The majority of the following text was originally published in my February 2021 article "Tips on Identifying and Recovering From Schizophrenia, Dissociative Identity Disorder, and Sleep Paralysis".
That article can be viewed at the link below. The section regarding Abilify and other antipsychotic medications, can be found under "Step 1".
http://aquarianagrarian.blogspot.com/2021/02/tips-on-recovering-from-schizophrenia.html
"S.G.A."
stands for "Second-Generation Antipsychotics". Abilify is
in a class of drugs known as "atypical antipsychotics".
Other drugs in this class include Seroquel, Risperdal, Geodon, and
Zyprexa.
Abilify (aripiprazole) is prescribed for bipolar
disorder, clinical depression, autism-associated irritability, and
various psychological disorders experienced by teenagers. Abilify is
also used to treat schizophrenia.
Whether
it actually works the way it's supposed to - and whether it's an
antipsychotic at all - has been questioned, however, and so has its use
on teenagers and children.
As
of late 2018, more than two thousand lawsuits were filed against the
makers of Abilify (Bristol-Myers Squibb), contending that the
drugmaker convinced doctors to prescribe Abilify for conditions which
the F.D.A. (Food and Drug Administration) had not approved.
Some
plaintiffs also asserted that the makers of Abilify failed to warn
doctors and patients about the connection between Abilify and
compulsive behaviors.
In
early 2015, I was prescribed Abilify by a psychiatrist who had not
yet diagnosed me with anything. The only thing he told me was that I
didn't have O.D.D. (Oppositional Defiant Disorder). He never
explained to me what Abilify was supposed to treat, aside from
"helping get the unwanted thoughts under control".
I
found out years later that some people who had taken Abilify had
experienced symptoms resembling paralysis after only one dose. I
refused to take the drug because I didn't know what it would do to
me, and in retrospect it could have risked permanent damage to my
nervous system.
The
articles linked below, explain that the negative side effects of
Abilify include akathisia (inner restlessness) and a persistent
feeling of need to walk and pace; limited mobility of the legs,
muscle pain, arthritis, weight gain, and irregular movements of the
mouth and head.
http://www.levinlaw.com/abilify-lawsuit-lawyer
http://www.peoplespharmacy.com/articles/abilify-side-effects-can-be-scary
______________________
Through
reading the articles above, and some of the comments on YouTube
videos about Abilify, we can see that there is, in fact, a wide range
of negative side effects, which are associated with either taking
Abilify, and/or withdrawing from its use. These include the
following.
Negative
side effects associated with taking Abilify include:
-
agitation
-
akathisia (inner restlessness), and compulsive need to walk and
pace, or feeling "wound up"
-
anxiety
-
blood disorders
-
blurred vision
-
compulsive behaviors, including binge eating, hypersexuality, and
compulsive gambling and shopping, even to the point of the patient's
financial ruin / reduction of inhibitions / increasing feelings of
mania and hyperactivity
-
constipation and digestive tract distress
-
diabetes or elevated blood sugar
-
difficulty sleeping
-
drowsiness
-
dry mouth, or drooling and excessive salivation
-
elevated cholesterol
-
fever
-
gall bladder problem
-
headaches, dizziness, and lightheadedness
-
high potassium
-
increased social anxiety
-
low blood pressure (especially with standing) or dizziness
-
low sodium
-
muscle pain and arthritis
-
nausea
-
pancreatitis
-
paranoia
-
stroke or transient ischemic attack (T.I.A.)
-
swelling of the throat
-
tardive dyskinesia, uncontrollable muscle movements, lip smacking,
grimacing, neck twisting
-
tremor
-
weight gain
-
worsening depression / suicidal thoughts
Negative
side effects associated with withdrawing use of Abilify include:
-
"creeping crawling sensation"
-
agitation
-
anxiety
-
confusion
-
difficulty socializing
-
dizziness
-
feeling of having had a "chemical lobotomy"
-
migraine headaches
-
nausea and vomiting
-
poor judgment
-
poor memory
-
sweating
-
uncontrollable muscular movements
One
commenter on YouTube even mentioned that juvenile detention
facilities put inmates on Abilify and other antipsychotic drugs, with
little regard about the potential hazardous side effects. This
phenomenon is detailed in the articles linked below.
http://www.phillyvoice.com/report-antipsychotic-drugs-pa-juvenile-offenders/
http://healthbeatblog.com/2011/06/atypical-antipsychotics-misused-as-chemical-restraints-for-youthful-offenders/
http://thelensnola.org/2011/07/27/jailedjuvenilesanddrugs/
______________________
It
is disturbing to think that anxiety and agitation are both side
effects of taking and
withdrawing from Abilify,
while Abilify is being prescribed to fix anxiety
and agitation problems in teenagers with autism.
It
should also be noted that Abilify can cause depression, while
withdrawing from its use can increase ones difficulty socializing,
when Abilify is prescribed to treat depression
and make socializing easier.
We
should also ask ourselves the following questions: 1) "Why would
drugmakers have had any reason to refrain from pressuring doctors
into over-prescribing Abilify, when its side effects make the patient
into a binge-eating, binge-shopping, hypersexual gambler?" 2) "Who stands to profit from marketing binge sex and gambling as the
solutions to depression?", and 3) "Since when is constantly
buying, shopping, gambling, and having sex a sign that everything is
OK in your life?".
In
2008, The
Guardian reported
that U.K. National Health Service psychiatrist Joanna Moncrieff
believes that antipsychotics not only don't work, but also cause
brain damage. Moncrieff researches "antidepressant
non-effectiveness", a phenomenon in which antipsychotic drugs no
longer work on a patient, usually after years of trying different
medications. Moncrieff says that antipsychotics tranquilize
depression and delusions, but also emotions.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2008/mar/02/mythoftheantipsychotic?fbclid=IwAR30axxWTJqQ_CRSOpq6t4KsubsgsKNLG8hFkPV4Vam6aEV5crwgjPAw58w
I
say all of this, not as a dismissal of medication entirely. I am not
anti-science, nor am I anti-medicine. I simply regard psychiatric
medications as blinders which shield us from having to deal with
reality.
I say that psychiatric
medications "shield us from having to deal with reality"
because some patients of Abilify have reported a "loss of joy"
resulting from the medication blocking-out all
emotional extremes. One
YouTube commenter who had taken Abilify, reported that Abilify got
rid of his depression, but
also got rid of his ability to experience joy and happiness.
A screenshot of several YouTube comments regarding
negative effects of Abilify
(click, open in new tab or window, and download if necessary,
to see image in full detail)
People who are experiencing hallucinations or delusions
or identity disorders - and victims of beatings, rape, and emotional
abuse - do not need to be sedated, nor do they need to have their
range of emotions narrowed and muted. They need someone to listen to
them talk about their problems, and they need someone to help them do
reality-checks.
When I was prescribed Abilify in late
March 2015, I was told that it would help stop “unwanted thoughts”
from coming into my mind.
To be fair, I had complained about
thoughts seeming to circle around in my mind endlessly. But I never
asked
for the thoughts to go away.
I never asked anyone to medicate the thoughts away.
My
psychiatrist said that the medication would help me get my thoughts
“under control”. Well, excuse me, but is that going to negatively
impact my imagination in any way? Since when is my imagination
something that I have to get “under control”?
If I don't
let thoughts enter my mind, and deal with them by confronting them
directly and considering them, then where are my ideas
going to come from? Blind faith in what other people say?
I
think for myself, and I make my own decisions about what goes into my body. I am not afraid of “unwanted thoughts”, nor of
“losing control” of my mind. Thoughts are immaterial and cannot hurt me.
All I needed was someone to talk to,
to help me do reality checks. All I needed was someone to bounce
ideas off of; someone who would bear with me while I occasionally
speak in metaphors and similes, or make use of poetic license to talk
about the connections I was perceiving.
I did not need
medication. I was trying to reduce
my total intake of artificial drugs at the time when I was prescribed
Abilify.
I believe that, if I had taken Abilify in early 2015
(when my memories of childhood sexual abuse began to resurface), then
I could have suffered neurological impairments, and/or inability to
move my mouth properly, which would have made it exceedingly
difficult to continue to retrieve suppressed memories, and to
articulate those memories verbally.
It's
possible that psychiatrists - and maybe even my former
psychiatrist, Dr. Michael Feld - know about this effect. It's
possible that they prescribe these neurotranquilizers - that
is, nerve
tranquilizers, i.e., sedatives -
to diminish the speaking and fleeing ability of young people who are
suffering from disruptive thought processes, because they know these young people suffered
forms of trauma in the past and cannot safely divulge those
traumas on these drugs.
All of these facts and
potentialities point to the possibilities that the over-prescription
of neurotranquilizing and neuroleptic antipsychotic medications - and
the over-diagnosis of disorders for which antipsychotic
sedatives are
prescribed - in order to "dope-up" the patient and render
them immobile and speechless (which only serves to make them look
more "catatonic" than before), is actually a systemic
problem.
This is certainly not a problem which can be medicated
away.
______________________
The
fact that depression results from a chemical imbalance in the brain,
does not always mean that psychiatric drugs are necessary to restore
that imbalance to equilibrium.
There
are club
drugs that
are being prescribed as anti-depressants now. Namely Ketamine, which
was known as a date-rape
drug until
just ten years ago.
http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2012/10/04/162299564/ketamine-relieves-depression-by-restoring-brain-connections?fbclid=IwAR0xv9Ni1qzZ5ZmgaGyMqLCl9z33R0-TEs8HIrC7NU8cjZgG3afeSCK0ML8
In
the 1970s, ecstasy was prescribed to couples who were having
difficulty being intimate.
http://maps.org/news/media/7645-big-think-decades-ago,-ecstasy-%E2%80%94-yes,-mdma-%E2%80%94-was-used-in-marriage-counseling
Some
people on the West Coast are micro-dosing LSD while they are at work.
http://www.wired.co.uk/article/lsd-microdosing-drugs-silicon-valley
Don't
tell me that "psychiatric medications aren't drugs" just
because they're made in a laboratory by scientists. That would be
like arguing that marijuana could not possibly have any psychoactive
effects simply because it was not
made
in a laboratory, and instead grows
out of the ground.
The fact that club drugs
are moving into psychiatrists' office, means that you have every
right to use the word “drugs” when referring to, or refusing to
take, medications whose full effects on the nervous system have
arguably not been sufficiently tested.
You
have every right to refuse to take psychiatric medications, as long
as you are prepared to confront painful and distressing memories
head-on.
You
may also wish to look into other more natural cures which may be
available. Skullcap, for example, is an herb that promotes alertness,
while also creating a soothing feeling. You can buy skullcap tea.
If you have been using hard drugs, or struggled with drug
addiction, you may wish to research anti-addictive chemicals.
Unfortunately, the anti-addictive substance ibogaine is
hallucinogenic, and illegal in the United States. But a derivative of
ibogaine, 18-MC, has no psychedelic effects, and has been shown to
reduce addiction in laboratory mice.
Your
brain stores all of your memories and thoughts; everything that has
ever happened to you. It stores the memories of your dreams, houses
your imagination, controls your personality and emotions. Your brain
is what makes you you. The last thing you want to do is alter your
brain chemistry out of the need to resort to a “quick fix” that
will solve all of your problems at once. No such quick fix exists.
Doing
drugs is (probably part of) what got you into this; more drugs might
not get you out.
Even if you are struggling with severe symptoms of psychosis,
antipsychotic medication might not necessarily be what you need.
Get your symptoms properly diagnosed, before jumping to any
conclusions, as withdrawals from antipsychotics can be severe (and
considering that antipsychotics can cause restless, manic,
depressive, and sociopathic symptoms to worsen).
Even if you
are sure that you are experiencing a chemical imbalance,
antipsychotics are not necessarily the cure. There is a vitamin you
can take, which should help restore your neurotransmitting chemicals
to good working order.
If you have been
experiencing hallucinations and delusions that are consistent with
symptoms of schizophrenia, then you may be experiencing psychiatric
symptoms associated with nerve degeneration. One major cause of nerve
degeneration is a deficiency of niacin (also known as Vitamin B3) in
your system.
Niacin stimulates the production of dopamine,
norepinephrine, and serotonin. Those neurotransmitters affect memory,
learning, recognition, and recall, and mood. That's why insufficient
intake of niacin can negatively affect our cognitive function.
If
you suspect that you aren't getting enough niacin, talk to your
doctor, nutritionist, and/or psychiatrist, and decide whether you
should start drinking vitamin water containing B3, and/or whether you
should get more of the high-in-niacin foods which are listed in the
article linked below.
If you are currently on psychiatric medications, then learn as
much as you can about the side effects of that drug (or those drugs).
If you are not on psychiatric meds, but someone has recommended a
specific medication to you, then you should still learn as much as
you can about the drug.
It is very important to consider
whether the effects of a drug might interfere with your ability to
think clearly, speak clearly, and remember things easily. Your
ability to recover lost repressed memories might become damaged, if
you take psychiatric drugs which have what I would describe as
neurotranquilizing effects; i.e., sedative
effects.
Alcohol has similar effects, because it has sedative
effects (as well as some stimulating effects); it's the brain's
cognitive centers that get sedated.
Don't
begin taking any medication until you have a good idea of what it
will – and might – do to you. You don't want to find out the hard
way, that a single dose of a medication can have effects from which
it is difficult to recover.
Use
several sources for reviews of the medication; read peer-reviewed
studies, read random YouTube comments, and read anything about the
medication that you can get your hands on. Make a “pro-vs.-con”
diagram, if you have to, to decide whether to try it.
And
finally, don't start a medication until you've made sure that your
doctor has a plan about what to do if it doesn't work. You might have
to either get off of it, or transition onto a different drug.
Withdrawal symptoms of psychiatric medications can be serious and
potentially life-threatening. If your psychiatrist doesn't have a
backup plan, or a backup medication, then you should start asking
more questions.
If Abilify advertisements were honest
Written
between February 24th
and 28th,
and
March 3rd,
5th,
and 7th
though 9th,
2021
Originally Published on March 11th, 2021
Edited and Expanded on March 11th, 12th, and 15th, 2021
First Image Added on March 12th, 2021
Second Image Added on March 15th, 2021
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