I thought long and hard about how to respond to this post. I am pretty active in the antipsychiatry sub on reddit as well as the therapy abuse sub....
For me the word "anxiety" and having these experiences explained by a psychiatrist invokes how I felt as a product of the system.
I am sure that you more than anyone can understand that rarely are things all "black" or all "white" many themes that I have come across in terms of people who feel harmed by psychiatry and adjacent fields are the degradation and lack of bodily autonomy.
Coming from a lived experience, I am a former foster kid and "troubled teen industry" survivor. Its fairly common to dump unwanted teens into abusive facilities and drug them up with a polypharmacy cocktail of antipsychotics sometimes SO many drugs that words like "zombie" feel fitting....
For the most part, as an adult I have avoided therapy and medications... I have never had a "good" experience with psychiatrist (not all were traumatic but most were largely unhelpful)
The major critiques stem from:
1. Lack of clarity around patients rights
2. Playing the "game" to discharge... mostly we were held as long as the state paid.... It was unclear what the doctor who spent all of 2 min. with you mostly staring at a computer while asking a litany of "yes/"no" questions wanted.... if you say "yes" you are punished with more meds... if you say "no" than you are concealing or "minimizing" symptoms... there is NEVER any winning.
3. Stigmatizing language. pretty much all girls were labeled with borderline personality disorder. Looking back I don't think that 100% of teen girls met this criteria but any sort of pushback or self advocacy was seen as "splitting" I learned to shut up and swallow pills
4. the Unease and boredom of Sitting around in a locked unit that supposedly will "help" us.... further more if we wanted to have a full dinner instead of just a tuna sandwich we had to participate in "group therapy" hardly anyone felt "helped" I think its called a "token economy?"
I just thought it was ironic that the word anxiety was my whole experience being in the system from the social workers who rip you from your home, clothes in trash bags, to the facilities that strip search you and tell you that if you are "good" you can have a crayon... To this day I shudder because I STILL get nightmares about those places... when I say I am a SURVIVOR I mean that...
Thank you though for mentioning over-pathologizing and slapping labels on folks....
the system broke me. I never felt heard or helped. I just tried to be as "compliant" as possible so that I could get the hell away when I aged out. For me the root cause is the broken system itself...
Hi Doctor,
I thought long and hard about how to respond to this post. I am pretty active in the antipsychiatry sub on reddit as well as the therapy abuse sub....
For me the word "anxiety" and having these experiences explained by a psychiatrist invokes how I felt as a product of the system.
I am sure that you more than anyone can understand that rarely are things all "black" or all "white" many themes that I have come across in terms of people who feel harmed by psychiatry and adjacent fields are the degradation and lack of bodily autonomy.
Coming from a lived experience, I am a former foster kid and "troubled teen industry" survivor. Its fairly common to dump unwanted teens into abusive facilities and drug them up with a polypharmacy cocktail of antipsychotics sometimes SO many drugs that words like "zombie" feel fitting....
For the most part, as an adult I have avoided therapy and medications... I have never had a "good" experience with psychiatrist (not all were traumatic but most were largely unhelpful)
The major critiques stem from:
1. Lack of clarity around patients rights
2. Playing the "game" to discharge... mostly we were held as long as the state paid.... It was unclear what the doctor who spent all of 2 min. with you mostly staring at a computer while asking a litany of "yes/"no" questions wanted.... if you say "yes" you are punished with more meds... if you say "no" than you are concealing or "minimizing" symptoms... there is NEVER any winning.
3. Stigmatizing language. pretty much all girls were labeled with borderline personality disorder. Looking back I don't think that 100% of teen girls met this criteria but any sort of pushback or self advocacy was seen as "splitting" I learned to shut up and swallow pills
4. the Unease and boredom of Sitting around in a locked unit that supposedly will "help" us.... further more if we wanted to have a full dinner instead of just a tuna sandwich we had to participate in "group therapy" hardly anyone felt "helped" I think its called a "token economy?"
I just thought it was ironic that the word anxiety was my whole experience being in the system from the social workers who rip you from your home, clothes in trash bags, to the facilities that strip search you and tell you that if you are "good" you can have a crayon... To this day I shudder because I STILL get nightmares about those places... when I say I am a SURVIVOR I mean that...
Thank you though for mentioning over-pathologizing and slapping labels on folks....
the system broke me. I never felt heard or helped. I just tried to be as "compliant" as possible so that I could get the hell away when I aged out. For me the root cause is the broken system itself...
Anyways be well.
Be well.
Y’all are so helpful for us patients who want to learn more about our conditions. Thank you!!