Most of these women who complain about how not enough moms have gone on drugs or gotten “help” have never been through what we have, what I have, what Andrea Yates has. To hear them complain on and on about PPD is amazing when you consider the tremendous and severe harm that these drugs can cause. It’s ironic how some of these families have turned into tools of pHARMa instead of realizing their loved ones are dead because of the psych industry.

I totally agree with your post and I thank you for speaking out as you have done for 20 years.

I “get it,” and I understand how angry you are and that’s how I feel as well. The idea that some people don’t even care about what you have gone through and they try to twist it around to make it seem like people like us are overreacting is beyond insulting.

It’s inexplicable really.

I also agree that there is great hope in our examples and that we have to keep being that example to show others the peace and life that lies ahead when the choice is made to abandon the path of destruction and choose to have a future.

Big Pharma has all sorts of “payment” options for the whores who work for them on the internet.

They are the kings of alternative and “under the table” kickbacks.

I ask you again, how much did you (or the groups with which you affiliate) get paid to push psychiatric drugs on the new mothers surfing for information on the web?

You said: “I am a stay-at-home, Christian homeschooling Mother of four who makes no income at all.”

Payments could be in the form of trips, conferences, web hosting, “gifts”, etc etc etc…

My anger is beyond rage.

It is this white hot festering glob of frustration and overwhelm.

And because I don’t see anything changing any time soon, and anticipate the Mother’s Act passing and doing the dirty work of Big Pharma, all I can hope for is the women themselves will one at a time go looking for the information that will set them free.

You know what the consistant response to my story has been for the past eighteen years?

Hope.

Just hope.

Hope for mothers, husbands, grandparents, and friends – that the loved one who has been lost in the overwhelm of psychosis and depression can be made whole again. Can give birth to more children, can enjoy sex and life and music, and pursue her own happiness without some stinking pill ruining her life and shoving her deeper into insanity.

That has been the constant theme of the emails I have received from the women and their families who have contacted me for almost two decades. I have not taken one damn psychiatric pill for over eighteen years, and if I had listened to the drug pushers, four beautiful healthy children would have never been born to my husband and I.

Know what drugs do? They rob families of hope, financial well being, physical health, and send the couple off on a journey that often ends in divorce, disability, and even…sometimes, the death of the mother and/or her children.

This post is dedicated to Andrea Yates and her five dead children. Victims in the WAR between natural family living and big pharma.

Jenny Hatch

I will not associate myself with a group that has repeatedly broadcast messages that downplay or deny the dangers of drugs and if you want to turn this into something about you personally, I’d like to remind you that those of us here on this group blog work to prevent needless deaths and injuries to babies and mothers.

Your initial post on the blog inviting Jenny to the PSI conference and the email I got asking me to join PSI were unconvincing attempts at repairing their image at best.

If you want to try and reach women who want non-drug options, it would probably best to disassociate yourself from them but it seems that your main interest is promoting PSI and not doing the most ethical and helpful possible things you can do for mothers. If it were, you would not be associated with them. Good luck with your balancing act.

Our organization is made up of individuals who are all different from one another- we have different focuses and different beliefs. Personally, I am a stay-at-home, Christian homeschooling Mother of four who makes no income at all. I hold a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology and a Master’s degree in Human Relations with focuses in counseling and women’s studies.

I knew about your past with DAD. It is a shame you have reacted so vehemently to a woman such as myself- if you had taken the time to read over my work you would have seen we have many common beliefs.

Many of the criticisms I have read about PSI are so very untrue. When you use sweeping criticisms such as “No one is talking about the drugs causing heart disease in newborns…”; etc. it is clear that you do not know what we talk about at our conferences or where our hearts lie.

The use of psychiatric medications in new mothers is only one type of treatment addressed at our conferences, and time given to this approach is greatly overshadowed by many other, non-pharmacological approaches. Most of us are not MDs and do not have, need, or want prescription privileges. Since I am a member of PSI, I can say that there most members who are not in favor of the use of meds as a first line of defense and many who fight for informed consent. Some members are in favor of using NO meds. Horrible problems with the drug industry are no secret. Your anger seems to make it difficult for you to realize that anyone else but you is capable of working with Mother’s best interests at heart.

If you had taken time to calm down, you could have realized my life’s work is promoting alternatives to medications for women. My personal beliefs are evident from my writings on WellPostpartum Weblog.

To use Amy Philo’s words, to each her own. I believe I can serve women with a clear conscience because I know what my work within PSI stands for and what is being accomplished in the field. I also know the depth of my own honesty, humility and kindness. I am fully aware of the need for much less pharmaceutical intervention and I am painfully aware of the lack of reporting of adverse reactions, trauma related to the use of pharmaceuticals and the unfortunate power of the drug industry. It is possible to serve women from a compassionate perspective while standing on the conviction of NOT attacking others who are doing so to the best of their ability.

So, if you choose to attack someone (me), who you do not know, based on a lack of knowledge about my work or my organization that is your choice. It is a shame that you are doing so out of anger where there is a possibility of building a bridge to focus on others’ well being.

–Cheryl Jazzar

No, I wouldn’t touch that conference with a proverbial ten foot pole. During the early years of my recovery from being mentally raped by the psychiatric profession, I worked for five years as a phone contact for Depression After Delivery (DAD) I had contact with over fifty women and my husband was even available for men to call who needed to talk about what was happening to their wives.

During these phone calls I would talk to the women about the need for proper sleep, good nutrition, and we would explore traumas experienced during birth that may have triggered depression. I also encouraged them to explore natural remedies like herbs, oils, and alternative doctors like Naturopaths and Chiropractors for real help with imbalances in their bodies.

The women who ran DAD discovered that I was encouraging women to avoid Drug Therapies in favor of alternative healing and I was FIRED from my VOLUNTEER job with that organization.

I had enjoyed talking with those women for the five years I was affiliated with Depression after Delivery. And was greatly dismayed by the hard line stance in favor of drug therapies.

I decided then I would never again affiliate with any organization that had drug therapy as a focused treatment option. I have watched with horror as the drug companies have taken over family life these past twenty years. I personally know women who have taken anti depressants while pregnant and have been told that the drugs will help their children be more “calm” because of getting these drugs in the womb.

No one is talking about the drugs causing heart disease in newborns, addictive drug withdrawal after they are born, or the side effects that come with a cortisol takeover of the mothers brain.

I believe the drug companies should be taken down the same way the tobacco companies were, and it is time for the coverup to be exposed.

I would never attend a conference of a group that is so closely affiliated with Big Pharma. And I am offended that PSI is attempting to pretend that they are supportive of alternative healing.

What a load of steaming sanctimonious horse pucky.

Jenny Hatch

PS Cheryl Jazzar, how much money did you make last year from Pharmacuetical Interests???

Cheryl — No doubt there is probably some helpful information on your website and that’s a good thing.

However, while we appreciate the effort at reaching common ground — we cannot support a group that is the main force behind a bill that will certainly result in more women taking antidepressant drugs (among others), particularly out of respect to women like Christian (see http://tinyurl.com/IndiVid ) who was never given informed consent — regarding the subjectivity of the psychiatric diagnosis of PPD / depression (not a medical condition requiring drugs) or the risks of the drugs prescribed.

PSI has been the main organization nulllifying, countering and fighting against our efforts for women to have full informed consent regarding PPD “treatments.” And we are supposed to believe that the vested interests of the mental health industry have our own well being first and foremost in mind, when they wish to blast the airwaves with what will essentially be government-sponsored ads for the psycho/pharma industry.

We are supposed to believe that those ads will be honest with new mothers and say that PPD is not a psychiatric condition requiring drugs documented to cause violence, psychosis, mania, suicidal ideation and if you should take them during pregnancy you risk losing your child.

We are supposed to go on faith? Where is the guarantee that women will be given informed consent – are we to trust front group members’ steadfast belief in the “good will” of the APA? Big Pharma? NIMH? Considering they are all tied together by their common vested interests in pharmaceutical grants — we think not.

And considering the garbage being spewed to NJ moms via their PPD website closely linked to PSI’s efforts, as well as the many other agendas PSI has for attempting to make new mothers feel like they are mentally ill (planting a poison seed in their minds) just because they had a new baby, I doubt that most moms who wish to find natural alternatives would trust getting it from anyone associated with the organization.

For example, when my midwife gave me a PSI pamphlet after my home birth of Toby (I guess that’s the law in Texas that the PSI pamphlets go out to new mothers, since Andrea Yates killed her kids while taking a cocktail of psych drugs), I threw it in the trash where it belonged. I found it rather insulting that anyone would attempt to imply I was about to become mentally ill just because I had a newborn, and I am sure most women would feel the same way. I hope that my story will help women come to understand that the scare tactics are false, and that they really can have more children…

Regarding the PSI conference you invited Jenny to, I sent her an email to alert her to your invitation. Women who don’t want to take psych drugs for “PMADs” (aka having feelings, or perhaps actual medical issues such as thyroid problems or hormone imbalances or nutritional deficiencies) aren’t too likely to want to come to that conference and donate more money to PSI.

However I am speculating that your main motivation in coming on this blog (based on the other comments I have seen you post online regarding PSI, as well as the email you sent to me asking me to join the group) to comment is probably to attempt to repair the reputation of PSI because of the fact that some prominent members of the organization who have received money from pharmaceutical interests have been shown to be such adamant pushers of drugs to women who are pregnant and nursing.

You’d likely be better able to help women, and more believable, if you weren’t associated with them, but hey – to each her own. If you want to collude with a group that promotes light sentences for infanticide along with indefinite psychiatric hospitalization as the alternative, a group that pushes drugs that make women kill their babies in the first place, that’s your choice.

And I don’t know if Jenny will want to come to your conference, but you never know. Like I said, to each her own.

I’m glad to have an opportunity to get to read your work. I agree with many of the premises of your work, that women benefit from a return to natural childbirth, that PMADs can be treated successfully with alternative methods and that drug companies are in the business of making money, which can interfere with the goal of healthcare.

I’d like to invite you to attend Postpartum Support International’s annual conference this summer in Los Angeles- August 4-7.

Speakers include Dr. Hyla Cass, the integrative psychiatrist who uses absolutely no psych meds in her practice.

And, Dr. Bonnie Kaplan of Alberta’s $5,000,000 APRON study looking at maternal nutrition, mental health, breast milk quality and children’s outcomes. You will relate to Dr. Kaplan. She has been targeted by two professional critics, one in the US and one in Canada! Apparently her work is too good to resist!

You may also wish to take advantage of PSI’s training which covers many alternative treatment approaches including acupuncture, light therapy and others.

Please review my blog, as well. WellPostpartum Weblog (www.wellpostpartum.com) was created to serve 1/2 our target population- those who do not wish to use psych meds to treat PMADs.

Warm regards,
Cheryl Jazzar

I, too, have been fighting for five years since my son was killed by Zyprexa. He had been taking lithium for years (it is a natural salt) and did fine most of the time. However when he went on Medicaid he was bribed into taking it.

It helps to live near the center of corruption only because I have access to Congress. Though I have spoken to the FDA numerous times, I have concluded that it is a waste of time.

Ellen Liversidge