Your Drug My Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Drugs

Your Drug May Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Drugs, Peter R. Breggin and David Cohen, Perseus Books, 1999

Psychiatric drugs are prescribed to millions of Americans for problems like anxiety, depression, panic disorder or insomnia. They are also an increasingly popular response to children who are hyperactive or otherwise "misbehaving".

This book lists the possible side effects of drugs from Prozac to Valium to Xanax, effects ranging from increased heart rate to psychosis and hallucinations. It also looks at things from the therapist's point of view, including why a therapist might prescribe a drug after spending as little as 15 minutes with a patient.

A popular claim is that psychiatric drugs simply correct a chemical imbalance in the brain. To the authors, this claim is nonsense. Current medical knowledge is not advanced enough to know that lack of a certain chemical is A cause of something like bipolar disorder, let alone THE cause.

If the decision is made to get off such drugs, the most important thing is not to quit cold turkey. Suddenly stopping these drugs can lead to withdrawal symptoms as bad, or worse, than whatever necessitated the drugs in the first place. The withdrawal should be done gradually, under the supervision of a clinician with experience at this sort of thing.

For anyone who is, or has a family member, on any psychiatric drug, this is very highly recommended. It is full of information never mentioned by the therapist, and is written in a very easy-to-read-style.