John Grohol Ignores Forced Treatment and Infant Deaths

Aside from the fact that this entire debate on PsychCentral got started when Dr. Bremner agreed with TIME magazine, and Grohol tried to “expose” Bremner based on a flimsy argument that there are really tons and tons of other “risk factors” of which we need to be aware when mass targeting women with DSM “diagnoses,” (mostly “risk factors” that apply to anyone and everyone if they have them, not just new moms), Dr. Grohol expects people to be convinced by his lame debating skills and attempts at distracting from all the issues. And aside from the fact that his entire argument for screening and The MOTHERS Act is that new moms are too stupid to realize that treament is out there for PPD, or too depressed to realize that they are depressed, he seems to be making this argument about him. It’s almost like it’s a contest in his mind between who is the smartest, Bremner or him. As if the issues in this debate over a potential federal law targeting mothers were really Bremner or Grohol, a couple of guys who will never have PPD or be a pregnant or nursing mother under a big brother spotlight. (Except that Grohol seems to promote anything pharma wants, and probably hopes to become a government funded entity helping to carry out the projects in the bill.)

All along attempting to comment on the blog has been met with condescending comments stating that we are not on topic, that’s not relevant, that’s not what I’m talking about, don’t talk about the players, don’t talk about forced treatment, and let’s not talk about side effects. He wants to talk about screening, as though a 10 question multiple choice test (or even 3 question test) justifies exposing a mom and her baby to toxic drugs. The entire theoretical concept of why drugs are given in the first place for mental “disorders” is ignored, so we’re supposed to make a logical leap that the treatments are irrelevant. The reverse logic that because I give you drugs and you feel better means that the emotion you had was a disease that the drugs cured is swept under the rug and kept all hush hush. Yet the sad part is that the very relevant logic that I give you drugs and then you flip out and shoot yourself, or that you can’t get off of them and then you wind up pregnant and your baby dies, is ignored as well.

As I have explained before, it is a fairly simple two-part phenomenon that would create a problem in terms of forced treatment were The MOTHERS Act to pass.

1) The paranoia of doctors and therapists not to let women slip through the cracks if a nationwide fear-mongering PPD advertising / screening campaign were initiated would lead to overzealous treatment of all sorts. Including forced treatment for those at “highest risk” or with the worst symptoms.

2) The adverse effects of drugs lead to forced hospitalization. When women go absolutely psychotic and suicidal after starting on drugs, if they are lucky they will make it long enough to ask for help. However this help will likely come in the form of being told to go to the emergency room, and forced treatment will ensue.

In addition, John Grohol continues talking about the screening being voluntary. This has not always been the goal, because it used to be that universal screening was the goal. Yet we are expected to forget what the “entities” have always wanted. Nor are we assured that women will indeed have a right to decline screenings without retaliation.

Assuming that women would only be given voluntary screenings, this does not justify the fact that the screening tools in existence are highly inaccurate and are considered unethical. If he does not believe it’s a problem to have mass screening, why does he also have no problem if the screening tool is one that is specifically designed to overdiagnose and misdiagnose women? The EPDS is the most common tool used for PPD screening. This tool triples the number of women diagnosed with PPD. And this is not a problem?

As I have also explained in the past, one third of pregnant women are exposed to psych drugs at some point during pregnancy. How could we possibly expect that there are women being missed out there who “need” treatment. Does 30% of pregnant women sound like too few and we seriously want to try to find some more women to put on drugs? What are we doing to our future?

It’s absurd and really sad that people act like screening is not going to lead to more treatment with drugs. It’s actually a desperate attempt to debate an imaginary point that doesn’t exist in the real world. In fact on the open letter to TIME posted on Katherine Stone’s blog, a letter signed by Grohol, it is emphasized that screening is not effective unless it is tied to follow up and treatment.

Psychologists and psychiatrists, OBs and family doctors are already told that medication for depression (whether in the form of antidepressants, antipsychotics, or mood stabilizers) should be thought of as crucial to help women, to prevent PPD etc. and that the benefits outweigh the risks. If you don’t believe that’s true, I simply suggest you read the comments on the MOTHERS Act promoters’ websites and how they minimize the risks of medications or try to convince others that meds are the way to go. The “It worked for me and my friends all swear by it” phenomenon. Perhaps this would fall under the “euphoria” side effect on the label, which is sometimes later followed by “paranoia, aggressive reaction, delusions, and illusions.”

John Grohol argues that we are trying to limit treatment choices for women. On the contrary, we feel that women should take whatever it is that they think they need, as long as they are fully informed. We’re not advocating for fewer choices, we are advocating  for fewer lies. Our coalition opposes the widespread government-endorsed promotion of programs that lead to the use of more drugs.

We don’t think it’s a particularly great idea to sell a disorder for which the mainstay of treatment is deadly drugs (quite easier and cheaper, on some insurance plans, than lengthy psychotherapy sessions – if you believe that meds are safe and effective).

We are demanding that the government not do something to increase the risk to women and their children, but step back and instead look at the data on psychotropic drugs.

John Grohol refused to respond to the issue of forced treatment. He has also failed to mention side effects and keeps harping on the “it’s the choice of the mother” mantra. Yes, it is her choice. But it needs to be her informed choice.

He says he is for informed consent, but there is no assurance that informed consent will be given to women. In fact, it’s impossible unless the entities doling out screening and education are required to inform women completely. And as we can see from their PR campaign, they’re on more of an anti-information campaign than anything. They want to talk about PPD the disorder, we want to talk about the available treatments and ways to prevent women and children from suffering. The treatments that exist include psychotropic drugs. The word medication was in the bill last year. Psychotropic medications cause death and birth defects and have questionable efficacy at best.

If the government wants to promote a disorder and encourage the management / treatment of that disorder without the assurance that the treatment side effects will be disclosed (look for the words treatment, management, etc. in the bill) then yes, we have a serious problem with that.

John Grohol replied to me that my tone speaks volumes. Perhaps that’s because he condescends and refuses to address all the dead babies and moms committing suicide and homicide. This is the type of professional we expect to be “helping” mothers? One who is in utter denial of drug effects? Is he the role model for other psychologists or what? I would hate to think that if I were a new mother suffering and I was screened and told I was suffering from PPD, but I decided to just try psychotherapy, that I would possibly encounter someone who loves to promote drugs, yet is so incredibly ignorant (or deceptive as the case may be) about what could happen to me or my baby if I did later decide to take drugs because my therapist recommends them.

This is exactly why we need proper oversight added to this bill. Without oversight and informed consent, and assurance that the entities doling out the government-endorsed services and screening are free of conflicts of interest, we are just asking for moms to be sent to people like John Grohol, Katherine Stone, PSI, Perinatal Pro, etc., where they cannot seriously expect to get balanced information.

If the government expects complete information to be given out then we need to see what that complete information will be. We need the government allow an intial study by the public and scientists, free of pharma influence, on these treatment options, including a review of the MedWatch data and a review of all existing research (which means also looking for research that is not pharma-funded or conducted by pharma cronies) and submit a report to Congress and the public for review before passing anything into law.

I just have a few questions for Grohol:

Do you really believe that The MOTHERS Act is not a boon to the pharmaceutical industry?

Do you really believe that there will be no increase in pregnant and nursing women taking antidepressants and other drugs should it pass?

Do you really expect people to ignore the side effects of drugs in this debate, namely suicide, homicide, and infant death?

Filed under: antidepressants, antipsychotics, Congress, forced 'treatment', Melanie Stokes, mothers act, PPD, Pregnancy, suicide, Bremner, Doug, Doug Bremner, John Grohol, Mommy Wars, PsychCentral

Motherhood Still Not a Mental Illness – Bremner responds to Grohol

**UPDATE – Not long after one of Dr. Bremner’s blogs was posted, the site started “malfunctioning” disabling both the archive and the comments. The site was later back up and running and this is a functioning link to the entry:
http://www.beforeyoutakethatpill.com/index.php/2009/07/15/test-2/

Because something with the BYTTP blog is not functioning and I can’t click on the link to share, I decided to repost this so that in the future when it gets moved further down into the BYTTP archives, you won’t get lost if you go to Dr. Bremner’s blog… which is the only link I can share right now:
http://www.beforeyoutakethatpill.com/

Aaah, I love the smell of a good debunking in the morning. And I find it amazing that someone with a Psy.D. would publish a misleading lit review summary. Does Dr. Grohol lack ethics, or thoroughness? I don’t know which one…

Dr. Bremner writes:

Motherhood is Not a Medical Disorder: Response to Critics

After I wrote this post yesterday called “Motherhood is Not a Medical Disorder” about the Mother’s Act, which advocates for widespread screening of moms for post-partum depression (PPD), something I don’t think is a good idea because it medicalizes a normal stage of life, increases the chances that people will be but on antidepressant medications that they may not need and that may have side effects, and represents yet another intrusion into privacy, I got this response from John Grohol at psychcentral.

First he grumbles about my pointing out that the psychiatrist quoted in the Time article, Katherine Wisner, MD (you can follow the link to the Time article in yesterday’s post), was on the speakers bureau for Pfizer and Lilly (something not noted in the article but which I found on my own), makers of Zoloft and Prozac, respectively, which as a commenter pointed out are promoted as the two safest antidepressants for pregnant and lactating women. Being on a speaker’s bureau these days means giving “promotional talks”, which translates into working for the drug company to advertise to other doctors, and is relevant. In addition, the psychcentral website has paid ads, most of them for treatment (which includes medications), while this site has no ads. And don’t say I am trying to profit off my book, which now goes for a nickel on amazon.

Grohol further takes issue with my statement that women without a prior history of anxiety or depression are not at risk for PPD and therefore would not benefit from widespread screening. However in support of that he cites Ross et al 2009, claiming that history of abuse and alcohol or substance abuse are risk factors for PPD as well. However a perusal of Ross et al shows that a history of childhood abuse is not in fact a factor, rather only abuse during pregnancy. In addition, it is alcohol and substance abuse during pregnancy that is a risk factor, on the order of a pregnant woman drinking a six pack a day or actively abusing cocaine. That kind of substance abuse is a risk to the fetus, and needs to be stopped.

If you have a man beating his pregnant wife, or a woman snorting cocaine while pregnant, that it is a situation much more serious than PPD, and should be stopped. These extreme circumstances hardly justify mass screening for PPD.

I still say NO to the MOTHER’S ACT.

[note: comments are down now, working on fixing that]

Filed under: antidepressants, experimentation, Melanie Stokes, mothers act, PPD, Pregnancy, Before You Take That Pill, Bremner, Bremner responds to Grohol, BYTTP, Doug, Motherhood Still Not a Mental Illness

Faction of Pill Pushers Embarks on Anti-Information Frenzy

I’d like to show you a few things being said about the anti-MOTHERS Act coalition on the net, by people who sell disorders to the public.

First of all, here’s a sampling of quotes from The MOTHERS Act legislation, to show you what they claim to be for:

Activities under such subsection shall include conducting and supporting the following:

(3) The development of improved screening and diagnostic techniques.

(4) Clinical research for the development and evaluation of new treatments.

(i) raising awareness about screening;

(ii) educating new mothers and their families about postpartum conditions to promote earlier diagnosis and treatment; and

(iii) ensuring that such education includes complete information concerning postpartum conditions, including its symptoms, methods of coping with the illness, and treatment resources.

To the extent practicable and appropriate, the Secretary shall ensure that projects funded under subsection (a) provide education and services with respect to the diagnosis and management of postpartum conditions. The Secretary may allow such projects to include the following:

‘(1) Delivering or enhancing outpatient and home-based health and support services, including case management and comprehensive treatment services for individuals with or at risk for postpartum conditions, and delivering or enhancing support services for their families.

‘(2) Delivering or enhancing inpatient care management services that ensure the well-being of the mother and family and the future development of the infant.

‘(4) Providing education to new mothers and, as appropriate, their families about postpartum conditions to promote earlier diagnosis and treatment. Such education may include–

‘(A) providing complete information on postpartum conditions, symptoms, methods of coping with the illness, and treatment resources

Question: Do the proponents of this bill agree that complete information should be given to women?

Answer: “How dare TIME Magazine interview Amy Philo and not me.”

Question: What’s wrong with hearing about Amy Philo’s story?

Answer: “That’s a rare event and you just scared people away from drugs.”

Question: Do you think screening is a good idea?

Answer: “Screening isn’t required by the bill, but we like screening, but you don’t have to accept the screening, but all moms need to be screened, but I didn’t say that, oh wait yes I did. But without universal screening, up to 20% of moms with PPD won’t get treatment. But screening is not effective unless it’s followed by treatment. But you can use whatever treatment you want. Including drugs. Don’t look at the Abilify ad on my site, please. Just be on your way.”

This is not much different from last year’s bill, with the exception of the fact that it has been rearranged. Nor are the arguments and attacks much different from last year’s fight.

Quote from Lauren Hale’s blog earlier today:

Awhile back, I was contacted by Catherine Elton regarding an article which was to examine Postpartum Depression and the Mother’s Act. The email somehow got buried and I did not get a chance to participate in the discussion.

It seems that it would not have mattered if I had been able to discuss my story with her.

Time published the story this week. While the online version has been modified, you can still see the original version in the hard copy. (Which by the way, I am personally asking you to boycott – even asking if you can take the copy of TIME home from the doctor’s office in order to keep other moms from reading it! And make sure you ASK – because just taking it would be stealing and that’s illegal.)

The original version, entitled “The Melancholy of Motherhood” includes one quote from Carole Blocker, the mother of Melanie Blocker Stokes…

The quote reflects Ms. Blocker’s confusion as to how someone could oppose the MOTHER’S Act, a bill which is designed to increase public and professional education regarding Postpartum Mood & Anxiety Disorders. Frankly, I’m confused right along with Ms. Blocker.

The only survivor story featured in this article is that of Amy Philo…

Amy has tirelessly worked against this bill for quite some time now but continues to be tragically misled. Few discussions with her have led to quite the round robin with Amy unable to come up with legitimate research to back up her claims. When asked for said research, Amy refers to her own websites instead of to specific research articles supporting her claims.

I chose to take Anti-depressants. My first prescription did not work out. But my second one did. Just as with any other medication, sometimes they don’t work so well with your system. So you try another one. You don’t suddenly take your own care into your hands – that’s ridiculous. Would you try to heal a broken leg or diabetes on your own? No? I didn’t think so. So why would you rely solely on self-care when it comes to mental illness? Self-care should be part of the picture but it shouldn’t be the ONLY part of the picture.I am so tired of being judged and accused of not having informed consent…

TIME – I am very disappointed in your lack of sharing both sides of this debate.

Hmmm, that’s interesting I thought TIME did include both sides of the debate. I guess Lauren is just upset that they devoted a whole paragraph to my story. I made a response to Lauren on her blog, pointing out that I had indeed sent her abstracts for studies over a year ago when she asked, but apparently she can’t keep up with her email.

Maybe she did get them and simply can’t recall, as she has been on drugs for quite some time and could be suffering from the side effects of confusion, poor concentration, or memory loss. I don’t think she understood that we want all women to have the right to informed consent, meaning all the information on the available treatments, the exact medical diagnosis, and the risks and benefits of treatment and of doing nothing. We were not waging a campaign against Lauren Hale’s lack of informed consent for her antidepressants. In fact, I have no idea if she has given informed consent, but frankly it’s none of my business. But what is my business is if the government wants to pass a law that could affect me and my children.

After my comment on Lauren’s blog, which stated in part, “And why do you refer people to the original copy of the magazine? Is that because you want people to read the error about me which was the only correction made in the online version?” she altered her blog entry to state the following:

Time published the story this week. While the online version has been modified to correct an error with Ms. Amy Philo’s story, you can still see the original version in the hard copy.

Lauren has failed, as of yet, to publish my comment on her blog. And I still have to ask why she would continue to refer people to the original version, instead of the online version, when the only difference in the original version is that it contains a misstatement about my story. A pretty big one. Namely a misstatement that I had thoughts of hurting Isaac before going on meds.

I’ve got to hand it to Lauren, for her blatant attempt to get women to remove the TIME article from public places, and to get people to read the original if they do read it at all. It’s incredibly strange to oppose people getting warnings, participating in public debate, or hearing about adverse effects of medications, and trying to purposefully spread false information about me. I don’t know if she is feeling desperate, or what, but she has just won the “Most Bizarre Behavior of a  Disease-Mongerer of the Year” award from me.

On to Dr. John Grohol, who writes that Dr. Bremner of Emory is publishing “false” statements about PPD. Sorry but this one just isn’t as interesting. You might want to close this down and get back on Twitter. The best I can say about this blog, is that it’s a highly publicized blog with many readers.

Sadly, whether people want to admit it or not, mothers are another “at risk” population. Why? Because society has told mothers time and time again that giving birth is supposed to be a joyous, happy occasion. If you’re depressed after giving birth to a child, there must be something wrong with you. Don’t draw attention to yourself or your problems. Just try and deal with it, try and take care of the baby, and make it through each day. Mothers don’t know they might have something recognized as postpartum depression, much less that they can talk to someone about these feelings or that there’s treatment — psychotherapy or medication — readily available for it.

Darn it Dr. Grohol, I didn’t realize that when I had both of my sons, thinking it was going to be a joyous occasion was a bad plan. Whoa, I just upped my risk for PPD. But did I actually have it or not? I think what I really need is Dr. Grohol to come to my house, watch me for a few days, and tell me about all the mental disorders I might not realize I had. Because I was just sitting here, blogging, thinking my life was great, but I didn’t realize it really sucked until you told me so. Please oh please Dr. Grohol which medication should I take for these disorders. Hmmm, how about Abilify?

(See the huge ad for Abilify on his page:
http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2009/07/14/bremners-false-claims-about-postpartum-depression/#comment-629791
)

The risk factors he lists for making you prone to PPD are:

prenatal depression, self-esteem, childcare stress, prenatal anxiety, life stress, social support, marital relationships, depression history, infant temperament, maternity blues, marital status, SES, and unplanned/unwanted pregnancy.

Holy crud! Childcare stress? Check. Anxiety? Check. Life Stress? Check. Social Support? Check. Marital relationships? I’ve got one. Check. Depression history? I have a history of not being depressed. Check. Infant temperament? Yes my baby has one. Check. Maternity blues? Was that a blue maternity bra? What? I need more sleep. Marital status – oh wait. Deja vu. SES. Yes I have an SES. Unplanned pregnancy. Sorry, can’t help you out there.

Golly. Oh my gosh. I am so sorry for all this anti-pharma advocacy. I didn’t realize exactly how crazy I am!!!!!!!!!!! Get me some pills, and I don’t want to know what they might do to my unplanned pregnancies I might not plan.

Marcie, another commenter on the blog actually said something I liked though:

I dare you to look into my children’s eyes and tell them that their mother’s life isn’t worth screening for. Tell them that your paranoid antipharm agenda is more important than them having a mother and even possibly life themselves. If you don’t want to take medication then don’t but leave the rest of us alone!

This was my reply:

OK then, I dare you to look into my children’s eyes and tell them that screening and drugging me and risking my life was worth it. If you want to take drugs fine but leave the rest of us alone – to use your words.

I dare you to watch this:

I have no doubt there will be more to come. Keep your eyes open and feel free to chime in.

If you are wondering about MedWatch and how to file a report, the link is here:
https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/medwatch/medwatch-online.htm

Click on begin. Please file a report if you have experienced an adverse event from a drug. It’s pretty much the only chance we have of helping more moms get complete information about the already available treatments being marketed for newly approved uses – a la antipsychotics being doled out for depression, anxiety and sleep problems. This falls into the category in The MOTHERS Act of research for the development and evaluation of new treatments. Apparently the only evaluation of treatments that the pill pushers want to see, would be the “meds helped me” or “meds saved my life” type. The “meds killed my baby” and “Meds made me homicidal” type apparently do not matter.

Do your part if you have never filled one out and you’re also a victim.

Filed under: Informed Consent, mothers act, Bremner, Dr. John Grohol, Informed Consent, Lauren Hale, TIME

Motherhood is Not a Mental Illness: Bremner on TIME

(Note: I encourage everyone to send a letter of thanks to TIME and Catherine Elton at letters@time.com.)

In this post from yesterday on Before You Take That Pill, which Philip Dawdy picked up over at Furious Seasons, Emory researcher and psychiatrist Dr. Doug Bremner writes about The MOTHERS Act in response to TIME magazine’s article, “The Melancholy of Motherhood: Should All Moms Be Screened for Postpartum Depression?”

“[T]o screen all moms as if giving birth is a risk factor for depression is ridiculous. And whenever you start screening the general population, you get into problems with over-identification of people and an increase in the number of people that go on antidepressants.”

He continues:

In the case of Melanie Blocker-Stokes, she had already been treated with multiple courses of psychotropic drugs and electro-convulsive therapy, so there is no reason to think that her life would have been saved by “screening.” This legislation is typical of much that comes out of an individual tragedy, that results in an intrusion into the personal lives of individuals and the further relinqueshment of individual freedoms to the government.

The article quotes psychiatrist Katherine Wisner MD as stating ”how can you be opposed to something that will help mothers?” But an examination of the fine print from one of her articles here shows that she is on speakers bureaus for Pfizer and Lilly, makers of Zoloft and Prozac, respectively.

Catherine Elton did a fantastic job of showing both sides in a fair light. She tells the truth about the treatment given to Melanie Stokes, about my experience with Zoloft, and about screening. But this does not sit well with people who make a living marketing disorders to the public. Later on down the page in the comments section of Dr. Bremner’s blog, I get accused of paranoia and of being mentally ill by a woman named Gina Pera, whom I’d never heard of, and she also says that people like me shouldn’t get to have a say in what happens to our country:

We cannot make public-policy decisions based on the stories of people who have been diagnosed with mental health disorders and treated for them.

Sorry, but it’s true. Many mental health disorders limit objectivity, so these people are just not the best judges of what has been done to them and why. They can have their stories and they can share them. But we can’t make policy on this kind of hearsay and paranoia.

Okay, I’ve had enough of the anti-medication, anti-psychiatry, don’t-control-me crowd. It’s bad for my brain, and it seems to be swelling in ranks on the Internet. Good luck making your way in the dismal future that you are creating for others who could use — and would appreciate — legitimate psychiatric help, well administered.

OK, would she say the same for those advocating for The MOTHERS Act who are currently both diagnosed with a mental illness and taking drugs – that their experiences don’t get to count because they were diagnosed mentally ill? Or does mental illness magically disappear and the slate is wiped clean because you start taking drugs? If so, then I was never “mentally ill” because I was fine before Zoloft and apparently being on drugs makes you “sane” or eligible to participate in public debate. I expected to see comments from the folks from PSI but I guess I didn’t think about the fact that simply by opposing The MOTHERS Act in TIME Magazine, I would get to encounter disease mongerers for all of the DSM (“adult ADHD” anyone?) who go as far as attacking informed consent in order to defend all drugging schemes that they hear about.

Apparently I am “creating a dismal future” for our country just by telling my story? Sorry, U.S.A. That’s just my paranoia and selfishness you’re feeling from afar, when you think about your future and your mental health – it has nothing to do with your life situations.  Is there an anti-future-creation drug yet available? Maybe they should inject me with it. Thanks, Gina for a good laugh.

TIME Magazine’s piece on The MOTHERS Act is sure to draw a lot of people with varying levels of pro-pharma bias, and many anti-pharma survivors into this debate. But most importantly, people who would otherwise never think twice if their doctor hands them a prescription for psych drugs will see this article and perhaps be saved because of it. I can only hope that when people read the print version they will decide to get online and google me or The MOTHERS Act so that they can get some more warnings before accepting a diagnosis and meds. Information is the least people deserve.

Katherine Stone and her pro-drug friends from Postpartum Support International were not pleased with the TIME article. They’ve worked themseleves into a tizzy issuing an open letter attempting to discredit Catherine Elton’s piece. And to think I was upset because the print version had an error about me. If I were Catherine Elton I would be more than a little annoyed by the pathetic whining coming to my inbox complaining that I didn’t write the article the way the drug industry front groups had hoped.

They’ve really got their panties in a wad. Apparently telling my story in TIME is a “disservice” to the country, and they “skip facts” when stating that there is dissent about this issue.

Nevermind the fact that between 2004 and 2008 FDA MedWatch collected 1,031 reports of miscarriages, abortions, and other prenatal and neonatal deaths caused by psychotropic drugs. Nevermind the 4,154 cases of suicidal depression reported to MedWatch for Psychotropic drugs from 2004-2006, along with 2,911 Attempted suicides, 4,260 completed suicides, 2,452 other deaths not from suicide, 434 cases of Homicidal Ideation, 195 Homicides, and 1,098 cases of Mania.

An anti-information campaign letter posted on a blog of a woman who worked for Cohn & Wolfe (a PR firm employed by pharma) with 43 signatures, including that of George Parnham (attorney for Andrea Yates), who advocates with PSI for lesser sentences for infanticide, should somehow top the 53 groups, 12,588 petition signatures, and 2,311 members of the Facebook Coalition against the bill? Why? Because they proclaimed themselves the final authority and followed up their names with long titles.

I’m betting PSI would love it if nobody ever wrote about The MOTHERS Act without running it through them first. Do they speak for all psychologists? All psychiatrists? As evidenced by the post on Dr. Bremner’s blog, Dr. Grace Jackson’s work, Dr. David Healy’s work, and the activism of Dr. Michael Zampardi, Dr. John Breeding, Dr. Peter Breggin, and the ICSPP, as well as countless other psychologists, midwives, doctors, psychiatrists, and mothers selflessly working to educate the public about the risks of psychotropic drugs or to prevent this dagnerous Act from becoming Law, I think not.

Without referring to me by name, Katherine and her co-signators say that they feel bad about my story – which they believe is a rare adverse event.

“We are terribly sorry about the experience of the one mother quoted in your article, which happens on rare occasions, but we believe that the MOTHERS Act would actually go a long way to prevent what happened to her.”

Not that I want half-hearted “sympathy” from people who can’t bring themselves to speak my name, but thank you for the apology. I can only wonder if they also feel guilty for all the “rare” moms out there who are suffering because of medication, since their letter gushes about how great screening and medication are.

“As Time reported in June, the National Academies fully endorses screening for parental depression and believes it is crucial, while also emphasizing that screening is not helpful unless there is effective follow up and treatment tied to it.”

[emphasis mine]

In case you didn’t notice, Katherine stone now emphasizes and refers to screening for parental depression rather than perinatal depression, and makes a point that treatment must follow screening.

I wonder when they’ll apologize about all the dead and injured babies they have helped to drug? Perhaps not unless and until the media pays attention to their stories as well.

As I wrote in my letter to the editor of TIME, which I will share later in a separate post, anyone who wants more information should email me and I can refer you to the FDA MedWatch Adverse Event Reports to help you get all the facts.

In the comments below the “Time Magazine Skips Facts” nonsense on Postpartum Progress, this is what AbleChild had to say:

Ablechild said…

Thank God for Time Magazine, I understand the “Expert” that was quoted in the article has ties to the drug companies. Considering the Subjective Nature and the lack of an accurate test, I find it interesting that you all would get so upset about people who would actually oppose the Mother’s Act.

Well you can count our organization into the camp that opposes such a far reaching grasp of parental rights! Great Going Time Magazine! It is about time the underdogs reeived a fair hearing! Informed Consent consists of all the information, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Why not promote all the deaths associated with your proposed mental health treatments. Andrea Yates was treated and look at what she did to her kids! Stop Promoting Misleading and dangerous treatments. With great respect for human rights and free will of man!

Don’t forget to send a letter of thanks to TIME. Honest journalism is most definitely not dead.

Stay tuned.

Filed under: mothers act, Postpartum Progress, Postpartum Support International, Bremner, disease mongering, Doug, Emory, Gina Pera, Katherine, Motherhood is Not a Mental Illness, Stone, The MOTHERS Act, TIME Magazine

Emory Backs Off Bremner to Avert Major Media Attention

Dr. Bremner was notified yesterday that he can use the Emory name and his title on his blog, as long as he does not implicate the university in his opinions. This was after Emory received an inquiry from a major reporter regarding the situation. Nice one, Emory. Read more here… and see a fun little comparison between Emory’s past treatment of Zachary Stowe, and their treatment of Dr. Bremner.

Filed under: Emory, academic freedom, Bremner, Emory, First Amendment Rights, NY Times

Emory Orders Professor Doug Bremner to Remove Their Name from His Blog

Emory University (the same school where Drs. Nemeroff and Stowe work) has ordered psychiatrist, author, and Emory professor Doug Bremner to remove their name from his blog. The blog is titled “Before You Take That Pill,” after his book by the same name – a book which Emory declined to promote with the standard press release they issue for professors who publish, even though the press release was already written!

Do professors at private universities have the right to say whatever they want about anything in their scholarly subject area without being retaliated against? I don’t know. I do know that there is nothing that would prohibit a professor at a public university from speaking about his own topic of academic interest freely. I thought private citizens writing blogs on their own time to promote themselves and their work would be allowed to say whatever they want, even the name of the university where they work. But what do I know? (Are we still in the U.S.A.?)

Here’s a post on Dr. Bremner’s blog explaining more about the situation, a situation that has attracted national attention. And here is a facebook group that you should join to support academic freedom and First Amendment rights.

Filed under: Emory, academic freedom, Before You Take That Pill, Bremner, Emory, facebook, First Amendment, pharma ties, throw doctor under the bus to suit your pharma ties