May 11 2020
May 07 2020
What Do You Think of the Medical Model of Mental Illness?- Vol. 548 -May 7, 2020
This was a question that was asked by a person on Quora and this is how I answered it:
This is the definition of the medical model of mental illness: “The approach argues that mental disorders are related to the physical structure and functioning of the brain” from Susan Boyd who wrote an article in Simply Psychology on just this topic.
I personally have many issues with this particular model based on similar observations from my own history as well as my hypnosis clients, to the observations that others have made in their responses to this question. However, there are many more reasons that people may have issues that look like they have to do with neurotransmitters, etc, yet go way beyond the neurotransmitters per se.
Let us ask the question as to what allows a person to make neurotransmitters? Well, neurotransmitters are made by the amino acids that come from the protein that we eat. However, what happens if someone has a leaky gut or maybe is malnourished because they cannot afford or perhaps access healthy lean proteins? Well, they may find themselves feeling depressed, unable to sleep or, a myriad of other types of symptoms that look psychiatric in nature but are merely a case of malnutrition. There was a writer here on Quora who wrote a very well researched article on her terrible symptoms of depression and neurological pain which all lead back to a B12 vitamin deficiency. All the while the doctors were telling her that she had depression.
Kelly Brogan, M.D. is a holistic psychologist who works very hard to get her patients off of psychotropic medications because the reality of the situation is that you are not suffering from a lack of these medications. What her patients are lacking is a healthy diet and what every single living organism needs in order to live based on its needs which also includes sunlight and movement for animals.
I have written many times on Quora of my own 14 years of being treated by a very gifted psychiatrist who was able to decrease my bipolar symptoms with the appropriate use of medication, however, that was not the underlying cause of the problem. The underlying cause of the problem was that of emotional feelings of being unworthy as well as a couple of other underlying negative emotions. I was able to release that with a technique that I had been using with my clients for the previous 8 months before I learned how to do this for myself for my particular issue. The answer came when I learned what needed to be released and that isn’t something the trainers are going to teach people who have no understanding of mental health issues. Once that was done, the bipolar was gone! That was back in February 2014. So, no I didn’t need to take all those meds for all those years and have some slight issues with kidneys – the reason I was taken off the medications. The kidneys are fine now, but if left unchecked, that could have been the end of Suzanne.
Sadly, the medical model does not understand that our thoughts create our lives. Our emotions are integrated with our thoughts and these need to be dealt with in a manner that works – not just endlessly talking about the same old crap which goes absolutely nowhere. It is a matter of clearing this crap out and moving on with life so these issues are no longer in our present.
When one understands the cause of the problem being much deeper than the manner in which the psychs are taught to look, then perhaps there would be many fewer people being incorrectly diagnosed with a stigmatizing illness being placed on toxic medications of marginal use, while actually treating them for the problem they have, not the one that a totally untested manual has to say that clusters a bunch of symptoms together that misdiagnose many more patients than one would want to consider. I learned that from my time working in with psychiatric patients.
Thank you, Andie, very much for having the guts for asking this question, because it is about time people woke up to the fallacy of the mental health system. This is not to say that one never go see a psychologist or psychiatrist, however, it is to say that their methods are limited and if medication is involved, often not worth the risk of your body becoming addicted to them even if they call it “antidepressant withdrawal syndrome” vs. addiction. The difference is that you don’t get high on the substance (Prozac in this case), but your body is still addicted to the substance as an example. One does, however, get addicted to benzos and amphetamines and a bunch of other crap they dole out. So use your best judgment before going there. Deal with the underlying issues be they emotional or physical.
Apr 30 2020
Vol. 547, April 30, 2020 – Can a skilled hypnotherapist hypnotize someone out of NPD?
This was a question that a Quoran asked and one that needed to be answered given all the talk of narcissism, especially on that platform. Here is how I answered the question:
Thanks for the A2A. I understand that I have been in the world of mental health conventionally first and then with hypnotic techniques after. When we speak of any personality disorder, there is no way to get them to be better. Narcissistic behavior is there as a protection for the individual who has it, and further a narcissist would never believe there was anything wrong with them so would never seek out treatment.
Anyone who tells you that personality disorders can be treated with hypnotism has no clue what they are speaking about. My specialization is in helping people to overcome emotional issues including the more challenging ones of addictions including eating disorders. These folks can be healed. I have several clients who have been healed since 2004 and 2005 – do the math – that’s a decent amount of time. However, those with personality disorders (histrionic, BPD, etc) though able to understand in intellectual terms what is being asked of them, have a terrible time actually making the behavioral changes. I have had more success working with schizophrenics, though in one case I didn’t know that he had that diagnosis – I actually don’t believe he has it, I believe that he probably has bipolar with psychotic features too be honest and did had great results letting go of his sex addiction- the reason he came to me. In the other case, it was a kid who was doing really well in his life with a full-time job, going to school and working out regularly. He is the exception, not the rule where schizophrenia is concerned, in how well he is doing with his life. He came to me because his parents wanted him to give up smoking marijuana, but it wasn’t what he wanted at all – for him, it helped him to be functional so that the voices in his head could be quieted down. I am unable to get into another person’s head, but given his success in life, I took his word for how marijuana helped him to cope.
Now, this is something else that I would bring out having stated that I really don’t believe in the DSM diagnoses given that there are so many overlapping symptoms for too many labels that are used. It is disgusting to my mind that the DSM 5 labels every normal human emotion as some sort of pathological illness making this manual (that has never been proven to be evidence-based – EVER) more disastrous than ever, given the many people who are going to be medicated for normal feelings that would be much better addressed by learning how to regulate them by understanding what they mean and then letting them go.
Apr 23 2020
Vol. 546, April 23 – What are some things you can do to get over the loss of a loved one?
A Quoran asked this question. Given that I have specific techniques that I use with my clients, I was happy to share them on Quora. You the readers of my blogpost may find this information helpful as well if you are going through a loss. Here is how I answered the question:
This is a great question!
I work with clients to overcome their grief. Here are some things that one can do to overcome the loss of a loved one.
First, depending on who the person is to you, you may never fully ‘get over’ the loss. This would be if one were to lose a child or a partner that one was deeply in love with at the time of the death. It is also quite difficult to get over the loss of someone who commits suicide, especially if you never saw it coming.
Here are my suggestions:
So, there you go – some things that one can do to deal with the loss of someone close to them. Over time the pain lessons, however, the great memories are great to hold inside you forever.
Apr 16 2020
Vol. 545, April 16. 2020 – Have therapists Ever Wanted to Slap Sense Into A Client?
This question was asked by a Quoran and one I was happy to answer because of the nature of how therapy is viewed by many with licenses. We who work with others are human beings and ALL of us have our times when we get to a point of real frustration in some of the sessions that we are involved in. Here is the answer that I wrote to the Quoran:
Thanks for the A2A. I am going to answer this from the perspective of figuratively slapping sense into a client (vs. literally doing so).
If one has ever worked with addicts one realizes that this is an ongoing feeling because the addict has learned many ways to manipulate themselves first and then to manipulate others, ALWAYS blaming others for their own behavior. So, yes that would be one category of clients that I did hold very strongly accountable for their manipulations and ‘victim’ mentalities. This particular work is not for the faint of heart at all.
I would also say that working with people who have personality disorders would be another category of client that presents this same feeling toward because they too feel that they are the ones being harmed, when in fact it is their own defense mechanisms that create most of the drama and trauma they have in their lives. The problem is that there is little to nothing that one can do to truly help these folks overcome it, so it’s best to not really get involved unless you have the knowledge necessary for working with them and are up for the challenge.
Parents who cannot relate to the emotional pain and suffering their kid is dealing with, who really wanted their kids to represent something that they are not – like the best student, best athlete, the best artist, best professional when they are not functioning well at all at school due to autism or some other mental health issue- to give the parent a sense of self through their kid. This dynamic nauseates me and I have had a few of them over the years. The kids were great – my heart went out to them. But, the parents – one just better understands why our world at large is as dysfunctional as it is through living through these sad and frustrating interactions between parents and their own children.
Interestingly enough, I have had clients who were ex-cons (and one who was placed in prison after I helped him get off cocaine for the previous breaking and entering in another state before our work together) sex addicts (these are NOT people who molest others, these are people who gain no emotional attachment to those with whom they have sexual relations, thus the need to continue to find partners). These particular clients I really enjoyed working with – very smart and very willing to heal themselves contrary to what most may believe.
I work very hard to hire clients that I believe have hearts underneath all the bravado and manipulations because we need to understand that these behaviors developed as defense mechanisms to protect them. So, to ‘despise’ them for their behaviors would be to miss the point as to why they would be needing the help they have requested. That being said, very few clients are really up to the type of intense and strict accountability that goes with the work that I do as a hypnotist and NLP practitioner – and that is important to realize as well. We each have our own type of clients that we work best with and that is the way it is supposed to be. Let others work with clients who are more closely aligned with the way they work.
Apr 09 2020
Vol. 544, April 9, 2020 – What Are Some Things a Psychotherapist Should Be Looking For In a Patient?
This was a very important question that was asked by a person on Quora because it emphasizes why it is that we need to be able to not just speak to people but to observe them in real life as well. When I do my online hypnosis sessions, video needs to be involved especially in the first few sessions as I get to know my client and how they present under different emotional states. Body language is so important while working with another human being because there are many movements that contradict what a person may be saying. These unconscious movements are telling us what the client is actually thinking making them very important to be able to witness. This is how I answered this question on Quora, except for the last one which a very helpful Quoran noted I had forgotten – and probably the most important of all dare I say.
This is an excellent question, so thanks for asking it.
These are some of the things I attend to while working with clients to better help them out – and sometimes it’s a referral to a different practitioner better able to handle the particular situation.
One of the most important things a clinician needs to understand is their scope of care. Anything outside requires if not a consult with a complementary practitioner for tests I cannot do, then an outright referral to the appropriate professional is required- period! I really wish more mental health professionals would understand that the body works as a whole system and to respect it as such. Hormones and even the very medications given can cause all sorts of emotional looking symptoms and yet they are not – they are physiological in nature and need to be treated as such.
Apr 02 2020
What is the Difference Between Hypomania A Mixed Episode and Social Anxiety? – Vol. 543, April 2, 2020
This was a question that was asked on Quora by a person whose psychiatrist told them that he possibly had social anxiety when he thought he had bipolar confusing this person even more. There is a huge tendency for people to use psychiatric terms without fully understanding what they mean, so it is important to clarify these designations. Though, it is my opinion that it is best to stop using these technical terms that as you can see, even the professionals mix up, and instead speak about the thoughts and behaviors that are problematic. This person may have had what we call in the psychiatric world ‘comorbidity’ meaning having two or more diagnoses. Here is how I answered the question:
This is an interesting question. Thanks for asking it.
Hypomania is when one has a euphoric feeling, whereas with a mixed episode you feel euphoric and depressed at the same time. it has nothing whatever to do with social anxiety disorders. Here is the definition of Mixed Episodes in Bipolar Disorder on WebMD:
“Mixed episodes are defined by symptoms of mania and depression that occur at the same time or in rapid sequence without recovery in between. Mania with mixed features usually involves irritability, high energy, racing thoughts and speech, and overactivity or agitation.”
Definition of Social Anxiety from Anxiety and Depression Association “The defining feature of social anxiety disorder, also called social phobia, is intense anxiety or fear of being judged, negatively evaluated, or rejected in a social or performance situation. … The average age of onset for social anxiety disorder is during the teenage years.”
I would ask your therapist to better define why it is that s/he feels that you have the two different diagnoses because they are in fact two separate diagnoses. Then I would ask your self if you are going to be more concerned with a diagnosis or working to control the symptoms so you can gain control of your own life. Because, in the end, you can either let your mental illness control you, or you can control it.