Travels Through Psychiatry

  Almost every day I wake up and I hate it, sorry I’m conscious, resenting the hours ahead of thinking and being in this apartment box, and even that the cat needs food, and doing my own basic care, and that I feel this way again, again, again. Even on rare days, when I come to with optimism, some excitement about the day, I don’t trust it. It’s probably an upswing, the start of an overly active period that will shrink away into darkness. Or, I’ll   hit a wall, break into a million pieces, once more to pick up, once more to glue back into some fashion of myself. Some would advise that I need psychiatric assistance. I’ve been through that already. Not that I don’t run that around my pessimistic mind, head still on my pillow, trying to convince myself that helpful psychiatry exists, in my geographic area, that accepts my current healthcare coverage. Make a plan! Make a budget and start leafing through who is out there and calling and making appointments and before you know...

  In this post, which is about my early psych drug withdrawal, I present my notes, doctors' notes and an administrative letter which I scanned to image form. I call it "the raw account", because it documents what was going on then, over 3 years ago, rather than how I've filtered it through my experiences since. That's important. I provide a brief explanation of each record, and if you'd like more detail, please see the article I wrote for Mad in America at this link:   Reckless Psychiatric Treatment Spun Me Out of Control , which contains more about my psych history and drugs the psychiatrist discontinued without taper. My main point in this post is to show how withdrawal not only ravaged my mind and body, but also my relationships. Furthermore, medical professionals refused my account of what happened. The beginning months were soul-crushing, and recovering is difficult, even a few years on, even with better insight. These are my own notes, written as part of...