Being at Risk for Psychosis and Coming off Antipsychotics

Peter Simons recently wrote an article for Mad in America about antipsychotics and their general lack of benefit for patients who are at a clinically high risk of psychosis. In fact, they often lead to a worsening of the patient’s situation over time. The article had me thinking about my own situation, years ago, when I first talked to my psychiatrist about coming off my psych drug cocktail.

~~~~

Link to Peter's Mad In America article:

“For People ‘At Risk for Psychosis,’ Antipsychotics Associated with Worse Outcomes”:

https://www.madinamerica.com/2020/07/...

~~~~

Resources:

Hearing Voices Network: http://www.hearing-voices.org/

~~~~

About Russell B:

I was 11-years-old when I was first taken to a psychiatrist. Like so many children, I was struggling to deal with a stressful home environment. Rather than embarking on the complicated, difficult, and delicate task of thoroughly exploring all of that and attempting to solve the problems at their origins, the psychiatrist instead gave me a diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and promptly prescribed the antidepressant Luvox to treat its “symptoms.”

This sequence of events kickstarted nearly two decades of wandering through psychiatry’s labyrinth of symptom management and prescribing cascades. By the time I was 25, I had received a half-dozen diagnoses, taken countless psychiatric drugs — including ten straight years on antipsychotics — and had more side effects than I could keep up with or manage. I weighed 400 lbs (181 kg), had out-of-control Type 2 diabetes, and felt like I was dying. And honestly, I had felt so bad for so long, I sometimes welcomed it.

I didn’t know where the DSM labels and all the treatments for my supposed “disorders” stopped and I began. I was sad, broken, and worst of all, someone I’d never had the chance to know.

But then I experienced a spark of hope. A light bulb-over-the-brain moment. Maybe I didn’t have to live that way. Even though the belief had been drilled into me for so many of my developing years that coming off the meds would surely seal my doom, something deep inside told me to take a chance and bet big on Russell B. Using this internal guidance, I began a psych drug taper and slowly started coming off every single one of the drugs in a psych drug cocktail: Lexapro, Concerta, Ritalin, Geodon, Klonopin, and Rozerem. None of them were safe. All were on the chopping block.

It took 5 god-awful years to complete the taper and with almost no help from the docs who’d put me on them. But I succeeded.

I’ve been off all meds for 10 years now (as of August 2023) and haven’t seen a psychiatrist since way back in 2009. It’s been a brutally long journey down a nightmarish path. One that was often too dark to see in front of me and littered with steep drops and soul-testing trials. But you know what? I survived. And my life has been improving, slowly but surely, ever since I escaped the house that psychiatry built.

If you’re wandering down the same path, please know you’re not alone. You’re not fated to lose your way – or yourself. You can succeed. We all can.

~~~~

Support Calls:

Support Call appointments are not currently available, but you can send an email to [email protected] if you would like to be added to the list of folks who will be notified as soon as more Calls are being scheduled.

Just put “Support Call Notification” in the subject line and you’ll be added to the list!

~~~~

Disclaimer:

Any advice given on this channel is not a substitute for medical advice. Please consult with a licensed medical professional before coming off psych drugs.

~~~~

Russell B’s videos are made using the following software: Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Adobe Audition