Quite some time ago I was informed that I had never actually been banned from schizophrenia.com. Apparently, many schizophrenics merely misinterpret server downtime to be the equivalent of repeatedly trying to log-in and not being able to do so while the server is up and running.

That explanation didn't ring quite true to me and neither do I have any cause for taking them at their word but today, I saw a post from a member insisting that not only does no one ever recover from schizophrenia but those who suggest it's possible are suffering from a "mental condition".

I felt compelled to respond and lo and behold, was able to log-in. In my response I noted that many people have made full recoveries. To demonstrate the validity of that claim, I cited the names of several professionals -- all doctors -- who had made full or partial recoveries: Dr. Daniel Fisher, Dr. Rufus May, Dr. Patricia Deegan, Dr. Christiane Northrup, Dr. Frederick Freese, Dr. Ronald Bassman, Dr. Edward Whitney...

This prompted a moderator to edit their own response in that thread to add the following notation to their post:

You should also have a look at page 113 where Torrey indicates "the recovery model " has no foundation in scientific studies or data. ... Also have a look at page 435 " Scientologists, Anti-Psychiatrists, and Consumer Survivors".

I'm not sure if that moderator meant to imply that all those doctors must all be scientologists, anti-psychiatrists or consumer survivors, or if I was. I didn't get the chance to ask.

Meantime, another member noted that his own physician had told him that upwards of 10% of people are incorrectly diagnosed and this is the rationale for why some people recover. The original poster responded:

Your statement has nothing to do with what I am talking about. Those 10% were not cured. They were mistaken to have an illness, which later turned out that they didn't have. That is why they did fine when they went off the medication. No cure was involved.

In response, I quoted Dr. Daniel Fisher...

When asked by yet another member how I defined full (clinical) recovery, I quoted Dr. Courtenay Harding's definition. (Note that personal definitions of recovery are always self-initiated and may include using medication for coping with ongoing or a reoccurence of symptoms).

Unfortunately, all those posts of mine are gone now. All that remains is the original poster's insistence that there is no such thing as cure (full recovery) with a brief reference to the erasure that took place and the moderator's assessment...

For the record, I had mentioned that I had never received psychiatric treatment. Those who know of my history know this is because I didn't know to go to the hospital. Some of them also know that I lived in a remote community at the time and psychiatrists were hard to come by -- they were, in fact, flying them in on a one-day per week basis at that time. I once spent eight months on a psychiatrist's waiting list and the week I was due to finally get in, my father-in-law died and I had to go out of town. When I returned, I just never bothered to call and add my name back to the waiting list; I was already getting well with my own efforts.

In one of my responses that was removed I'd also noted I had two children who had experienced psychosis but of course those posts were not allowed to stand because we wouldn't want to create the impression that I might have had a serious "mental condition" that I had recovered from or share what helped me do so. After all, according to the moderating department of schizophrenia.com no one whose been ill has ever recovered because there is no such thing as cure. Therefore, it's quite understandable why they would want to sweep away any historic details relating to my own experience, my children's, and even my birth father's who was in and out of psychiatric hospitals for reasons I never knew.

Meantime, I had also added my response to the original post above -- the one related to John Read's work. That post was also removed by the moderators. The storyline the reader is supposed to go with is that the original article was the work of antipsychiatrists at Psych Central and the original study was never accepted by mainstream professional journals. Therefore, both are suspect. Besides... as many good schizophrenics know, their job is not to point out factual, verifiable truths, it is to comply with the lies. Those who do not comply will be punished in some fashion. Fortunately, as the moderator pointed out, my own diagnosis is in doubt -- I never was a "good schizophrenic" so I went ahead reposted the response that verified John Read's work had been published.

Meanwhile, for reasons I cannot comprehend, factual information seems to frighten the moderating team at schizophrenia.com, although if you ask me... that's just crazy.


Edited to note that the re-post I'd made demonstrating that John Read's work was published in a peer-reviewed professional journal has been removed (again). It may be worth noting, the moderator whose opinion of my posts was "********" was also the same moderator who made the statement that Psych Central publishes "antipsychiatry" articles and that John Read's work had never been published in an accredited journal. There does appear to be some degree of personal bias at work.

I had once said that the moderating team of schizophrenia.com was cultish. I would have to maintain that they do not have appear to have changed since the last time I swung through. The truth is, many people recover from serious mental illnesses -- schizophrenia, psychosis, bipolar disorder -- I'm one of them. I anticipate that my child will also make a full recovery. Unfortunately, recovery is not something that is permitted to happen at schizophrenia.com.

More personal stories of recovery including those of many of the professionals I mentioned above can be found here: Voices of Recovery. Another respondent in that thread has also added this name to the list: Janet Frame

~ Namaste