When I was 19, my parents sent me to see a therapist. This therapist's office was in the Children's Hospital, and it was already humiliating to walk into that p

When I was 19, my parents sent me to see a therapist. This therapist's office was in the Children's Hospital, and it was already humiliating to walk into that place as a grown man and there is a waiting room with toys and building blocks for me to play with. Anyway, the therapist gave me a few "pep-talk sessions" which did not seem oriented at all to helping me get better, or discern the root causes of my depression. The therapist proceeded to help me claim disability at work and get back into college. He also referred me to his next-door neighbor, the psychiatrist. So I go home with my first SSRI prescription and start taking it. My mother soon exclaimed how much better I was acting. I was smiling and full of energy. And it turns out that whether or not we are ingesting fluoride orally, people do act and feel better when they are seeing a therapist and getting attention. For a time there, I actually felt like people cared about my well-being and there were things being done about it. Upon my diagnoses, the nurses would often regale me with stories about how the noblest politicians and artists were afflicted with the same things I was. This was cold comfort. They all insisted it was a chemical imbalance, and their own cocktail of chemicals was bound to offset this crazy wrong-headed chemistry that had gotten mixed up in my head (nevermind that most serotonin has nothing to do with the brain, and is mostly in your digestive system?) Now there were many dark things I didn't know about the fluoride pills they had prescribed me. I suffered several disastrous interactions with alcohol before they told me it's not a good idea to drink. I had those "brain zap" withdrawal symptoms when I hadn't taken enough. Thankfully, I did not experience the suicidal or homicidal tendencies which can come with taking SSRIs. Yes, homicide is a common reaction to being drugged. Before SSRIs, Charles Whitman loved his Dexedrine, and packed a goodly supply as he scaled the tower in Texas. The Columbine Kids, very intelligent boys, had all been referred to BH care and were all being medicated with SSRIs and other drugs at the time of their untimely deaths and egregious actions.