"The documentary begins as filmmaker and suburban dad Phil Lawrence cracks open his pill box and cuts his antidepressant Paxil in half. Under a doctor’s guidance, Phil is weaning himself off the drug and is looking forward to getting back to the day when he can feel emotion instead of feeling numb. He tells his kids what he’s doing and his wife is supportive but skeptical.
Over the next few weeks, Lawrence continues to cut back, but withdrawal symptoms emerge. The first is a slight headache and constant ringing in his head. Later the symptoms get more severe. He can’t sleep and he sleeps too much. He struggles with wild emotional swings filled with rage and thoughts of violence.
Phil’s relationship with his wife and family becomes strained as he continues to spiral out of control. He attempts to find alternatives to his discomfort through diet and exercise, but the withdrawal symptoms are too severe. His wife thinks she may have lost the man she loved. Phil is moody and exhausted.
He can’t even muster the energy to play with his kids on Christmas day. While going through withdrawal, Phil decides to find out how and why he got addicted to antidepressants. He interviews experts all over the country who confirm that the drug companies knew years ago that antidepressants were addictive.
He goes to hearings on Capitol Hill where dozens of people testify that their loved ones lost control under the spell of antidepressants. He also uncovers documents that confirm what Phil suspected: the drug companies hid the facts from the public.
When we see Phil on day 120, he’s suicidal and terrified.
Phil always wanted to feel emotion and now he feels it too much. You cheer for him to keep going and at the same time you secretly hope he gives up. It’s painful and riveting to watch a man’s life unravel on video. But it is also incredibly compelling because so many of us know someone whose life has been touched by antidepressants and we understand the dilemma.
In the end, Phil makes a haunting decision as he realizes that he’s trapped in a physical and psychological dependence on the most prescribed drug in the United States."
VIA
Paxil/Seroxat survivor and author, Bob Fiddaman.
---
Phil Lawrence, is from MN in the U.S. He has testified before an
FDA advisory panel of the Psychopharmacologic Drugs Advisory Committee and the review of data linking antidepressants to a risk of suicide in adults in 2006.
MARCH 2007
Numb Documentary Blog:
"
for the past month or so, I have focused on work and my family and really tried to accept my new reality – and learn to live with it. What I have really struggled with is the inconsistency in the recovery from the drug. One day, I’m fine and the next, I wake up to the same physical symptoms like the ringing in the ears and electrical pulses. It’s a constant reminder of the long-term damage that was done to my mind and body. I am also struggling with an intense lethargic feeling that can hit at anytime, regardless of the amount of rest I have had. I feel like damaged goods – and that makes me angry.
For over six months, I have suffered more than I would wish on even my worst enemy – both physically and psychologically. Not because I have some disease or infection that won’t go away – no, I am suffering because I am trying to STOP a medication. An FDA approved medication that was supposed to help me. What a joke."
--
Paxil Withdrawal Symptoms:
Twenty percent of all
Paxil users experience such serious Paxil side effects that they must terminate their treatment. When a patient attempts to go off treatment to stop side effects, they often then face serious Paxil withdrawal symptoms.
Paxil (paroxetine) is a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant. Paxil is developed by
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), and was first approved by the FDA in 1993. Paxil is prescribed to treat major depressive disorder, general anxiety disorder, social anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, and panic disorder. Paxil withdrawal symptoms and other serious side effects pose such a threat to patients that several lawsuits have been filed against GSK and consumer rights groups have urged the pharmaceutical company to take this dangerous drug off the market.
All of the SSRI antidepressants are considered habit forming and even addictive. Paxil withdrawal symptoms are more severe and longer lasting than the symptoms caused any other SSRI drug. This is because Paxil's half life is shorter than any other SSRI's half life. A drug's half life indicates how long it takes the body to process its chemicals. The shorter the half life, the stronger the drug's action and the more severe the side effects can be. Paxil withdrawal symptoms are often so serious that they discourage a person's effort to terminate treatment and even endanger their life and well being.
Serious physical Paxil withdrawal symptoms can include nausea, vomiting, dizziness, sweating, motor system disturbances, fever, chills, tremors, sleep disturbances, gastrointestinal problems, flu-like symptoms, vertigo, and the feeling of "electric zaps" throughout the body. Paxil withdrawal symptoms can also cause serious psychological symptoms such as: confusion, anxiety, irritability, panic attacks, uncontrollable moods, depression, suicidal ideations, and aggressive thoughts and actions.
One of the most serious Paxil withdrawal symptoms is a condition known as akathisia. This condition is marked by extreme agitation and motor restlessness. This condition can become so severe that individuals may begin to develop suicidal or aggressive thoughts. Many doctors believe that akathisia is a precursor to SSRI related suicides."
---
Bob Fiddaman writes, about his Paxil/Seroxat withdrawal about his new book:
"
I took Seroxat for 6 years, the last 22 months I tapered using an oral syringe and a liquid form of Seroxat. On month 19, I went cold turkey. [See Chapter 2] The following 3 months were the worst moments of my life.
The first chapter of this book takes you through my six years on Seroxat. It is a snapshot of how this one drug completely changed my character. Many of the personal events I mention throughout this book are hazy at best. Seroxat, I believe, has left me impaired in as much that my memory is not what it used to be, nor is my sleep. My life has changed as a result of taking Seroxat. I have lost many things along the way, both physical and mental. Seroxat depersonalised me.
It's time for change here in the UK.
It's time to stand up and be counted."
----
BREGGIN
Dr. Breggin:
"Dr. Breggin stated that physicians and patients are not aware that many severe adverse drug effects can surface after the first or second dose of any SSRI antidepressant. Because the "therapeutic effect" of any antidepressant usually takes several weeks or more to develop, some doctors fail to realize that toxic effects can develop beginning with the first dose. These doctors are not likely to warn patients and their families about adverse events occurring after one or two doses.
Furthermore, these doctors may discount the patient's report when these early reactions occur. They may urge the patient to continue taking the drug so that the patient ends up developing an unnecessarily severe reaction.
Dr. Breggin is a medical expert in cases in which SSRI antidepressants, including
Prozac, Paxil,
Zoloft, Celexa and
Luvox, have caused suicidal and violent behavior in individuals while taking the drug rather than during withdrawal. In some cases, it can be difficult to determine if the adverse drug effect is caused by direct drug toxicity, by drug withdrawal, or by both."
---
SSRI Stories
Antidepressant induced suicide and violence:
Traci Johnson, 2004 Cymbalta
(19 year old)Woman in Lilly clinical trial hangs herself:
"
A nurse found Johnson's body around 8:20 p.m. Saturday at the Lilly Lab, which occupies the fifth and sixth floors of an outpatient center on the campus of the Indiana University Medical School.
Lilly's clinical trial is one that tests "healthy volunteers," who do not have depression or incontinence, in order to evaluate how the human body metabolizes the drug and to examine proper dosages and side effects."
-----
"The weekend before she died she was almost zombielike, really very pale, could hardly talk; she had a look of terror on her face."-Bostock
"Cecily’s suicide
galvanized Bostock to find out everything she could about the neurological effects of these drugs. She immersed herself in research, enrolled in a neuroscience course at Stanford, and became a lightning rod for families who have lost loved ones on SSRIs. In 2004, Bostock testified before the FDA along with about 50 other people who had lost family or friends because of what they felt were SSRI-related side effects.
What she learned about how SSRIs are studied, approved, and prescribed was shocking, she says. She discovered that drug trials that do not produce favourable results do not have to be published or submitted as part of the drug-approval process. In
Paxil’s case, she learned of unpublished evidence indicating those taking the drug had at least twice as much risk of suicidal thinking and behavior as those on a placebo.
Last spring, Bostock and others started up an on-line index of media stories, mainly criminal in nature, in which antidepressants were involved in some way (www.ssristories.com/). Advocates argue that if medications play a significant role in these tragedies,
widespread SSRI use is a public-health problem of epidemic proportions."
--
April 2010
Dr. Daniel Carlat, practicing
psychiatrist in Newburyport, MS. and an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at
Tufts Medical School
April 2010
"However, for most psychiatric problems, the dichotomy between therapy and medications is overblown. Both meds and therapy are crucial. The ultimate mental health practitioners, in my view, should be equally skilled at both psychopharmacology and psychotherapy. Unfortunately, there are very few practitioners who can offer the full package. Because of this, most patients have to see two professionals, one for therapy and one for meds.
That’s a crazy system.." --
New York Times magazine
---
Robert Whitaker 2010
Anatomy of an Epidemic: BOOK REVIEW
Time magazine review
"With Americans popping psychiatric drugs like so many pieces of candy, you'd think mental illness would have decreased since the first antipsychotic medication was approved in 1954. Not so. In 1987, the year Prozac was approved, 1 in 184 Americans was receiving disability payments for a mental illness. Two decades later, the rate had more than doubled, to 1 in 76. Why? Anatomy of an Epidemic offers some answers, charting controversial ground with mystery-novel pacing. Despite much vaunted claims to the contrary, writes Whitaker, a medical journalist, "there was never any evidence" in the scientific literature showing that certain mental illnesses result from faulty brain chemistry. ("The serotonin theory of depression," says one quoted psychiatrist, "is comparable to the masturbatory theory of insanity.") Additionally, says Whitaker, certain medications intended to correct chemical imbalances may actually create them. Psychiatric drugs have changed the lives of millions, but this book explores how they would have fared without them. It's an alternative worth imagining."
Posts
