Just Call Me On It

Posted on February 1, 2006 in Psychotropics Responsibility

How I came to my sympathy for those who were forcibly medicated as children comes from a different direction than the clever but not accountable poster known as Noni Moose supposes: I was never forcibly medicated as a child. In fact, I was deterred from seeking psychiatric help.

As many of you know, I suffered the fists and belts of child abuse. My mother, in particular, wanted to hide this fact from the medical establishment because, after all, if a doctor saw the bruises or a psychiatrist heard me attest to the physical damage, their act would be up. The abusers in my family promoted the idea that the abuse didn’t happen that often, so it wasn’t as bad as say the kid I know whose stepfather swung a baseball bat through his skull because the boy had told the police about him. I know there are others out there who know how wracking intermittent abuse can be.

My parents put their issues ahead of my own. Consequently I listen compassionately when someone tells me that s/he about her/his own history of suffering. I know that it is not easy to be a parent, but my hours spent listening to other bipolars suggest to me that it is foolhardy to force any child to take medications. A far wiser course is to educate the child and enlist her/his understanding so that later in life that adult will know why it is important to take the medication and not spend her/his time going on and off treatment because s/he has not resolved the independence issue.

In some ways, I am thankful because my resistance to my parents’ control over my mental state meant that I did take my medications. “Damn you,” I cried. “These are making me feel better.” Even today, when my mother attempts to chant her litany of side effects, I can smile and tell her that it is none of her business. She’s not the medical professional nor the patient: I am.

Those who don’t take their meds are saying pretty much the same thing except they are going against what is good for them. They take up my mother’s banner. They accuse the medical profession of attempting to enslave them. And why? I suspect that their parents sought to “control” them using the meds. Maybe they were overmedicated and had other issues, but their families and psychiatrists ignored this. The price they pay are the results of noncompliance which can include jail time, personal injury, injury to others, destruction of property, and suicide.

But I know where they are coming from. They are sick and tired of others trying to run their lives as if their views and opinions did not matter to them. They are tired of people who do not know them rushing to diagnoses and giving unhelpful advice. It sounds odd when they declare that they see the pills as stigma’s spearpoint, but I can understand their resentment. Like me, they want to be free. They don’t want to hide. Noni Mouse, on the other hand, promotes stigma against the mentally ill with her/his anonymity and uninformd attacks.

Should I care? I care for the same reason that I care about the people who don’t take their meds: Noni claims to be bipolar and that is not an easy life to live. It’s unfortunate that s/he has not risen to the level of accountability where s/he can speak as who s/he is, but that’s not my problem. You can call me on what I do. You’d better have your facts right, however.

Adults who refuse medication because of childhood trauma issues: We have a few of these in my groups. I listen to them just as I listen to others. The tendency is for other members to nod their heads and say “Sounds like you’re doing fine” without having really listened.

The noncompliant tell us that we can’t challenge their present behavior, their failure to be compliant. Otherwise we trying to “control them”. I think this is why others don’t give sincere feedback. “Freddy, if you don’t take your meds, you’re going to keep falling.” Or “I know we often catch it for being what we are, but others do matter.”

The nonmedicators get on their soapboxes and inveil against the psychiatric profession, using our support group as a captive audience. All to avoid accountability.

I understand the roots, but that doesn’t mean that I have encourage the crazy growth of the rampant denial vine.

That plant drops rotten fruit on the rest of us. If stigma comes in the pills as some claim, then they set a stigma on me for taking them. Right now, I’m fighting in the corridors of my interior castle against this guy who always tries to tell me that I’m faking it. “Look,” he says. “You’re feeling fine. You never needed the meds in the first place.” At this moment, I am winning but I am also making sure that my support group includes people who appreciate the importance of my compliance.

I think it’ll work because my support group has been handpicked by me and all are committed to the same end: keeping Joel well. I, too, have felt stigma in these last twenty-four hours and the stigma has been borne on the shoulders of my own kind. Some accuse me of histories which I never had and others undercut the one therapy which has helped me more than any others. In fact, both do the historical fabrication and both undercut the therapy. Do I have issues with this? Why the hell shouldn’t I?

In summary, I think two things that I do are not evils: first to warn parents against forcibly medicating their children and second to urge compliance. Hang me if you wish or merely deride me: I dare say that you’ll be wrong.

Under no conditions please hold Bitch Phd responsible for Noni or any other poster at that site.