Boom 💥 You nailed it, Roger. Your words hit straight to the heart—because like you, I’ve lived it.
Long before I was blindsided and thrown into my drug safety advocacy after my husband Woody died by suicide, just five weeks after being prescribed Zoloft for insomnia, I had already witnessed the quiet cost of what you so eloquently described.
Years earlier, I helped bring a program called Free Arts to Minnesota, using the power of creativity and caring volunteers to kids who had been abused, neglected, and forgotten by the system. After one session, the children (ages 8 to 12) excitedly showed us where they lived in their group home. I’ll never forget when several kids picked up tiny plastic cups filled with pills, like it was nothing.
Shocked, I asked the staff if they were all sick …like strep throat.
She said, “No. That’s their behavior medicine.”
I didn’t have the words for it then, but something in me knew this wasn’t healing. That moment planted a seed.
Fast forward a few years—Woody is dead, and I’m sitting on FDA Advisory Committee. That’s where I saw the machine from the inside. The “experts” nodding to “the data.” The blind acceptance of pharmaceutical narratives. The absence of critical questioning. The silencing of those who dare to ask why.
We’ve pathologized pain. We’ve treated trauma like a glitch. And we’ve replaced human connection and compassion with checklists and pills. We’ve given our power away to those playing God and think they “know better” than us.
Like you, I can’t sit back and do nothing. I know what happens when we do. I’ve seen what’s at stake…for vulnerable kids (especially unborn babies), for grieving families, for anyone who dares to trust the system too deeply.
I can’t wait to hear your 5 minutes. I know it will be powerful and leave a lasting mark. And I’m grateful to Commissioner Makary for convening this long-overdue conversation.
Thank you for your boldness, your clarity, and for being a voice rooted in love NOT fear. These conversations matter. You’re helping people wake up.
I was having emotional regulation difficulty during my second pregnancy and was recommended SSRI's by Dr Amanda Ward in Warracknabeal, Victoria. It was in the first trimester that they were introduced.
My son is 21 now. He struggles with mental health issues like complex anxiety. I would appreciate knowing how this medication impacted and what might support him moving forward. His older sister, does not suffer like him, and I took no medication during her pregnancy. An observation she made recently while watching my son was.. 'it is hard hard work for Noah to navigate a day with his mind'.
I wish to take responsibility for the SSRI impact on Noah.
I promise we will find answers... and there is plenty of science that exists to share with women to help them make more informed decisions. I am grateful for your willingness to share your story.
This is one of the best articles I have ever read,thank you.
I am in the UK. This is my experience. I experienced older medications but the values and procedures are much the same.
I was diagnosed at 20 years old. I had decided to leave the Mormon church and a University course which could only lead to teaching.
I was exhausted and all Hell broke loose at home. I was overly anxious and persuaded by a GP to go to the local mental hospital, where someone would have the time and knowledge to talk over my issues and help me.
That's the last I could remember for a long time. I was not given information on diagnosis,just expected to take pills unquestionly.
I was eventually given lithium carbonate which had horrific side effects including lethargy,raging thirst and incontinence( the latter made the psychiatrist laugh). Lithium carbonate is toxic and had to be monitored by regular blood tests, which also reveals if it is taken regularly.
I forgot my previous decisions and returned to church and University. When I remembered leaving I was terrified to do so again - it took another year to pluck up courage .
I was eventually discharged as recovered in my early 40s, I had been very lucky in the doctor who was assigned.
I had fairly strong feminist views, an antipathy to organised religion, tend not to wear make up and was impoverished in earlier life so could not afford expensive clothes. All this affected assessments, the doctors expected slimline skirts,make up and generally conventional behaviour.
There was always what I felt to be intrusive interest in my fertility. I was told not to get pregnant without telling my psychiatrist,because I had to be prepared. When I asked one doctor what effect my medication would have on a baby he shrugged and replied, "What does it matter,you are not married." I was divorced at the time.
I learned that other women were ' kept on Lithium' throughout pregnancy, and closely monitored.
My own instinct,even with a partner, was that I wouldn't have children while on medication because I wouldn't want to subject a developing child to the debilitating effects of medication in my system.
When I moved I away from home I was given weekly appointments,travel was expensive, I was given tours of the wards to show me where I would come, I was questioned endlessly about how I spent my time, who my friends were and how I met them. I was unemployed,due largely to stigma and a time of widespread unemployment,and the frequent hospital visits meant expensive journeys. I struggled to afford food.
I believe I would have been better helped by talking therapies,and by some support to make the changes I need in life. Medication doesn't help with problems,it makes it more difficult to deal with them and easier to avoid them.
I have worked in third sector mental health services, which I can't discuss.
The power with which you speak bring tears to my eyes every time. It is the message of hope that every word carries that feels like a breath of air has been provided in a space without oxygen. Since the first time I heard you, I have felt life flood back into my world, having a perspective that I thought was gone, leaving me feel like I was going crazy.
I, tragically, do not have a story of SSRIs and pregnancy to share as I blindly followed the bad science of my doctor and ended up losing my uterus before I had the chance to carry a child. This resulted in me being put on mood altering drugs and resulting in a whiplashing of effects that took me years to understand as a result of the drugs. Ten years later, I have begun to come out of the haze of protracted withdrawal and now am feeling the emotions that the drugs altered - the reality that cannot and should not be ignored. The Intense grief.
All this to say, you are right - I did not come upon this article by chance. I do feel it was meant for me. Each opportunity to engage in the fight for the unborn gives me permission to grieve for myself and energetically extend compassion to others that need it now and in the future.
Thank you for this today. Your message always renews hope and I needed that today.
..."But I'm fearful this groundbreaking moment may just become background noise. Another government meeting that gets buried while pregnant women continue being lied to about the safety of psychiatric drugs."...that nails it to perfection. Thus far, nothing has changed within the HHS that is of any meaningful positivity or significance that actually makes a honest difference.
Truthfully, each of you should be allotted 15-20 minutes to make your case. And then face a Q & A period.
>It's the calm acceptance of my colleagues who watched the same thing and felt nothing.
Doc, I watched an entire nation do this for years. They built camps and kidnapped us in the middle of the night. Now no one talks about it and all the official enquiries say that 'nothing happened' or if it did it was 'a good thing'
Powerful, heartfelt writing, for which I thank you sincerely. May your scanty five minutes burn as deeply into the minds of your listeners as this beautiful article.
Is there a link between taking SSRI’s in pregnancy and the sudden explosion of diagnosed autism in children now? (I’m skeptical of the diagnosis, I’m an old Gen Xer that observed the classic signs of autism in some of my elementary school classmates. It seems like any trait is now diagnosed as autism, but I digress. )
You will make a powerful impression on our stone-faced senators. Personal stories like the ones that haunt you to this day are always the most impactful. In the current unfolding of Epstein, we are learning how many of the ruling class are child abusers, human traffickers, money launderers, and drug pushers. They know the truth, so demand accountability, Dr. McFillin. We will be cheering you on.
I was brought to a psychiatrist at age 17 in 1984, by my mom who was concerned because my grades had dropped, I stayed up late, slept late and didn’t socialize anymore. I was terrified sitting before that psychiatrist as he said he was recommending family therapy with my abuser—my stepdad. I went home & took a bottle of Tylenol because in my 17 yr old immaturity I believed death was better than therapy where I surely would be punished by my stepdad (later at home)for what the therapist would get me to say. I ended up in the ER and the next day in a teen mental ward. That same psychiatrist was my inpatient doc and when he came to see me there for the first time inpatient, & asked how I was doing all I said was, “my stomach hurts” He said “I’ve got a great medicine for tummy aches.” Turned out that med was melaril an antipsychotic.
AFTER a steady stream of melaril plus trials of 1st generation antidepressants for 3 months inpatient, I became very very much more suicidal, extremely depressed, started cutting myself with sharps I found in the ward, and actually thought I was a serial killer!! Except for that one impulsive Tylenol suicide attempt these were ALL thoughts and behaviors I’d NEVER EVER EVER had before. But these novel symptoms were not blamed on a paradoxical adverse reaction to the meds. He diagnosed me with incurable chronic schizo-affective & told my parents I’d end up institutionalized for life. His solution to manage me was continued meds and ECT. I was shocked 50+ times over the years from 1984 to 1990. The shocks stopped after clozaril came to market. 1984 was the beginning of my 4 decade full time career as a patient—both mental and physical as I now had an electrical and synthetic brain injury with all kinds of other specialists in my life from GI docs, to hematologists to cardiologists, to gynecologists who took my entire ovary because of a benign cyst [because why would a schizophrenic need to have children anyway?]
After 38 years of that inpatient & outpatient career, in 2022, I “woke up”, tapered too quickly off all meds and got yet another synthetic brain injury (protracted withdrawal).
I may still be injured & physically and unnecessarily suffering 24/7 but I am now feeling FREE to think for myself and feeling free to FEEL my emotions. I know that at any time of their choosing the authorities can take my body back—But they will never have my soul again!!
Thanks to myself, my fellow psychiatric survivors, teachers and activists like you, Angie Peacock, Bob Whitaker, and Dr Witt-Doerring I now RESIST!!
The pharmaceutical industry has harmed us from so many directions but it’s the innocent that the LORD will surely not forget. Parents and children experimented on. Or just used for cash. Thank you for participating in exposing truth. I pray more and more light will be brought to this subject. Just my strongly held opinion, SSRIs are toxic. Period. And vaccines harm us ALL. I rest in God’s sovereign will regarding the matter, and surely He is with you. Be strong and May God bless you.
The world is full of sin but vengeance is the LORD’s. Evil won’t go unpunished. Who are we to try to understand the will of God? He gave His only Son so that we might have eternal life. Jesus suffered. Too many people think they can love more than God or they are more just than God. Yet no man can create an ant out of nothing yet alone the moon or stars. Though we grieve the awful things in this world we can have hope and faith in something better and everlasting. At least that’s how I look at it.
Thank you for you post, I’ve been searching for any doctors with the courage to call this abuse out, to feel like I am not alone.
My mother brought me in for a psych evaluation as a teen due to inattention and behavioral issues related to depression and anxiety in high school. I went through so many diagnoses and by the time I was a senior in high school, I had gone through probably 10 different prescription drugs and I could tolerate none of them. I was severely depressed and anxious. Long story short, the drug that seemed to work the best for me (aka zombify me and make me compliant) was an antipsychotic. I was on this drug for about 7 years with very little oversight from doctors. I experienced horrific side effects and I was effectively sedated and emotionally muted for much of that time; my memories aren’t even formed well. I gained 60+ pounds. I slept about 10 hours a day. I had constant nausea and stomach pain. My personality was markedly different, I had lowered inhibitions. I had metabolic syndrome. I began developing tremors and subtle loss of control of body movements. I learned that I had been put on an extremely high dose for a long time and the doctor which I had been under, Dr. Mario Robbins, told me that none of those things could be from the meds. I finally got another evaluation confirming C-PTSD and was weaned off my meds by another doc. EMDR has done more for me than any drug and any other therapy.
I lived through hell at the hands of people who were hurting me while they told me they were taking care of me. I’m so much healthier now being off the meds for nearly two years now. But now I am processing so much trauma that I couldn’t feel in all the time I was numbed out. It’s a slow process that is taking a lot of extra love and grace from me to me❤️
This is a sobering and necessary read. The quiet corrosion of trust in the name of institutional alignment has done deep harm, not just to those misled, but to the integrity of the profession itself. Your breakdown of the history, the pressure points, and the cultural gaslighting is as infuriating as it is clarifying.
Thank you for saying what so many are still afraid to voice. Truth, when spoken with clarity and care, becomes a kind of medicine. And this? This is healing work.
Psychiatry should be obsolete and replaced with depth psychology from skilled and compassionate people. My aunt was put on SSRIs for most of her life, my mother-in-law, same thing. When I told a doctor I had severe PMS, he pushed Prozac, I declined. The strange thing is that all those years of drugging never helped my relatives, yet they were kept on them. Mainstream believe in them, like they believe in vaccines as the b all and end all. People don't want the burden of another's depression, so suggesting antidepressants will be encouraged. It is expensive and time consuming to provide healing services. I imagine sending traumatized kids to a farm, where they could spend time with animals, and work off stress with some chores, and in the evening sit around a fire and share their stories, grieve and gain support from a group of shamans, therapists, body healers, massage therapists, yoga teachers, and nurturing people who understand cPTSD and how to unravel its effects from the mind and body. Then these kids could sleep in cozy beds, with caring adults who say good night. Safety is the antidote to emotional instability. So much need, so little resources, except a sick system that drives despair deeper.
Boom 💥 You nailed it, Roger. Your words hit straight to the heart—because like you, I’ve lived it.
Long before I was blindsided and thrown into my drug safety advocacy after my husband Woody died by suicide, just five weeks after being prescribed Zoloft for insomnia, I had already witnessed the quiet cost of what you so eloquently described.
Years earlier, I helped bring a program called Free Arts to Minnesota, using the power of creativity and caring volunteers to kids who had been abused, neglected, and forgotten by the system. After one session, the children (ages 8 to 12) excitedly showed us where they lived in their group home. I’ll never forget when several kids picked up tiny plastic cups filled with pills, like it was nothing.
Shocked, I asked the staff if they were all sick …like strep throat.
She said, “No. That’s their behavior medicine.”
I didn’t have the words for it then, but something in me knew this wasn’t healing. That moment planted a seed.
Fast forward a few years—Woody is dead, and I’m sitting on FDA Advisory Committee. That’s where I saw the machine from the inside. The “experts” nodding to “the data.” The blind acceptance of pharmaceutical narratives. The absence of critical questioning. The silencing of those who dare to ask why.
We’ve pathologized pain. We’ve treated trauma like a glitch. And we’ve replaced human connection and compassion with checklists and pills. We’ve given our power away to those playing God and think they “know better” than us.
Like you, I can’t sit back and do nothing. I know what happens when we do. I’ve seen what’s at stake…for vulnerable kids (especially unborn babies), for grieving families, for anyone who dares to trust the system too deeply.
I can’t wait to hear your 5 minutes. I know it will be powerful and leave a lasting mark. And I’m grateful to Commissioner Makary for convening this long-overdue conversation.
Thank you for your boldness, your clarity, and for being a voice rooted in love NOT fear. These conversations matter. You’re helping people wake up.
Huge fan!!!
Thank you Kim. You are an inspiration.
Thankyou.
I was having emotional regulation difficulty during my second pregnancy and was recommended SSRI's by Dr Amanda Ward in Warracknabeal, Victoria. It was in the first trimester that they were introduced.
My son is 21 now. He struggles with mental health issues like complex anxiety. I would appreciate knowing how this medication impacted and what might support him moving forward. His older sister, does not suffer like him, and I took no medication during her pregnancy. An observation she made recently while watching my son was.. 'it is hard hard work for Noah to navigate a day with his mind'.
I wish to take responsibility for the SSRI impact on Noah.
Regards
Lynley Hocking
I promise we will find answers... and there is plenty of science that exists to share with women to help them make more informed decisions. I am grateful for your willingness to share your story.
This is one of the best articles I have ever read,thank you.
I am in the UK. This is my experience. I experienced older medications but the values and procedures are much the same.
I was diagnosed at 20 years old. I had decided to leave the Mormon church and a University course which could only lead to teaching.
I was exhausted and all Hell broke loose at home. I was overly anxious and persuaded by a GP to go to the local mental hospital, where someone would have the time and knowledge to talk over my issues and help me.
That's the last I could remember for a long time. I was not given information on diagnosis,just expected to take pills unquestionly.
I was eventually given lithium carbonate which had horrific side effects including lethargy,raging thirst and incontinence( the latter made the psychiatrist laugh). Lithium carbonate is toxic and had to be monitored by regular blood tests, which also reveals if it is taken regularly.
I forgot my previous decisions and returned to church and University. When I remembered leaving I was terrified to do so again - it took another year to pluck up courage .
I was eventually discharged as recovered in my early 40s, I had been very lucky in the doctor who was assigned.
I had fairly strong feminist views, an antipathy to organised religion, tend not to wear make up and was impoverished in earlier life so could not afford expensive clothes. All this affected assessments, the doctors expected slimline skirts,make up and generally conventional behaviour.
There was always what I felt to be intrusive interest in my fertility. I was told not to get pregnant without telling my psychiatrist,because I had to be prepared. When I asked one doctor what effect my medication would have on a baby he shrugged and replied, "What does it matter,you are not married." I was divorced at the time.
I learned that other women were ' kept on Lithium' throughout pregnancy, and closely monitored.
My own instinct,even with a partner, was that I wouldn't have children while on medication because I wouldn't want to subject a developing child to the debilitating effects of medication in my system.
When I moved I away from home I was given weekly appointments,travel was expensive, I was given tours of the wards to show me where I would come, I was questioned endlessly about how I spent my time, who my friends were and how I met them. I was unemployed,due largely to stigma and a time of widespread unemployment,and the frequent hospital visits meant expensive journeys. I struggled to afford food.
I believe I would have been better helped by talking therapies,and by some support to make the changes I need in life. Medication doesn't help with problems,it makes it more difficult to deal with them and easier to avoid them.
I have worked in third sector mental health services, which I can't discuss.
Thank for taking the time to share your story
The power with which you speak bring tears to my eyes every time. It is the message of hope that every word carries that feels like a breath of air has been provided in a space without oxygen. Since the first time I heard you, I have felt life flood back into my world, having a perspective that I thought was gone, leaving me feel like I was going crazy.
I, tragically, do not have a story of SSRIs and pregnancy to share as I blindly followed the bad science of my doctor and ended up losing my uterus before I had the chance to carry a child. This resulted in me being put on mood altering drugs and resulting in a whiplashing of effects that took me years to understand as a result of the drugs. Ten years later, I have begun to come out of the haze of protracted withdrawal and now am feeling the emotions that the drugs altered - the reality that cannot and should not be ignored. The Intense grief.
All this to say, you are right - I did not come upon this article by chance. I do feel it was meant for me. Each opportunity to engage in the fight for the unborn gives me permission to grieve for myself and energetically extend compassion to others that need it now and in the future.
Thank you for this today. Your message always renews hope and I needed that today.
Thank you for the kind words... they are motivating. God bless you and I am grateful for willingness to share your story.
..."But I'm fearful this groundbreaking moment may just become background noise. Another government meeting that gets buried while pregnant women continue being lied to about the safety of psychiatric drugs."...that nails it to perfection. Thus far, nothing has changed within the HHS that is of any meaningful positivity or significance that actually makes a honest difference.
Truthfully, each of you should be allotted 15-20 minutes to make your case. And then face a Q & A period.
I agree
>It's the calm acceptance of my colleagues who watched the same thing and felt nothing.
Doc, I watched an entire nation do this for years. They built camps and kidnapped us in the middle of the night. Now no one talks about it and all the official enquiries say that 'nothing happened' or if it did it was 'a good thing'
You'll do great.
Powerful, heartfelt writing, for which I thank you sincerely. May your scanty five minutes burn as deeply into the minds of your listeners as this beautiful article.
Is there a link between taking SSRI’s in pregnancy and the sudden explosion of diagnosed autism in children now? (I’m skeptical of the diagnosis, I’m an old Gen Xer that observed the classic signs of autism in some of my elementary school classmates. It seems like any trait is now diagnosed as autism, but I digress. )
I am hoping this will be addressed by Dr. Adam Urato who is on the panel
Thank you for the work you do!
You couldn't possibly be more right. Let's spread awareness together!
You will make a powerful impression on our stone-faced senators. Personal stories like the ones that haunt you to this day are always the most impactful. In the current unfolding of Epstein, we are learning how many of the ruling class are child abusers, human traffickers, money launderers, and drug pushers. They know the truth, so demand accountability, Dr. McFillin. We will be cheering you on.
I was brought to a psychiatrist at age 17 in 1984, by my mom who was concerned because my grades had dropped, I stayed up late, slept late and didn’t socialize anymore. I was terrified sitting before that psychiatrist as he said he was recommending family therapy with my abuser—my stepdad. I went home & took a bottle of Tylenol because in my 17 yr old immaturity I believed death was better than therapy where I surely would be punished by my stepdad (later at home)for what the therapist would get me to say. I ended up in the ER and the next day in a teen mental ward. That same psychiatrist was my inpatient doc and when he came to see me there for the first time inpatient, & asked how I was doing all I said was, “my stomach hurts” He said “I’ve got a great medicine for tummy aches.” Turned out that med was melaril an antipsychotic.
AFTER a steady stream of melaril plus trials of 1st generation antidepressants for 3 months inpatient, I became very very much more suicidal, extremely depressed, started cutting myself with sharps I found in the ward, and actually thought I was a serial killer!! Except for that one impulsive Tylenol suicide attempt these were ALL thoughts and behaviors I’d NEVER EVER EVER had before. But these novel symptoms were not blamed on a paradoxical adverse reaction to the meds. He diagnosed me with incurable chronic schizo-affective & told my parents I’d end up institutionalized for life. His solution to manage me was continued meds and ECT. I was shocked 50+ times over the years from 1984 to 1990. The shocks stopped after clozaril came to market. 1984 was the beginning of my 4 decade full time career as a patient—both mental and physical as I now had an electrical and synthetic brain injury with all kinds of other specialists in my life from GI docs, to hematologists to cardiologists, to gynecologists who took my entire ovary because of a benign cyst [because why would a schizophrenic need to have children anyway?]
After 38 years of that inpatient & outpatient career, in 2022, I “woke up”, tapered too quickly off all meds and got yet another synthetic brain injury (protracted withdrawal).
I may still be injured & physically and unnecessarily suffering 24/7 but I am now feeling FREE to think for myself and feeling free to FEEL my emotions. I know that at any time of their choosing the authorities can take my body back—But they will never have my soul again!!
Thanks to myself, my fellow psychiatric survivors, teachers and activists like you, Angie Peacock, Bob Whitaker, and Dr Witt-Doerring I now RESIST!!
I am now my own doctor. And I am Dr Awesome!!
Thank you Dr McF!
Please keep up your good work!
You are making a HUGE difference!!!
Bless you!!
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!
The pharmaceutical industry has harmed us from so many directions but it’s the innocent that the LORD will surely not forget. Parents and children experimented on. Or just used for cash. Thank you for participating in exposing truth. I pray more and more light will be brought to this subject. Just my strongly held opinion, SSRIs are toxic. Period. And vaccines harm us ALL. I rest in God’s sovereign will regarding the matter, and surely He is with you. Be strong and May God bless you.
Is God with kids while they are being raped by adults though, I don't get the whole concept of a loving father, who does not intervene in child abuse.
The world is full of sin but vengeance is the LORD’s. Evil won’t go unpunished. Who are we to try to understand the will of God? He gave His only Son so that we might have eternal life. Jesus suffered. Too many people think they can love more than God or they are more just than God. Yet no man can create an ant out of nothing yet alone the moon or stars. Though we grieve the awful things in this world we can have hope and faith in something better and everlasting. At least that’s how I look at it.
Thank you for you post, I’ve been searching for any doctors with the courage to call this abuse out, to feel like I am not alone.
My mother brought me in for a psych evaluation as a teen due to inattention and behavioral issues related to depression and anxiety in high school. I went through so many diagnoses and by the time I was a senior in high school, I had gone through probably 10 different prescription drugs and I could tolerate none of them. I was severely depressed and anxious. Long story short, the drug that seemed to work the best for me (aka zombify me and make me compliant) was an antipsychotic. I was on this drug for about 7 years with very little oversight from doctors. I experienced horrific side effects and I was effectively sedated and emotionally muted for much of that time; my memories aren’t even formed well. I gained 60+ pounds. I slept about 10 hours a day. I had constant nausea and stomach pain. My personality was markedly different, I had lowered inhibitions. I had metabolic syndrome. I began developing tremors and subtle loss of control of body movements. I learned that I had been put on an extremely high dose for a long time and the doctor which I had been under, Dr. Mario Robbins, told me that none of those things could be from the meds. I finally got another evaluation confirming C-PTSD and was weaned off my meds by another doc. EMDR has done more for me than any drug and any other therapy.
I lived through hell at the hands of people who were hurting me while they told me they were taking care of me. I’m so much healthier now being off the meds for nearly two years now. But now I am processing so much trauma that I couldn’t feel in all the time I was numbed out. It’s a slow process that is taking a lot of extra love and grace from me to me❤️
This is a sobering and necessary read. The quiet corrosion of trust in the name of institutional alignment has done deep harm, not just to those misled, but to the integrity of the profession itself. Your breakdown of the history, the pressure points, and the cultural gaslighting is as infuriating as it is clarifying.
Thank you for saying what so many are still afraid to voice. Truth, when spoken with clarity and care, becomes a kind of medicine. And this? This is healing work.
Stay entangled, my friend.
—The Bathrobe Guy
Psychiatry should be obsolete and replaced with depth psychology from skilled and compassionate people. My aunt was put on SSRIs for most of her life, my mother-in-law, same thing. When I told a doctor I had severe PMS, he pushed Prozac, I declined. The strange thing is that all those years of drugging never helped my relatives, yet they were kept on them. Mainstream believe in them, like they believe in vaccines as the b all and end all. People don't want the burden of another's depression, so suggesting antidepressants will be encouraged. It is expensive and time consuming to provide healing services. I imagine sending traumatized kids to a farm, where they could spend time with animals, and work off stress with some chores, and in the evening sit around a fire and share their stories, grieve and gain support from a group of shamans, therapists, body healers, massage therapists, yoga teachers, and nurturing people who understand cPTSD and how to unravel its effects from the mind and body. Then these kids could sleep in cozy beds, with caring adults who say good night. Safety is the antidote to emotional instability. So much need, so little resources, except a sick system that drives despair deeper.
Phenomenal work. Looking forward to witnessing your 5 minutes.