[dmz]

Seriously, meds are not as effective as the drug industry and psychiatrists have led us to believe.

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My experience with a family member’s mental illness (bipolar disorder) is very different from what you have stated.

As long as she was on the meds, no problems. Skip a day or two, forget about it. Psychosis followed in short order, and then hospitalization to get her blood chemistry fixed.

[Jedidah]

Yes. Same experience here.

Thank you for posting.

I wish the chorus understood.

[noprogs]

Bipolar disorder is manic depression. Comparing it to schizophrenia is like saying the common cold and HIV are the same thing since both have viral origins.

If your family member were institutionalized she would be taking her meds. The pattern is always the same. They take the meds, get to feeling better, realize the meds cause a certain level of intoxicated feeling, and then they stop taking the meds. Then they go bonkers and the pattern starts all over again.

I’m sorry your family member has an incurable, chronic illness. Being institutionalized is far better than being the next Navy Yard shooter, the next person choked to death by other passengers on an airplane, or the next erratic driver in DC.

[Borges]

Well Bi Polar Disorder isn’t schizophrenia. A close family member got along for months and months without meds till something happened.

[DarkSavant]

More likely it's withdrawal from the meds that causes the phychosis. The brain gets used to getting the drug the same way a speed or meth fix is constantly needed in a drug addict's brain.

Meds don't fix brain chemistry. They numb the brain and sedate them, many times keeping them from acting out, but doesn't fix anything. Studies have shown they actually lose brain matter the longer they are on psychiatric drugs.

[surrey]

I had the same experience with a neighbor. When she was on her meds she was delightful but she eventually decided that everyone else had a problem and not her. When she went off her medication all hell would break loose. She continued to spiral downward for years and died alone at an early age. She alienated her family and everyone else around her.