Warning: Psychiatry Can Be Hazardous to Your Mental Health: How Ritalin, Prozac, and Zoloft Replaced Safer Psychotherapy

by William Glasser

How psychopharmacology has usurped the role of psychotherapy in our society, to the great detriment of the patients involved. William Glasser describes in Warning: Psychiatry Can Be Hazardous to Your Mental Health the sea change that has taken place in the treatment of mental health in the last few years. Millions of patients are now routinely being given prescriptions for a wide range of drugs including Ritalin, Prosac, Zoloft and related drugs which can be harmful to the brain. A previous generation of patients would have had a course of psychotherapy without brain–damaging chemicals. Glasser explains the wide implications of this radical change in treatment and what can be done to counter it.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Health, Psychiatry, Mental Health, Medicine, Self Help

288 pages, Paperback

First published April 29, 2003

Reviews

[Missy Bowen · Rating 1 out of 5]

I used to be a member of the Glasser Institute as well as a trainer. I love and use most of Glasser's teachings in my classroom and personal life. Glasser lost me when he began saying health conditions such as diabetes and fibromyalgia are just a state of mind and can be cured by changing your way of thinking.

[Gina · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ask any high school English teacher and they'll tell you: if you want to prove a point (in anything, from a debate to a five-paragraph essay) consider the other side. Keep that in mind.
So... Would you like to read this book?
Would you like to convince yourself or your child that medication will harm their mental health?
Would you like to convince yourself or your child that seeking help for a mental disease/disorder will harm their mental health?
Would you like to convince yourself or your child that psychiatry will harm their mental health?
Are you in the market for some good, old-fashioned fear mongering, Fox News style?
Great! You've picked the perfect book, and it's probably available at a book store/library near you!
On the other hand, before you open this book's cover, I'd like to warn you about some of the phrases you may come across:
- "The psychiatrists who use brain scans are guessing at the [idea that depression is caused by serotonin levels] and are trying to persuade you to go along with their guess." (p. 26)
- "When your psychiatrist tells you that your symptoms caused by a mental illness, he hasn't a shred of similar evidence." (p. 26)
- "Seven Deadly Habits of External Control: Criticizing, Blaming, Complaining, Nagging, Threatening, Punishing, and Rewarding to control [bribing]." (p. 78-79)
I don't have the time nor the patience to relay the entirety of the last quote, but he refers to "hallucinations, delusions, and mania" as "creative possibilities" and "what makes them most human." (p. 117)
Imagine being a child or teenager (or, worst of all, an adult) with uncontrollable hallucinations, and being told by someone you're supposed to trust that the part of your brain that seems like it's actively working against you every step of the way... is your creativity.
Yes, keep imagining that!
Do you feel the injustice yet?
Do you feel the guilt and shame of being told that it's you; it's You who has to trust your support team to help you cure yourself.
The same support team that just told you your problem is your creativity.
I hope you can see it from that vantage point.

Please don't give this book to your child who's reached out to you. Please don't give this book to a friend, a spouse, a family member.
Don't tell them that their mutinous brain is what makes them human.

[Keith · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the introduction and chapter 1 it is quite clear that the hazardous part is what he calls "brain drugs." He contends that mental health just like physical health is a continuum with most people in the middle, and that being in the middle isn't being mentally ill, but that being in the middle is called "unhappiness."

"Ritalin, a strong synthetic cocaine" (p3,32)

"Happiness or mental health is enjoying the live you are choosing to live, getting along well with the people near and dear to you, doing something with your life you believe is worthwhile, and not doing anything to deprive anyone else of the same chance of happiness you have." p7

"The people in (a focus group) are not there to hear extensively about your past or present unhappiness, ... or ... how much pain your are suffering or how unfair life has been to you. They will be interested in hearing about how you are applying the choice theory ideas of this book to your present problems. And in helping you to learn to do this more effectively as the group continues to meet." (p10)

(I have already started to apply this, and I am not even through chapter 1. Last night I made a choice that I would be happier if I vacuumed the floor, so I did, and was happier. Before that I made a choice that I would be happier if I played the musical keyboard, so I did that for 10 minutes, something I have not been doing for the last month or so. 05/03/2006)

Happiness Defined

"You are mentally healthy if you enjoy being with most of the people you know, especially with the important people of your life such as family and friends. Generally, you like people and are more than willing to help an unhappy family member, friend, or colleague to feel better. You lead a mostly tension-free life, laugh a lot, and rarely suffer from the aches and pains that so many people accept as an unavoidable part of living. You enjoy life and have no trouble accepting that other people are different from you. The last thing that comes to your mind is to criticize or try to change anyone. You are creative in what you attempt and may enjoy more of your potential than you ever thought was possible. Finally, even in difficult situations when you are unhappy -- no one can be happy all the time -- you'll know why you are unhappy and you'll attempt to do something about it. you may even be physically handicapped, as is actor Christopher Reeve, and still fit the criteria above." (p22)

"But if they are wrong, (about drugs being needed to correct erroneous brain chemistry) and there are many highly respected psychiatrist and psychologists who believe they are completely wrong, (10) it should reassure you to know that there is a small group of psychiatrists like myself who don't believe in mental illness." (p34)

"Is there a way to tell if I'm making a bad choice before I go ahead and make it?"

"The answer (is) ... covered in remaining chapters but ... Good choices are those that bring us closer to the people we want to be close to. Bad choices tend to separate us from those people." (p54)

The thrust of the book is to stop trying to exert external control over other people. That is hard to do because it is so ingrained into our society.

[J.S. Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

He clearly states how prescribing drugs is harmful to health, as we all know, and the insider look at the negative side of the psychiatry industry is interesting.
However, there are some things, like arthritis & fibromyalgia, that have proven physical components (yes, they can be aggravated by stress & emotions, but not caused by them) that he says are purely psychological where I considered making this a DNF

[LucidStyle · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are many reasons to look warily at the modern industry of psychiatry, as presented here.
This book also itemizes the tenets of Reality Theory, developed by the author, as an approach to psychiatric/mental health issues. It is an approach that begs a deeper probing of the question, what is a mental illness? As I have been looking for realistic day-to-day and holistic, and less pharmacologically oriented, approaches to healing mental anguish, there are aspects of this approach which resonate.
My takeaways from this book are
(1) let go of the need for control in relationships!
(2) ensure the basic needs: survival, love and belonging, fun, power, and freedom.
I strongly believe in these ideas as manifesting truth in personal identity and in our relationships, making more clear our purpose in existence.

[Sue-Anne Lim · Rating 4 out of 5]

The ideas and arguments presented in the book are presented in quite an anecdotal manner which is helpful in getting the ideas across but lends to one questioning the validity of the claims. There are references to works and studies down but to a very limited degree.

It is a very teaching book which I believe is the intention of the author - to teach the basics of Choice Theory. One that challenges the approach to psychiatry and key principles to face unhappiness with examples presented in the focus groups as well as personal experiences.

The key takeaway for me is that we are creative beings and the symptoms of mental illness can often be our minds' way of escpaing from the unhapiness which usually stems from an unsatisfying relationship that is important to us.

[Patricia Joynton · Rating 2 out of 5]

All about the profession he choose doesn't work: mental illness doesn't exist and you don't need meds. The thing he claims that really caught my attention is the Ritalin is nothing but synthetic cocaine. I've got to investigate this...can it really be so. It has been given out to our children like candy for years. (Not mine, thank goodness.)

[Shalyse Bailey Hammond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book

This book further expounded on ideas I was thinking on my own. I would recommend this to anyone who has been told they are "mentally ill" and the family members that support them.

[Vicki Lannerholm · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolute must-read in today's world of mental hype.

[John Hancock · Rating 3 out of 5]

https://psychiatricsurvivors.wordpres...

[Robert Federline · Rating 4 out of 5]

I once had a client who was a psychiatrist. He told me that it was easy to tell which of the students in med school would go into psychiatry because their thinking was not like anyone else's. They were all a bit strange. He confessed that this also applied to him.

The problem with psychiatry, as this book (and several others I have read) points out, is the desire of psychiatrists to enjoy the same prestige and income as other medical doctors. In order to achieve this, they need to be prescribing medications. The problem then becomes a profession driven by the pharmaceutical companies, rather than the doctors, but without the empirical, scientific studies to back up the claims made for the drugs they push on their patients.

Instead, psychiatrists find their practices driven by the drug companies, and use coercive tactics and techniques, imposing their views on others, preying on the unhappiness of people, and doing their level best to convince these unhappy people that they are mentally ill.

The majority of what is currently referred to as "mental illness" is simply the normal unhappiness into which people fall when they discover the world is not prepared to grant them wishes and may, in fact, be operating to keep them separated from their happiness. Instead of realizing we are responsible for our own happiness, we try to control others as they attempt to control us. True mental health and happiness will only be realized when we realize that we cannot control others, and we stop permitting them to attempt to control us.

A car wash manager (who later became a millionaire in Amway) discovered this secret. He said that there are only two things in life you can control: your own actions and your own attitude. Once you start to live your life according to this truth, you will find your relationships with others will improve and your happiness will grow.

This book looks at this question more scientifically. It speaks to "Choice Theory," which opines that people choose their reactions and choose, therefore, to anger, or depress, or even to suffer with rheumatoid arthritis. We bring these illnesses upon ourselves by choice as we react to our disappointments in our attempts to control others, or as a reaction to how they are attempting to control us. Discovering that we can change our choices is, for many people, the true path to mental health and happiness.

Perhaps the most useful idea in the book is that one is not either mentally healthy or mentally ill, but, like physical health, there is a spectrum of such health. In physical health, you can be an Olympic athlete, or you can be riddled with cancer. Most people are somewhere in between, of course, many landing in the realm of the couch potato. Mental health is similar. You may be very well adjusted and extremely happy, or you may just be unhappy or you may be into Alzheimer's or Parkinson's diseases. Just because you are not at one extreme does not automatically make you a candidate for compelled medication or therapy.

Most of us can benefit from the ear of a friend. That may be all you need to restore your full level of mental health. This book shows the way most people can achieve this inexpensively, but effectively.

[Kalem Wright · Rating 3 out of 5]

This work of Glasser’s, which explores his theories of how “mental illness” develops, is a significant contribution to the canon of self-help. A psychiatrist, Glasser educates readers about the risks and then-limited evidence base for psychotropic drugs while arguing that symptoms are creative manifestations of unhappiness rather than proof positive of neurological or biological disorder.
By focusing on how we are not living to our values, nurturing important relationships, or using our gifts to the best of our abilities, Glasser is returning agency to patients and challenging them to take a more active role in their own recovery. His method to achive this is through focus groups to educate one another about different ways to view their symptoms and to use this knowledge to make empowering decisions for themselves, something he notes doesn’t need to be ensconced in the mental health establishment. As a countercultural message, it’s intriguing and yet consistent with lived experience.
As for the book itself, however, Glasser has detailed these ideas more thoroughly and ably elsewhere. The pages dedicate significant time to detailing the creation of the book in tandem with the aforementioned focus groups. This is less than compelling and lend the pages a bloated feeling. For someone on medication and considering what else they can do to recover, this book may be an inspiring read. For fans of Glasser, however, this is an appendix to his important work.

[Mike McMahon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Glasser (author of Reality Therapy) discusses his view that mental illness is not caused by biological brain chemistry as is asserted by modern psychiatry, but instead is caused by unhappiness. This in turn is due to difficulty in meeting the basic needs of survival, love & belonging, power, freedom, and fun. Glasser goes so far as to suggest that mental illness is an inaccurate term because mental health symptoms are not due to identifiable brain pathology. Therefore Glasser warns of the harmful effects of most psychiatric medications.

While the book is a natural outgrowth of Glasser's previous works I find it somewhat disheartening. Mental health problems strike people of all walks of life including various intelligent ones who could reasonably be expected to know how to meet the needs Glasser identifies. By getting rid of the term mental illness we would be taking two steps backwards in the recovery movement and could increase the stigma that people recovering from mental illness face in rebuilding their lives. If you're not ill, then you are inept.

[Robert Bogue · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s an odd title for a book. Why would a psychologist title a book Warning: Psychiatry Can Be Hazardous to Your Mental Health? The answer lies in the belief that drugs are not the answer to all of the mental health problems of the day, and that in truth many – if not all – of the mental health problems that we have today can be traced back to a single source: unhappiness. While happiness itself is hard to define and even harder to find, the lack of happiness seems to manifest problems in our mental states as well as our physical bodies.

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[K, Nz · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an eye opener, and yet in some ways the underlying concepts or axioms are simple - it's an 'unlearning' process in a way.
The foreword was describing a situation that I'd find difficult to credit, if I wasn't reading someone's experience of it.
I read this a while back, and have reread - probably time to go back to it and refresh the core principles.

[Elizabeth Justesen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book helped me realize what I need to do to avoid being unhappy. I think it has a lot of great points and everyone should read it!