The Brilliance Of Spikol

I've meant to link to this post of Liz Spikol's for a couple of days, because it says much of what I've tried to get at on this blog for the last 9 months only Liz does it with 10 times the eloquence and none of the bullshit. She's responding to queries from the anti-psychiatry crowd (whom she and I both respect) and laying out her own thinking (with which I largely agree). Better late than never, I quote from some of it and link to the rest:

"It would be ridiculous to "worship" any field of medicine. It's not a question of emotion. I take pragmatic advantage of the medical services available to me—in every context. I treat my asthma the same way I treat my psychiatric illness: When I have a problem, I address it with a trained professional. I haven't been schooled in how to treat lung disease, so I rely on my doctor. If my medication is causing unacceptable side effects (my old inhaler gave me oral thrush), I go for a medical consultation and we adjust the treatment. I approach psychiatry in exactly the same way.

In my experience—and I've only been doing the journalism thing for seven years, so I still have a lot to learn—I have literally never met a person with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder who was able to be medication-free for a lifetime and still maintain the kind of life that worked for them and for others. I have seen many people who were medication-free but still plagued by demons, or at least compromised in some way by the illness. This isn't to say there's no other way. It's to say that's been my experience as a journalist, patient, friend and family member."

Oh, and Spikol has also begun a book club and if you are interested in such matters go here.