Counselorssoapbox.com
By David Joel Miller, MS, Licensed Therapist & Licensed Counselor.
Thank you for reading counselorssoapbox.com both those of you that have been with me for a while and those of you that joined me over this past month.
So far this year I have been keeping up with my plan to post at least once per day. While I am not able to do counseling or offer personal advice over the internet I have tried to answer questions of a general nature as they came in.
I appreciate all your comments.
Here are the top ten posts over the last month. A few are old, a few are new, and most fall somewhere in between. Stay tuned for a whole new series of posts over the next month. Most of March’s posts are written and in the final editing stage.
February’s top 10 counselorssoapbox.com posts.
How much should you tell a therapist?
Do people really forget what happened when drinking? – Blackouts
What is the difference between Depression and Major Depressive Disorder?
Why can’t we forget the painful past?
Do therapists have to report a crime?
Is nicotine a stimulant or a depressant?
6 ways to recover from Complex Trauma or Complex PTSD
Which border is Borderline Intellectual Functioning on?
Levels or types of Borderline Personality Disorder
Staying connected with David Joel Miller
Seven David Joel Miller Books are available now!
My newest book is now available. It was my opportunity to try on a new genre. I’ve been working on this book for several years, but now seem like the right time to publish it.
Story Bureau is a thrilling Dystopian Post-Apocalyptic adventure in the Surviving the Apocalypse series.
Baldwin struggles to survive life in a post-apocalyptic world where the government controls everything.
As society collapses and his family gets plunged into poverty, Baldwin takes a job in the capital city, working for a government agency called the Story Bureau. He discovers the Story Bureau is not a benign news outlet but a sinister government plot to manipulate society.
Bumps on the Road of Life. Whether you struggle with anxiety, depression, low motivation, or addiction, you can recover. Bumps on the Road of Life is the story of how people get off track and how to get your life out of the ditch.
Dark Family Secrets: Doris wants to get her life back, but small-town prejudice could shatter her dreams.
Casino Robbery Arthur Mitchell escapes the trauma of watching his girlfriend die. But the killers know he’s a witness and want him dead.
Planned Accidents The second Arthur Mitchell and Plutus mystery.
Letters from the Dead: The third in the Arthur Mitchell mystery series.
What would you do if you found a letter to a detective describing a crime and you knew the writer and detective were dead, and you could be next?
Sasquatch. Three things about us, you should know. One, we have seen the past. Two, we’re trapped there. Three, I don’t know if we’ll ever get back to our own time.
For these and my upcoming books; please visit my Author Page – David Joel Miller
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Well, I had some active substance abuse issues in those days, and I can tell you that when consumed in large doses, Wellbutrin does indeed work as a powerful stimulant and euphoriant, with sweating, increased heart rate, and all the rest. Actually even at milder/non-abusive doses it can do that. They even gave me beta blockers along with it to counter some of those undesired effects. That aside though, my life has indeed improved dramatically since then, thank you. Ultimately I realized, and still believe today, that the main source of my problems was my dysfunctional family, who was pushing me into the psych system in the first place in lieu of trying to face up to and correct their own shortcomings IMO, and severing ties with them was at least 75% of my cure. It’s not a perfect solution, but it has gone a long way toward making my life liveable — nothing else did — and allowing me enough breathing room to get the other 25% up to par and move on with my life. I haven’t used meds since, nor felt a need for them, and this was over ten years ago. Actually my experiences with the psych system and its meds were forced upon me from the start and hellish on the whole. I questioned it the entire time and tossed my scrips at least as often as I swallowed them. That whole process, again, was IMO a part of my scapegoating in the context of my “black sheep” role within the dysfunctional family, particularly in that it added fuel to a kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy of a downward spiral that went something like, “X is showing signs of emotional disturbance, so let’s take X to be proclaimed to be mentally unwell by a professional. Then, since X’s credibility has been so limited, we have gained license to treat everything X says and wants even more dismissively and condescendingly than before, which makes X more frustrated, intensifying X’s emotional disturbance,” and on the cycle went. It nearly destroyed me until I freed myself by recognizing and dealing with the severe abuse, humiliation, and neglect that was originally causing the emotional disturbance — largely on my own and with the help of friends, I might add, not with the shrinks who mostly just wanted to line their pockets by feeding me pills for the rest of my life. I may never be able to prove legally that I got screwed by their meds experiments, but I’m sure I’ll find a way to tell my story to my satisfaction at some point. Thanks again.
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This is off-topic, but do you know anything about actions that can be taken against psychiatrists who put patients on prescriptions that are above the max recommended dose? When I was a teen, I was prescribed an above-therapeutic level of a stimulant antidepressant — the shrink told me this at the time — and wound up having psychotic episodes within weeks (involving bizarre violent fantasies of self harm, the likes of which had never happened before), which culminated in a suicide attempt.
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That sounds like a legal question. You may need to talk with an attorney. You probably need to do something within a set number of years after you turn 18 or you will not be allowed to file an action. It is also possible to file a complaint with the licensing board in the state in which the professional is licensed if that person is still practicing in that state. As a therapist I do not prescribe but I do not know of anyone prescribing a stimulant to treat depression in my area. Unless this was a long time ago this sounds unusual. All kinds of reactions and side effects are possible from many medications so you would want to know if the med you were prescribed was known to produce those effects back when it was prescribed for you. Having some proof of what was prescribed would help. Hope that helps.
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Thanks. FYI, the RX was Wellbutrin; from what I was told, it is sort of a cross between cocaine and speed and works differently than the more common SSRIs. It is also used to treat nicotine addiction.
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SSRI’s slow the breakdown of serotonin. There are hundreds of neurotransmitters in the brain. Some psych meds slow the breakdown of two or even three neurotransmitters. I do not believe that Wellbutrin is a stimulant in the same way Cocaine or Meth are. Coffee would be more of a stimulant than Wellbutrin. The legal question is more whether this professional knew or should know that this side effect was a possibility and then what did they do to monitor your condition and to correct the problem once it occurred. At this point the most important thing is have you gotten the help you need or what do you need to help you recover from your issues at this point. Hope thing are improving for you.
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