SAMHSA, the Alternatives Conference, and the Story of an Opportunity Lost

The Medication Taboo in the Land of Free Speech

Posted Oct 06, 2010

In the last chapter of my book Anatomy of an Epidemic, I noted that if our society is going to stem the epidemic of disabling mental illness that has erupted during the past twenty years, then it needs to have an honest discussion about what is truly known about the biological causes of psychiatric disorders, and an honest discussion about how the medications affect the long-term course of those disorders. The illuminating powers of science could work their usual magic. But that is a discussion that many in our society don't want to have, and my recent experience at the Alternatives conference in Anaheim illustrates that point, and reveals too why this is such a loss.

The Background to the "Controversy"

In Anatomy of an Epidemic, I basically followed a tried-and-true journalistic path. I followed the evidence. I looked at how the chemical imbalance theory of mental disorders arose, how it was investigated, and how it never panned out. As Kenneth Kendler, coeditor in chief of Psychological Medicine wrote in 2005, "We have hunted for big simple neurochemical explanations for psychiatric disorders and have not found them." Then I investigated how psychiatric medications affect the long-term course of four major mental disorders (schizophrenia, anxiety, depression, and bipolar illness), and that involves doing an exhaustive survey of studies conducted (or funded) by the National Institute of Mental Health, the World Health Organization, and foreign governments for the past 50 years.

Now, when you do that, you discover a story of science quite at odds with our societal belief that psychiatric medications fix chemical imbalances in the brain and that they have dramatically improved long-term outcomes. And when you write up this history of science, as I did in Anatomy of an Epidemic, you do become unpopular in certain circles.

In July, the National Empowerment Center, which is a peer-run advocacy organization, invited me to be a keynote speaker at the Alternatives Conference. The National Empowerment Center is funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), and SAMHSA, I was told, had signed off on having me speak. However, once the National Empowerment Center announced that I would be speaking at the conference, SAMHSA quickly rescinded the invitation. In response, MindFreedom, which is an activist group, organized a protest via the Internet, asking people to contact both SAMSHA and the White House, and within 36 hours, I had been publicly re-invited to speak.

What people following this "controversy" didn't know was that my re-invitation came with considerable strings attached. I had originally been scheduled to give a workshop in addition to a keynote, but the workshop was still cancelled. (I had planned to speak about a Finnish program for treating psychotic patients that was producing excellent results, and the prescribing of exercise as a treatment for depression, which is now being done in Britain.) The other condition was this: The National Empowerment Center was required to recruit a psychiatrist, from a list of names provided by SAMHSA, to "rebut" my keynote. And I would not be given an opportunity to respond to that rebuttal.

Now, if SAMSHA had wanted to organize a debate following my talk, that would have been terrific. But this was a setup that SAMHSA seemed to have torn from the pages of a 25-year old Soviet Union handbook: invite dissident speaker and then denounce him! Normally, I wouldn't have accepted such an arrangement, but I had been quite moved and humbled by the protest that had led to my "reinvitation," and so I figured, what the heck. It wasn't every day that you got to sit in a ballroom with more than 1,000 people and hear your work denounced.

As the conference approached, a new controversy reared its head. Will Hall, who many years ago was given a diagnosis of "schizoaffective disorder/schizophrenia," and who today works as a therapist (having been off psychiatric medications for 17 years), had planned to give a workshop that included discussing a "harm-reduction" approach to withdrawing from psychiatric medications. Several years ago, Hall had written a book on the subject, which had been published by two advocacy groups, The Freedom Center and the Icarus Project, and given that there are few books written by professionals on the circuit, his had proven to be quite popular. But a few days before the conference began, Hall was told that the printed description of his workshop in the conference brochure had been changed to remove any mention about "coming off drugs." Hall announced that he couldn't accept such censorship, a new protest erupted, and then he was told that the offending words could in fact be mentioned in an updated description that would be added to the conference brochure.

And all this occurred before an alternatives conference.

Friday, October 1

On Friday morning, I was given about 45 minutes to speak, and after I gave a brief overview of Anatomy of an Epidemic, I spoke at greater length about this question: Is it true that people diagnosed with schizophrenia (or other psychotic disorders) need to be on antipsychotic medication all their lives? There is a fairly long line of studies dating back to the 1960s that bear on this question, and the conclusion to be drawn is this: If psychiatry wants to maximize long-term outcomes, it needs to use antipsychotic medications in a selective, limited manner. Time and time again, the studies showed that there is a large subgroup of patients that would fare better if they were never put on the drugs in the first place, or if they were maintained on the drugs for only a short while.

The beauty of this particular story of science is that it concludes with a description of how western Lapland, in northern Finland, started using antipsychotic medications in this manner in 1992, and today their psychotic patients enjoy the best long-term outcomes in the western world. Five years after a first psychotic episode, eighty percent of their patients are either back in school or working. About one-third of the patients have been exposed to antipsychotics during this period, and about twenty percent end up taking the medication regularly. And what I like most about this success story is that it cannot be viewed, in any way, as an "anti-medication" story. It's a "best-practices" story.

Most of the audience understood this to be a "good news" tale, with science telling us of a therapeutic path that led to high recovery rates. And imagine if the program, at this national conference, had been structured to have psychiatrists (or other providers) discuss the talk I had just given. We could have spoken about whether a similar therapeutic approach could ever be tried here, and with representatives from SAMHSA there, perhaps this possibility could even have leapt onto a national agenda. This could have been a moment for transformative change in the treatment of first-episode psychosis in this country, a change designed to put young people back onto a path of real recovery, rather than down a path that led all too often to chronicity and disability. But unfortunately, in that Hyatt Regency ballroom, a much different process was underway. Several SAMHSA officials were nervously huddled with the psychiatrist, Mark Ragins, who had been selected to rebut my talk, apparently with a sense of urgency that he effectively counter what I had said. No good news allowed!

When Dr. Ragins took the stage at lunchtime, he was remarkably candid. He was here because SAMHSA wouldn't let me speak unless a psychiatrist had a chance to rebut what I had said. This, of course, was startling news to most in the audience, as few had ever been to a conference where a second keynote speaker was brought in to discredit the first.

There was, however, no real discussion by Dr. Ragins of the talk I had given, or the issues brought up in Anatomy of an Epidemic. Instead, Dr. Ragins used this metaphor to criticize Anatomy: In the book, he said, I had provided readers with a "compelling picture" of a "close-up of a car accident," but "we have to widen our view to decide if freeways should be torn down." Dr. Ragins then discussed other factors besides medication that might be causing the astonishing rise in the number of disabled mentally ill in our society, such as the fact that once people are on SSI or SSDI, there is a financial disincentive to return to work (which I agree is a factor.) Finally, in apparent reference to the many studies I cited in the book that had found that medicated patients have worse long-term outcomes than the off-medication group, he said:

"Medical interventions are always correlated with worse (long-term) problems . . . It is likely that all interventions ‘done to' someone to give them help or take care of them will have short-term benefits that wane over time and may well become long-term negatives."

I still am not quite sure how that was supposed to be a "rebuttal" to Anatomy of an Epidemic. But that is how it was being pitched, and then when Dr. Ragins detailed some of his thoughts on what promoted long-term recovery -- "Love other people, family, partners, kids" was one of the things he advised -- I could only think: Am I supposed to be against this? Indeed, I had the feeling that if Dr. Ragins and I had been on a panel together, we would have found much common ground, and that he might have thought that there was considerable merit to the Western Lapland approach. But the chance to have that productive discussion had been lost.

A Postscript

During the conference, D. J. Jaffe, who has close ties to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, having served on its national board of directors, wrote a blog about the conference for The Huffington Post, describing it as a waste of taxpayer money. My presence there, he argued, was evidence of why this was so. The keynote speaker, Jaffe said, had written that "antipsychotic drugs do not fix any known brain abnormality nor do they put brain chemistry back into balance," and readers were left to understand that, given that everybody knew that mental disorders were caused by chemical imbalances, I was a bit of a loony-tune.

So what was the real purpose of this blog? NAMI is a powerful political group, heavily funded by pharmaceutical companies, and in my opinion, Jaffe was delivering a warning. He was telling the National Empowerment Center and other consumer groups that they risked losing their funding if they did not, in the future, march in lockstep with psychiatry's official story, which is that mental disorders are known brain illnesses, and that the drugs are like "insulin for diabetes." No more invitation by the National Empowerment Center to speakers who would say otherwise.

At such moments, I have to confess that I begin to lose all hope. It seems quite impossible that our society will ever be able to have a thoughtful, honest discussion about what is truly known about mental disorders, and about the merits of psychiatric medications. The forces lined up against such a discussion are simply too great.

Please don't give up hope.

Submitted by Anonymous on October 6, 2010 - 11:00pm

Please don't give up hope. Even if mainstream psychiatry isn't listening, the availability of information on alternatives is helping thousands of people. After taking an SSRI and experiencing "SSRI induced mania" I was told that I have bipolar disorder and that I would have to take debilitating drugs for the rest of my life. Fortunately, I wasn't willing to "accept my diagnosis" and thanks to writers like you and other internet resources I learned that there are much, much better ways. Four years later I'm still a working, productive member of society and med free despite the dire warnings I heard from a psychiatrist. You and others who provide information about alternatives are saving lives.

I agree that we must not give

Submitted by mixmuffin on October 7, 2010 - 8:54pm

I agree that we must not give up. I was diagnosed with manic depressive illness with a secondary diagnosis of borderline personality disorder in 1992. I swallowed every pill prescribed for me and became a zombie for six years, unable to do more than eat and sleep all day. Through the grace of God, I was made aware of some of the side effects of one of the pills, and was asked to sign a waiver for the state-run facility TWO YEARS AFTER the first dose; I refused, flushed that prescription when I got home, and gradually stopped the rest of them on my own, as I was "refusing medication", and, therefore, turned away from counseling, as well. I asked my GP if he could just prescribe a low dose anti-anxiety pill for me to take AS NEEDED, as I am not manic or depressed every single day. I get better "counsel" from my close friends and family, now. The problem, now, is that I got so flaccid from being "zombie-fied", I am physically unable to do much of anything without straining a muscle. So, I am still disabled. At 55. This has to stop!

I agree! You have changed and saved so many lives .

Submitted by Cindy on October 8, 2010 - 9:48am

Please don't give up!! I credit your first book with saving my life and my mental health. In large part thanks to you, I have been off medications, free from mental health problems, and functioning as a full-time mental health professional and mental health volunteer advocate for eight years. My depression and psychosis were extremely severe eight years ago, and medications did not help at all, but your work helped me figure out another way to recovery, even though others were telling me that medications were the only option. I can never thank you enough for that. Remember that in spite of this recent discouraging sequence of events, you have already made an amazing difference in the world, and you'll continue to do so, even if change doesn't always happen as fast as our dreams do.

Don't get discouraged - we can do it!

Submitted by Corinna on October 6, 2010 - 11:05pm

But there was the standing ovation before you spoke - the massive discontent in the room during the denouncement, the line of people who stood up to denounce the denouncement.

All of us are on your side. I think things are getting better. Big pharma is starting to be shown to be the emperor with no clothes. Besides, it's more cost effective to use less meds. That's the bottom line.

The government of the U.S.

Submitted by Stephany on October 7, 2010 - 12:23am

The government of the U.S. has clearly made a statement that the medication based paradigm for mental health treatment is the only option patient have for treatment of mental illness.

The pharmaceutical industry has a grip on the American public, and this is a crisis that has evolved from greed, unethical behavior by KOL's, research that has been tainted by opinion leaders with their pockets lined with income from pharma companies to promote their drugs.

The controversial medication Seroquel is just one example of what America has chosen for a medication to treat Schizophrenia, bipolar, off-label use for insomnia, and more.

The makers of Seroquel, AstraZeneca were fined $520 million dollars for illegal marketing and promotion of the drug. The drug has a black box warning for diabetes, and the internal documents prove the company knew the drug had that side effect before it was placed on the market and the FDA approved the drug.

The drug is in litigation for millions of dollars for injured patients who became diabetic on the drug and yet Seroquel not only remains on the market, it is being given to children as young as 3 years old.

The heavy hand the government showed by attempting to stop Whitaker and Hall from speaking is nothing less than evil at work.

This country has lost its moral compass, lost its future, it in fact has lost all integrity and the industry that supports NAMI, DBSA, grants for research, money to KOL's such as Biederman and Nemeroff, is in charge of America's care of psychiatric patients.

In America, you can search high and low for an alternative treatment for Schizophrenia and if you ask a psychiatrist you will be told, that drugs are the only way.

Yet, those drugs are not effacious, they cause shortened lifespans, and increase body physical dysfunction. Most psychiatrists cannot tell their patients how or why the drugs work or not.

Question the paradigm and this is the result.

Never give up hope, and never stop speaking for those who have no voice.

Thank you, Bob.

Nutritional alternatives to meds or 'no meds' paint a vast, colorful landscape of new possibilities! Don't lose hope. Get informed and get well! Help others!!!

Submitted by Anonymous on October 8, 2010 - 2:20am

Thanks for the supportive comment. And special thanks to Robert for carrying part of this load. There are millions more of us, Bob, so don't lose hope. I am constantly fighting to get nutrition on the agenda in mental health forums, public meetings, consumer/survivor groups, conferences, and into programs at different levels. Fortunately, the understanding is growing that poor nutrition and nutrient-poor foods are big, major major factors in why peoples's brains don't work well or sometimes at all..

The biggest problem we face today is a for-profit 'health care system' which profits off sickness and not health. You can read that sentence again if you want...You can even copy it and repeat it or use it in articles and letters to the editor or whatever. It's the basic dilemma and dysfunction we face--the medical system is sick and psychiatry is out of touch with (the) reality of what people need and how to provide that. For profit 'health care' doesn't work, since it makes money off peoples' sickness and loses customers when they are well. H-m-m...

I was at Alternatives, too. A very savvy and popular speaker on gluten sensitivity/celiac disease co-presented with me a workshop on carbohydrates, gluten, weight gain, and the brain. Poor diet, lousy food, pollutants, and medications are huge contributors to weight gain and brain illnesses in America, not just among the behaviorally-upset.

There are actually fairly to very effective ways of dealing with these biological illnesses of brain function without using drugs for most people but medications could also be used as adjunct or mainline treatments, in some cases. I spoke up at Alternatives about this broad swath of nutritional solutions and the vacuous nature of a 'debate' about only:

1) MEDICATIONS, OR.. 2) NO MEDICATIONS. There's actually a lot between those two poles.

This unproductive 'discussion' focuses on the much much misused, misaligned, and mistreated concept of a 'chemical imbalance.' Pharma hucksters doesn't have to understand what it is, since they don't know understand really, don't care, and are making way too much money on the concept without knowing about the workings of the brain, but tens or even hundreds (over a hundred) million people are not very happy with what's going on with 'meds'.

Just ask people. Query them. Don't take the first answer. Many are trained to not think or analyze it, just take and buck up, but often when they think for about 3-5 sec. they say something like, 'Zorroastria doesn't seem to help' 'I don't like Serohell' "My medications don't work" "I feel worse on my (fill in blank)". Wait, you feel worse on ____+? Then why do you take it? 'Because the doctor says so' "I have to take them" (big mistake--assuming your doctor knows what s/he is doing and is able to fundamentally treat the illness you came in to see him/her about.

We need to understand the highly limited rubric of today's medicine and psychiatry--allopathy and chemical alterations of natural body and brain function. It should be a small sub-specialty when healthier, normally more direct and cost-effective nutritional treatments aren't enough.

Think: officially-sanctioned 'drug pushers' or something less graphic if you want. makes me feel rotten" or they just talk about 'side effects' because that's mainly what they experience. People are taught that 'this is all we have' mostly by default, which is how doctors are given drug training--not as a best treatment, but as the ONLY treatment, therefore it must be good, right? Wrong.

If we can stop and think for a minute or 2, what is a 'chemical imbalance'. It seems to suggest that two chemicals are imbalanced or one is imbalanced (low or high). It is not specified but presumed.

Unfortunately, doctors these days function as 'applied pharmacists' rather than inquisitive, well-trained, and skilled, highly effective providers. In a sense, they now act as drug pushers for pharmaceutical companies. They know it and so do we. It's not a secret or anything.

Most doctors (psych docs included) don't even study health. They don't even study HEALTH. What did you say? Let me say that again--for a little emphasis here. Medical doctors and 'psychiatrists' don't even study health. Health, no? Wait a minute...wait, slow down here Chris (important concept),.

You mean the people at the apex of 'our' highly-expensive, highly-touted, supposedly highly-advanced and scientifically -supported 'health care system' don't even study health??? And I would say: "Well, actually, "You're right!"" "How did you figure that out?" "Who told you that? Some intellectual...or something?

So, one might ask: if my doctor doesn't understand or know how to produce health, because they haven't even studied it to begin with, why do we call it a 'health care system'? GOOD QUESTION! PEOPLE ARE FIGURING IT OUT, RIGHT? I THINK. THE PHRASE HEALTH CARE AND MENTAL HEALTH SYSTEM ARE RADICAL, HALL OF FAME EUPHEMISMS (understatements, intentional misrepresentations or 'large exaggerations').

Medical people, bless their polished stethoscopes, study.......disease and........ the identification of advanced diseases and....... the removal of disease symptoms by.........taking a drug called...(fill in blank on prescription pad)_. It's very simple and it's very very crude, and it doesn't really have to work in any fundamental sense, since, well, ah.....well, that wouldn't be profitable and ah, we have a job here...which is well...why we treat people...yah, excuse me, I have another patient..

And, root causes--"aren't concerned about those". Why should they be? They make over 100,000 / year sitting in an office and writing prescriptions to pad Big Pharma's profit charts and marketing schemes.

Pharmaceuticals and medical doctors unfortunately do not know how to beneficially support natural brain function--but nutritionally-schooled therapists have learned about this, generally and specifically through many years of research and decades of application, and have far superior results than either medications or no meds for most all physical illnesses, 'mental illnesses' included.

In an article or talk, Mr. Whitaker reported on one study where only 5% got better using anti-depressants while 40% recovered without using any drugs, but nutritional (Orthomolecular--another term) doctors and providers almost routinely talk about ~80% effectiveness in alleviating symptoms and bringing clients out of the disease state and back into meaningful lives and recovery.

I would even go so far as to say that recovery could just be a milepost on the way to much better health and wellness, such as never been experienced before. I am a Nutritional Therapy Practitioner who is doing education, consulting, volunteer sharing, help, and professional nutritional therapy. Others could train and use nutritional knowledge to help themselves and others.

The association that provided training for me and numerous other nutritionally interested people is called Nutritional Therapy Association (www.nutritionaltherapy.com). You will be extremely favorably impressed with the organization, professionalism, program, and quality of instruction in this year-long training, which I highly recommend, having gone to 4 universities myself and received 3 degrees.

People are mentally unwell because they are physically sick and/or emotionally ill. That's about 90-95+% of the issue. If we understand that the term 'mental' is inaccurate, concocted, negative, perceived, not tied to any physical reality, and very vague, we can conclude it is outdated and wrong--the term 'mental illness' needs to be put in mothballs or permanent storage underground. It should be junked for appropriate terminology.

If we use the language of oppression, we give up power. We should begin to understand that schizophrenia, bipolar, anxiety, and depression are physical expressions of malnourished, stressed, and/or chemically-upset metabolic systems.

There needs to be more discussion of that fact and learning and application of the healthier treatments which work a whole lot better for most, cost a fraction of the stupid medications, and are 100,000's of times safer. Yes, nutrients are win-win=win-win.

If you want you can email me for further info consulting or resources. I do educational workshops that are informative and fun, like we did at Alternatives this year. The title of our workshop was "Against the Grain....."

I HOPE PEOPLE DON'T GIVE UP HOPE--OUR MOVEMENT IS A CO-OPERATIVE, BUILDING ONE AND WE MUST BUOY UP EACH OTHER, BUILD SEQUENTIALLY, AND NEVER GIVE UP! i get discouraged, too. Robert Whitaker has done a very credible job of exposing the long-term truth about pharmacological agents, and we are gratefully indebted to him, but we need to start filling in the 'void' between the understanding of the big failure of medications and 'not taking them' (as if that's all we can do).

I'm really glad that Robert talks about the Quakers approach, social supports, and such. WE need to broaden the social to the healthy bio-physical with nutritional support. Many providers and nutritionally oriented therapists are already filling in this big valley with amazing success. Nutritional therapy should be available for all someday.

Ironically, or practically we could be working along with psychiatrists to truly provide an integrated approach in treatment. I am willing to work with and also help train open-minded and interested providers who want to provide healthier treatments for their clients beyond the pharmaceutical paradigm which doesn't work very well because it's not supposed to, or more specifically, can't.

Drugs are at best a poor substitute for nutrition, active lives, social activities, and the other supports that make thriving and surviving possible, or just getting someone on their feet again.

Nutrition is #1 in terms of overall effectiveness since it could be conservatively said that the lion's share of behavioral problems are metabolic, bio-physical in nature. This is not 'pie-in-the-sky' rhetoric, it is already happening to millions. Keep the faith. We have so many opportunities for healthy regeneration of our metabolic systems, emotions, and lives that it is hard to keep track of them all. It takes some exposure and learning, and hopefully being able to find a trained provider to guide and help. We all should keep trying.

People have been trained to expect low results, so sometimes think that anything that offers dramatic success must be 'too good to be true'. I'm here to tell you with every fiber of my being that it's 'not too good to be true' but 'even better than that' (You really can't imagine what you can be two years down the road). Who's that guy or gal? Wow! Is that ??Martha Is that...John?? He's doing really well. What happened? Your friends may remark on how you have changed quite for the better with healthy nutritional therapy.

The results with nutrition are best described as 'phenomenal' because they work using the phenomena of our natural biology and because the results are so good, as in "I had phenomenal results with Niacin, B-6, and Zinc". Using natural dietary elements and healthy, whole foods does work, is real & is natural. Nutrients work WITH our bodies and our brains to build and support healthy function. Depression can be a simple nutritional deficiency such as a folic acid deficiency, or low blood Vitamin D, or a pyroluric depression. Many things can be causes, but nutrition is paramount for full recovery.

Stress wears down certain vitamins, minerals, cellular structures, and fats and proteins in our system, but our diets are not even close to supplying enough of these basic, required raw materials for LIFE>

Disease is the lack of health as much as anything else. What we should be talking about (and will, have faith!) as we apply and use informed, guided, and sustained nutritional therapy, is 'side benefits', multiple benefits for other physical systems that readily translate to mental and emotional factors and build healthier, new lives and more fully functioning people. NOTE: with medications, what do we talk about? (_side effects_, which is a euphemism for harm, toxicity, additional illness or problems).

And remember that some are extremely skilled and professional at doing this. The results are far better than any other individual form of therapy, psych drug taking (medications) included.

Nutrients and healthy food can begin to build and even revolutionize our lives and our brains. It's painting in a broad, colorful array of natural solutions where meds and no meds cannot go. It 'works' and we can learn about it, apply it, and see remarkable results over time. So, Time's a wastin'! Keep active, build health, and KEEP HOPE ALIVE!

THANKS ROBERT. Chris Foulke, NTP, BS, BA
'nutrition for bio-behavioral health'

Dr Mark Ragins-the SAMHSA psychiatrist

Submitted by Stephany on October 7, 2010 - 12:51am

Eli Lilly, maker of Zyprexa (antipsychotic)

http://www.village-isa.org/Outcomes/outcome_studies.htm

FUNDED the Village data of quality of life outcome

"The Village Integrated Service Agency has pioneered the use of quality of life outcome data for people with severe and persistent mental illness in Los Angeles county. In 1995, MHALA, through a grant jointly funded by the Robert Ellis Simon Foundation and the Eli Lilly Corporation, implemented the MHALA Outcome System for measuring the quality of life of all the consumers in the Partners programs. Data collection began on August 1, 1996 and we now have more than 3 years of data on the 1600 + consumers of the Partners programs. MHALA continues to coordinate the monthly aggregation of data across the programs and to produce the county’s monthly report card."

Wherever you look, pharma $$$ is connected with mental health in America.

Much Gathering of Data

Submitted by Anonymous on October 7, 2010 - 9:04am

OK. So, data is being gathered. Whatis being done with the data? Has the data gathering become national? Is it being used to propel intentional recovery? Is the consumer in any way benefiting directly from this "data gathering?" What is this report card indicating? What is the report card accomplishing? Once again, above all else how is this research promoting recovery on a individual by individual case? State by State? Any agency can do research an say that it is vital to the consumer. Prove that it promotes, encourages and helps to build recovery in the Mental Health System, then I will listen.

Much Gathering of Data

Submitted by Anonymous on October 7, 2010 - 9:04am

Financial disclosures of the Village?

Submitted by Stephany on October 7, 2010 - 1:39am

I would like to know if Dr. Mark Ragin offered a full disclosure, when he spoke at the Alternatives Conference.

Did he disclose that his 'Village' received funding from Eli Lilly? and did he disclose he won a "Welcome Back" award in 2006 from Eli Lilly, which, I believe as a result gave him a cash award for the non profit of his choice, and did that money go to 'the Village'?

If he did not disclose financial ties to pharma at the Alternative Mental Health Conference, then he, in my opinion is just another cookie cutter NAMI, DBSA gov funded pro-medication doctor with an agenda to promote wellness and independence, but with MEDICATION.

The word 'chronic' does not allow for wellness does it? there is no pharma business profit to be made if chronic patients are cured or recovered off meds is there?

Bob, as one who has heard you

Submitted by Anonymous on October 7, 2010 - 4:29am

Bob, as one who has heard you speak, I thank you profusely for what you have done.

I suffered greatly from being on a cocktail of psych meds as I feel it destroyed 15 years of my life. I am now off of them, thanks to the great support from Paxil Progress Boards, and am doing much better.

I shudder to think what my life would still be like on these meds and how my health would be deteriorating.

Since I want to stay classy, I can't repeat what I think of the folks who put conditions on your talk.

All I can say it don't give up and again, thank you for speaking at the conference under these conditions and thank you again, for speaking the truth about these meds.

Bob Whitaker helps save

Submitted by Anonymous on October 8, 2010 - 4:17am

Bob Whitaker helps save lives. He is an American living treasure.

Any young adult in medical school seriously considering specializing in the quackery that is psychiatry, please, we only need real doctors in this world, become a cardiologist or something. We need real doctors for real diseases, not the violent thugs in mental health who don't give a #$@$ about human rights and informed consent, who are content to violently push their unevidenced beliefs on innocent people. If you're still in medical school, it's not to late to abandon any plans to flush a perfectly good medical degree down the toilet by specializing as a quack 'drug and label' psychiatrist.

Be careful about stereotyping

Submitted by AA on October 8, 2010 - 6:19am

Be careful about stereotyping all psychiatrists. I know of one who has literally saved someone's life due to going through withdrawal h-ll from an SSRI.

Apparently, this doctor is a big fan of Whitaker's book.

Just saying.

Psychiatrists

Submitted by Portland17 on October 9, 2010 - 12:58am

I agree. They are few in number, but there are some heroic psychiatrists out there who are bucking the trend, sometimes at the risk of losing their credibility and practice. It takes a great deal of courage to go against this particular stream, and my hat is off to any psychiatrist with the guts to do it. They can and do save lives.

"quack 'drug and label'

Submitted by Anonymous on October 9, 2010 - 11:28am

"quack 'drug and label' psychiatrist."

I said that 'drug and label' psychiatrists are not what the world needs. That is 99.9% of psychiatrists, the rare independent thinker in psychiatry, is not among the 'drug and label' crowd. I give them their due.

Question: why do you consider cardiologists to be 'real doctors'-?

Submitted by Filbert on October 9, 2010 - 5:58am

We have all been programmed by our parents, society, the media, dizzy-headed thinking, emergency situations, etc. to consider medical doctors as somehow knowledgeable although they do not even study the very most critically important input for human health or, lacking it, disease –and that is NUTRITION.

We need the building blocks for health and efficient metabolism, which start with the physical components of our body, its structures, fluids, and metabolic compounds. What I speak of is—nutrients, in a word.

If your psych doc doesn't prescribe nutrients for your body and brain, fire him--he isn't worth the paint on his door. And someday you may realize it's not that much different in mainline medicine--plenty of pharmaceutical non-solutions for pretty much anything. Oh, some medications do help, and some drugs alleviate symptoms but way too many do a lot of harm and not much help, which actually...helps pharmaceuticals and doctors, who can't make money off of healthy people so they don't study health in medical school.

"Health? Hell, who wants to learn about that? Where's the money in it?" "I am going to become a........'psy---chi--atrist' (and I already have two Pharma dharma comp's hooking up with me...everybody does It. It's the only game in town-kinda like the lady down the block).

Most doctors today are trained to NOT provide healthy treatments but prostrate themselves in one way or another to Big Pharma candy. I don't know a awful lot about cardiologists, except that 50-80% of cardiologists supposedly take Vitamin E (themselves) since it is obviously a heart-healthy vitamin and potent antioxidant. That's really important for post-cardiac victims and those on psych meds, especially anti-dep's and anti-psychotics.

The question to ask a cardiologist to weed out some of the unschooled or unworthy ones might be: "Do you recommend Vitamin E for your patients?"

If he/she says No, then you could say goodbye and explain why you are going to leave, but I would leave right away and find a real healer—a qualified physician, someone who understands the body's workings and how to beneficially supply the necessary nutrients to begin building back health. Or maybe just walk straight out of the guys/gals' office without apology (he/she may get the emphasis that way!). Case closed but not dismissed.

Find a nutritional doc or psych doc or you're wasting your time and your life will be impaired by largely unnecessary drugs. Few will not recommend impairing one's brain with pharmaceuticals. Few will help you professionally taper off those toxic compounds. Good luck finding a real doc, though, be sincere and keep looking!

Believe me, most people in

Submitted by Elizabeth H on October 10, 2010 - 2:36am

Believe me, most people in psychiatry would much rather be cardiologists. They were hoping to engage in tissue, not minds; and if you wonder why so many psychiatrists are totally unsuited to the profession, realize that psychiatry is where the bottom-of-the-barrel medical students go.

Berlin wall gives us hope

Submitted by Rossa Forbes on October 7, 2010 - 5:44am

Remember the Berlin Wall and how fast communism collapsed almost everywhere in only a few months. There is a tipping point. Blogsters like me weren't even around at that time, so, yes, there is hope.

Berlin Walls of the Mind...

Submitted by Filbert on October 8, 2010 - 2:54am

My most distinct memory of the Berlin Wall was a phrase someone had painted: "Smoke Pine Needles!" The mind was really at work there. Has Bag Harma looked into new plant tobaccos? WoW! Alternative smokes! Now there's an idea. ON the serious side, I met an East German guy in West Berlin who had just been let out of prison after 2 years of detention there for some..probably political crime. I gave him a bottle of smoke-flavored beer formerly designated for my Dad. Big Pharma is a wall of fluffy 'science' and statistical chaff where alternative possibilities are not mentioned or used, until recently. Watch out. WE need to keep pushing back on Senate Bill 510 at the federal level. It's a fake 'food safety bill' being pushed in the Senate by commercial interests and bought-out Senators like the legally insane John McCane, Hairy Reed, and others now to further hamper natural food production, organic foods, nutritional supp's, etc. Google 'Natural Solutions Foundation' and read some of the articles and get involved, people! /We can win if we get involved! Do it./

Complaining in the corner

Submitted by David Petropoulos on October 7, 2010 - 8:49am

If you want to discuss mental illness, in all It's complexities-why not critically engage the writings of the top psychiatrist in the country- Peter D. Kramer?

I suspect, you're too smart for that.

Kramer

Submitted by Stephany on October 7, 2010 - 11:17am

The discussion is about the government censorship and control of the message regarding the choice of treatment for psychiatric care in the United States.

Dr. Peter Kramer was not the psychiatrist who the program brought in to rebut Whitaker's keynote speech, which to remind everyone was not a debate. Has anyone ever heard of outside parties controlling what a keynote said?

It's obvious that big pharma=big money and our government runs with the pack. Why were they so threatened? and why are readers of this article and others of late? what could be so threatening about good news that someone "beat a chronic illness" with methods other than medication that has severe side effects?

Do we celebrate the remission of someone's cancer and then demand they remain in radiation treatment and chemo?

Mental illness is not cancer, but the NAMI, TAC, Earley types want people to believe that its chronic and dangerous to not be medicated.

Why was Pete Earley, a father of a son who he committed to care by lying his way through the ER eval process, so threatened by David Oaks of MindFreedom and other advocates that he closed his blog and face book to discussion?

It's all about hanging onto the medication based paradigm for care. If meds work for people, then they work...why not listen to those who say, "Whoa, got off the antipsychotics and have an independent and great life!"

Cash cows. State funded, goverment paid care of patients equals big bucks. Each person is worth money to the government and if they all got well the drug industry would lose billions of dollars on drugs that are being dosed out like candy to the military and to kids for off-label uses.

Jaffe, the TAC based Fuller Torrey next generation is already back in action now attempting to attach MindFreedom to scientology. Why he uses that as a way to destroy people is beyond me. Because, using Scientology to explain away hundreds and thousands of people who are against drugging of children with antipsychotics and freedom of choices is old, and worn out like a flat tire on a dump truck.

I am not a scientologist for the record and I also have witnessed people have horrific and permanent damage done to their bodies from long term use of antipsychotics. The antipsychotics also are not efficacious for what they were designed for: the treatment of schizophrenia. Unless they were designed for how they are used now: as chemical restraints and mind-dumbing and body slowing drugs to control patients in and out of psych wards.

Stories such as Mary Weiss and her son should be a reason to think about how our government cares for and researches drugs such as Seroquel.

http://psychrights.org/articles/WhenDrugTrialsGoTerriblyWrong(PsychToday2009).htm

Her son died after being coerced to remain in a drug trial at the UMN for Seroquel.

That same doctor, Shulz, is currently trialing Seroquel XR, same place, same doctor, in a trial for a drug in litigation for diabetes lawsuits, and this time the trial is for Borderline Personality Disorder. The trial, is sponsored by AstraZeneca.

The conflict of interest is example of how entrenched the mental health care system is in pharmaceutical company money and profit.

Patients who can succeed out of that system and off meds should receive a round of applause, for it is in fact as if they escaped a communistic regime. Anyone who has witnessed the inside of a locked mental institution and witnessed the drugged stupors, the restraints and seclusion rooms (yes they are still used)will know what I am talking about.

You are right on target.

Submitted by mixmuffin on October 7, 2010 - 9:13pm

I accept your applause, Stephany. Psych wards are very scary places. They let you know you have no rights, and, if you refuse to be drugged mindless you will be put out...which, in my book, was the best thing for me, personally. I prefer to feel ANY emotion to none whatsoever.
I pray, daily, now, for those poor lost souls I met on my different trips for a "medicine adjustment" (aka: I was shaking it off and questioning the shrinks instead of swallowing them because the doctor told me to.)
Thank God for the internet. Obama proved its power when he got elected, so I hope this "goes viral".

Petter Kramer--who is he? writings? why do you consider him to be tops?

Submitted by Filbert on October 9, 2010 - 5:24am

Can you recommend one of Peter Kramer's writings? Also, why do you consider him to be the 'top psychiatrist in the country'? Does he practice nutritional or integrated nutritional/medicative psychiatry? Is that why you consider him tops? Questions.

Your talk was excellent!

Submitted by Dorothy Dundas on October 7, 2010 - 12:20pm

I agree with Corinna. Your talk spoke to the truth. Your book brilliantly weaves the incestuous relationship between big pharmacy, the APA and the government(NIMH/SAMHSA). Don't give up! We are all behind you in our search for the truth. Whatever the causes of emotional distresses, kindness and a gentle caring often are more healing than any drug.
Dorothy Dundas

Great books on pharmaceuticals and their various and sordid practices

Submitted by Filbert on October 9, 2010 - 6:24am

If you like Whitaker's book, you should read Melody Peterson's 'Our Daily Meds'. It goes way beyond any other book on how the pharma companies have degraded through various marketing 'strategems' to become basically rotten-moraled, evil marketing firms with no value system other than selling more drugs--side effects? Great, we have a drug for that? Near death, we'll be glad to help you! Metabolic disorder from an anti-psychotic, you must need a statin!

"Oh, you are so healthy, let's see, your last b.p. was 150/90. @@3weight is ... 250, gees, you've gained another 10, or is it 15 pounds this month? What are you eating? Why do you feel like eating so much? You really should cut down on your calories and start exercising...oh, your knees hurt now. OK, then don't exercise. But eat lots of whole grains and fruits and vegetables (all starches that produce more fat and cholesterol). OK, I'm going to raise your Seroquel 100mg to help you deal with this anxiety that seems to causing your eating disorder (caused by SEroquel)--it'll relax you". "What's my co-pay, doc? is it an arm or...a leg? Or maybe...my heart?" Not funny, but unfortunately somewhat or very true.

So when a person ends up in a

Submitted by Anonymous on October 7, 2010 - 12:20pm

So when a person ends up in a behavioral health care system due to psychotic behavior, what do you want the system to do? On the private end, if you don't go to a psychiatrist, you're not going to get a prescription. I don't see psychiatrists in the public systems eager to hand out meds. Public systems are so under funded they don't want to help people at all. The people in the public system are pretty ill. They always try weaning people off meds and they don't treat them unless those people show up with the behavior again. Again, with private psychiatrists, don't go if you don't want meds. I'm lost as to what this big controversy is about. As far as Pete Earley is concerned, his son got arrested for (I believe for breaking & entering) because he took a bath in someone else's home. Are you suggesting he should do nothing to help his son since the system wouldn't help him until he unknowingly became a criminal?

I would like the "system" to

Submitted by Rossa Forbes on October 7, 2010 - 2:41pm

I would like the "system" to have provided some help and insight to me before we get to that point. I would like an honest system, one that showed me there was another side to the use of meds and given me specific ways to change the interaction between me and my son. A couple of years ago we ended up putting our son in the hospital after I tried to do the Soteria thing at home. Any understanding I have of helping him I had to learn myself. I had to learn that the way the family specifically interacts with the so called mental patient is critical, and that most families probably made the person "crazy" to begin with. But, you won't hear this from psychiatry. No, psychiatry doesn't blame the parent or the family. That would be putting the onus back on families to clean up their act. Drug companies would have us believe this is all biochemical. It lets the family off the hook. Nobody's to blame. Very convenenient, isn' it? Psychiatry wants us to turn our lives over to them. They try to claim that what they are doing is science. When my son landed in the hospital, this was sure admission that psychiatry and the family have failed. The "system" know the answers, but alas, there is no money in the truth.

Great

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 1:31pm

So we're back to blaming the family. It's my fault my daughter has a mental illness. I repent of all my sins. Is she better now?

It has been said "if the shoe

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 7:00pm

It has been said "if the shoe fits, wear it"

Repentance without change of mind, heart, and actions means absolutely nothing. Haven't you already walked down the precarious road of medical miracles and quick fixes? I don't know your particular situation, but in general the time for more excuses has passed with the mountain of information now being made available for parents to make informed and rational decisions upon.

You can't change what is already done, but you can accept the mistakes made by taking responsibility for the past and then by digesting your guilt before to moving forward with a renewed knowledge using the shield of actual "truth" as your guide.

In fact you (or anyone), as a parent needs to own your responsibility as such. Your job if you haven't forgotten is to prepare/foster your child for the world of independence based in your actions, example, limits, guidance, love, and encouragement; and then let them fly on thier own free out of your control.

I know it's much easier to buy into the faith based psychiatric model and blame some con-cocked disease; but how's that working out for your daughter? Those medications get her well and functioning back on track to a hope filled life full of endless opportunities? Or have you now just buried your head in the sands of guilt living in a state of constant denial that your chosen quick fix ended up being just an added poison pill making an unfortunate situation far worse and possibly permanent for your child.

We have now already gone through the duped period of this monumental greed based mental health marketing power grab crisis & myth, now it has morphed into some ingrained faith and belief system that relies upon those indoctrinated zealots vigorously defending their faith.

Who are you repenting to exactly anywise? Just maybe the church of NAMI (the marketing off chute from the Church of Psychiatry/Big Pharma) will they pull/suck you into their ordained confessional booth and let you watch their latest AstraZeneca Marketing video, before declaring you washed of sin and forgiven in the diseased blood of their profitable created victims.

I guess it’s a nice cult if you’re at the collection end of this diabolical scheme.

Anyone who thinks a bad

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 7:48pm

Anyone who thinks a bad parent can't drive a kid to mental breakdown is kidding themselves.

Most people I know how have had serious psychiatric labels applied to them, have awful family lives.

Bad Families

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 9:17pm

Anonymous wrote:

Anyone who thinks a bad parent can't drive a kid to mental breakdown is kidding themselves.

Most people I know how have had serious psychiatric labels applied to them, have awful family lives.

My brother has schizophrenia. Me and my sister are okay though. Our family wasn't awful. But there's a genetic component, my uncle has schizophrenia too.

so, so true!!

Submitted by kimbriel on October 14, 2010 - 2:00pm

I participate in a mainstream bipolar discussion board. These people all adhere to the biological, genetic explanations of mental illness, all the while, every last one of them has horrible stories of family trauma and abuse!

so, so true!!

Submitted by kimbriel on October 14, 2010 - 2:00pm

Anyone who thinks a bad

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 7:48pm

Anyone who thinks a bad parent can't drive a kid to mental breakdown is kidding themselves.

Most people I know how have had serious psychiatric labels applied to them, have awful family lives.

Bad Family

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 8:41pm

Anonymous wrote:

Anyone who thinks a bad parent can't drive a kid to mental breakdown is kidding themselves.

Most people I know how have had serious psychiatric labels applied to them, have awful family lives.

I hope you're right.

I would like the "system" to

Submitted by Rossa Forbes on October 7, 2010 - 2:42pm

what the hell is 'behavioral

Submitted by Anonymous on October 8, 2010 - 4:58am

what the hell is 'behavioral health'? Who are you to medicalize anyone's behavior! The so called 'behavioral health experts' are just a pack of faith based true believers who come armed with nothing but a bible full of labels that used to include being gay, and some tranquilizer drugs, and a veneer of medical hubris and 'just so' stories. You ever met a psychiatrist who examined anyone's brain?

If I commit a crime, I'll do the time. For you to claim someone 'unknowingly' committed a crime, would require a lengthy trial with real evidence that I had a real disease, wouldn't it. Don't speak for me, don't call the owner of a body never examined by a real doctor 'ill' either. You can, but you're merely taking a leap of faith. I can call the economy sick, and a sick joke 'sick' or 'ill', the Beastie Boys can have a 'license to ill', but none of what you said, or the example I gave, constitute evidence of disease.

And as you can see (wonderful isn't it?), many people are defecting from the Church of Psychiatry, a violent, fraudulent church whose scriptures are now on a metaphorical bonfire, and every day, more survivors of this fraud come and pour some more kerosene on the pyre.... we can't be stopped, can't be censored, get used to it, we are not going anywhere, we grow in number all the time, and since the stranglehold on information was broken with the dawn of the internet, defection from the Church of Psychiatry is going viral, and saving lives.

"Are you suggesting he should do nothing to help his son since the system wouldn't help him until he unknowingly became a criminal?"

Pete Earley considers lobbying to make it easier for any American to be targeted for forced drugging, to be 'help', so guess what, newsflash, when you use the world 'help' in connection to this man, it kind of has no real emotive effect.

"So when a person ends up in a behavioral health care system due to psychotic behavior, what do you want the system to do?"

Ah... sheesh, 'ends up', you call being arrested without charge merely for 'acting funny', and dragged against your will to a psychiatric facility, to have psychiatry's monopoly paradigm literally forced down your throat through state sanctioned violence again you, you call this 'ending up'...

And your 'psychotic behavior' assertions presupposes that medicalized term corresponds to a brain disease, which you can't prove, nor can anyone. 'the system' is nothing but a brutal system of coercion forcibly indoctrinating everyone into believing behavior is a 'health' issue as you say it is, it's a theocracy, it is the state forcing psychiatry's flawed interpretive system on every man, woman and child in the society, a belief system held by the elite, and forced on all, with brute force. We are not going to take it any more.

Believe what you like. A person who has not harmed another's behavior is none of your business, none of the state's business. We don't want you medicalizing our behavior, we've examined the goods you're selling (and forcing on people by way of 'the system') and we've seen all you've got is a pathetic book of arbitrary labels voted in and out of existence as the political and social mood changes, see the voting out of homosexuality from the list of mental illnesses in the 1970s if you want a blatant example of how unscientific and subjective the Church of Psychiatry really is... internet addiction? eat too much, too little, pay too much attention, not enough attention, get too sad, too happy, too overwhelmed, it's automatically a 'disease' and a 'health' issue according to these quacks.

The quacks have got nothing. They don't examine peoples' biology, they just slap labels on people and hand out guesswork cocktails of tranquilizer drugs and other associated snake oil, damaging organs never once proven diseased. They show they have no morality by being more than willing to engage in coercion and force, damaging the organs of nonconsenting people with forced drugging and forced electroshock, they are human rights criminals.

Your faith based belief in 'behavioral health', is a paradigm that when compared to actual hard science, is nothing but an absolute piece of crap, I don't buy it, and I don't want it to be the law of the land, I think it is always evil when a belief system is forced on us by our government, that is what monopoly 'behavioral health' is, and that is what handing coercive powers to psychiatrists is, forcing your beliefs on others by force.

Not interested, get away from me, my children, my loved ones, and innocent people. You're quacks, liars, and you've wasted your lives founding your career around a lie, and you do more harm than good, and you're essentially just a secular religion of scientism and 'just so' stories. Creation stories, filling little kids' heads with lies about chemical imbalances, it's just so misguided, unsophisticated and pathetic, and the fact the world fell for it, will be remembered as one of humanity's greatest unenlightened blunders.

I'm so glad I'm a nonbeliever, I can't imagine what I'd think of myself, if life had meandered and twisted and turned in such a way that I ended up another one of these unquestioning 'sheeple'.

What is behavioral health?

Submitted by Stephany on October 8, 2010 - 10:21am

re: what is behaviorial health?

This is an important question!

Because there are private psych hospitals that are now called behaviorial health programs.

Here's an example:

http://www.psysolutions.com/

These places removed the word hospital from many of their front door signs and added behavioral health to it. Inside these places are children and teen units, as well as adult units and though they claim to focus on behavior approach intervention their treatment IS PSYCHIATRIC MEDICATION.(that is a fact)

"Psychiatric Solutions, Inc. offers an extensive continuum of behavioral health programs to children, adolescents and adults suffering from persistent and severe psychiatric disorders. PSI is the largest operator of owned or leased freestanding psychiatric inpatient facilities with approximately 11,000 beds in 32 states, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. PSI also manages freestanding psychiatric inpatient facilities and is the largest contract manager of psychiatric services within general acute care hospitals owned by others."

It's a marketing tactic for their company and they load the ppl up on drugs esp the teens!

Right On!

Submitted by COS on October 8, 2010 - 4:28pm

See the Church of Schizophrenia site at churchofschizophrenia.i8.com for arguments that psychiatry is just a cult of people with a belief system they try to "force on unbelivers" just like other cults.

I don't think anyone is

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 11:44am

I don't think anyone is interested in anyone's behavior unless it is somehow harming them. I know of no states that allow people to be involuntarily admitted to a hospital for acting funny. As far as suicide is concerned, most states allow admission if the person is a danger to themselves. I disagree with that as well. If you want to kill yourself, as far as I'm concerned, you have that right.

I have an adult child with a psychiatric diagnosis who has to undergo forced treatment. It's only because her behavior affects others. Otherwise, nobody would bother her. Just because you don't believe in something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. My kid says she doesn't believe in it either sometimes. I tell her I won't believe in it either, until she's psychotic and I'm witnessing it. It's not like she was sitting in her room minding her own business or as you say, acting funny, and somebody came & started pumping her full of medication. Crisis teams, case managers, me and her father give her as much time as we can to stop the disruptive behavior before anyone does anything in the way of admitting her to a hospital. During her last episode, I was determined to ride it out and not call anyone because I love her and I hear her and I know she hates the medication. After 4 days without sleep, I realized I couldn't do it, to say nothing of that teeny little matter of I was afraid for my safety. I won't post specific behavior except to say I have a right to be safe. While you might disagree with that, she doesn't. She's always remorseful afterwards that she scared me.

I hate the term behavioral health too. When she was first psychotic and taken to a behavioral health institute, I didn't understand she was ill and I had to do a lot of research. I wish she had been taken to a hospital for brain disorders. Oh wait, that's right. Brain disorders don't exist.

She understands her behavior has given reason for her to be locked up. She has no desire to go to jail though. What she'd prefer, and what I'd prefer for her is they'd lock her up so we're all safe and she's separated from us so we can get some rest. But I wish they wouldn't medicate her against her will. I wish they'd just keep her in the hospital until the psychotic episode has run it's course.

She told me the other day she'd rather be dead than take the medicine. She's never been suicidal, but she asked me if she ever is not to intervene. I will honor that request.

"I don't think anyone is

Submitted by Anonymous on October 10, 2010 - 8:22pm

"I don't think anyone is interested in anyone's behavior unless it is somehow harming them. I know of no states that allow people to be involuntarily admitted to a hospital for acting funny."

You're incorrect. There are numerous statutes around the entire world, and western world, in countless jurisdictions whose commitment criteria is 'appears to be mentally ill'.

I don't consider a building that contains not so much as a stethoscope, and not so much as a doctor who looks inside their patients' bodies, to be a 'hospital'. Especially the bars on the windows and the locked doors and solitary confinement cells, they don't cry out 'hospital' to me either.

We have a criminal justice system for those whose behavior is harming others, which is called a violent crime.

"I tell her I won't believe in it either, until she's psychotic and I'm witnessing it"

Key word, witnessing. Come back when you can change 'witnessing' to experienced. Like I can say.

Isn't it interesting, that for such a 'well established proven brain disease', all we have are anecdotes of people 'witnessing behavior' and not an ounce of other evidence.

"It's not like she was sitting in her room minding her own business or as you say, acting funny, and somebody came & started pumping her full of medication"

Ah, this happens to multitudes of people, their family becomes concerned and calls those people who 'come and start pumping'. I wouldn't call major tranquilizer drugs 'medication' wither. I could call getting drunk after a divorce 'medication' too, but I'd merely be crafting a pseudomedical creation story to justify and frame the act of imbibing a substance during a time of emotional problems.

"I realized I couldn't do it, to say nothing of that teeny little matter of I was afraid for my safety."

If you have evidence someone is planning a crime, call the cops. If fear for my safety from the very system you find convenient to divert your kid from the criminal justice system to...

Why should I live in fear? I've committed no crime.

"I won't post specific behavior except to say I have a right to be safe. While you might disagree with that, she doesn't. She's always remorseful afterwards that she scared me. "

Buy a gun. I have a right to feel safe too, and not be terrorized by the prospect of being committed. If she is 'remorseful' and you accept this remorse and share this fact, you clearly consider she should accept responsibility.

"I didn't understand she was ill and I had to do a lot of research. I wish she had been taken to a hospital for brain disorders. Oh wait, that's right. Brain disorders don't exist. "

I guess that 'research' didn't involve you, or anyone else examining her brain. When you've got no evidence your kid has a brain disease, and you act on faith the way you do, you've got nothing. Brain diseases exist, and are discovered in your kid's body by a neurologist, like Parkinson's or a brain tumor etc.

"She understands her behavior has given reason for her to be locked up. She has no desire to go to jail though. What she'd prefer, and what I'd prefer for her is they'd lock her up so we're all safe and she's separated from us so we can get some rest"

If she has committed a crime, she should go to jail. All criminals would 'prefer' something. The system you draw a benefit from, has many INNOCENT victims who have never committed a crime, who are terrorized by it. If you're fine with people like me being the inevitable collateral damage of you having a 'preferred' place to lockup your child, then what I am supposed to say?

And by the way... using the word 'episode' and wording your child up and leading her to expect that this 'episode' is just one chapter in a long story, is not good for recovery, it creates a self fulfilling prophecy.

By the way also, your standard of 'dangerousness' is nothing but an affront to the standards of due process and liberty if it involves merely the declaration by a psychiatrist or you, and doesn't include evidence, investigation and the right to hire counsel to defend yourself from being merely 'declared' a danger.

I refuse to accept such a poor standard, that parents like you love, but the people like me, who stand to have our liberty taken away, live in disgust and fear of.

"She told me the other day she'd rather be dead than take the medicine. "

So would I. And it is not 'medicine' any more than the government shooting up every despairing recently divorced father in the country with tranquilizer drugs can be called 'medicine'.