God chooses people to be prophets, but ignorant people call it madness only to confirm it with medication.
Instead of answering God's call, these poor individuals become the schizophrenic and the bipolar, which are only man-made labels. In the end they die before a cult can be established around them.
For this is how the modern world deals with God's chosen ones.
Even though a few people become schizophrenic, this is due to stress and the inability of the person to cope with it. However, few schizophrenics develop religious delusions, because most of them are unbelievers.
In contrast, people with bipolar personality disorder make up the bulk of people with religious delusions. This is because, contrary to schizophrenics, only their mood is affected. Were it not for the moodiness, people with bipolar might have become prophets. It depends on how well they handle stress.
However, these are but medical labels which is rejected by the religious masses due to their man-made nature.
In my opinion, a person would only become schizophrenic or bipolar when she does not heed God's calling but instead treats it as a mental condition. Indeed, the atypical antipsychotic risperidone is given to schizophrenics and bipolar people. People given it develop tolerance, and need to be weaned off it. If they don't, then schizophrenic symptoms such as anxiety, delusions, and hallucinations may develop as a result.
This is why medication should be a last resort, and any psychiatrist who insists that a patient has to take it for life is incompetent.
However, from the religious viewpoint, medication is useful only when it helps to induce visions. Therefore risperidone is almost as good as fasting, though there is anecdotal evidence for marijuana and other soft drugs. Even so, because risperidone is legal, it might be useful for the new visionary to use as would phenibut. YMMV.
Just think of risperidone as a doctor-approved entheogen that only works when you take as directed up to the recommended dosage for a few months, and later try to wean yourself off them. It is during the "cold-turkey" period that the visions may appear.
So, please give risperidone a try if you are bipolar and wish to become a God's chosen one. Otherwise, avoid the booze and pot, man.
Showing posts with label mental illness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mental illness. Show all posts
20131231
On satan, meds and mental illness (satire)
According to superstitous people, satan never commands, he only suggests.
He suggests by showing tempting visions to distract the faithful, though man's thoughts are easily distracted by this images of temptation.
However, satan is no master of mind control. Only a person has control of his or her mind, but may decide at his will to place faith in a leader out of compliant need of an authority figure.
With suggestion, satan might tempt such a figure, but that person may be so egocentric that the thought of being tempted by satan never crosses his mind. Yet he is not so egocentric as to deny the existence of God, which happens when one's ego becomes so big that the shining of his imagination is mistaken for "no God but I".
Today, the modern terms for human behavior influenced by satan are "mental illness" and "the evil that men do." However, most mental illnesses have nothing to do with satan according to the biochemical model. This theoretical model denies supernatural influence on human behavior, and substitutes the biochemical "superstition" for the spiritual one.
For the biochemical model of mental illness is a superstition because much of the reasoning that explains how psychiatric medications work is theory, and often certain medications do not work as the literature says.
A famous example of this is paxil (paroxetine): Glaxo-Smith-Kline claimed that the antidepressant had few withdrawal symptoms. However, it turned out that research which indicated that test patient indeed did have problems with withdrawal from the medication was suppressed and a big court case was fought over it.
Another example is mirtazapine, which is a sedative affecting the histamine receptors. When 30+ mg of mirtazapine is administered, the anti-histamine properties lead to changes in serotonin levels which affected the adrenalin receptors, leading to changes in alertness.
Mirtazapine actually reduces the serotonin-meditated side effect of nausea, due to its anti-histamine effect. As well, it also improves access to memory, resulting in a nootropic effect. Despite the initial anti-histamine effect, the brain adapts to the changes that mirtazapine causes, resulting in changes in sleep behavior at night, leading one to wake up hungry and willing to snack.
Though, the resulting sedation caused by mirtazapine results in the ability to realize that life is go on. Then, after three months on the drug, one day it will poop out and the only thing to do at that point is taper off rather than play the frustrating game of "hoping the medication still works", which involves taking the first 15 mg dose in the morning and the last dose at bedtime.
Finally, after tapering off and enduring the mild chaos in the mind due to it, even one dose of mirtazapine has the effect of strong sedation, so strong that I wonder why I ever took it!
Overall, mirtazapine is a strong sedative, rather than an antidepressant. Yet few people in the psychopharmacuetical field have re-explored the anti-histamine model of depression relief. Instead, the SSRIs are peddled, despite the fact that most of them cause akathasia (where one's anxiety morphs into an extreme case of nerves with attendant restlessness) which is actually due to serotonin re-uptake inhibition. If you actually want to calm a person down after taking an SSRI, just have mirtazapine prescribed with it, since its sedative effects are caused by anti-histamine side effects.
Doctors have a short explanation for the way medications work: "Modern science does not know exactly how psychopharmaceuticals work, but they work."
However, the ones that harm you less and allow you to explore the world actually work more effectively than the ones that lead you to seek the comfort of your bed and that occasional evening snack.
Originally posted: December 24, 2012 2:30 PM
Reference:
Paroxetine: Controversy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paroxetine#Controversy
He suggests by showing tempting visions to distract the faithful, though man's thoughts are easily distracted by this images of temptation.
However, satan is no master of mind control. Only a person has control of his or her mind, but may decide at his will to place faith in a leader out of compliant need of an authority figure.
With suggestion, satan might tempt such a figure, but that person may be so egocentric that the thought of being tempted by satan never crosses his mind. Yet he is not so egocentric as to deny the existence of God, which happens when one's ego becomes so big that the shining of his imagination is mistaken for "no God but I".
Today, the modern terms for human behavior influenced by satan are "mental illness" and "the evil that men do." However, most mental illnesses have nothing to do with satan according to the biochemical model. This theoretical model denies supernatural influence on human behavior, and substitutes the biochemical "superstition" for the spiritual one.
For the biochemical model of mental illness is a superstition because much of the reasoning that explains how psychiatric medications work is theory, and often certain medications do not work as the literature says.
A famous example of this is paxil (paroxetine): Glaxo-Smith-Kline claimed that the antidepressant had few withdrawal symptoms. However, it turned out that research which indicated that test patient indeed did have problems with withdrawal from the medication was suppressed and a big court case was fought over it.
Another example is mirtazapine, which is a sedative affecting the histamine receptors. When 30+ mg of mirtazapine is administered, the anti-histamine properties lead to changes in serotonin levels which affected the adrenalin receptors, leading to changes in alertness.
Mirtazapine actually reduces the serotonin-meditated side effect of nausea, due to its anti-histamine effect. As well, it also improves access to memory, resulting in a nootropic effect. Despite the initial anti-histamine effect, the brain adapts to the changes that mirtazapine causes, resulting in changes in sleep behavior at night, leading one to wake up hungry and willing to snack.
Though, the resulting sedation caused by mirtazapine results in the ability to realize that life is go on. Then, after three months on the drug, one day it will poop out and the only thing to do at that point is taper off rather than play the frustrating game of "hoping the medication still works", which involves taking the first 15 mg dose in the morning and the last dose at bedtime.
Finally, after tapering off and enduring the mild chaos in the mind due to it, even one dose of mirtazapine has the effect of strong sedation, so strong that I wonder why I ever took it!
Overall, mirtazapine is a strong sedative, rather than an antidepressant. Yet few people in the psychopharmacuetical field have re-explored the anti-histamine model of depression relief. Instead, the SSRIs are peddled, despite the fact that most of them cause akathasia (where one's anxiety morphs into an extreme case of nerves with attendant restlessness) which is actually due to serotonin re-uptake inhibition. If you actually want to calm a person down after taking an SSRI, just have mirtazapine prescribed with it, since its sedative effects are caused by anti-histamine side effects.
Doctors have a short explanation for the way medications work: "Modern science does not know exactly how psychopharmaceuticals work, but they work."
However, the ones that harm you less and allow you to explore the world actually work more effectively than the ones that lead you to seek the comfort of your bed and that occasional evening snack.
Originally posted: December 24, 2012 2:30 PM
Reference:
Paroxetine: Controversy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paroxetine#Controversy
20131204
Mass Media Perpetuates Propaganda In Wake of Shooting
By not reassuring the American people, CNN, Fox News and other mass media outlets have once again used propaganda to unnecessarily scare its viewers.
By perpetuating social stigma against mentally ill people, viewers who think they are mentally ill will hide at home because of the delusion perpetuated by this propaganda that they might be dangerous to others.
God forbid that they make the mistake of buying a gun!
Therefore I will emphasize once again that Adam Lanza most likely killed his mother, 20 children and 6 adults because his mother improperly stored her guns.
His motive was simple: jealous rage at his mother for neglecting him due to her hobby.
For he was afraid of being deprived of the close proximity to his mother by being sent to an institution suited to meet his need for a disciplined, orderly and regular environment.
Therefore, mental illness has nothing to do with this tragedy.
For Adam Lanza was not crazy: he was in a rage due to the fear reaction he had at the prospect of being deprived of his mother's love.
While this may sound irrational to a mature adult, it is reasonable speculation on my part to suggest this scenario, rather than the propaganda that mass media outlets peddle which socially stigmatizes the mentally ill, who are four times more like to be a victim of violence than to harm another person.
We also do not need the NRA to peddle this propaganda, too.
As well, the other propaganda being peddled is the "rising murder rate". In fact, murder rates are higher in cities with 250,000+ people than in rural towns with 10,000 people, but are slightly less than they were 20 years ago, in America.
Easy access to firearms is the sole problem. When you have one immature individual, you might have a mass school killer. It makes no difference about their gender or whether they are mentally ill.
This is a crime of passion by a young man whose own mother had fears of her own about the world. Those fears were exhibited by her growing interest in survivalism and in firearms (her hobby), which includes firearms training for both her and her son.
Quite possibly, she may have also favoured Adam to the point of inculcating in him the seeds of dependency. Today we have no way of knowing this, because both he and his mother are dead.
Even so, Adam Lanza is yet another example of how fear distorts mother love into such a strong bond between mother and child that the child expresses his rage at his mother in a tragic manner.
Originally written: January 3, 2013 at 11:50 PM
FBI Uniform Crime Reports Table 1
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
FBI Uniform Crime Reports Table 16
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
FBI Uniform Crime Repots Table 8
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting
By perpetuating social stigma against mentally ill people, viewers who think they are mentally ill will hide at home because of the delusion perpetuated by this propaganda that they might be dangerous to others.
God forbid that they make the mistake of buying a gun!
Therefore I will emphasize once again that Adam Lanza most likely killed his mother, 20 children and 6 adults because his mother improperly stored her guns.
His motive was simple: jealous rage at his mother for neglecting him due to her hobby.
For he was afraid of being deprived of the close proximity to his mother by being sent to an institution suited to meet his need for a disciplined, orderly and regular environment.
Therefore, mental illness has nothing to do with this tragedy.
For Adam Lanza was not crazy: he was in a rage due to the fear reaction he had at the prospect of being deprived of his mother's love.
While this may sound irrational to a mature adult, it is reasonable speculation on my part to suggest this scenario, rather than the propaganda that mass media outlets peddle which socially stigmatizes the mentally ill, who are four times more like to be a victim of violence than to harm another person.
We also do not need the NRA to peddle this propaganda, too.
As well, the other propaganda being peddled is the "rising murder rate". In fact, murder rates are higher in cities with 250,000+ people than in rural towns with 10,000 people, but are slightly less than they were 20 years ago, in America.
Easy access to firearms is the sole problem. When you have one immature individual, you might have a mass school killer. It makes no difference about their gender or whether they are mentally ill.
This is a crime of passion by a young man whose own mother had fears of her own about the world. Those fears were exhibited by her growing interest in survivalism and in firearms (her hobby), which includes firearms training for both her and her son.
Quite possibly, she may have also favoured Adam to the point of inculcating in him the seeds of dependency. Today we have no way of knowing this, because both he and his mother are dead.
Even so, Adam Lanza is yet another example of how fear distorts mother love into such a strong bond between mother and child that the child expresses his rage at his mother in a tragic manner.
Originally written: January 3, 2013 at 11:50 PM
FBI Uniform Crime Reports Table 1
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
FBI Uniform Crime Reports Table 16
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
FBI Uniform Crime Repots Table 8
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-...
Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting
20131128
How the State Fails Us (satire)
How does the State fail us ?
It fails us when politicians who claim to be ensuring the safety of its citizens put them at risk of injury either from overcrowding in mental health facilities, over-medication of patients by family doctors, and overreacting to mostly harmless people who daily beat the stigma.
Take, for example, the State's handling of mental health.
Only effective forms of medication are covered by state health insurance i.e. Medicaid/Medicare.
Medications deemed old and inefficient are not covered, nor are the newest ones approved in another jurisdiction universally available.
The State does so to protect people from harm, since it knows what is best for the People.
Yet it does not go further to protect the mentally ill from stigma, citing "free speech" when Hollywood stereotypes the mentally ill as evil in the guise of violent psychotics, zombies or agents of the Devil.
Could it be that the stigma of mental illness is manufactured by society to motivate each of us to pro-actively develop mental health strategies through education and therapy.
Perhaps the State implies through its administration of Medicaid/Medicare that medication does the least harm while allowing local government to section/hospitalize mentally ill people who pose potential harm to themselves or others.
At the same time, it surely cannot protect the People from benign sociopaths who become politicians. Why can't the State protect the People from politicians? While the laws of the State are often written to remedy social problems such as mental illness, they also ensure that "the rich get richer while the poor get poorer."
In this way, doing what's best for the People profits the State through the private sector. Hopefully it also helps us to promote the mental health of the People.
While ending the stigma of the mentally ill may not be profitable to the State, it still is a basic human right for the People.
Yet the free speech observed by Hollywood producers trades a few laughs gained by parodying the mentally ill for profit.
Even if the State fails us by helping the pharmaceutical corporations profit from increased psychiatric medication sales, that should provide adequate motivation to beat the stigma of mental illness daily.
If we want to end such stigma, then it is only worth watching a movie which casts mental illness in a negative light by discussing the stereotyping that casts the shadow stigma on the characters in it.
In that way, it is possible to educate family and friends about how stereotyping the mentally ill subtly promotes the stigma.
If we want to reduce the cost of lives lost due to over-medication, then prevention could save costs.
For not everyone wants to rush forward where the extremely nervous of people fear to tread.
Original post: June 25, 2010 1154H
Previous updated: March 15, 2013 2327H
Currently revised: November 28, 2013 0447H
It fails us when politicians who claim to be ensuring the safety of its citizens put them at risk of injury either from overcrowding in mental health facilities, over-medication of patients by family doctors, and overreacting to mostly harmless people who daily beat the stigma.
Take, for example, the State's handling of mental health.
Only effective forms of medication are covered by state health insurance i.e. Medicaid/Medicare.
Medications deemed old and inefficient are not covered, nor are the newest ones approved in another jurisdiction universally available.
The State does so to protect people from harm, since it knows what is best for the People.
Yet it does not go further to protect the mentally ill from stigma, citing "free speech" when Hollywood stereotypes the mentally ill as evil in the guise of violent psychotics, zombies or agents of the Devil.
Could it be that the stigma of mental illness is manufactured by society to motivate each of us to pro-actively develop mental health strategies through education and therapy.
Perhaps the State implies through its administration of Medicaid/Medicare that medication does the least harm while allowing local government to section/hospitalize mentally ill people who pose potential harm to themselves or others.
At the same time, it surely cannot protect the People from benign sociopaths who become politicians. Why can't the State protect the People from politicians? While the laws of the State are often written to remedy social problems such as mental illness, they also ensure that "the rich get richer while the poor get poorer."
In this way, doing what's best for the People profits the State through the private sector. Hopefully it also helps us to promote the mental health of the People.
While ending the stigma of the mentally ill may not be profitable to the State, it still is a basic human right for the People.
Yet the free speech observed by Hollywood producers trades a few laughs gained by parodying the mentally ill for profit.
Even if the State fails us by helping the pharmaceutical corporations profit from increased psychiatric medication sales, that should provide adequate motivation to beat the stigma of mental illness daily.
If we want to end such stigma, then it is only worth watching a movie which casts mental illness in a negative light by discussing the stereotyping that casts the shadow stigma on the characters in it.
In that way, it is possible to educate family and friends about how stereotyping the mentally ill subtly promotes the stigma.
If we want to reduce the cost of lives lost due to over-medication, then prevention could save costs.
For not everyone wants to rush forward where the extremely nervous of people fear to tread.
Original post: June 25, 2010 1154H
Previous updated: March 15, 2013 2327H
Currently revised: November 28, 2013 0447H
Mental Illness as Society's Reaction to Inappropriate Honesty (satire)
In order to deal with reality, we sometimes develop elaborate fictions to cover the past or a defect of character.
Apart from the ravages of drug abuse, including the psychosis resulting from B-vitamins deficiency, which is prevalent amongst chronic alcoholics and may be part of other forms of abuse - though never acknowledged, few people would consider their fictions as the cumulative effect of the clever white lies they daily say over the course of a lifetime.
Even when we are threatened by a mortal illness which is in part due to the idiosyncratic varieties of personality and their attendant mental habits, few of us are willing to admit that it is due to lying to ourselves about reality.
Might mental illness be due to a history of white lies used to handle reality?
Maybe so, maybe not. Consider the white lies the State feeds us daily both through law enforcement (e.g. cannabis drug laws) and the media, be it news and edutainment (talk shows, reality TV, movies and advertisement).
Indeed, propaganda might be both cause and effect of the human ability to conceal the truth by not mentioning the obvious.
Schizophrenia might just be an effect of a society that cannot handle honesty and truth 24/7.
Some civilizations fell because a few revolutionaries became too honest about their current situation and caused doubt amongst the representatives of the ruling body for a specific monarchy, only to have a civil war fuelled by differences in ideology (monarchy versus nationalism and later, socialism versus free-market capitalism).
Russia's descent into communism was a post-modern example of this.
Most recently, examples of ideological warfare include the political damage control occurring in America due to Wikileaks, the recent protests in the Maghreb (north Africa from Morocco to Egypt) and in the Middle East (especially Libya, Egypt and Syria), and the hype and propaganda on cable news.
With regard to society, the honest people tend to get penalized for their honesty.
If you are honest about your taxes, you pay more taxes; if you are honest about your sexual exploits, then you tend to either get cock-blocked or end up alone in your old age; if you are honest about your emotions, then you get misunderstood. If you keep being honest, then sensitive friends and loved ones might get annoyed and either threaten to end the relationship or find someone who will tell them the white lies they want to hear.
Although I'm exaggerating about honesty to prove a point, I'd like to emphasize that total honesty entails full disclosure.
On the prospect of full disclosure, most people are adverse to expose their indiscretions to the public due to the public scrutiny which may arise as a result of such disclosures. When faced with the prospect of honesty, we'd rather baulk and wonder, "What would the neighbours think?" In the end, such honesty might lead critics to ignore the Biblical adage that "he who has no sin may cast the first stone".
If mental illness is due to society's reaction to inappropriate honesty, then mental health is the result of the individual's pro-active use of appropriate honesty.
With honesty and in the face of total disclosure, perhaps there is an appropriate outlet for it, both through journal writing and especially on-line blogging.
Originally posted: February 3, 2011 at 9:24 AM
Previous update: 8/28/11 1:01 PM
Current update: 11/28/13 03:28 AM
Apart from the ravages of drug abuse, including the psychosis resulting from B-vitamins deficiency, which is prevalent amongst chronic alcoholics and may be part of other forms of abuse - though never acknowledged, few people would consider their fictions as the cumulative effect of the clever white lies they daily say over the course of a lifetime.
Even when we are threatened by a mortal illness which is in part due to the idiosyncratic varieties of personality and their attendant mental habits, few of us are willing to admit that it is due to lying to ourselves about reality.
Might mental illness be due to a history of white lies used to handle reality?
Maybe so, maybe not. Consider the white lies the State feeds us daily both through law enforcement (e.g. cannabis drug laws) and the media, be it news and edutainment (talk shows, reality TV, movies and advertisement).
Indeed, propaganda might be both cause and effect of the human ability to conceal the truth by not mentioning the obvious.
Schizophrenia might just be an effect of a society that cannot handle honesty and truth 24/7.
Some civilizations fell because a few revolutionaries became too honest about their current situation and caused doubt amongst the representatives of the ruling body for a specific monarchy, only to have a civil war fuelled by differences in ideology (monarchy versus nationalism and later, socialism versus free-market capitalism).
Russia's descent into communism was a post-modern example of this.
Most recently, examples of ideological warfare include the political damage control occurring in America due to Wikileaks, the recent protests in the Maghreb (north Africa from Morocco to Egypt) and in the Middle East (especially Libya, Egypt and Syria), and the hype and propaganda on cable news.
With regard to society, the honest people tend to get penalized for their honesty.
If you are honest about your taxes, you pay more taxes; if you are honest about your sexual exploits, then you tend to either get cock-blocked or end up alone in your old age; if you are honest about your emotions, then you get misunderstood. If you keep being honest, then sensitive friends and loved ones might get annoyed and either threaten to end the relationship or find someone who will tell them the white lies they want to hear.
Although I'm exaggerating about honesty to prove a point, I'd like to emphasize that total honesty entails full disclosure.
On the prospect of full disclosure, most people are adverse to expose their indiscretions to the public due to the public scrutiny which may arise as a result of such disclosures. When faced with the prospect of honesty, we'd rather baulk and wonder, "What would the neighbours think?" In the end, such honesty might lead critics to ignore the Biblical adage that "he who has no sin may cast the first stone".
If mental illness is due to society's reaction to inappropriate honesty, then mental health is the result of the individual's pro-active use of appropriate honesty.
With honesty and in the face of total disclosure, perhaps there is an appropriate outlet for it, both through journal writing and especially on-line blogging.
Originally posted: February 3, 2011 at 9:24 AM
Previous update: 8/28/11 1:01 PM
Current update: 11/28/13 03:28 AM
20130709
Marilyn Monroe: Unwitting Victim or Witting Agent of Destiny?
Does Marilyn Monroe represent a healthy ideal of American womanhood or hide a fear of hysteria among young American women today?
IMO Monroe presented a false facade of childlike innocence which actually hid her own personal fear of ending up in a mental hospital like her mother.
Thus, she is representative of a small minority of women whose mothers were taken advantage of by men.
However, Monroe's strategies that she employed through her many characters movies actually represents the fantasies of men about sexual stereotypes of women.
As well, her "dumb blonde" stereotypes are actually a clever facade designed to fool men, and sometimes women, into believing her to be more naîve than she actually was.
Yes, it was all an act. However, it is more likely that she was being taken advantage of by men, and doing tit for tat subtly.
I also see self deception at work in some of her characters, which suggests willingness to deceive oneself about the reality of the situation in order to escape anxiety about one's place in the world.
Even though Monroe appears to be a witting pawn of men, she too is a witting manipulator of men whose demeanor is a beautiful distraction from the fear all women have to face about destiny.
For Marilyn Monroe was especially afraid that she might end up mad in a mental hospital like her mother. My theory about why her mother ended up there is simplistic: she was taken advantage of by Marilyn's father and was not emotionally supported by her own mother (Marilyn's grandmother) due to her lifestyle.
Indeed, there is enough evidence to suggest her behavior from puberty to her death as indicative of child abuse. Furthermore, even though Marilyn's mother Gladys Baker was known to be mentally unstable, the etiology of her mental illness was never mentioned, probably due to a health respect about privacy of women with obvious signs of madness.
My guess is, Gladys Baker too might have been abused as a child. However, a clue appears in the early life of Marilyn Monroe when her maternal grandfather, Otis Elmer Monroe died of syphilis of the brain in 1909. He had been institutionalized at a mental hospital the previous year.
Thus the root of Gladys Baker's madness is syphilis, which was common around and before the turn of the 20th Century. As well, the death of a sibling may have been a childhood trauma which affected her deeply, and lead me to suspect that her own family were affected by their son's death.
As well, a history of depression runs in the family as Gladys' brother committed suicide after being let out of a mental asylum, and a grandfather committed suicide after struggling with depression.
Evidence of little or no emotional support appears when young Norma Jean Baker is rejected by her grandmother Della when Gladys Baker is rebuffed by her attempts to get her mother to look after the child.
As well, Marilyn Monroe's later characterization as thinking her first foster father, Albert Bollender, was a woman either indicates a hilarious story played for laughs, or the possible evidence that the foster father might have been either a cross dresser or closet homosexual who married in order to keep up appearances.
In actual fact, there is no Albert. Mr. Bollender's name was actually Wayne Bolender. Thus, the wikipedia entry below is full of inaccuracies.
Overall, Marilyn Monroe's early life as a child of the 1930s and early war era lacks a strong father figure, which is essential to a woman's character and adult emotional stability. Indeed, a healthy relationship with men may be maintained when a girl is free of childhood abuse and trauma, and a father or substitute father figure establishes and maintains a healthy role in her life.
I see little evidence of this occurring in young Norma Jean Baker's life before puberty. However, I see evidence that the future Marilyn Monroe adapted well to the lack of a father in her life.
Even so, the victimization of Monroe by her doctor led to her death from barbiturate poisoning. Her difficulties before her death are indicative of drug abuse, abuse that was facilitated by a doctor who may have overprescribed.
Merci Marilyn! Tu as joué le partie bien.
Reference:
Early life of Marilyn Monroe: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_life_of_Marilyn_Monroe
50 Playboy pictures of Marilyn Monroe hid from us: http://coed.com/2012/11/19/50-rarely-seen-marilyn-monroe-playboy-photos-in-celebration-of-the-nude-marilyn/#photoid=44
Marilyn Monroe on Marilyn documentary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyWW0bDnY28
In this documentary, you hear Marilyn Monroe's story in her own words.
20130614
Stress Kills
If n-acetylcysteine improves schizophrenia outcomes, why haven't most schizophrenia associations mentioned it?
Perhaps few of them believe mental illness is the precursor to autoimmune diseases.
Stress first makes you crazy; then later it attacks an organ. Later, you die.
Sitting on your ass in Zen meditation may not reduce stress, but it would go a long way to reducing physical and mental illness, autoimmune disease, and death.
Reference:
N-acetylcysteine: Potent Influenza Protection: http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2010/may2010_N-Acetyl-Cysteine_01.htm
Perhaps few of them believe mental illness is the precursor to autoimmune diseases.
Stress first makes you crazy; then later it attacks an organ. Later, you die.
Sitting on your ass in Zen meditation may not reduce stress, but it would go a long way to reducing physical and mental illness, autoimmune disease, and death.
Reference:
N-acetylcysteine: Potent Influenza Protection: http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2010/may2010_N-Acetyl-Cysteine_01.htm
N-acetylcysteine: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3044191/
Complexity of schizophrenia: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3505861/
Complexity of schizophrenia: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3505861/
20130607
The Medicalization of Mental Illness
The reason why mental illness is medicalized is because mental health professionals get a cut of taxpayers' money to prevent what is essentially eccentricity from developing into psychopathology.
For the mental health profession is well known for causing certain forms of mental illness to worsen into psychopathology through the use of drugs and a lack of meaningful therapy.
Though, acceptance and a job are more therapeutic than drugs. Indeed, drug therapy arises out of the biopsychiatric model of mental illness, which verges on a pseudo-science as there is no medical test which verifies most mental illnesses.
Yet mental health professionals make a lot of money from treating people who used to be eccentric but now have evolved a psychopathology due to their (mis)treatment.
Is it any wonder that sometimes suicide seems the only option out of the stigma of mental illness?
Even so, it is imperative for each person to overcome their diagnosis out of the positive liberty of realizing their potential, whether through therapy and/or work.
With regard to mental illness, you are not your diagnosis.
For the mental health profession is well known for causing certain forms of mental illness to worsen into psychopathology through the use of drugs and a lack of meaningful therapy.
Though, acceptance and a job are more therapeutic than drugs. Indeed, drug therapy arises out of the biopsychiatric model of mental illness, which verges on a pseudo-science as there is no medical test which verifies most mental illnesses.
Yet mental health professionals make a lot of money from treating people who used to be eccentric but now have evolved a psychopathology due to their (mis)treatment.
Is it any wonder that sometimes suicide seems the only option out of the stigma of mental illness?
Even so, it is imperative for each person to overcome their diagnosis out of the positive liberty of realizing their potential, whether through therapy and/or work.
With regard to mental illness, you are not your diagnosis.
20130606
Mental Illness as Social Construct Manufactured by Society and the Individual
Contrary to what the psychiatrists have decided, mental illness is a rough collaboration between society and the individual based on society's opinion of the individual's mental state based on behavior without due care for its genesis in the individual's family of origin.
In sbort, mental illness, as well as mental health is a product of the complex interaction between the individual and society. It is not all in the head of the individual, but is always on the mind of each and every person they meet.
As well, mental illness is the product of social control in that society promotes the fallacy of liberty from coercion yet fails to place any guidelines on how to liberate the potential of the individual in a functional manner.
In sbort, mental illness, as well as mental health is a product of the complex interaction between the individual and society. It is not all in the head of the individual, but is always on the mind of each and every person they meet.
As well, mental illness is the product of social control in that society promotes the fallacy of liberty from coercion yet fails to place any guidelines on how to liberate the potential of the individual in a functional manner.
20130605
Note to Mass Media: Stop Putting Amanda Bynes in a Bad Light
I object to the unflattering pictures of Amanda Bynes being used.
This is only manufacturing the fallacy that Amanda Bynes is in the midst of a meltdown.
As well, the articles attacking Bynes have very little verification from a third-party health official sound byte.
In short, mass media outlets are complicit in manufacturing the rumor that Bynes is not right in the head. All of it is just a careful ploy to peddle your paper based on your vile contempt for Amanda Bynes.
Mass media did the same thing to Amy Winehouse and recently, Justin Bieber. You're not publishing the truth anymore. You're just using bits and pieces of facts to perpetuate stigma against mental illness to profit from.
Shame on you!
According to Thomas Szasz, psychiatry actively obscures the difference between misbehavior and disease, in its quest to help or harm parties in conflicts. By calling certain people "diseased", psychiatry attempts to deny them responsibility as moral agents, in order to better control them.
Sadly though when mass media plays arm-chair psychiatry on celebrities, they manufacture the illusion that their target is mentally ill.
In essence, mass media is used as form of social control of not only celebrities but also society itself.
This is only manufacturing the fallacy that Amanda Bynes is in the midst of a meltdown.
As well, the articles attacking Bynes have very little verification from a third-party health official sound byte.
In short, mass media outlets are complicit in manufacturing the rumor that Bynes is not right in the head. All of it is just a careful ploy to peddle your paper based on your vile contempt for Amanda Bynes.
Mass media did the same thing to Amy Winehouse and recently, Justin Bieber. You're not publishing the truth anymore. You're just using bits and pieces of facts to perpetuate stigma against mental illness to profit from.
Shame on you!
According to Thomas Szasz, psychiatry actively obscures the difference between misbehavior and disease, in its quest to help or harm parties in conflicts. By calling certain people "diseased", psychiatry attempts to deny them responsibility as moral agents, in order to better control them.
Sadly though when mass media plays arm-chair psychiatry on celebrities, they manufacture the illusion that their target is mentally ill.
In essence, mass media is used as form of social control of not only celebrities but also society itself.
20130203
Child Abuse and Its Relation to Addictions and Mental Health
My best friend was FM. After hearing how he grew up in Surrey as a kid, I realized that child abuse is also the prime factor in alcoholism and drug abuse.
However, the rest of this blog post isn't about him but is chiefly concerned with the prevalence of child abuse in the addiction and mental health field.
Due to the fact that no health professional can handle trauma without getting tripped up by its intensity, child abuse sometimes overlooked by mental health professionals.
As well, I learned that child abuse and neglect is sometimes swept under the rug by health professionals because of the costs in burnout due to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder induced by detailed revelations of the abuse.
Victims of child abuse or neglect are given a limited (PTSD) time in psychotherapy (2 years) because therapy does not work with personality disorders caused by PTSD from the abuse.
However, any health professional who reacts negatively to a person hurting from child abuse, even though both parents are dead, acts in an unprofessional manner when that mental health consumer is told to "get over it."
When a person chooses to live in her own hell, the challenge is in offering her choices that show to her the futility of living in hell.
A lack of belief in heaven and a God that is forgiving is lost on child abuse victims whose father used to abuse them as children because the only father they knew was mean to them.
Religion is also lost on them when the abuse was done by a certain Christian sect. Such Christian sects attract child abusers and other sinners who break Jesus' rule against harming children, because it is so easy to control the church hierarchy by invoking the name of the Devil or Satan to prevent exposure of the crime.
However, the rest of this blog post isn't about him but is chiefly concerned with the prevalence of child abuse in the addiction and mental health field.
Due to the fact that no health professional can handle trauma without getting tripped up by its intensity, child abuse sometimes overlooked by mental health professionals.
As well, I learned that child abuse and neglect is sometimes swept under the rug by health professionals because of the costs in burnout due to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder induced by detailed revelations of the abuse.
Victims of child abuse or neglect are given a limited (PTSD) time in psychotherapy (2 years) because therapy does not work with personality disorders caused by PTSD from the abuse.
However, any health professional who reacts negatively to a person hurting from child abuse, even though both parents are dead, acts in an unprofessional manner when that mental health consumer is told to "get over it."
When a person chooses to live in her own hell, the challenge is in offering her choices that show to her the futility of living in hell.
A lack of belief in heaven and a God that is forgiving is lost on child abuse victims whose father used to abuse them as children because the only father they knew was mean to them.
Religion is also lost on them when the abuse was done by a certain Christian sect. Such Christian sects attract child abusers and other sinners who break Jesus' rule against harming children, because it is so easy to control the church hierarchy by invoking the name of the Devil or Satan to prevent exposure of the crime.
20130201
Beating the Stigma of Mental Illness
Even though psychosiphobia is an invented term to describe society's fear of psychosis, mass media has done a disservice by either playing it for laughs or taking it all to seriously.
This fear appears in the minds of people who think if I tough it out, then I can beat mental illness just by thinking it away and gave patience waiting for my inner demons to leave me...
What magical thinking is this??
It's unfair to discriminate and stigmatize a person for his social ineptness even when he is supportive of tolerance of mental health consumers.
For mental health consumers, the peaceful confrontation is the safest path to survival.
If you don't like me for a few of my more eccentric views, and if you ignore the evidence as I've presented it, then my fear is validated — the fear that if you got to know me better, you'd called me weird and scary, and avoid close contact with me.
I agree with your view but we need to do more than complain about this problem that people with psychiatric disabilities face. This problem is called STIGMA.
Most mentally ill people are no more likely to harm others or even be violent to friends, loved ones, or even strangers.
Possibly only psychopaths are more likely to use violence on others.
A world leader with depression is an asset to the world, and a medicated world leader is as effective as a world leader in a wheelchair.
With therapy — whether from a therapist or of the self-help kind — we are mostly harmless.
So I am fed up with the stigmatization of people with psychiatric disabilities.
I am not crazy, a nutjob or totally insane; I have a mental illness. While you may think I might be scary and weird sometimes, that's only my anxiety talking.
It really isn't the real me.
So give the mentally ill a chance.
Thank you for your support!
psychosiphobia: http://wayback.archive.org/web/20061202024408/http://psychosiphobia.com/
This fear appears in the minds of people who think if I tough it out, then I can beat mental illness just by thinking it away and gave patience waiting for my inner demons to leave me...
What magical thinking is this??
It's unfair to discriminate and stigmatize a person for his social ineptness even when he is supportive of tolerance of mental health consumers.
For mental health consumers, the peaceful confrontation is the safest path to survival.
If you don't like me for a few of my more eccentric views, and if you ignore the evidence as I've presented it, then my fear is validated — the fear that if you got to know me better, you'd called me weird and scary, and avoid close contact with me.
I agree with your view but we need to do more than complain about this problem that people with psychiatric disabilities face. This problem is called STIGMA.
Most mentally ill people are no more likely to harm others or even be violent to friends, loved ones, or even strangers.
Possibly only psychopaths are more likely to use violence on others.
A world leader with depression is an asset to the world, and a medicated world leader is as effective as a world leader in a wheelchair.
With therapy — whether from a therapist or of the self-help kind — we are mostly harmless.
So I am fed up with the stigmatization of people with psychiatric disabilities.
I am not crazy, a nutjob or totally insane; I have a mental illness. While you may think I might be scary and weird sometimes, that's only my anxiety talking.
It really isn't the real me.
So give the mentally ill a chance.
Thank you for your support!
psychosiphobia: http://wayback.archive.org/web/20061202024408/http://psychosiphobia.com/
20130112
Overmedication in Psychwards: Its Cure
A hospital psychward demands order.
That's why they're medicated.
Most psychiatric professionals are not in the business of administering therapy in such a setting because working in such a setting only makes them chump change.
Besides most of them know that psychoanalysis usually does not "cure" a patient but merely ensures that he'll be back for more of the same.
Medicating patients in a psychward is more efficient use of resources, and often more humane than the mental hospitals of the past.
Sadly though, the reason why most patients are in a psychward is because nobody actually listens to them and takes care of their needs at home.
Sometimes, a psychward actually has caring professionals to give the minimum of care.
That is because it is difficult to inculcate a caring and compassionate attitude in the profession.
You either have it or you burn out.
For the whole purpose of medication is to avoid burn out, because even a caring professional will be overwhelmed by the horror stories some of the mentally ill have to tell.
If it weren't for the fact that most parents haven't gotten their shit together and take out their unresolved issues on their children, the world would have less rates of mental illness than they currently!
20 percent of people == 1.3 billion worldwide who have a mental illness, which in itself is evidence of child abuse and neglect in their immediate families.
When we learn how to effectively address the risks which lead to abuse and neglect, that'll be when the rates go down.
However, it is the stress of a fast-paced society that breeds mental illness due to ineffective coping skills.
That may be because public education is a fast-paced stream of academics lacking even the basics of teaching kids how to handle stress.
However, I'll bet you teaching them the basics of meditation can and will help to reduce transforming benign schizotypies into mental illness.
And I'll be you too that in nations where the people are obligated to spend five years of Buddhist training (become monks and nuns) before being allowed to become householders probably have lower rates of mental illness than secular nations that manufacture consumers who are first and foremost obligated to become productive members of a fast-paced society, often without giving them a wide range of coping skills to deal with stress.
That's why they're medicated.
Most psychiatric professionals are not in the business of administering therapy in such a setting because working in such a setting only makes them chump change.
Besides most of them know that psychoanalysis usually does not "cure" a patient but merely ensures that he'll be back for more of the same.
Medicating patients in a psychward is more efficient use of resources, and often more humane than the mental hospitals of the past.
Sadly though, the reason why most patients are in a psychward is because nobody actually listens to them and takes care of their needs at home.
Sometimes, a psychward actually has caring professionals to give the minimum of care.
That is because it is difficult to inculcate a caring and compassionate attitude in the profession.
You either have it or you burn out.
For the whole purpose of medication is to avoid burn out, because even a caring professional will be overwhelmed by the horror stories some of the mentally ill have to tell.
If it weren't for the fact that most parents haven't gotten their shit together and take out their unresolved issues on their children, the world would have less rates of mental illness than they currently!
20 percent of people == 1.3 billion worldwide who have a mental illness, which in itself is evidence of child abuse and neglect in their immediate families.
When we learn how to effectively address the risks which lead to abuse and neglect, that'll be when the rates go down.
However, it is the stress of a fast-paced society that breeds mental illness due to ineffective coping skills.
That may be because public education is a fast-paced stream of academics lacking even the basics of teaching kids how to handle stress.
However, I'll bet you teaching them the basics of meditation can and will help to reduce transforming benign schizotypies into mental illness.
And I'll be you too that in nations where the people are obligated to spend five years of Buddhist training (become monks and nuns) before being allowed to become householders probably have lower rates of mental illness than secular nations that manufacture consumers who are first and foremost obligated to become productive members of a fast-paced society, often without giving them a wide range of coping skills to deal with stress.
20130103
Watch Out for These Pharmaceutical Companies
Over the next year, these are the eight pharmacuetical companies to watch in the news.
No, this isn't a stock market tip. Rather, this is a list of pharmaceutical companies which manufacture psychiatric drugs for ADD, depression, schizophrenia and related forms of mental illness.
They are also the ones who profit from the bio-chemical theory of modern psychiatry, which is verges on being a pseudo-science mainly because it ignores the social causes of mental illness (child abuse, child neglect, bullying and related causes).
I feel strongly that the social model of mental illness will reduce the stigma that the medical model of deficit and pathology has brought to us. Included in the medical model is the bio-chemical theory of how psychopharmaceutical drugs work.
However, without a grasp of the social model, it would be almost impossible for psychotherapy to educate the mental health consumer during therapy sessions as a vital part of proper management of symptoms and effect remission.
Astra Zeneca
Glaxo Smith Kline
Johnson
Lilly
Merck
Novartis
Pfizer
Roche
It is up to anyone concerned about Big Pharma to research each company's involvement in lawsuits, including out of court settlements with each of them and the plaintiffs, where the companies effectively "bribed" survivors of killings and suicides related to mental illness.
If I did this for you, then you'd just take my word for it and not actively participate in monitoring Big Pharm's slippery slope in providing effective medication for mental health consumers which were actually unsafe to take.
So I ask anyone who is experience with Google to search each company's name with the keywords "murder", "suicide" and "killing".
In doing so, you will actively particpate in seeing the social cost to the People by the State in following the medical model of mental illness blindly without moderation by a reciprocal social model.
Thank you for helping me out. Please feel free to post comments.
No, this isn't a stock market tip. Rather, this is a list of pharmaceutical companies which manufacture psychiatric drugs for ADD, depression, schizophrenia and related forms of mental illness.
They are also the ones who profit from the bio-chemical theory of modern psychiatry, which is verges on being a pseudo-science mainly because it ignores the social causes of mental illness (child abuse, child neglect, bullying and related causes).
I feel strongly that the social model of mental illness will reduce the stigma that the medical model of deficit and pathology has brought to us. Included in the medical model is the bio-chemical theory of how psychopharmaceutical drugs work.
However, without a grasp of the social model, it would be almost impossible for psychotherapy to educate the mental health consumer during therapy sessions as a vital part of proper management of symptoms and effect remission.
Astra Zeneca
Glaxo Smith Kline
Johnson
Lilly
Merck
Novartis
Pfizer
Roche
It is up to anyone concerned about Big Pharma to research each company's involvement in lawsuits, including out of court settlements with each of them and the plaintiffs, where the companies effectively "bribed" survivors of killings and suicides related to mental illness.
If I did this for you, then you'd just take my word for it and not actively participate in monitoring Big Pharm's slippery slope in providing effective medication for mental health consumers which were actually unsafe to take.
So I ask anyone who is experience with Google to search each company's name with the keywords "murder", "suicide" and "killing".
In doing so, you will actively particpate in seeing the social cost to the People by the State in following the medical model of mental illness blindly without moderation by a reciprocal social model.
Thank you for helping me out. Please feel free to post comments.
20121219
Why Adam Lanza Killed
His mom was a end of days cultist.
If that doesn't lead to neglect and subtle forms of child abuse, then I'm going to shut up about this.
However, there is nothing about the rumoured proposed hospitalization of Adam Lanza. Ergo, that's a rumour and unverified.
So my guess is, Adam Lanza killed not because his mom cared more about kids, but because as a survivalist, she'd inculcated some crazy shit in her son.
Maybe Adam went wacko because Nancy Lanza pissed him off.
He shot up the school because he wasn't treated respectfully there. his autism and Aspergers would have gotten him into special needs, and might have subjected him to the social isolation that precedes a personality disorder.
In short, Adam killed because the public school system is designed to manufacture two types of students: the academics and the "problem children".
For mental illness itself indicates that there is something wrong with society that's supposed to be inclusive but excludes anyone who cannot be controlled.
I fault the medical model of mental illness with its obsession with deficits and pathologies without balancing it with a social model of mental illness.
However, I feel that the Lanza shooting has less to do with mental illness and more to do with America's obsession with the Second Amendment to justify their obsession with guns.
In short, Adam Lanza is trying to show that, in the end, there is something wrong with how the public school system treats the problem child and with how a mother's obsession with guns would warp a child's mind.
Update: 20121226
More information about Adam Lanza's mother: http://www.calgaryherald.com/sports/Adam+Lanza+mother+shared+friendships+kept+home+life+hidden/7708553/story.html
Update: 20130103
Edited the text to mention the models of mental illness and my first attempt to state that mass school killings little to do with mental illness and more to do with how the public education system treats the problem child and how a mother's obsession with guns warmps that child's mind.
When You Tie Shootings to Mental Illness,
http://freethoughtblogs.com/ashleymiller/2012/12/14/when-you-tie-shootings-to-mental-illness/
If that doesn't lead to neglect and subtle forms of child abuse, then I'm going to shut up about this.
However, there is nothing about the rumoured proposed hospitalization of Adam Lanza. Ergo, that's a rumour and unverified.
So my guess is, Adam Lanza killed not because his mom cared more about kids, but because as a survivalist, she'd inculcated some crazy shit in her son.
Maybe Adam went wacko because Nancy Lanza pissed him off.
He shot up the school because he wasn't treated respectfully there. his autism and Aspergers would have gotten him into special needs, and might have subjected him to the social isolation that precedes a personality disorder.
In short, Adam killed because the public school system is designed to manufacture two types of students: the academics and the "problem children".
For mental illness itself indicates that there is something wrong with society that's supposed to be inclusive but excludes anyone who cannot be controlled.
I fault the medical model of mental illness with its obsession with deficits and pathologies without balancing it with a social model of mental illness.
However, I feel that the Lanza shooting has less to do with mental illness and more to do with America's obsession with the Second Amendment to justify their obsession with guns.
In short, Adam Lanza is trying to show that, in the end, there is something wrong with how the public school system treats the problem child and with how a mother's obsession with guns would warp a child's mind.
Update: 20121226
More information about Adam Lanza's mother: http://www.calgaryherald.com/sports/Adam+Lanza+mother+shared+friendships+kept+home+life+hidden/7708553/story.html
Update: 20130103
Edited the text to mention the models of mental illness and my first attempt to state that mass school killings little to do with mental illness and more to do with how the public education system treats the problem child and how a mother's obsession with guns warmps that child's mind.
When You Tie Shootings to Mental Illness,
http://freethoughtblogs.com/ashleymiller/2012/12/14/when-you-tie-shootings-to-mental-illness/
20120530
Kratom & Ibogaine as Psychiatric Medication
It's been said that mental illness is manufactured by the State to control the people.
Now I do not know how true this is, because it gives the State too much credit. A more moderate stance is this: stress is known to cause insomnia, which may arise due to anxiety. Anxiety may arise out of fear, and most of that anxiety may due to anger about loss of control over our lives. While it's not all that simple, the remedy for insomnia before one becomes so tired that self control is sleep.
In the worst case scenario, the lack of sleep leads to mania and sometimes brief psychotic episodes. It's at this point that most people may get the first intervention for it in the form of anti-psychotics..
However, those drugs work via the placebo process since most of the anti-psychotics are hypnotics, and sleep aids the process by providing rest.
Ibogaine, that entheogenic African root, and kratom, that wonderful South-East Asian herb, are better than or equal to all psychiatric medications because of its profile: in low doses, it's a stimulant and in high doses, a sedative.
With chronic use, kratom is addictive but ibogaine will cure it. So, in a perfect world I would urge the medical community to provide an alternative to psychiatric medications with regulated use of kratom and ibogaine with therapy.
Unfortunately, this is not a perfect world. Therefore I would urge moderation in the use of kratom.
In fact, moderation preserves mental health. A little bit of caffeine is ok, but 6 cups of coffee is not moderation.
Getting back to kratom, it's unlikely the way it's presented to us in the West - it was an extract but was mixed with other herbs, all of them safe at the dose. If anything, I felt stimulated, because of its action in low doses. I am very doubtful it had much effect on me. It tasted more like an energy drink.
And that was the first time I drank it. Several weeks went by and I drank the second little bottle of this kratom drink. Nothing. Just endless energy for a little bit and then peace.
I drank those drinks back in June. It wasn't the cheapest energy drink, though.
That is the only reason why I didn't get any more. If kratom is the ideal drug to calm the mind, then my experience with it only seemed to fizzle because I'd expected something astounding. Instead, if I even had a placebo effect, then the energy I showed was a combination of wishful thinking and being jaded by energy drinks.
While kratom is helpful to some people, I believe my brain likes a sedative because being mellow is the most excellent state of mind. Under such conditions, it's hard to get upset and spiral into an anxiety-induced insomnia.
So like I said, moderation is the key and meditation is the finger pointing to the moon.
Now I do not know how true this is, because it gives the State too much credit. A more moderate stance is this: stress is known to cause insomnia, which may arise due to anxiety. Anxiety may arise out of fear, and most of that anxiety may due to anger about loss of control over our lives. While it's not all that simple, the remedy for insomnia before one becomes so tired that self control is sleep.
In the worst case scenario, the lack of sleep leads to mania and sometimes brief psychotic episodes. It's at this point that most people may get the first intervention for it in the form of anti-psychotics..
However, those drugs work via the placebo process since most of the anti-psychotics are hypnotics, and sleep aids the process by providing rest.
Ibogaine, that entheogenic African root, and kratom, that wonderful South-East Asian herb, are better than or equal to all psychiatric medications because of its profile: in low doses, it's a stimulant and in high doses, a sedative.
With chronic use, kratom is addictive but ibogaine will cure it. So, in a perfect world I would urge the medical community to provide an alternative to psychiatric medications with regulated use of kratom and ibogaine with therapy.
Unfortunately, this is not a perfect world. Therefore I would urge moderation in the use of kratom.
In fact, moderation preserves mental health. A little bit of caffeine is ok, but 6 cups of coffee is not moderation.
Getting back to kratom, it's unlikely the way it's presented to us in the West - it was an extract but was mixed with other herbs, all of them safe at the dose. If anything, I felt stimulated, because of its action in low doses. I am very doubtful it had much effect on me. It tasted more like an energy drink.
And that was the first time I drank it. Several weeks went by and I drank the second little bottle of this kratom drink. Nothing. Just endless energy for a little bit and then peace.
I drank those drinks back in June. It wasn't the cheapest energy drink, though.
That is the only reason why I didn't get any more. If kratom is the ideal drug to calm the mind, then my experience with it only seemed to fizzle because I'd expected something astounding. Instead, if I even had a placebo effect, then the energy I showed was a combination of wishful thinking and being jaded by energy drinks.
While kratom is helpful to some people, I believe my brain likes a sedative because being mellow is the most excellent state of mind. Under such conditions, it's hard to get upset and spiral into an anxiety-induced insomnia.
So like I said, moderation is the key and meditation is the finger pointing to the moon.
20110811
Mental Health begins by looking at mental illness in a new light
It starts with My Mental Health, which helps one see clearly the folly of not closely examining misconceptions about mental illness.
Forget the movies: they're not accurate in depicting anything but sometimes overdramatize mental illness without stopping to breathe life into a person who suffers.
Though there are films in recent times which depict people suffering from such illnesses, they don't usually deal with reality honestly.
Though Wikipedia provides a list of movies with a psychiatric illness as a theme, it would take much time to view these movies objectively and develop a respect for people suffering a mental illness.
So in essence, all pop culture does is pick a mental illness, use its worst aspects to dramatize a convincing portrayal of a mental health client, and then let the viewer figure out if they can spot a person suffering from a mental health issue.
FWIW that's a pretty shabby way to treat mental illness and people who suffer from it.
Anyway, I am going to examine My Mental Health with a calm and respectful look.
People suffer mental health issues, often with a lot of support and loving care.
Yet it is not a big deal, and shouldn't be.
Forget the movies: they're not accurate in depicting anything but sometimes overdramatize mental illness without stopping to breathe life into a person who suffers.
Though there are films in recent times which depict people suffering from such illnesses, they don't usually deal with reality honestly.
Though Wikipedia provides a list of movies with a psychiatric illness as a theme, it would take much time to view these movies objectively and develop a respect for people suffering a mental illness.
So in essence, all pop culture does is pick a mental illness, use its worst aspects to dramatize a convincing portrayal of a mental health client, and then let the viewer figure out if they can spot a person suffering from a mental health issue.
FWIW that's a pretty shabby way to treat mental illness and people who suffer from it.
Anyway, I am going to examine My Mental Health with a calm and respectful look.
People suffer mental health issues, often with a lot of support and loving care.
Yet it is not a big deal, and shouldn't be.
20100522
A Week and a Day With Mirtazapine
On May 11, 2010, I attended my appointment with Dr. "A", the pdoc (psychiatrist). Most of my behavior with him is consistent with borderline personality disorder: giving out details not related to self to related to family of origin, but being vague about my own complaints.
At the conclusion of my first interview with Dr. "A", he writes me a script for mirtazapine at 15 mg to be taken at 1-2 pills nightly for one month (60 pills). He then states that serotonin may cause nausea, and I get the impression would have similar effects to Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressants.
When the pdoc came to medication, I selected mirtazapine because my initial on-line research gave it a good safety profile for the average North American, which I am not.
For I am a Japanese-Canadian person, 51 years old, and male. IMHO the cultural and genetic (ethnic) background of all the mirtazapine test groups probably did not include a lot of Asians, but it should because of the Asian sensitivity to psychopharmaceuticals (psychiatric medication or pmeds). (See Ethnicity and psychopharmacology APT(1999), vol.5,p.91; A Psychiatric Residency Curriculum About Asian-American Issues Academic Psychiatry 26:225-236, December 2002)
On the other hand, my pdoc is Anglo-Canadian, and landed immigrant from the UK. Schooled in Western psychiatry, he's been trained to overlook my ethnic background and treat only my brain. Yet his faith in the "magic" of psychiatric medication had led him to assume my brain, physiologically, is like any other brain.
However, the following week only proves to me that my brain and my body is not made to take pmeds at the recommended doses.
In the following journal entries, I've redacted MHC professionals names to letters of the alphabet to protect their privacy. As well, when I need to comment on a journal entry, the commentary is quite obvious.
According to BC provincial health protocol for mental health, a mental health consumer (me) is assigned a case worker with a Bachelor's of Social Work at the local office, a pdoc to figure out which medication is prescribed, and a pyschotherapist with the expertise and qualification to handle the particular issue (integration of person of color into Western culture with focus on family of origin).
Even though there may be opinionated statements in this article, in no way do they reflect upon the professionals in a negative light. Any reader naïve to my style of hyperbole and its multifaceted confabulation should take a lot of salt to what they are about to digest...
SHK 20100522.0605
---
Tuesday, May 11, 9:08 PM
I read up on Mirtazapine, and according to what I've read, it does not cause nausea. In fact, it relieves nausea. The antihistamine effect is stronger than hydroxyzine, though.
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirtazapine
Tuesday, May 11, 9:40 PM
At 9:30 PM, I've taken the first mirtazapine dose (15 mg). Within the past ten minutes, I felt "better", which may be due to the antihistamine effect.
Also, the pain from a cold sore on my upper lip and earache in the right ear have faded somewhat. This may be due to moderate peripheral α1 adrenergic antagonism. [Commentary: It's actually due to the antihistamine effect.]
Tuesday, May 11, 9:51 PM: Hopefully the hypotension will be manageable. I just feel relaxed because of the antihistamine's effect. None of the nausea appeared at all, which proves that it is not a side effect.
Tuesday, May 11, 10:05 PM
The mellowness is a plus, though I have moderate difficulty in forming my thoughts.
Yet there is no real anxiety about this. I really like this effect, but feel that it's preventing me from freely expressing myself in the journal.
Currently, I just want to meditate while on mirtazapine. The more I focus on concentrating, the less I want to use that concentration to write.
There is very little anxiety, and if there is anxiety, then I do not feel it impeding my thoughts.
Tuesday, May 11, 10:17 PM
I ate a donut, and had a multivitamin. The mirtazapine's effects are still happening: calmness, mellowness, a sense of joy, serendipity, serenity... these words barely describe the feeling.
Yet not a tinge of nausea is present.
Tuesday, May 11, 10:36 PM
Oh, yes! I finished a bottle of water without thinking, thanks to mirtazapine.
[Commentary: Within an hour, I've turned off my computer because the sedative effect of 15 mg of mirtazapine has overtaken me.]
Wednesday, May 12, 12:21 PM
This morning I got up at around 10 AM. I spent the morning writing, but wrote only briefly about Buddha Nature. It seemed easily to read than it did to write. Though I am not surprised by the mood swing side effect, IMHO it should be easier to control because of experience with my changes in mood.
[Commentary: "mood swing side effect" refers to agitation, restlessness, irritability, aggression. On waking up at around 9 AM, I felt malaise or lassitude. After shaking off this feeling, I wrote in my Spiritual Journal about Buddha Nature, which will be added to my Buddhist notes as Buddhahood.]
Thursday, May 13, 9:52 AM
The mirtazapine appears to have worsened the cold sore and mouth cankers I had on the day I filled my prescription. I have fever blisters on my upper lip, and my mouth has been dry on waking.
I am getting mouth and skin rash/lesions because of side effect of Mirtazapine.
http://doublecheckmd.com/EffectsDetail.do?dname=mirtazapine&sid=13590&eid=6621#selist
I also have enlarged lymph nodes as a result of infection.
The 30 mg dose also makes me feel more aggressive, angry, hostile, and mean. Though, I'm sure that what it actually does is moderate impulse control negatively.
Friday, May 14, 9:11 AM
Today I called the MHC (Mental Health Centre) and reported the symptoms I've been experiencing, which now includes fever and swollen upper lip.
The medication causing these symptoms is mirtazapine. Tuesday evening, I took 15 mg at bedtime; and Wednesday evening, 30 mg.
After experiencing the physical symptoms, the use of mirtazapine was discontinued Thursday, but the only medication used Thursday evening was one 10 mg dose of hydroxyzine to act as a sedative.
So the physical symptoms are fever, sore throat, mouth ulcers, skin lesions, and fever blisters.
The psychological symptoms are: depression, aggression, agitation. There also is a negative self image due to skin lesions on the face.
Friday, May 14, 10:46 AM
Dr. "A" called back, and I gave him the list of symptoms I had. He confirmed that I had discontinued mirtazapine as of Thursday. While he stated that hydroxyzine may be too expensive for me to use, and that he may be recommending other medication, since I have 8 capsules left, IF the swollen upper lip and face becomes a problem, then I will take hydroxyzine tonight at bedtime.
[Commentary: the pdoc also claimed that mirtazapine usually never has that effect. This is true, but it did contribute to a change in body chemistry which IMHO lowered my WBC rapidly enough for the zoster virus to activate as shingles. It also indirectly worsened my psychoneurotic behaviorisms I exhibit when not able to express myself by either read, writing, and writing in my journal on the computer.]
Friday, May 14, 2:23 PM
Since I am able to tolerate the pain, I want to tough out the symptoms. The reason is, I am not in very much discomfort. This is why when the roommate expressed her concern, I wasn't willing to agree that it needs a doctor to be looked after properly.
IMHO, swollen lymph nodes mean that my body is fighting off the infection. Fever means that the infection is bad, but not life threatening.
However, before deciding to act, the symptoms need to be much worse than this.
[Commentary: Between 3:00 PM and 6:00 PM I visit Emergency Ward at the local hospital.]
Friday, May 14, 6:03 PM
It turns out that the mirtazapine may have reactivated the herpes zoster virus (chicken pox) as shingles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herpes_zoster
After getting my condition diagnosed at the hospital, the emergency doctor gave me a prescription for acyclovir, a potent antiviral drug, which is to be taken 5 x daily for 7 days.
So I have to take 5 times daily Acyclovir for a week, religiously, and preferably with food, from May 14 until May 20.
Friday, May 14, 6:14 PM
The lesions and fever blisters are due to herpes simplex zoster (originally chicken pox), which reactivated as shingles. Most likely, mirtazapine played an indirect part in reactivating it.
IMHO influenza may have reactivated the herpes virus, and both hydroxyzine and mirtazapine may have been the most recent trigger, due to their effect on the immune system via histamine suppression.
When I took my first dose, Mirtazapine had a strong histamine rebound effect on me.
Friday, May 14, 7:46 PM
On Monday (May 16) I intend to call Dr. "A" to update him about the symptoms I previously attributed to mirtazapine.
It turns out that the dormant herpes zoster virus reactivated, IMHO due to a combination of stress, including the use of hydroxyzine & recently mirtazapine.
After getting my condition diagnosed at the hospital, the emergency doctor gave me a prescription for acyclovir, a potent antiviral drug, which is to be taken 5 x daily for 7 days.
[Commentary: when I compare the name of my pdoc in this entry with the previous entry on Fri, May 14, 10:46 AM, his name has changed in this entry. Nine hours have passed by this point.]
Saturday, May 15, 11:40 PM
One side effect of recovery from mirtazapine I noticed was mild hallucinations where I see a comic book. [Commentary: though this can be attributed to having finished inventory on the last 30 comics in my collection. These hallucinations only occur when I am tired, IMHO as a reminder from my subconscious to take a break from whatever I am doing at the moment and rest. I also have a dream later on that night, though 72 hours later, no recall of details of that dream remain, due to it being trivial in nature.]
Sunday, May 16, 1:54 PM
The right side of my face is slightly swollen. There are two lesions under the eye near the nose, two across the cheek, three on the right side of the nose, and one large one at the top of the middle of the upper lip. They all follow a serpentine pattern from eye to upper lip. This is the symptom of shingles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dermatomic_area
Monday, May 17, 10:58 AM
At 10:41 AM I called up the MHC, and got Dr. "A" surname wrong. After the initial confusion experienced with the receptionist, I left a message for my caseworker, "B", mentioned the herpes (shingles), being medicated for it, being on hydroxyzine, and asking if I could return to mirtazapine at 7.5 mg on May 23 after the hydroxyzine runs out.
Monday, May 17, 6:08 PM
Quite possibly the activation of shingles (herpes zoster) was precipitated by a rapid onset of neutropenia.
This is similar to the case study online:
http://psy.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/50/3/299?maxtoshow=&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=mirtazapine&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec=relevance&resourcetype=HWCIT
Tuesday, May 18, 8:32 AM
I just thought of something: improvement of my neutrophil count, to lower the risk of mirtazapine causing a bad reaction.
For now, it's in my best interest to get a baseline blood test done.
[Commentary: this entry is important to explain the next entry.
Eating a lot more than I usually do when not ill should improve the neutrophil count, as well as taking the antiviral medication.]
Tuesday, May 18, 6:50 PM
After updating "B" Monday through voice-mail, there's been no response from Dr. "A" regarding returning to Mirtazapine. Also, my research on-line about mirtazapine indicates that returning to the drug may reduce my ANC (absolute neutrophil count) and WBC (white blood count). The symptoms of being on Mirtazapine from May 11 to 12, were similar to hypomania. [Commentary: IMHO it seems similar to cyclothymia. However, when I've been isolated on the computer for more than 4 hours, I may become mute and may show irritability to interruption of my current activity. This is probably one of the symptoms of the borderline personality disorder.]
From Friday May 14 until Sunday May 16 it felt more like a return to depression, but I attribute that feeling to change in self-image due to the temporary disfigurement shingles causes when it affects the face.
Self-care has been reduced, and every second or third day I spend too much time behind the computer, in an attempt to avoid facing with the reality effectively.
[Commentary: Actually, being on the computer almost continuously for almost 10 hours had led to a deterioration of mood and behavior around 6:30 PM.]
Recommendations:
From pdoc, ask for SCID-DSMIV diagnosis.
Request starting dose of mirtazapine at 3.75 mg indefinitely.
From GP, ask for blood test to get baseline.
Friday, May 21, 9:38 PM
Update: so I called the MHC, inform the receptionist of what I've learned about mirtazapine, and the shingles which results from its use. 15 minutes later the psychologist calls back to tell me to discuss it with my GP.
After talking to my GP, he told me that he can't approve of any reduction in dosage for mirtazapine, and that the pdoc will have to try another medication. At this point, I replied "I really rather stick with mirtazapine at the lowest dose ( less than 3.75 mg) possible than try an SSRI!"
Why? Because the pdoc made it seem like he'll be playing SSRI roulette until we find the correct dose, or even better, stuck on Seroquel or olanzapine because of a calculated risk with an SSRI.
Regarding Remeron, I've read its monograph from Health Canada, and it states that mirtazapine has antidepressant activity at 0.5 and 1.0 mg.
So, obviously, going from 15 to 30 mg over 48 hours precipitated the shingles (varicella zoster virus aka VZV ) reaction to rapid changes in my WBC.
Had I wisely titrated from 3.75 mg over a week, I wouldn't have gone through a week of pain to endure a few days of depressive psychosis ("I feel too self-conscious with this painful, blistering skin rash - and the painful neuralgia!"), only to recover a few days later, and make my psychologist's first interview.
Saturday, May 22, 5:02 AM
Addendum: If my math skills are up to snuff, it appears that mirtazapine's clinical trials have given enough statistics to help me calculate the number needed to cause harm.
That number is 17, but the odds are 1.25-1.75 to 1 that you'd get any one of the side effects. With paxil, the number needed to harm is 50, but the odds are like 2 to 1 i.e. you are twice a likely to get any side effect than you would with placebo.
Therefore, mirtazapine evens the odds ever so slightly. The only benefits in exchange for risk of lowering WBC that is appealing is its ability to tolerate nausea, and the lack of serotonin withdrawal symptoms which the SSRI and SNRI medications have in spades.
So I am going to build tolerance to mirtazapine by titrating using the hydration method i.e. dissolve 3.75 mg of the drug in about 250 ml water, let it sit for a few hours, and then sip it slowly.
Since that much water takes about 4-5 sips, I could titrate the drug over 4 hours, rather than ingest one half dose at bedtime. The only risk here is that of waking dreams, which the literature calls "hallucinations".
---
References:
Ethnopsychopharmacology: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnopsychopharmacology
Varicella Zoster virus: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_zoster_virus
Zoster reactivation worst case: http://www.hivinsite.org/InSite?page=kb-05-03-01
Statistics involving pharmacology:
Number needed to harm: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_needed_to_harm
Health Canada Database for Drugs:
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/prodpharma/databasdon/index-eng.php
Both hydroxyzine and mirtazapine have lots of pages about their pharmacology and toxicology. The Health Canada website should have the main monograph to make the probability statistics.
At the conclusion of my first interview with Dr. "A", he writes me a script for mirtazapine at 15 mg to be taken at 1-2 pills nightly for one month (60 pills). He then states that serotonin may cause nausea, and I get the impression would have similar effects to Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressants.
When the pdoc came to medication, I selected mirtazapine because my initial on-line research gave it a good safety profile for the average North American, which I am not.
For I am a Japanese-Canadian person, 51 years old, and male. IMHO the cultural and genetic (ethnic) background of all the mirtazapine test groups probably did not include a lot of Asians, but it should because of the Asian sensitivity to psychopharmaceuticals (psychiatric medication or pmeds). (See Ethnicity and psychopharmacology APT(1999), vol.5,p.91; A Psychiatric Residency Curriculum About Asian-American Issues Academic Psychiatry 26:225-236, December 2002)
On the other hand, my pdoc is Anglo-Canadian, and landed immigrant from the UK. Schooled in Western psychiatry, he's been trained to overlook my ethnic background and treat only my brain. Yet his faith in the "magic" of psychiatric medication had led him to assume my brain, physiologically, is like any other brain.
However, the following week only proves to me that my brain and my body is not made to take pmeds at the recommended doses.
In the following journal entries, I've redacted MHC professionals names to letters of the alphabet to protect their privacy. As well, when I need to comment on a journal entry, the commentary is quite obvious.
According to BC provincial health protocol for mental health, a mental health consumer (me) is assigned a case worker with a Bachelor's of Social Work at the local office, a pdoc to figure out which medication is prescribed, and a pyschotherapist with the expertise and qualification to handle the particular issue (integration of person of color into Western culture with focus on family of origin).
Even though there may be opinionated statements in this article, in no way do they reflect upon the professionals in a negative light. Any reader naïve to my style of hyperbole and its multifaceted confabulation should take a lot of salt to what they are about to digest...
SHK 20100522.0605
---
Tuesday, May 11, 9:08 PM
I read up on Mirtazapine, and according to what I've read, it does not cause nausea. In fact, it relieves nausea. The antihistamine effect is stronger than hydroxyzine, though.
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirtazapine
Tuesday, May 11, 9:40 PM
At 9:30 PM, I've taken the first mirtazapine dose (15 mg). Within the past ten minutes, I felt "better", which may be due to the antihistamine effect.
Also, the pain from a cold sore on my upper lip and earache in the right ear have faded somewhat. This may be due to moderate peripheral α1 adrenergic antagonism. [Commentary: It's actually due to the antihistamine effect.]
Tuesday, May 11, 9:51 PM: Hopefully the hypotension will be manageable. I just feel relaxed because of the antihistamine's effect. None of the nausea appeared at all, which proves that it is not a side effect.
Tuesday, May 11, 10:05 PM
The mellowness is a plus, though I have moderate difficulty in forming my thoughts.
Yet there is no real anxiety about this. I really like this effect, but feel that it's preventing me from freely expressing myself in the journal.
Currently, I just want to meditate while on mirtazapine. The more I focus on concentrating, the less I want to use that concentration to write.
There is very little anxiety, and if there is anxiety, then I do not feel it impeding my thoughts.
Tuesday, May 11, 10:17 PM
I ate a donut, and had a multivitamin. The mirtazapine's effects are still happening: calmness, mellowness, a sense of joy, serendipity, serenity... these words barely describe the feeling.
Yet not a tinge of nausea is present.
Tuesday, May 11, 10:36 PM
Oh, yes! I finished a bottle of water without thinking, thanks to mirtazapine.
[Commentary: Within an hour, I've turned off my computer because the sedative effect of 15 mg of mirtazapine has overtaken me.]
Wednesday, May 12, 12:21 PM
This morning I got up at around 10 AM. I spent the morning writing, but wrote only briefly about Buddha Nature. It seemed easily to read than it did to write. Though I am not surprised by the mood swing side effect, IMHO it should be easier to control because of experience with my changes in mood.
[Commentary: "mood swing side effect" refers to agitation, restlessness, irritability, aggression. On waking up at around 9 AM, I felt malaise or lassitude. After shaking off this feeling, I wrote in my Spiritual Journal about Buddha Nature, which will be added to my Buddhist notes as Buddhahood.]
Thursday, May 13, 9:52 AM
The mirtazapine appears to have worsened the cold sore and mouth cankers I had on the day I filled my prescription. I have fever blisters on my upper lip, and my mouth has been dry on waking.
I am getting mouth and skin rash/lesions because of side effect of Mirtazapine.
http://doublecheckmd.com/EffectsDetail.do?dname=mirtazapine&sid=13590&eid=6621#selist
I also have enlarged lymph nodes as a result of infection.
The 30 mg dose also makes me feel more aggressive, angry, hostile, and mean. Though, I'm sure that what it actually does is moderate impulse control negatively.
Friday, May 14, 9:11 AM
Today I called the MHC (Mental Health Centre) and reported the symptoms I've been experiencing, which now includes fever and swollen upper lip.
The medication causing these symptoms is mirtazapine. Tuesday evening, I took 15 mg at bedtime; and Wednesday evening, 30 mg.
After experiencing the physical symptoms, the use of mirtazapine was discontinued Thursday, but the only medication used Thursday evening was one 10 mg dose of hydroxyzine to act as a sedative.
So the physical symptoms are fever, sore throat, mouth ulcers, skin lesions, and fever blisters.
The psychological symptoms are: depression, aggression, agitation. There also is a negative self image due to skin lesions on the face.
Friday, May 14, 10:46 AM
Dr. "A" called back, and I gave him the list of symptoms I had. He confirmed that I had discontinued mirtazapine as of Thursday. While he stated that hydroxyzine may be too expensive for me to use, and that he may be recommending other medication, since I have 8 capsules left, IF the swollen upper lip and face becomes a problem, then I will take hydroxyzine tonight at bedtime.
[Commentary: the pdoc also claimed that mirtazapine usually never has that effect. This is true, but it did contribute to a change in body chemistry which IMHO lowered my WBC rapidly enough for the zoster virus to activate as shingles. It also indirectly worsened my psychoneurotic behaviorisms I exhibit when not able to express myself by either read, writing, and writing in my journal on the computer.]
Friday, May 14, 2:23 PM
Since I am able to tolerate the pain, I want to tough out the symptoms. The reason is, I am not in very much discomfort. This is why when the roommate expressed her concern, I wasn't willing to agree that it needs a doctor to be looked after properly.
IMHO, swollen lymph nodes mean that my body is fighting off the infection. Fever means that the infection is bad, but not life threatening.
However, before deciding to act, the symptoms need to be much worse than this.
[Commentary: Between 3:00 PM and 6:00 PM I visit Emergency Ward at the local hospital.]
Friday, May 14, 6:03 PM
It turns out that the mirtazapine may have reactivated the herpes zoster virus (chicken pox) as shingles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herpes_zoster
After getting my condition diagnosed at the hospital, the emergency doctor gave me a prescription for acyclovir, a potent antiviral drug, which is to be taken 5 x daily for 7 days.
So I have to take 5 times daily Acyclovir for a week, religiously, and preferably with food, from May 14 until May 20.
Friday, May 14, 6:14 PM
The lesions and fever blisters are due to herpes simplex zoster (originally chicken pox), which reactivated as shingles. Most likely, mirtazapine played an indirect part in reactivating it.
IMHO influenza may have reactivated the herpes virus, and both hydroxyzine and mirtazapine may have been the most recent trigger, due to their effect on the immune system via histamine suppression.
When I took my first dose, Mirtazapine had a strong histamine rebound effect on me.
Friday, May 14, 7:46 PM
On Monday (May 16) I intend to call Dr. "A" to update him about the symptoms I previously attributed to mirtazapine.
It turns out that the dormant herpes zoster virus reactivated, IMHO due to a combination of stress, including the use of hydroxyzine & recently mirtazapine.
After getting my condition diagnosed at the hospital, the emergency doctor gave me a prescription for acyclovir, a potent antiviral drug, which is to be taken 5 x daily for 7 days.
[Commentary: when I compare the name of my pdoc in this entry with the previous entry on Fri, May 14, 10:46 AM, his name has changed in this entry. Nine hours have passed by this point.]
Saturday, May 15, 11:40 PM
One side effect of recovery from mirtazapine I noticed was mild hallucinations where I see a comic book. [Commentary: though this can be attributed to having finished inventory on the last 30 comics in my collection. These hallucinations only occur when I am tired, IMHO as a reminder from my subconscious to take a break from whatever I am doing at the moment and rest. I also have a dream later on that night, though 72 hours later, no recall of details of that dream remain, due to it being trivial in nature.]
Sunday, May 16, 1:54 PM
The right side of my face is slightly swollen. There are two lesions under the eye near the nose, two across the cheek, three on the right side of the nose, and one large one at the top of the middle of the upper lip. They all follow a serpentine pattern from eye to upper lip. This is the symptom of shingles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dermatomic_area
Monday, May 17, 10:58 AM
At 10:41 AM I called up the MHC, and got Dr. "A" surname wrong. After the initial confusion experienced with the receptionist, I left a message for my caseworker, "B", mentioned the herpes (shingles), being medicated for it, being on hydroxyzine, and asking if I could return to mirtazapine at 7.5 mg on May 23 after the hydroxyzine runs out.
Monday, May 17, 6:08 PM
Quite possibly the activation of shingles (herpes zoster) was precipitated by a rapid onset of neutropenia.
This is similar to the case study online:
http://psy.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/50/3/299?maxtoshow=&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=mirtazapine&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec=relevance&resourcetype=HWCIT
Tuesday, May 18, 8:32 AM
I just thought of something: improvement of my neutrophil count, to lower the risk of mirtazapine causing a bad reaction.
For now, it's in my best interest to get a baseline blood test done.
[Commentary: this entry is important to explain the next entry.
Eating a lot more than I usually do when not ill should improve the neutrophil count, as well as taking the antiviral medication.]
Tuesday, May 18, 6:50 PM
After updating "B" Monday through voice-mail, there's been no response from Dr. "A" regarding returning to Mirtazapine. Also, my research on-line about mirtazapine indicates that returning to the drug may reduce my ANC (absolute neutrophil count) and WBC (white blood count). The symptoms of being on Mirtazapine from May 11 to 12, were similar to hypomania. [Commentary: IMHO it seems similar to cyclothymia. However, when I've been isolated on the computer for more than 4 hours, I may become mute and may show irritability to interruption of my current activity. This is probably one of the symptoms of the borderline personality disorder.]
From Friday May 14 until Sunday May 16 it felt more like a return to depression, but I attribute that feeling to change in self-image due to the temporary disfigurement shingles causes when it affects the face.
Self-care has been reduced, and every second or third day I spend too much time behind the computer, in an attempt to avoid facing with the reality effectively.
[Commentary: Actually, being on the computer almost continuously for almost 10 hours had led to a deterioration of mood and behavior around 6:30 PM.]
Recommendations:
From pdoc, ask for SCID-DSMIV diagnosis.
Request starting dose of mirtazapine at 3.75 mg indefinitely.
From GP, ask for blood test to get baseline.
Friday, May 21, 9:38 PM
Update: so I called the MHC, inform the receptionist of what I've learned about mirtazapine, and the shingles which results from its use. 15 minutes later the psychologist calls back to tell me to discuss it with my GP.
After talking to my GP, he told me that he can't approve of any reduction in dosage for mirtazapine, and that the pdoc will have to try another medication. At this point, I replied "I really rather stick with mirtazapine at the lowest dose ( less than 3.75 mg) possible than try an SSRI!"
Why? Because the pdoc made it seem like he'll be playing SSRI roulette until we find the correct dose, or even better, stuck on Seroquel or olanzapine because of a calculated risk with an SSRI.
Regarding Remeron, I've read its monograph from Health Canada, and it states that mirtazapine has antidepressant activity at 0.5 and 1.0 mg.
So, obviously, going from 15 to 30 mg over 48 hours precipitated the shingles (varicella zoster virus aka VZV ) reaction to rapid changes in my WBC.
Had I wisely titrated from 3.75 mg over a week, I wouldn't have gone through a week of pain to endure a few days of depressive psychosis ("I feel too self-conscious with this painful, blistering skin rash - and the painful neuralgia!"), only to recover a few days later, and make my psychologist's first interview.
Saturday, May 22, 5:02 AM
Addendum: If my math skills are up to snuff, it appears that mirtazapine's clinical trials have given enough statistics to help me calculate the number needed to cause harm.
That number is 17, but the odds are 1.25-1.75 to 1 that you'd get any one of the side effects. With paxil, the number needed to harm is 50, but the odds are like 2 to 1 i.e. you are twice a likely to get any side effect than you would with placebo.
Therefore, mirtazapine evens the odds ever so slightly. The only benefits in exchange for risk of lowering WBC that is appealing is its ability to tolerate nausea, and the lack of serotonin withdrawal symptoms which the SSRI and SNRI medications have in spades.
So I am going to build tolerance to mirtazapine by titrating using the hydration method i.e. dissolve 3.75 mg of the drug in about 250 ml water, let it sit for a few hours, and then sip it slowly.
Since that much water takes about 4-5 sips, I could titrate the drug over 4 hours, rather than ingest one half dose at bedtime. The only risk here is that of waking dreams, which the literature calls "hallucinations".
---
References:
- Ethnicity and psychopharmacology APT(1999), vol.5,p.91: http://apt.rcpsych.org/cgi/reprint/5/2/89.pdf
- A Psychiatric Residency Curriculum About Asian-American Issues : http://ap.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/26/4/225
Ethnopsychopharmacology: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnopsychopharmacology
Varicella Zoster virus: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varicella_zoster_virus
Zoster reactivation worst case: http://www.hivinsite.org/InSite?page=kb-05-03-01
Statistics involving pharmacology:
Number needed to harm: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_needed_to_harm
Health Canada Database for Drugs:
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/prodpharma/databasdon/index-eng.php
Both hydroxyzine and mirtazapine have lots of pages about their pharmacology and toxicology. The Health Canada website should have the main monograph to make the probability statistics.
20090305
Proof that Society Manufactures Mental Illness and School Shooters
In 1999 Todd Cameron Smith was the fellow who murdered a pastor's son and injured another student after being expelled from school.
Five years later, he walked away from a half-way home in Toronto, only to turn himself in the next day.
Yet the demons which haunt him even today began in Grade One in Taber, AB when he was bullied and teased by his fellow students.
His only crime prior to the tragic shooting was being born into poverty.
For that he was teased to the breaking point when he shot Jason Lang to death on April 28, 1999.
And the town of Taber, AB, has to live with the aftermath of that tragedy to this day.
IMHO society has the potential to create a new Todd Cameron Smith just as much as it had to create the dozens of wonderful people of Taber, AB.
As long as society continues to judge the poor, and to ignore bullying and teasing in school and in the workplace, the manufacture of mental illness will go on, unchecked.
Five years later, he walked away from a half-way home in Toronto, only to turn himself in the next day.
Yet the demons which haunt him even today began in Grade One in Taber, AB when he was bullied and teased by his fellow students.
His only crime prior to the tragic shooting was being born into poverty.
For that he was teased to the breaking point when he shot Jason Lang to death on April 28, 1999.
And the town of Taber, AB, has to live with the aftermath of that tragedy to this day.
IMHO society has the potential to create a new Todd Cameron Smith just as much as it had to create the dozens of wonderful people of Taber, AB.
As long as society continues to judge the poor, and to ignore bullying and teasing in school and in the workplace, the manufacture of mental illness will go on, unchecked.
20080527
Depression Due to Loneliness
Our genetic predestiny will tell us to find a mate, and it is half instinct and half intellect going "Woah Nelly!"
When we rationalize that predestiny away, we learn distraction helps remove the pain of melancholy, which is what's left over after binding instinct qnd repressing libido.
However, repressing libido can cause stress which may uncover subclinical schizophrenia.
Depression isn't all about suppressed rage; it's about suppressing instinct with the mind using intellect like damming a mighty river (the libido).
I am not suggesting that the relationship thing is a must, but "mental illness" is not just about child abuse. it's also about self-abuse.
For repressing human nature has consequences, just like a longjam can cause floods, and "mental illness" is that flood.
Thus, depression may simply be due to loneliness, and its etiology a result of repressing the libido.
This is why painting and other creative acts relieve depression. By the act of creation, we release libido in a sublimated manner. By releasing libido, our attention focuses on the created work of art. With our attention focused on creating, less time is devoted to building castles in the mind called neuroses.
When less time is devoted to neuroses, more time can be devoted to activities designed to recreate the Garden of Eden as it were. Hence the term, "recreation".
Therefore hobbies are the most expedient of therapies for depression.
When we rationalize that predestiny away, we learn distraction helps remove the pain of melancholy, which is what's left over after binding instinct qnd repressing libido.
However, repressing libido can cause stress which may uncover subclinical schizophrenia.
Depression isn't all about suppressed rage; it's about suppressing instinct with the mind using intellect like damming a mighty river (the libido).
I am not suggesting that the relationship thing is a must, but "mental illness" is not just about child abuse. it's also about self-abuse.
For repressing human nature has consequences, just like a longjam can cause floods, and "mental illness" is that flood.
Thus, depression may simply be due to loneliness, and its etiology a result of repressing the libido.
This is why painting and other creative acts relieve depression. By the act of creation, we release libido in a sublimated manner. By releasing libido, our attention focuses on the created work of art. With our attention focused on creating, less time is devoted to building castles in the mind called neuroses.
When less time is devoted to neuroses, more time can be devoted to activities designed to recreate the Garden of Eden as it were. Hence the term, "recreation".
Therefore hobbies are the most expedient of therapies for depression.
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