I’m a pharmacist by profession and never understood how SSRIs worked especially since we couldn’t measure serotonin. Now that I’ve began to wake up to the world, I’ve realized that this whole mental health crisis started in the 1800s and we chose to heal the body with chemicals rather than the true cure: https://unorthodoxy.substack.com/p/the-history-of-you-a-book-that-connects
The best thing about Covid is that it woke a lot of people to the fake narratives out there with depression being one of them. My argument is that depression is a spiritual condition and should be met with a spiritual solution as I discussed in this article here: https://unorthodoxy.substack.com/p/spiritual-resistance-leads-to-physical
Thank you for this timely topic and I look forward to explore more of it.
I too, am a pharmacist and spend much of my energy trying to talk the newly prescribed out of starting down this path. It’s difficult to catch since I work nights but I’m often the one called since many times people get curious in the middle of the night. It seems counterintuitive for a pharmacist to spend her time talking folks out of taking prescriptions, but it’s a point of pride for me to do so. I can do very little for those incurious people who take whatever the doctor tells them to take, and of the thousand or so prescriptions a day my one store fills most will go unquestioned and, most likely, not benefiting the intended taker to any degree. I see few exceptions to this in my day to day work, so I live for those moments, that phone call…what is it, REALLY, that I (or my loved one) is taking?
"The main areas of serotonin research provide no consistent evidence of there being an association between serotonin and depression, and no support for the hypothesis that depression is caused by lowered serotonin activity or concentrations"
The one silver lining from Covid is that more and more people are waking up and seeing the corruption. Unfortunately, I think a lot of people are doubling down the other way, not wanting to seem to be wrong, and so the gulf is widening with more division.
"The science behind the use of SSRIs as the solution to what is a very complex problem has been challenged, and yet, despite the knowledge that they are highly addictive and cause damage at the individual and collective levels, the number of prescriptions being written show no sign of slowing. Why?"
Because (a) in a busy general practice, with a patient booked every 10 minutes, the fastest way to get-em-in-get-em-out is a prescription. And (b) doctors have no clue about the real effects of many of the drugs they prescribe (let alone how they interact with the rest of the cocktail).
We're at the "burn it all down stage".
Medicating our children into oblivion, fomenting deep psychological instability, not equipping them with the knowledge and education to become self-reliant, successful and functioning members of society, hampering (or completely destroying) their ability to procreate - is intentional carnage designed to cripple the adults of tomorrow.
And the underlying reason is simple.
The fourth industrial revolution just doesn't need humans in the same numbers we did previously.
There's no reason to believe SSRIs work for depression, because there's no evidence serotonin has anything to do with it.
"The main areas of serotonin research provide no consistent evidence of there being an association between serotonin and depression, and no support for the hypothesis that depression is caused by lowered serotonin activity or concentrations"
Let me connect a couple of dots here. So the childhood vaccination schedule in Ontario Canada is 55 doses to age 16. On the other hand it has been revealed now that these vaccines increase occurrence of autism, depression and a host of other undesirable side effects. So when depression occurs in a child the parent gives them another drug to counter depression. Seems the only ones winning here are the pharamaceutical companies. They make money off both the government mandated vaccine schedule and the treatment of the problems caused by said schedule.
Recently I warned a hard working Muslim customer who has 3 very young children about the problems of the mandatory childhood vaccination schedule. He told me it was not a problem for his family as his children would go to a Muslim private school that does not require any vaccinations. That group in society has got it right!
Great article! I was unfortunately one of the many who went down this road of psychotropic drugs for “mental health”. I tried many different ones, all with severe side effects, & no relief from mental anguish. I eventually, after almost 30 years of wasting my life away with an incompetent psychologist, came to my own realization that indeed, my spiritual disconnection with God was my greatest issue. I began seeking out various spiritual guidance & support & found that the more connected I was spiritually, the less psychic pain I felt. So I agree with Mr. O’Kanu’s assessment on this. I also found Trudy Scott online at everywomanover29.com & learned about Amino Acids like GABA, glycine, L-theanine, 5HTP, tryptophan, & others that were very effective at turning off the fear, the self talk, the nihilism, self loathing, panic attacks, etc. This is all that was needed for me to be able to pull out of my downward trajectory & grow as a human being. And be “okay” with myself. Not one psychotherapist, psychologist, nor psychiatrist had helped me in this way. I found it on my own, thankfully, & reconnected with God for a healing journey I didn’t think was ever possible. I would love to help others on this same journey. It’s been a wild ride. Thank you for this extraordinary piece of writing! Have a beautiful day! 🙏🏽
I am in the US and don't really want to get into the details here of how we got where we got( now 17 years ago), but our adolescent daughter was put on an SSRI (incredibly low dose because she typically reacted adversely to most meds) -- actually it was coerced but we still had parental rights so we got the Dr. to give lowest dose possible. Even that extremely low dose was enough to turn our genius (tested) daughter into an absolute airhead -- her ability to think critically and operate with spatial awareness completely flew out the window -- I had to BEGto get her off the meds! Fortunately, the Dr. listened, but the damage was done. She still frequently struggles with brain fog and it really makes me angry.
Most of psychiatry produces iatrogenic harm. People are finally seeing how FDA approves drugs based on cherry-picked data and subjective measurements. There is no informed consent to all those that are prescribed psychiatric medications and when patients have side effects, they are blamed on their "disease" and not the drug. Often people receive poly pharmacy in an effort to "cure" the person which many times makes there life worse. Individuals have a hard time getting off of these drugs. There are severe and, many times, lasting iatrogenic harm from psychiatric medications. They are easy to dispense, whereby, listening and helping people with their problems takes too much time and does not make money. It's sad that this is our world. It's horrible that "science" thinks a pill is a cure for everything.
I remember in my 30s taking Prozac for general anxiety that I had reported to my GP, it was the strangest experience for me I am naturally introverted and very quiet and enjoy my own company. From the second week of taking this drug I became outgoing, would talk to anyone in any situation in effect I was the total opposite of my natural self. It started a conflict within me because I knew this was not normal, but I had little control over suddenly becoming an extrovert. I became very uncomfortable with this different personality and thankfully I recognised that I would have to stop them. I slowly reduced the Prozac and returned to my normal introverted self. I do not know the action of these drugs but for me it was a very uncomfortable experience, my general anxiety eventually disappeared on its own without help.
I am a holistic nutritionist and view depression as a symptom of underlying root causes and systemic imbalances. Many parents with children/teens showing signs of depression just want it to go away and they believe in the medical system. I ended up in the field I am in after my sons depression. It was work trying to figure it out and help him, even taking a leave of absence from work at that time so I could dive into all the literature, learn and help him. Most parents believe in the allopathic model and would never do what I did. At that time my son said something profound, “ mom, why can't I just pop a pill like everyone else at school.”
My aunt and my mother were put on anti-depressants in 1972 when their father died. My mother only took them once because they made her feel spaced-out and not in control. My aunt died in 2011 still taking them. She ended up with dementia after a stroke and the only time she "came back" was when they briefly took her off the Prozac (or whatever it was). She sometimes tried to come off them herself but it was impossible.
Her daughter is on anti-depressants because her mother died. She freely admits she is still depressed because everything is so horrendous in the world - she believes there is no future, what with Climate Armageddon, Putin, Trump, Plague-like Viruses and all the rest.
Her daughter has just been put on anti-depressants because her life isn't how she thought it would be - she wanted to be a cool Black hip hop dancer with cool Black friends. She's a nice white girl who had a poor education (her mother didn't want her to get stressed at school), failed to be a hip hop dancer, tried being gay, became a fanatical vegan, doesn't have a big social circle (she won't socialise with white people) and works as a hotel receptionist. She's 31 years old! She can't see how lucky she is - she lost her waitressing job during the pandemic but didn't become homeless or starve, she has no health problems other than of her own making.
None of these ladies needed medication - two of them were sad because a parent died (which is a natural part of life and grief is normal) and one of them is simply disappointed. The medication made no difference to their mental happiness.
SSRIs (along with methylphenidate) are torture drugs, whereas risperidone, olanzepine, and perhaps other atypical antipsychotics are cull pills (via inducing metabolic syndrome). SSRIs do nothing for depression, what's the big idea of pushing them? They're weight control drugs!
I’m a pharmacist by profession and never understood how SSRIs worked especially since we couldn’t measure serotonin. Now that I’ve began to wake up to the world, I’ve realized that this whole mental health crisis started in the 1800s and we chose to heal the body with chemicals rather than the true cure: https://unorthodoxy.substack.com/p/the-history-of-you-a-book-that-connects
The best thing about Covid is that it woke a lot of people to the fake narratives out there with depression being one of them. My argument is that depression is a spiritual condition and should be met with a spiritual solution as I discussed in this article here: https://unorthodoxy.substack.com/p/spiritual-resistance-leads-to-physical
Thank you for this timely topic and I look forward to explore more of it.
I too, am a pharmacist and spend much of my energy trying to talk the newly prescribed out of starting down this path. It’s difficult to catch since I work nights but I’m often the one called since many times people get curious in the middle of the night. It seems counterintuitive for a pharmacist to spend her time talking folks out of taking prescriptions, but it’s a point of pride for me to do so. I can do very little for those incurious people who take whatever the doctor tells them to take, and of the thousand or so prescriptions a day my one store fills most will go unquestioned and, most likely, not benefiting the intended taker to any degree. I see few exceptions to this in my day to day work, so I live for those moments, that phone call…what is it, REALLY, that I (or my loved one) is taking?
Yeah they don't work
"The main areas of serotonin research provide no consistent evidence of there being an association between serotonin and depression, and no support for the hypothesis that depression is caused by lowered serotonin activity or concentrations"
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41380-022-01661-0
The one silver lining from Covid is that more and more people are waking up and seeing the corruption. Unfortunately, I think a lot of people are doubling down the other way, not wanting to seem to be wrong, and so the gulf is widening with more division.
Yep - I can count on a couple of fingers the number of Vaxxers who have turned on the Safe and Effective narrative... this only reinforces my low opinion of humans https://fasteddynz.substack.com/p/the-dumbest-species-ever
I wrote an article that was supposed to be published by UK Column on the DEPOPULATION OF SCOTLAND but too hot to handle. see here- https://biologyphenom.substack.com/p/foi-response-depopulation-in-scotland
Very good work as usual Joel !
Synchronously, I just published another example of this, namely L-Dopa based Parkinson's meds... https://garysharpe.substack.com/p/a-history-of-l-dopa-the-dopamine
You have to be insane to be taking SSRIs or any drug for that matter. They are ALL poisons your body does not want, need or cherish.
"The science behind the use of SSRIs as the solution to what is a very complex problem has been challenged, and yet, despite the knowledge that they are highly addictive and cause damage at the individual and collective levels, the number of prescriptions being written show no sign of slowing. Why?"
Because (a) in a busy general practice, with a patient booked every 10 minutes, the fastest way to get-em-in-get-em-out is a prescription. And (b) doctors have no clue about the real effects of many of the drugs they prescribe (let alone how they interact with the rest of the cocktail).
We're at the "burn it all down stage".
Medicating our children into oblivion, fomenting deep psychological instability, not equipping them with the knowledge and education to become self-reliant, successful and functioning members of society, hampering (or completely destroying) their ability to procreate - is intentional carnage designed to cripple the adults of tomorrow.
And the underlying reason is simple.
The fourth industrial revolution just doesn't need humans in the same numbers we did previously.
There's no reason to believe SSRIs work for depression, because there's no evidence serotonin has anything to do with it.
"The main areas of serotonin research provide no consistent evidence of there being an association between serotonin and depression, and no support for the hypothesis that depression is caused by lowered serotonin activity or concentrations"
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41380-022-01661-0
The fourth industrial revolution doesn't require humans end of , what it does require is GMOs hence the need to bang so many shots into the livestock.
Joel, I assume you are familiar with the RIAT Act? https://doctorschierling.com/blog/depression-drug-for-teens
Let me connect a couple of dots here. So the childhood vaccination schedule in Ontario Canada is 55 doses to age 16. On the other hand it has been revealed now that these vaccines increase occurrence of autism, depression and a host of other undesirable side effects. So when depression occurs in a child the parent gives them another drug to counter depression. Seems the only ones winning here are the pharamaceutical companies. They make money off both the government mandated vaccine schedule and the treatment of the problems caused by said schedule.
Recently I warned a hard working Muslim customer who has 3 very young children about the problems of the mandatory childhood vaccination schedule. He told me it was not a problem for his family as his children would go to a Muslim private school that does not require any vaccinations. That group in society has got it right!
It’s up to 74+ in the states. Autism rate at 1 in 35….basically at least one kid per classroom.
Great article! I was unfortunately one of the many who went down this road of psychotropic drugs for “mental health”. I tried many different ones, all with severe side effects, & no relief from mental anguish. I eventually, after almost 30 years of wasting my life away with an incompetent psychologist, came to my own realization that indeed, my spiritual disconnection with God was my greatest issue. I began seeking out various spiritual guidance & support & found that the more connected I was spiritually, the less psychic pain I felt. So I agree with Mr. O’Kanu’s assessment on this. I also found Trudy Scott online at everywomanover29.com & learned about Amino Acids like GABA, glycine, L-theanine, 5HTP, tryptophan, & others that were very effective at turning off the fear, the self talk, the nihilism, self loathing, panic attacks, etc. This is all that was needed for me to be able to pull out of my downward trajectory & grow as a human being. And be “okay” with myself. Not one psychotherapist, psychologist, nor psychiatrist had helped me in this way. I found it on my own, thankfully, & reconnected with God for a healing journey I didn’t think was ever possible. I would love to help others on this same journey. It’s been a wild ride. Thank you for this extraordinary piece of writing! Have a beautiful day! 🙏🏽
I am in the US and don't really want to get into the details here of how we got where we got( now 17 years ago), but our adolescent daughter was put on an SSRI (incredibly low dose because she typically reacted adversely to most meds) -- actually it was coerced but we still had parental rights so we got the Dr. to give lowest dose possible. Even that extremely low dose was enough to turn our genius (tested) daughter into an absolute airhead -- her ability to think critically and operate with spatial awareness completely flew out the window -- I had to BEGto get her off the meds! Fortunately, the Dr. listened, but the damage was done. She still frequently struggles with brain fog and it really makes me angry.
Most of psychiatry produces iatrogenic harm. People are finally seeing how FDA approves drugs based on cherry-picked data and subjective measurements. There is no informed consent to all those that are prescribed psychiatric medications and when patients have side effects, they are blamed on their "disease" and not the drug. Often people receive poly pharmacy in an effort to "cure" the person which many times makes there life worse. Individuals have a hard time getting off of these drugs. There are severe and, many times, lasting iatrogenic harm from psychiatric medications. They are easy to dispense, whereby, listening and helping people with their problems takes too much time and does not make money. It's sad that this is our world. It's horrible that "science" thinks a pill is a cure for everything.
I remember in my 30s taking Prozac for general anxiety that I had reported to my GP, it was the strangest experience for me I am naturally introverted and very quiet and enjoy my own company. From the second week of taking this drug I became outgoing, would talk to anyone in any situation in effect I was the total opposite of my natural self. It started a conflict within me because I knew this was not normal, but I had little control over suddenly becoming an extrovert. I became very uncomfortable with this different personality and thankfully I recognised that I would have to stop them. I slowly reduced the Prozac and returned to my normal introverted self. I do not know the action of these drugs but for me it was a very uncomfortable experience, my general anxiety eventually disappeared on its own without help.
I am a holistic nutritionist and view depression as a symptom of underlying root causes and systemic imbalances. Many parents with children/teens showing signs of depression just want it to go away and they believe in the medical system. I ended up in the field I am in after my sons depression. It was work trying to figure it out and help him, even taking a leave of absence from work at that time so I could dive into all the literature, learn and help him. Most parents believe in the allopathic model and would never do what I did. At that time my son said something profound, “ mom, why can't I just pop a pill like everyone else at school.”
I first noticed the medicalization of human experience in my twenties, 50 years ago. A mistake that has only gotten worse
My aunt and my mother were put on anti-depressants in 1972 when their father died. My mother only took them once because they made her feel spaced-out and not in control. My aunt died in 2011 still taking them. She ended up with dementia after a stroke and the only time she "came back" was when they briefly took her off the Prozac (or whatever it was). She sometimes tried to come off them herself but it was impossible.
Her daughter is on anti-depressants because her mother died. She freely admits she is still depressed because everything is so horrendous in the world - she believes there is no future, what with Climate Armageddon, Putin, Trump, Plague-like Viruses and all the rest.
Her daughter has just been put on anti-depressants because her life isn't how she thought it would be - she wanted to be a cool Black hip hop dancer with cool Black friends. She's a nice white girl who had a poor education (her mother didn't want her to get stressed at school), failed to be a hip hop dancer, tried being gay, became a fanatical vegan, doesn't have a big social circle (she won't socialise with white people) and works as a hotel receptionist. She's 31 years old! She can't see how lucky she is - she lost her waitressing job during the pandemic but didn't become homeless or starve, she has no health problems other than of her own making.
None of these ladies needed medication - two of them were sad because a parent died (which is a natural part of life and grief is normal) and one of them is simply disappointed. The medication made no difference to their mental happiness.
Ups and downs are part of life not illnesses!
SSRIs (along with methylphenidate) are torture drugs, whereas risperidone, olanzepine, and perhaps other atypical antipsychotics are cull pills (via inducing metabolic syndrome). SSRIs do nothing for depression, what's the big idea of pushing them? They're weight control drugs!