Word: lithium
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Jamison had her first psychotic breakdown just months after receiving her Ph.D. in psychology from UCLA. Found to have manic depression, she was put on lithium, now a standard therapy for the condition. She responded well to the medication, but like so many other patients--and despite all her training--she stopped taking it as soon as she began to feel better. Her resistance was part denial, part side effects (the high doses used in the early '70s blurred her vision). But the core of her defiance, Jamison makes clear, was that she was addicted to the highs...
...suicide. But it took years for her to accept the fact that she had to stay on medication. What really saved her life, she says, was psychotherapy. In an age that believes drugs alone can defeat disease, Jamison remains a staunch supporter of what Freud called "the talking cure." "Lithium moderates the illness," she observes, "but therapy teaches you to live with...
...with her second husband Dr. Richard Wyatt, a schizophrenia researcher at the National Institute of Mental Health, she writes her books, sees close friends and takes long walks. But like many who have lived life at the highest pitch, Jamison finds being "normal" a "bittersweet exchange." "I know without lithium I'd be dead or insane," she says. And yet "I don't see Saturn's image now without feeling an acute sadness...
...Breggin is his relentless crusade against the conventional wisdom of psychiatry -- and his increasingly high profile. What causes Breggin to rail against his profession is its eagerness to embrace technology, from the early zeal for lobotomies and electroshock to the modern reliance on such psychoactive drugs as Thorazine and lithium. In looking for the quick fix, Breggin argues, too many psychiatrists have forgotten the importance of love, hope and empathy in maintaining sanity. The power to heal the mind lies in people, he says, not pills...
What galls psychiatrists most are Breggin's attacks on the usefulness of antipsychosis drugs. He doesn't content himself with describing possible side effects, such as uncontrollable jerky movements and facial ticks, but claims the drugs rarely have any benefit. He likens lithium, which is used to treat manic depression, to lead and compares Prozac to amphetamines...