[sshtuose]

so i went to a quack today. and she gave me a Lexapro sampler. and my mom is goingto shove this crap down my throat.

sigh. so i did my homework. unlike my mom. and googled Lexapro and what do you kno i find all of this talk about suicidal thoughts, seratonin syndrome, and extreme withdrawal symtpoms, and side effects and all that bs.. im not taking this crap.. please.. i dont wanna..

Hey. Have you got a therapist that you can talk to?

There should be loads of stuff available online about how therapy can help people with depression. If you show your Mom some of that then maybe she will be more sympathetic about your trying to do things without medication?

[Hopefull]

I tried a T first. I'd try to talk to a T before trying Lexapro. I hope you can find a counselor to talk to. I have read that it is the counseling that has the long-term effects more than the drug.
Otherwise, Lexapro is not too bad. The withdrawal symptoms are annoying though. I was good and dizzy because my psychiatrist was out sick. So I went without for two days. Also the initial side effects are pretty annoying. I felt like I wanted to throw up. According to my original psychiatrist, this is normal with this drug.
There is a black box warning for suicidal thoughts especially in children. I have not had an increase in suicidal thoughts since I started Lexapro. As for serotonin syndrome, that is probably unlikely with Lexapro. The patient leaflet on the Lexapro website states that a person can overdose and live.
I hope you find a solution that works for you. Good job on doing your homework. I did the same thing after getting the samples from my psychiatrist the first time.

[(JD)]

I'm sorry you feel you aren't able to work with the adults trying to help you. If you have a real problem with the medicine, the most adult thing to do is to call the "quack" doctor and tell him/her your fears and have a discussion. Why didn't you discuss medicines with him in the first place? I'm sure that the doctor gave you meds because you need them, and they can help you feel better and not like everything in life is garbage.

Part of being a child is allowing adults to make decisions for you. You are more likely to get into worse feelings by not doing anything, then by trying a good medicine known to help depressive feelings. Please reconsider. I'm sure that now you know some of the possible reactions, you will alert your mom to them if they happen.

[SeptemberMorn]

I'm on Lexapro... have been for about 6 or 7 months. NO side effects and I feel ever so much better! Not EVERYONE has these side effects. Lexapro is the "cleanest" anti-depresant out there.

I agree with Sky. You need to talk to the Dr that prescribed Lexapro and to your mother, too! They are adults and that alone gives them more knowledge because of experience.

[mark101]

they can force you to take drugs because they own you.http://www.szasz.com/szaszwri.html
http://www.szasz.com/cchr.html
Another lamentable development is the claim that millions of children suffer from a mental illness called "attention deficit hyperactivity disorder" (ADHD) and that Ritalin -- administered to the child often against the will of the parent -- is a treatment for it. Of course, it is always administered against the will of the child. What child wants to be stigmatized?

When school authorities tell a mother that her son is sick and needs to be on drugs, how is she to know that that's a lie? How is she to know that what experts call Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is not a disease?

Bedazzled by psychiatric jargon, she does not realize that diagnoses are not diseases.

She is not expert in the history of psychiatry. She does not know that psychiatrists have always used diagnostic terms to stigmatize and control people -- for example

* black slaves who ran away to freedom suffered from drapetomania;
* women who rebelled against being controlled by men suffered from hysteria;
* until only a few years ago, men and women who engaged in sexual acts with members of their own sex suffered from the dread disease of homosexuality.

Of course, none of those behaviors was a disease. ADHD is not a disease.

Nor is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder a disease.

No behavior or misbehavior is a disease or can be a disease. There is no mental disease. Period.

i think that there is truth to some of the psychiatry claims and there is truth to some of the anti-psychiatry claims. i think that the majority of pscyhiatrists are trying to help, but i think that sometimes that 'help' is misguided, sure. at this stage it doesn't sound like anybody is trying to force you to do anything, they are trying to help you. drugs are but one option, however, and it can be wise to look at many options before deciding which option to go with. there is this notion of informed consent and i would hope that you would be able to discuss this with your mother and your pschiatrist so that you can mutually come to a decision that everybody can live with.

> Of course, it is always administered against the will of the child. What child wants to be stigmatized?

i don't think that is true. i think that some children take ritalin willingly because they find that it helps them not get into so much trouble. instead of people viewing them as being willfully disobedient people think that their behaviour is the result of something that is outside their control. this can actually result in less stigmatisation / blame.

whether there are mental disorders or not is controversial. some people (like szatz) argue like this:

disease is a term that only applies to bodily complaints.
a mental complaint is not a bodily complaint
therefore there is no such thing as mental disease.

most people would say that the first premise is controversial. one could certainly dictate that the term disease only applies to physical disease but that would be a stipulation. most philosophers, psychiatrists and psychologists would deny premise two. they would say that mental diseases ARE physical diseases. i have heard it said (and i have sympathy for this) that the trouble with szatz is his dualism...

> She does not know that psychiatrists have always used diagnostic terms to stigmatize and control people -- for example

psychiatry does indeed have a regrettable past. what is at issue, however, is whether present use of psychiatry is as regrettable as its past or whether it has progressed on from some of the past abuses.

Shorter (in his book 'History of Psychiatry') contests Focult's claims that institutions arose due to capatilism etc. he also contests the notions that schizophrenics used to gambol across the country side al day. before institutions many people were chained to beds etc by their family.

> * black slaves who ran away to freedom suffered from drapetomania;

one psychiatrist suggested that (and he was wrong) that was never accepted in any edition of the DSM or ICD.

> * women who rebelled against being controlled by men suffered from hysteria;

that most certainly wasn't their only complaint. many of them volountarily sought out treatment and reported significant improvement after being prescribed visits to the spa, being attended to by a caring clinician, etc etc.

> Of course, none of those behaviors was a disease.

yes. and most people would say that psychiatrists were wrong about those cases. thats okay, scientists often get things wrong. psychiatry is a relatively new field but many would say that it is progressing.

ADHD is not a disease.

what do you take a disease to be?

i'm interested in the anti-psychiatry movement because i'm interested in some of the research that has been done that has found unfavourable results as far as the drug companies are concerned. i think it is important to balance drug company funded research with research that is funded by other sources. i do have a problem, however, that a lot of the anti-psychiatry claims seem to be based on sweeping generalisations without research to back them up or they go with anecdotes of a favourite case or two or the quality of research is terrible. thats okay though because most of the drug company sponsored research is the same.

i think that the anti-pscyhiatry movement is important in its focus on cognitive and (even probably more emphasis on) the social causes of pathological behaviour. i think that psychiatry has increasingly moved towards biological reductionism where the mechanisms that cause pathological behaviour are thought to be neural at base and they have systematically ignored cognitive and social causes.

but clearly the way that other people relates to you has an impact on how you see and think of yourself and that has a subsequent effect on how you act. the genetic, neurological, cognitive and social all have a causal effect on our behaviour.

the anti-psychiatrists also typically focus on disorders that are nearer the 'neurotic' end of the spectrum. i think it is correct that there is an over-emphasis on medication in this present generation (prozac is the new spa treatment or application of magnet or a cheaper substitute for a caring relationship with a clinician or radical social interventions where we actually get people out of their drug infested slums for example).

but anyways... end of rave now...

[SeptemberMorn]

Oooooooh, I don't think so! Nobody owns me and nobody bedazzles me with their jargon. NOBODY would give any of my kids meds without my consent or I'd know on who's authority it was done! They couldn't come up with a name big enough, either person or dx, because *I* was my kids ultimate authority when they were growing up!

though of course there have been cases where parents have not thought that their kids had ADD and they chose not to give them ADD meds and where teachers, pscyhiatrists, and ultimately judges decide differently.

there was a case in NZ where parents were jahovah's witness and they did not want their child to have a blood transfusion. doctors testified saying that the child would likely die without one. judge ruled in favour of the doctor. the parents decision was over-ridden. it happens...

[Rapunzel]

Part of what I think Mark101 is saying goes along with the "wellness model" as opposed to the medical model or disease model. The focus on health and responsibility and what it takes to feel good definitely has applications in mental health, and in physical health too. Mental health concerns (whether or not you call them disease and/or treat them with medication) often do have physical components, and physical health concerns have more psychological, behavioral, emotional, and even spiritual components than a lot of people ever recognize too. Medication might help with either, and so might just living in a healthier way and being more positive about yourself. Medication is much more likely to work if you believe that it will and are a full participant in your own treatment and planning, no matter how old you are.

Here's a link about wellness models:
http://www.seekwellness.com/wellness...ess_models.htm

Ah. Thanks for the link :-)

The 'wellness model' looks like an elaboration on Engles 'bio-psycho-social model'. (Sorry I'm getting the spelling on most of the names wrong).

Typically the debate is between the psychiatrists (with the medical or biological reductionist model) and the anti-psychiatrists (who think that all there is to mental illness is violation of social norms or something like that)

There is also debate between the biological reductionist psychiatrists and psychologists / psychoanalysts / psychodynamic theorists who think that mental disorders are cognitive. (the main debate here is over how we are best to treat mental disorders)

There are some extremists who think that mental disorders are only on one of these levels (either biological or psychological or social). typically the die-hards are the biological psychiatrists who think that mental disorders just are neurological / genetic disorders that need to be treated with medications and / or psychosurgery and / or pre-embryonic selection and the anti-psychiatrists who (sometimes) maintain that there is no such thing as mental disorder (it is just behaviour that society chooses to label 'devient') or that the nature of mental disorder is that it is a social problem (hence society is sick or ill and interventions need to be targeted towards the social system that regards teh behaviour as devient rather than targeted towards the individual).

(Szatz would probably roll over in his grave at the notion of a sick or diseased society! He comes down on the 'there is no such thing' side)

The majority of theorists and clinicians will verbally assent to the bio-psycho-social approach being correct and that all of these factors are important. In practice, however, psychiatry has been criticised for being bio-bio-bio oriented where it is about drugs-drugs-drugs and there is an unwillingness to consider psychological and social interventions.

partly this comes about because the biopsychosocial models simply aren't very well worked out. you can draw three inter-related circles and go on about how 'no level is fundamental' but clearly there is a sense in which biology is more fundamental than psychology (a change in psychology entails a change in biology but not vice versa or in philosophical terminology the mental supervenes on (depends upon) the physical. but similarly biology supervenes on chemistry and chemistry supervenes on physics so why stop at the level of neurophysiology? there is some work on how different levels get explanatory autonomy and about how sometimes interventions at higher levels are appropriate. but there is a lot more work to do.

e.g., if you want to teach someone how to cook you are better off showing him how to cook than you are attempting psychosurgery.

showing him how to cook results in neurological changes. more fine grained than current psychosurgeries. i don't see psychosurgery ever being a cost-effective way to achieve the same results lol.

Dominic Murphy in http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item...pe=2&tid=10687
argues that the sciences of the mind (cognitive neuro-psychology) are working towards models of normal human functioning. mental disorders should be conceived of as breakdowns in these models of normal human functioning. he turns to the sciences of the mind to tell us what normal / healthy functioning is. I think that is a good idea. This is a very new research area... But there has been some work done on cognitive neuro-psychiatry. I'm interested in the prospects for integrating sociology (the anti-pscyhiatry stuff) with that too...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_neuropsychiatry

[LMo]

This is all interesting info, but let's get back on track to support sshtuose, since he/she's asking for help and support.

Thanks,
LMo

[SeptemberMorn]

AMEN! Thank you, LMo!

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
_Sky said:
I'm sorry you feel you aren't able to work with the adults trying to help you. If you have a real problem with the medicine, the most adult thing to do is to call the "quack" doctor and tell him/her your fears and have a discussion. Why didn't you discuss medicines with him in the first place? I'm sure that the doctor gave you meds because you need them, and they can help you feel better and not like everything in life is garbage.

Part of being a child is allowing adults to make decisions for you. You are more likely to get into worse feelings by not doing anything, then by trying a good medicine known to help depressive feelings. Please reconsider. I'm sure that now you know some of the possible reactions, you will alert your mom to them if they happen.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

Hmm. Do I need to have this little thing at the end of my posts called 'take home message'?

Take home message:

It is very controversial which interventions (medication, psychotherapy, social) are the best (in the sense of most scientifically adequate) and hence whether interventions should be focused on one or more of the above.

This could be considered a rather supportive fact to someone who doesn't seem happy about being prescribed medication.

[pegasus]

Hello sshtuose,

Welcome to Psych Central.

Years ago psychiatrists and doctors did used to just give people a load of meds and leave them to it.

These days professionals have realised that talking-therapies actually work much better.

Sometimes a combination of meds and therapy is needed to start off with but imo. you may not have to stay on meds for ever.

If the medication does not suit you it is important to let a doctor know, and indeed any concerns that you have with the effects of medication.

I'd also like to say that the professionals are not quacks and are actually on your side, trying to help YOU.

Let us know how you are getting on.

Take care.

[sshtuose]

OK, I have an update: so I have been taking this drug 5mg since Tuesday. I still feel like crap. I findd some beginnign side effects especially bothersome - I would hve extreme highs and lows.. with sweating, clammy hands and feet, feeling shocks in my brain especially the back of my head, blurriness, and feeling tingling in my mouth throat and stomach.. i have 0 appetite. nausea, dizziness, aggitation, constant ringing in my ears, disruptive sleep.. waking up several times, having bad dreams, up to 5 dreams every time I sleep.. During the highs, my sweating, breathing, heart rate and clamminess increased.. I would feel this almost insanity.. couldnt sit still.. this happened in school and I felt like bouncing off a wall but it felt HORRIBLE...I wanted to smash my head in.. i kept jerking my head in class and people noticed I was going nuts! I told all of tese things to my parents and they did not believe me.. they thought I was fabricating symptoms!! My mom laughed at me!

On Friday I woke up with such an intense headache that i could not wake up! Consequently, I stayed home.. Luckily some of these side effects are subsiding.. but I did not in any way shape or form exaggerate or make them up when this began.. why cant they beleive me?? Now, I feel like a drone. I'm extremely exhausted and stressed out. I find it even more difficult to wake up or talk to people than before. And I still feel 'depressed'.

I cant belive a parent would give their child this kind of medication.. i took prozac before but I dont recall having these kind of side effects cept for heart racing and tremors.. Just cos Im not their ideal definition of 'normal' doesn mean they can drug me up like this! My mom threatened to shove it down my throat! This is parenting???

edit: also im a female.. not taht it really matters.. but anyways. yes my psychologist also set me up with a therapist.. i probably posted this thread in the wrong forum area.. ho well..

[Rapunzel]

Your post is fine here. You might also want to post about the medications in the Drug Questions forum because some of the people who read there and not as much here might have more answers about side effects and how long to wait it out, etc. I understand that it is usual for the side effects to kick in sooner, while it can take a few weeks for your symptoms to start improving. It sounds like you are having some rather intense side effects to me, and you might want to talk to your doctor about it if you can. Also, this doesn't make your experience of the effects any less real, but anticipating the side effects quite possibly could make them worse. From what I have heard, they don't usually stay that intense.

I am glad that you will go to a therapist too. Medication may help with current symptoms, but therapy is how you learn to actually fix the real problems that cause the symptoms.

Best Wishes,
Rap