Re: to cristey, med vacations

September 4, 2004

What do you mean by " pushed the limit " ?

Eventually we pushed the limit and that worked to break the cycle. On the

other hand, there were many occasions over the 6 years he was in treatment that

I insisted that he be cleaned of all medication in his system before trying

another. He has been med free for 3 years and is managing well.

What are " Mannatech products " ?

take care, wendy, in canada

Cristey Gibson wrote:

Hi all, Below is an email that my sis-in-law forwarded to me from another

email loop. I'd love to hear from the 'experts by experience'

regarding this issue. My daughter is on Prozac and while I don't regard it

lightly, it restored our family to normalcy. Thanks in advance for sharing your

wisdom. cristey

***Many people these days are focusing on detoxing from the use of SSRI

medications. One of the side effects that many people report from use of SSRI's

is that they develop behaviors that end up being labeled bipolar. The majority

of those I have read info. from indicate that they did not have what

would be called " bipolar " behavior/diagnoses before being on SSRI's.

I am using Mannatech products currently to help my 10-year-old son detox and

build-up after using SSRI's. They had become inneffective, and his behavior had

gotten so bad that he was hospitalized, and labeled bipolar. That didn't help

with his behavior problems, though! Long story, but he now is healing from some

brain-damage symptoms (verbal tic) that developed when we increased his SSRI

dose in April. Immediately after that, I started taking him off the meds.

I took 2 months to do it, and probably should have tapered him off even

slower. I had no help from the psychiatrist, who simply wanted to add more meds.

Bottom line is that he is doing much better, and his behavior is better than

when he was on the SSRI's. It was the right medication for him, according to

medical treatment regimines (OCD, ODD), but the improvement only lasted

for a month or two before his behavior went downhill. Many folks now believe

that the

bipolar diagnosis is actually an alternate label for Prozac Backlash.

There is not a magic formula for detoxing and building up after using SSRI's,

but just what you all would imagine for building health and detoxing with. Our

next step is to do various tests to identify food sensitivities and

vitamin/mineral deficiencies. ***

---------------------------------

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September 5, 2004

Hi ,

When we " pushed the limit " we went over the maximum recommended dosage. At that

time I had not found an inpatient facility for him (too old, too young) and the

local hospital was not able to treat OCD except for medication, and that I could

monitor at home. Tom had spent a year in a group home (and jail) due to his

violent compulsions and had just returned to our home with our rules.

He was asking for help so with the psychiatrists supervision, consultation with

Dr. Jenike of the OCF and a very attentive pharmacist, we agreed to try

going over the 250-300mg maximum for anafranil/clomipramine. Tom was 17 and

adult size and weight. His only side effects stayed consistent: sleepiness, a

feeling that someone was near him (not paranoia), dry mouth, and 'mr. happy

wasnt' happy!!). He was prescribed anafranil at 350mg, for ~2 weeks and 400mg

for ~2 weeks, and then returned to the 300mg range. At first we didnt notice any

difference, but months later we were able to see that he had broken the cycle of

compulsions and his mood was less intense.

I would never undertake this kind of treatment without adequate supervision from

a trained and experienced psychiatrist or psychopharmacist. The pharmacist used

to call us all the time, he was so worried! We decided to push the extremes

mostly due to Tom asking, but also because there are 3 others here that he would

set off when he was on a rampage. It had to stop.

take care, wendy in canada

Ausley wrote: