I suppose if you are prepared to support such hypocrisy you don't deserve to get paid too well for it.

Put the Psychiatrist on my Income for a month and me on His Income and I might be recommending Antidepressants for the Psychiatrist.  We are all such HYPOCRITES it makes me laugh!

Make my Day

Comment

So I have an Audience

Or is it just me looking?
It gives me something to do
Other than Concentrate on
"Retardive Dyskinesia"
Don't you just love the names
They dream up for the Mentally Ill
Apparently I'm B.A.D.
Psychiatric Medicine
In fact COMPOUNDS
The Mental Ill Health
Of Psychiatric Patients
Short term maybe
But Long term Solution
Bullshit
I bet there's hardly a Doctor
Or Psychiatrist
That would happily take these Medications
And yet they dish them out like lollies 
To Children
Do we deserve this sort of Punishment?
Where's the justification
In what we like to think of
As a Humane Society?
If we gave them a Town
Where everyone was Mentally Ill
And there was no Prejudice
The "Mentally Ill" usually have more brains
So they might just do better than the average town.
Give them a Leg Up
Give them a chance
Give them rewards
Don't just pat yourselves on the back
For even tolerating them
It's Archaic
And Barbaric
Please CHANGE
The Status Quo
Before Millions
And Millions more Human beings
Suffer unnecessarily
Because they bear the Stigma
Of Mental Illness
PLEASE

My Dream for people with Psychiatric Problems

My Dream for people that
Present
With Mental Health Issues
Would be that we
First find out
If the sufferer
Is being Victimised
In the family Unit
And Offer them
Indépendant Living accommodation
And Employment
Whereby you have
A roll over system
For all Employees
So that in their
Absence
From illness
Or holiday
Another
Trained fellow psychiatric patient
In good health
Act as a Locum
would in a Doctors Surgery
We would also give them
Health Insurance
And Buffer them
Against Poverty
For it is Poverty
That destroys Human Souls
That is my Dream
It is simply not enough to try and mainstream Us
And expect Us to float
In a vicious Society
That more oft than not
Completely Rejects
The Mentally Ill
Where is the conscience?
Where is the Humanity?

N.B.

Severity of the illness, alcohol or illicit drugs had no effect in the results in the Survey on chronic Brain Damage from Antipsychotics.  Which means we really are CRUEL towards the Mentally Ill when we use medication as our first line of Treatment.  We are not Shielding and Protecting the vulnerable.  We are PUNISHING them!

The Psychiatrists love to blame Illicit Drugs but they have little or no relevance when compared to the damage done by Psychiatric Drugs as stated below...

Brain Damage Caused by Neuroleptic Psychiatric Drugs

In the past two decades, countless medical studies have shown that use of neuroleptic psychiatric drugs (also known as antipsychotics) is associated with structural brain changes, especially when taking high dosages for a long time. These brain changes can include actual shrinkage of the higher level parts of the brain. The shrinkage can be seen in brain scans and autopsy studies. In response to industry defenders who claim that this shrinkage is from the "mental illness," studies show neuroleptics lead to similar brain changes in animals. While the medical side of large libraries has this information, the public media side of the library does not. In other words, the public, patients and their families are not being informed about what medicine has long known. 

 Ron Unger: Latest News on Brain Tissue Shrinkage from Antipsychotic Drugs

Ron Unger, chair of MindFreedom Lane County affiliate, is a full time mental health counselor, who has raised concerns about the way the neuroleptic or "antipsychotic" psychiatric drugs have been linked to shrinkage of brain tissue. 

 Neuroleptics shrink brains in monkeys

In this study, both an older neuroleptic (Haldol or "haloperidol") and a newer atypical neuroleptic (Zyprexa or "olanzapine") caused significant shrinkage in the higher level parts of the brains in monkeys. Source: Neuropsychopharmacology 9 March 2005 

 Medical articles on neuroleptic brain damage

These are a few of the many mainstream medical articles indicating that using neuroleptic psychiatric drugs (also known as antipsychotics) can lead to significant structural brain damage. 

 Scientific article: Neuroleptic (antipsychotic) drugs may cause cell death.

This medical research revealed that the neuroleptics (also known as antipsychotics) may not only shrink the brain, but cause actual cell death.

 Neuroleptic psychiatric drugs apparently impact brain cell numbers.

Here's a follow-up study to the other study of monkeys given neuroleptics (see related content below), "Effect of Chronic Exposure to Antipsychotic Medication on Cell Numbers in the Parietal Cortex of Macaque Monkeys"

 More about how neuroleptics are shown to harm monkey brains.

More about neuroleptic damage to monkey brains from Biol Psychiatry 2008 April 15: "Effect of chronic antipsychotic exposure on astrocyte and oligodendrocyte numbers in macaque monkeys"

 A Conversation With Nancy C. Andreasen

The New York Times reports an extremely important discussion with psychiatrist and neuroscientist Nancy C. Andreasen. In he conversation, Prof. Andreasen speaks out about her findings that neuroleptic psychiatric drugs (also known as "antipsychotics") are leading to significant brain atrophy -- or shrinkage -- in patients. 

 Robert Whitaker on Neuroleptic "Brain Damage" Debate

In the "climate crisis" controversy there are deniers, people who are putting out misinformation to cloud the debate about the greenhouse effect. The same thing is true in the debate about brain damage caused by the neuroleptic drugs, also known as antipsychotics. Some scientists, instead of warning the public about the many studies regarding massive brain changes induced by neuroleptics, are hypothesizing - based on fragmentary and contradictory research - that neuroleptics somehow help prevent brain damage. Here Robert Whitaker, in his Mad in America blog, analyzes some of these claim as aired on the PBS national television show, PBS.

 Permanent muscle twitching from antipsychotics: Tardive Dyskinesia and Tardive Dystonia

It's been known since the 1950's that the family of psychiatric drugs called antipsychotics -- also known as neuroleptics -- can lead to involuntary muscular movements that can often be permanent. Among these are the "TD's," which stands for both Tardive Dyskinesia and Tardive Dystonia. Since the 1990's, the psychiatric industry has reassured the public that newer neuroleptics cause far less TD. However, now that the data is in, more recent medical studies show that the rate for TD caused by newer antipsychotics is "more similar" to the rate by the older antipsychotics than the the medical field generally believed. That means that the mental health industry has falsely reassured millions of people since the 1990's that their risk of TD is lower than reality. TD can range from mild twitches, to extremely disfiguring spasms.

 Archives of General Psychiatry: Neuroleptics Shrink Brain Volume

An article in the February 2011 Archives of General Psychiatry, "Long-term Antipsychotic Treatment and Brain Volumes" by Ho, Andreasen, et al. describes a study that points to antipsychotic drugs as a major cause of brain shrinkage. The study found that over 7 to 14 years, "More antipsychotic drug treatment, including duration and intensity, was linked to greater declines in brain volume. Severity of disease, alcohol and illegal drug use had no effect."

 Bob Whitaker on Nancy Andreasen finding that neuroleptics (antipsychotics) lead to brain shrinkage

Journalist Robert Whitaker blogs here on Psychology Today web site about what he calls the "bomb shell" of researcher Nancy Andreasen: That neuroleptic (antipsychotic) psychiatric drugs can lead to brain shrinkage of the frontal lobes, the part that makes us human. 

 The Traumatized Brain: Investigating injury, recovery, and repair 

Psychiatrists often argue that to prove "brain damage" from a psychiatric procedure, whether psychotropic drugs or electroshock, we'd have to prove masses of brain cells dying. Whether or not there are studies about certain psychiatric procedures leading to mass brain cell death, here is one of the latest theories about the mechanism of brain damage following enormous blasts from "improvised explosive devices" to soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. It turns out that brain damage even from a large bomb can result in far more complex changes than cell death to one of the most complex networks in the known universe: the brain. Excerpt: "During a blast, a quick pressure wave rips through the air; the question is what happens when that wave meets brain tissue. Parker says many people assumed that blast-induced TBI damages the brain by ripping small holes in brain cells, causing them to die. He had a different theory: that the mechanical forces of a blast might trigger a chemical shake-up within the cells, initiated by proteins called integrins at the cell surface." The below is a link to an from article by Courtney Humphries published in the Features section of Harvard Magazine - May/June 2012, pages 36 to 41.

 Antipsychotic brain damage in those with dementia (especially Lewy Body)

People diagnosed with dementia are especially sensitive to neuroleptics (also known as antipsychotics). In a way, these folks are the 'canary in the coal mine,' because an antipsychotic can cause rapid and significant brain changes, including neuroleptic malignant syndrome (which can be fatal). Especially hypersensitive are those with a variety of dementia where the brain has something called "Lewy Bodies" (which are visible under microscopic examination of the brain. More than one millions Americans have Dementia with Lewy Bodies, or DLB. Here's a UK General Practice Notebook plainly explaining the dangers of neuroleptics and dementia. These dangers can apply to everyone, but they are especially pronounced with people who have DLB.

 Brain shrinkage seen in those taking antipsychotic medications 

The well-respected Los Angeles Times ran an article about a scientific study indicating that taking neuroleptic psychiatric drugs - also known as 'antipychotics' - may shrink the brain. 

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About Dopamine

Psychosis and antipsychotic drugs[edit]

Main article: Psychosis

Psychiatrists in the early 1950s discovered that a class of drugs known as typical antipsychotics (also known as major tranquilizers), were often effective at reducing the psychoticsymptoms of schizophrenia.^[90] The introduction of the first widely used antipsychotic, chlorpromazine (Thorazine), in the 1950s, led to the release of many patients with schizophrenia from institutions in the years that followed.^[90] By the 1970s researchers understood that these typical antipsychotics worked as antagonists on the D2 receptors.^[90][91] This realization led to the so-called dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia, which postulates that schizophrenia is largely caused, by hyperactivity of brain dopamine systems.^[92] The dopamine hypothesis drew additional support from the observation that psychotic symptoms were often intensified by dopamine-enhancing stimulants such as methamphetamine, and that these drugs could also produce psychosis in healthy people if taken in large enough doses.^[92] In the following decades other atypical antipsychotics that had fewer serious side effects were developed.^[90] Many of these newer drugs do not act directly on dopamine receptors, but instead produce alterations in dopamine activity indirectly.^[93] These drugs were also used to treat other psychoses.^[90] Antipsychotic drugs have a broadly suppressive effect on most types of active behavior, and particularly reduce the delusional and agitated behavior characteristic of overt psychosis.^[91] There remains substantial dispute, however, about how much of an improvement the patient experiences on these drugs.^[94]

Later observations, however, have caused the dopamine hypothesis to lose popularity, at least in its simple original form.^[92] For one thing, patients with schizophrenia do not typically show measurably increased levels of brain dopamine activity.^[92] Also, other dissociative drugs, notably ketamine and phencyclidine that act on glutamate NMDA receptors (and not on dopamine receptors) can produce psychotic symptoms.^[92] Perhaps most importantly, those drugs that do reduce dopamine activity are a very imperfect treatment for schizophrenia: they only reduce a subset of symptoms, while producing severe short-term and long-term side effects.^[95] Even so, many psychiatrists and neuroscientists continue to believe that schizophrenia involves some sort of dopamine system dysfunction.^[90] As the "dopamine hypothesis" has evolved over time, however, the sorts of dysfunctions it postulates have tended to become increasingly subtle and complex.^[90]

However, the widespread use of antipsychotic drugs has long been controversial.^[94] There are several reasons for this. First, antipsychotic drugs are perceived as very aversive by people who have to take them, because they produce a general dullness of thought and suppress the ability to experience pleasure.^[96] Second, it is difficult to show that they act specifically against psychotic behaviors rather than merely suppressing all types of active behavior.^[94] Third, they can produce a range of serious side effects, including weight gain, diabetes, fatigue, sexual dysfunction, hormonal changes, and a type of serious movement disorder known as tardive dyskinesia.^[95]Some of these side effects may continue long after the cessation of drug use, or even permanently.^[95]

Queens Birthday Weekend

The Queen had another marvellous Birthday and I wish I possessed more of her Stoicism and Grace.  I have too much too commiserate about to be that gracious.  God Save Our Queen though.  I love her.

Visit to New Psychiatrist

I visited a new Psychiatrist.  A charming and kind Soul so I have had it verified.  I like him and hope the new regime helps.  But I've already noticed the Seraquel is making me have restless leg syndrome.  They all attack the Dopamine and that is what I need more of rather then less of if my concentration is to improve.  Theoretically it works but it seems to me like giggery pokery and all at the expense of the patient.  When Tardive dyskinesia occurs in New Zealand everyone just plays dumb.  Suffer the patient because certainly nobody else does.  I am pissed off to put it mildly but a nice Doctor does reduce the sting so I shall try and be courteous rather than ungracious.  When I wish they'd just get it over with and be kind and line me up against a wall and Shoot me I have to go on with the knowledge that I will inevitably completely loss my mind to Mental Illness and Antipsychotics.  It's a fatal combination and I believe it's time we started acknowledging that the Mentally Ill deserve a place and a Job rather than simply being Punished for having human frailties.  Please give them Rights and Dignity instead of insults and medication.....or just SHOOT them!