I have often said, if you took away all the legal and illegal drugs from members of this society, America would go insane, literally! Here is a statistic that should freak you out, especially if you are using anti-depressants. 230 million prescriptions are written for those powerful little pills every year! One in 20 Americans are depressed. Whoa, now that is a bit scary! The statistic my friends is from the CDC. The use of antidepressants has doubled in the past decade. Ask yourself how that is possible. There is quite a bit of information available that eludes to the fact that the antidepressants are no more powerful than a placebo. But, its the side effects that would have me “running for the hills”.

A JAMA report in January of this year, stated that there is little evidence that a popular group of antidepressants including Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft have any benefit to people with mild to moderate depression. They don’t work any better than a placebo! Whoops. Researchers  at a major  Canadian University found that antideprssant drugs were not developed for depression, but to manipulate the behavioral stress in animals. Well chronic stess doesn’t make the same molecular changes in our bodies that depression does… so it two  birds of a different feather so to speak. Hello!

There are more studies that support not using antidepressants, but time is limited here.  Its the list of side effects that should have you wary of using them. Let’s forget about the 42,000 people who die from psychiatric drugs every year, just for a moment. How about the increased risk of diabetes, supposedly two to three times in fact! Then there is immune system comprimizing effects, suicidal thoughts and feelings, and the violent behavior associated with some users. It is said that women who were using these drugs, were twice as likely to have a still birth! Stroke is 45% higher with antidepressant usage. Even the final outcome of life,  which we are all painfully aware of, arrives 32% more quickly  amongst antidepressant usage!

I think you get the point. In my next post I will give you some of the tools to combat depression without resorting to drugs to deal with the challenges of embodiement in these times.