Censorship may prolong bipolar suffering

A few years ago I only knew a few people with a bipolar diagnosis who were living well without medication.

censorship by big pharma?

Access to good recovery training and explanations of the effects of the various medications have changed so much for so many. Increasingly I am meeting people who, like me, were diagnosed and told to stay on medication for life and then found that it was possible to responsibly come of the medication and stay well.

This week, I met a newly diagnosed person with a forward-thinking-psychiatrist who showed a list of medications, what they were said to do and the side-effects for each. They asked the patient which they thought would be best for slowing their thinking and making them sleep more during the night. The patient selected one and although they told me it was giving some horrible side-effects such as blurred vision, they were happy with their choice. They felt it better than one of the antipsychotics known to cause permanent brain damage.

Censorship? If the censorship laws being considered today go through, will this lead to more restrictive laws in the future that will stop us talking about bipolar recovery. Big business supports the medical model, which says that recovery is not possible. They say that we are sick people who cannot learn from our mistakes. They say that our emotions (that cause us to write about these things) have to be kept under control by medication.

The trend is for more people who have discovered they were not mentally ill after all to come on-line and talk about their horrendous  experiences on drugs. This is beginning to threaten all the big drug companies and their share prices/value on the stock market. Yes, what we are doing is starting to unsettle and is likely to make the global economy more unstable. This is a shame.

It has to be said though. The only alternative is greater censorship and increased use of drugs to stop people talking.