Andrea Yates and Competent Council.
Saturday, July 02, 2005
The Yates "Thing"
Conviction overturned
A Texas appeals court in early 2005 reversed the capital murder convictions of Andrea Yates, the woman who drowned her five children in a bathtub, citing the false testimony of a prosecution witness. Jurors in 2002 sentenced Yates to life in prison in the 2001 deaths of three of her children: Noah, 7, John, 5, and Mary, 6 months. She was not tried in the deaths of the other two, Luke, 3, and Paul, 2. Jurors deliberated for three hours and 40 minutes before finding Yates guilty of murder on March 13, 2002. Her attorneys argued that Yates was insane when she drowned the children but prosecutors said Yates knew what she was doing was wrong.
A Texas appeals court in early 2005 reversed the capital murder convictions of Andrea Yates, the woman who drowned her five children in a bathtub, citing the false testimony of a prosecution witness. Jurors in 2002 sentenced Yates to life in prison in the 2001 deaths of three of her children: Noah, 7, John, 5, and Mary, 6 months. She was not tried in the deaths of the other two, Luke, 3, and Paul, 2. Jurors deliberated for three hours and 40 minutes before finding Yates guilty of murder on March 13, 2002. Her attorneys argued that Yates was insane when she drowned the children but prosecutors said Yates knew what she was doing was wrong.
War of Worlds
July 1, 2005
By BROOKE SHIELDS
London
I WAS hoping it wouldn't come to this, but after Tom Cruise's interview with Matt Lauer on the NBC show "Today" last week, I feel compelled to speak not just for myself but also for the hundreds of thousands of women who have suffered from postpartum depression. While Mr. Cruise says that Mr. Lauer and I do not "understand the history of psychiatry," I'm going to take a wild guess and say that Mr. Cruise has never suffered from postpartum depression.
Postpartum depression is caused by the hormonal shifts that occur after childbirth. During pregnancy, a woman's level of estrogen and progesterone greatly increases; then, in the first 24 hours after childbirth, the amount of these hormones rapidly drops to normal, nonpregnant levels. This change in hormone levels can lead to reactions that range from restlessness and irritability to feelings of sadness and hopelessness.
I never thought I would have postpartum depression. After two years of trying to conceive and several attempts at in vitro fertilization, I thought I would be overjoyed when my daughter, Rowan Francis, was born in the spring of 2003. But instead I felt completely overwhelmed. This baby was a stranger to me. I didn't know what to do with her. I didn't feel at all joyful. I attributed feelings of doom to simple fatigue and figured that they would eventually go away. But they didn't; in fact, they got worse.
I couldn't bear the sound of Rowan crying, and I dreaded the moments my husband would bring her to me. I wanted her to disappear. I wanted to disappear. At my lowest points, I thought of swallowing a bottle of pills or jumping out the window of my apartment.
I couldn't believe it when my doctor told me that I was suffering from postpartum depression and gave me a prescription for the antidepressant Paxil. I wasn't thrilled to be taking drugs. In fact, I prematurely stopped taking them and had a relapse that almost led me to drive my car into a wall with Rowan in the backseat. But the drugs, along with weekly therapy sessions, are what saved me - and my family.
Since writing about my experiences with the disease, I have been approached by many women who have told me their stories and thanked me for opening up about a topic that is often not discussed because of fear, shame or lack of support and information. Experts estimate that one in 10 women suffer, usually in silence, with this treatable disease. We are living in an era of so-called family values, yet because almost all of the postnatal focus is on the baby, mothers are overlooked and left behind to endure what can be very dark times.
And comments like those made by Tom Cruise are a disservice to mothers everywhere. To suggest that I was wrong to take drugs to deal with my depression, and that instead I should have taken vitamins and exercised shows an utter lack of understanding about postpartum depression and childbirth in general.
If any good can come of Mr. Cruise's ridiculous rant, let's hope that it gives much-needed attention to a serious disease. Perhaps now is the time to call on doctors, particularly obstetricians and pediatricians, to screen for postpartum depression. After all, during the first three months after childbirth, you see a pediatrician at least three times. While pediatricians are trained to take care of children, it would make sense for them to talk with new mothers, ask questions and inform them of the symptoms and treatment should they show signs of postpartum depression.
In a strange way, it was comforting to me when my obstetrician told me that my feelings of extreme despair and my suicidal thoughts were directly tied to a biochemical shift in my body. Once we admit that postpartum is a serious medical condition, then the treatment becomes more available and socially acceptable. With a doctor's care, I have since tapered off the medication, but without it, I wouldn't have become the loving parent I am today.
So, there you have it. It's not the history of psychiatry, but it is my history, personal and real.
Brooke Shields, the author of "Down Came the Rain: My Journey Through Postpartum Depression," is starring in the musical "Chicago" in London.
By BROOKE SHIELDS
London
I WAS hoping it wouldn't come to this, but after Tom Cruise's interview with Matt Lauer on the NBC show "Today" last week, I feel compelled to speak not just for myself but also for the hundreds of thousands of women who have suffered from postpartum depression. While Mr. Cruise says that Mr. Lauer and I do not "understand the history of psychiatry," I'm going to take a wild guess and say that Mr. Cruise has never suffered from postpartum depression.
Postpartum depression is caused by the hormonal shifts that occur after childbirth. During pregnancy, a woman's level of estrogen and progesterone greatly increases; then, in the first 24 hours after childbirth, the amount of these hormones rapidly drops to normal, nonpregnant levels. This change in hormone levels can lead to reactions that range from restlessness and irritability to feelings of sadness and hopelessness.
I never thought I would have postpartum depression. After two years of trying to conceive and several attempts at in vitro fertilization, I thought I would be overjoyed when my daughter, Rowan Francis, was born in the spring of 2003. But instead I felt completely overwhelmed. This baby was a stranger to me. I didn't know what to do with her. I didn't feel at all joyful. I attributed feelings of doom to simple fatigue and figured that they would eventually go away. But they didn't; in fact, they got worse.
I couldn't bear the sound of Rowan crying, and I dreaded the moments my husband would bring her to me. I wanted her to disappear. I wanted to disappear. At my lowest points, I thought of swallowing a bottle of pills or jumping out the window of my apartment.
I couldn't believe it when my doctor told me that I was suffering from postpartum depression and gave me a prescription for the antidepressant Paxil. I wasn't thrilled to be taking drugs. In fact, I prematurely stopped taking them and had a relapse that almost led me to drive my car into a wall with Rowan in the backseat. But the drugs, along with weekly therapy sessions, are what saved me - and my family.
Since writing about my experiences with the disease, I have been approached by many women who have told me their stories and thanked me for opening up about a topic that is often not discussed because of fear, shame or lack of support and information. Experts estimate that one in 10 women suffer, usually in silence, with this treatable disease. We are living in an era of so-called family values, yet because almost all of the postnatal focus is on the baby, mothers are overlooked and left behind to endure what can be very dark times.
And comments like those made by Tom Cruise are a disservice to mothers everywhere. To suggest that I was wrong to take drugs to deal with my depression, and that instead I should have taken vitamins and exercised shows an utter lack of understanding about postpartum depression and childbirth in general.
If any good can come of Mr. Cruise's ridiculous rant, let's hope that it gives much-needed attention to a serious disease. Perhaps now is the time to call on doctors, particularly obstetricians and pediatricians, to screen for postpartum depression. After all, during the first three months after childbirth, you see a pediatrician at least three times. While pediatricians are trained to take care of children, it would make sense for them to talk with new mothers, ask questions and inform them of the symptoms and treatment should they show signs of postpartum depression.
In a strange way, it was comforting to me when my obstetrician told me that my feelings of extreme despair and my suicidal thoughts were directly tied to a biochemical shift in my body. Once we admit that postpartum is a serious medical condition, then the treatment becomes more available and socially acceptable. With a doctor's care, I have since tapered off the medication, but without it, I wouldn't have become the loving parent I am today.
So, there you have it. It's not the history of psychiatry, but it is my history, personal and real.
Brooke Shields, the author of "Down Came the Rain: My Journey Through Postpartum Depression," is starring in the musical "Chicago" in London.
Gosh Let's Not Think of this as War
War of Words
I am pleased that Brooke was able to articulate her feelings before her depression was so bad she acted on it.
The Baby Blues are experienced by most women after their child is born because of the huge shift in hormones within that short span of time when neither the baby or the placenta need support. Hormones are a form of steroids. Then to think the female body is ready to supply lactation for an infant is an amazing capacity that again requires a shift in hormone (steroid) balance.
The next degree of severity is Post Partum Depression and then Post Partum Psychosis which was experienced by Andrea Yates. We all know her case has been reviewed and the physician she was seeing is very much at fault for Andrea's condition post partum of her infant girl, the fifth child I believe.
I also believe at this point Andrea is taking five different medications successfully. But this is not about Post Partum Psychosis.
I am pleased that Brooke did what she felt she needed to do. I am more pleased it worked for her.
At the same time there are alternatives to 'medicines' and in my opinion there are studies that have been done in England that shows a better treatment for some of these issues is supplemental injections of estrogen until normal levels are reached and maintained.
I've looked at this subject somewhat extensively.
In understanding Western Medicine, which supplemental treatment of estrogen is, from Eastern Medicine one cannot say that a 'specific' treatment regime will work for everyone. Personally. I think the best thing Brooke did was to enter into weekly visits to a psychiatrist while on the medication to be sure she was working on overcoming those feelings. I am confident her husband was a part of her recovery as well. So to say the medication alone recovered her is not exactly accurate and women with these terrible feelings and thoughts should never be without a good support system. It's not their fault and having a child is a life changing event for any couple.
The science of psychiatry has an interesting beginning and it is actually rather crude. Many of the medications were found 'by accident' to work on extreme conditions like schizophrenia when they were actually developed for other conditions of the body. So, I don't find it odd that most people don't know the history of psychiatry and for someone who has a belief system that steers them away from conventional Western medicine it is understandable how one might state a concern for someone they sincerely care about who.
I think Tom Cruise sincerely cares about the Post Partum Depression of Brooks Shields and cares about her, but, he comes from it from a different view of the world and that is okay. Just as there are failings of Western Medicine so there are failings of Eastern Medicine and at no point in time should anyone feel one direction is the only direction and in some cases or should I say most cases a blending of the two has the best results. The 'talk sessions' are as much Eastern medicine as otherwise and the emotional support of parents by those who love are as well.
Good Karma.
Lovely editorial, Brooke. I am sure there are many people who have taken heart at your success. Thank you kindly and best life has to offer you and your family.
I am pleased that Brooke was able to articulate her feelings before her depression was so bad she acted on it.
The Baby Blues are experienced by most women after their child is born because of the huge shift in hormones within that short span of time when neither the baby or the placenta need support. Hormones are a form of steroids. Then to think the female body is ready to supply lactation for an infant is an amazing capacity that again requires a shift in hormone (steroid) balance.
The next degree of severity is Post Partum Depression and then Post Partum Psychosis which was experienced by Andrea Yates. We all know her case has been reviewed and the physician she was seeing is very much at fault for Andrea's condition post partum of her infant girl, the fifth child I believe.
I also believe at this point Andrea is taking five different medications successfully. But this is not about Post Partum Psychosis.
I am pleased that Brooke did what she felt she needed to do. I am more pleased it worked for her.
At the same time there are alternatives to 'medicines' and in my opinion there are studies that have been done in England that shows a better treatment for some of these issues is supplemental injections of estrogen until normal levels are reached and maintained.
I've looked at this subject somewhat extensively.
In understanding Western Medicine, which supplemental treatment of estrogen is, from Eastern Medicine one cannot say that a 'specific' treatment regime will work for everyone. Personally. I think the best thing Brooke did was to enter into weekly visits to a psychiatrist while on the medication to be sure she was working on overcoming those feelings. I am confident her husband was a part of her recovery as well. So to say the medication alone recovered her is not exactly accurate and women with these terrible feelings and thoughts should never be without a good support system. It's not their fault and having a child is a life changing event for any couple.
The science of psychiatry has an interesting beginning and it is actually rather crude. Many of the medications were found 'by accident' to work on extreme conditions like schizophrenia when they were actually developed for other conditions of the body. So, I don't find it odd that most people don't know the history of psychiatry and for someone who has a belief system that steers them away from conventional Western medicine it is understandable how one might state a concern for someone they sincerely care about who.
I think Tom Cruise sincerely cares about the Post Partum Depression of Brooks Shields and cares about her, but, he comes from it from a different view of the world and that is okay. Just as there are failings of Western Medicine so there are failings of Eastern Medicine and at no point in time should anyone feel one direction is the only direction and in some cases or should I say most cases a blending of the two has the best results. The 'talk sessions' are as much Eastern medicine as otherwise and the emotional support of parents by those who love are as well.
Good Karma.
Lovely editorial, Brooke. I am sure there are many people who have taken heart at your success. Thank you kindly and best life has to offer you and your family.
Psychiatry. Who? Me? Crazy?
Psychiatry and Psychology are as old as human existence itself. We know for a fact since the early beginnings of time even before recorded human history early hominid life was characterized by medicine, herbs and yes, even the characterization of insanity.
That characterization included seeing unexplained behavior as anything from godlike to demonic leading to a containment of abhorrent behavior as something outside of normal and the exception. In doing so, hominids were able to secure themselves into a sane rather than strange behavior with explanations of what they saw having it’s own characteristics.
The earliest civilizations, the Egyptians who coined math, science and astrology had explanations for insanity. The Greeks which were among the first ‘thinkers’ came to realize there were maladies of the brain which resulted in permanent and altered behavior. The Romans were among the civilization that saw insanity as a godlike quality of the Gods that ruled the underworld.
The Greeks sought to ‘treat’ insanity with herbal drugs of one kind or another altering body chemistry to enhance accepted behaviors. Altered body chemistry (not brain chemistry) which can be measured today with a simple blood test, tends to change behavior in one fashion or another. Example: Low sodium levels (Na+) causes confusion. Always accompanying the science of psychiatry was the practice of psychology but in many instances that was in the area of spiritual practices and not formal medicine.
The earliest organization of modern day psychiatry began somewhere in the 1700s. But, even then doctors like Franz G. Alexander and Sheldon T. Selesnick stated the treatment of the mentally deranged was beyond the ‘methods of medicine. There was just no acceptable treatment of people and they were frequently locked away from society rather than included in it.
General hospitals were first declared an issue for society in France. Louis XIII in 1676 set aside space for the infirmed. Mind you, being hospitalized until the later 1900’s usually dictated death. The treatment of even common physical illnesses was crude and mostly inhumane with practices like blood letting. IV therapy began with access to veins with metal and/or glass rods and vials that instilled fluid that usually resulted in worsening conditions. People were different centuries ago, they were physically strong and rarely were they depleted so the crude treatment of illness by these methods including early surgeries sometimes worked. Caesarian Section, named after the birth of Caesar’s first born son, for the birth of breached infants was around much earlier than the Roman Empire and was practiced first in Egypt. When ‘interventionary’ medicine worked it spurred the further investigation of scientific study leading to medicine so it all wasn’t so bad. There had to be enough of a survival rate all along the chain of exploration to continue to believe all should not be left up to the gods.
But, with hospitals also came the confinement of the insane including those ordered by a court somewhere in the land for law breakers that were too deranged to contain elsewhere. Custodial institutions, asylums, were the earliest of institutionalized care of the insane but there was no medication or treatment except for very crude methods such as placing those admitted in serpent filled holes to shock them out of their insanity. This is where the name ‘Snake Pit’ was derived referring to the early institutions to contain the insane.
Asylums were ‘convenient’ for society and became a legitimate place to house the insane. Psychiatrists were therefore needed to care medically for these people and for hundreds of years practiced methods that were mostly cruel and not therapeutic but demonstrated ‘logical’ treatment as sane people were to understand it and approve of their treatment of the insane. Asylums were more or less a political institution with little regard for the reality of purposeful treatment.
It wasn’t until the later 1800s that Rudolf Virchow released his Cellular Pathology as Based upon Physiological and Pathological Histology, hence, the beginnings of molecular understanding of the processes of the body and the birth of modern day medicine. That step into the reality of molecular medicine brought with it the fashionable thinking of psychiatry bringing now and finally experimental treatment modalities rather than social confinement and logical explanations. Psychiatry was going to become controversial and indulgent. Indulgence of the insane was a new venue for society who isolated themselves from the strange they were now faced with confronting the mysticism of the mind.
Some of the earliest treatments were still very cruel such as ‘whipping’ but also came the concept of body massage leading to body work and in far away places like the orient practices such as ‘acupuncture’ were still unknown to Western style medicine. Opium would come to be realized as a very early treatment of behavioral disorders.
For some time and not until medicine was more sophisticated, the treatment of the insane remained focused on body work and manipulation and how the mind reacted to that treatment. The methods remained cruel in many ways but at least society was beginning to deal with the fact ‘the mind’ had it’s own illnesses and made a commitment to address them.
As always what coexisted with psychiatry was the success being found in places of psychology and the development of true mental illness not traceable to any physical malady. The late 1800s found itself with a gifted man by the name of Sigmund Freud who wrote a book on hysteria. Hysteria was the first ‘diagnosable’ malady of the mind whereby there was no physical condition but only traumatic experience related to a person’s understanding of life which lead to psychosomatic illness. This book was based on an experience Freud had with a woman who had gradually over time lost use of her body as a form of hysteria related to caring for a man that would eventually die. The illness was psychosomatic and without any interventionary medicine Freud treated the hysteria with patient psychotherapy to reverse the understanding of the trauma and allow the body to stop it’s sympathy with the mind. The treatment was legitimate and Freud coined it in analogy to ‘lancing a boil.’
Freud would come to be respected in some circles demonstrating his ability to captivate society with an understanding of ‘developmental’ psychology based in sexual development of people. First Freud realized the physical needs of the body were satisfied through orifices and hence named his developmental stages as oral, anal and sexual. He divided the mind’s development into Id, Superego and ‘the ego.’ It was the healthy ego society sought to capture.
The trend of psychotherapy spread like wildfire throughout Europe and eventually lead medicine down a path to treat the physical aspects of psychiatric disease as all illnesses of the mind were not satisfied by psychotherapy alone. Some physicians did not see all mental illness as metaphysical as Freud and his followers and detractors did.
In the 1920s and 1930s it was usually some type of shock to the body that was the methodology of treatment including the horrors of Metrozol shock, insulin shock, electroshock and psychosurgery. It wasn’t until the 1950s and 1960s did we realize psychotropic medicines were effective. These medications were originally developed for treatment of physical ailments but side effects were showing control of behavior as well.
One of the earliest discoveries resulted from a chemical used to treat shock in post surgical patients. The patients undergoing surgery were experiencing shock due to anesthesia. A talented French surgeon by the name of Henri Laborit attempted administrations of large amounts antihistamines to reduce swelling and wake people sooner from anesthesia improving their outcomes from surgery. He found a drug by the name of chlorpromazine had an effect on his patients and decided to encourage the use of it in psychiatry. These were the early beginning of psychopharmaceuticals and were discovered to be effective quite by accident. The early drugs psychiatrists used were never developed for psychiatry. It was after this that brain biopsies of cadavers and live patients at times allowed microscopic understanding of what is know today as chemical brain balance. The chemistry of the brain has been come to be called appropriately neurotransmitters. It is a grossly boring subject of which would take a great deal of time to begin to explain and I will not go into it here.
The physical attributes of the brain are quite interesting in the defense mechanisms that exist to protect it. The brain tissue never truly comes in contact with the blood and therefore brain chemistry is not measurable in blood tests. There are intricate mechanisms of specialized cells that compose the brain-blood barrier which protect and nourish brain tissue. Our thoughts are dominated by chemistry. There really is nothing mystical about it, except to say it is an amazing quality of our lives we need to appreciate and hold in esteem. The ‘workings’ of the mind that conducts thoughts is still somewhat distant in understanding but we know through modern diagnostic tools there are ways of looking at ‘normal’ functioning vs. what we as a society call ‘dysfunction.’
Needless to say it wasn’t until journalist got involved did the treatment of the insane take on a humane character. Through film journalism such as Geraldo Rivera’s expose’ on Willowbrook disclosure of cruel and inhumane treatment of society’s discarded people came to light never to remain the same.
Today, psychiatry has honed itself into a specific discipline that still has large avenues of perfection to pursue and one of the most areas of the practice of psychiatry with little emphasis is in the area of women’s disorders known as the Baby Blues, Post Partum Depression and Post Partum Psychosis. Even in the year 2005 these disorders of women are grossly unemphasized by American society and ostracized into prisonable and or institutionalized offenses by women with little regard for the depth of understanding needed in an empathetic society whereby supposedly family and children are the primary focus.
A very healthy discussion regarding the treatment of women experiencing post partum mental illness has begun in the USA and it has it’s basis in the sound understanding of grossly neglected treatment of hormone (steroid) imbalance after parturition. I suggest we return to a venture into understanding the potency of uniquely ‘female’ hormones and their effect on the psychi as well as recognition of the lack of adequate pre-natal preparedness for the event that could easily destroy a family as well as build one.
That characterization included seeing unexplained behavior as anything from godlike to demonic leading to a containment of abhorrent behavior as something outside of normal and the exception. In doing so, hominids were able to secure themselves into a sane rather than strange behavior with explanations of what they saw having it’s own characteristics.
The earliest civilizations, the Egyptians who coined math, science and astrology had explanations for insanity. The Greeks which were among the first ‘thinkers’ came to realize there were maladies of the brain which resulted in permanent and altered behavior. The Romans were among the civilization that saw insanity as a godlike quality of the Gods that ruled the underworld.
The Greeks sought to ‘treat’ insanity with herbal drugs of one kind or another altering body chemistry to enhance accepted behaviors. Altered body chemistry (not brain chemistry) which can be measured today with a simple blood test, tends to change behavior in one fashion or another. Example: Low sodium levels (Na+) causes confusion. Always accompanying the science of psychiatry was the practice of psychology but in many instances that was in the area of spiritual practices and not formal medicine.
The earliest organization of modern day psychiatry began somewhere in the 1700s. But, even then doctors like Franz G. Alexander and Sheldon T. Selesnick stated the treatment of the mentally deranged was beyond the ‘methods of medicine. There was just no acceptable treatment of people and they were frequently locked away from society rather than included in it.
General hospitals were first declared an issue for society in France. Louis XIII in 1676 set aside space for the infirmed. Mind you, being hospitalized until the later 1900’s usually dictated death. The treatment of even common physical illnesses was crude and mostly inhumane with practices like blood letting. IV therapy began with access to veins with metal and/or glass rods and vials that instilled fluid that usually resulted in worsening conditions. People were different centuries ago, they were physically strong and rarely were they depleted so the crude treatment of illness by these methods including early surgeries sometimes worked. Caesarian Section, named after the birth of Caesar’s first born son, for the birth of breached infants was around much earlier than the Roman Empire and was practiced first in Egypt. When ‘interventionary’ medicine worked it spurred the further investigation of scientific study leading to medicine so it all wasn’t so bad. There had to be enough of a survival rate all along the chain of exploration to continue to believe all should not be left up to the gods.
But, with hospitals also came the confinement of the insane including those ordered by a court somewhere in the land for law breakers that were too deranged to contain elsewhere. Custodial institutions, asylums, were the earliest of institutionalized care of the insane but there was no medication or treatment except for very crude methods such as placing those admitted in serpent filled holes to shock them out of their insanity. This is where the name ‘Snake Pit’ was derived referring to the early institutions to contain the insane.
Asylums were ‘convenient’ for society and became a legitimate place to house the insane. Psychiatrists were therefore needed to care medically for these people and for hundreds of years practiced methods that were mostly cruel and not therapeutic but demonstrated ‘logical’ treatment as sane people were to understand it and approve of their treatment of the insane. Asylums were more or less a political institution with little regard for the reality of purposeful treatment.
It wasn’t until the later 1800s that Rudolf Virchow released his Cellular Pathology as Based upon Physiological and Pathological Histology, hence, the beginnings of molecular understanding of the processes of the body and the birth of modern day medicine. That step into the reality of molecular medicine brought with it the fashionable thinking of psychiatry bringing now and finally experimental treatment modalities rather than social confinement and logical explanations. Psychiatry was going to become controversial and indulgent. Indulgence of the insane was a new venue for society who isolated themselves from the strange they were now faced with confronting the mysticism of the mind.
Some of the earliest treatments were still very cruel such as ‘whipping’ but also came the concept of body massage leading to body work and in far away places like the orient practices such as ‘acupuncture’ were still unknown to Western style medicine. Opium would come to be realized as a very early treatment of behavioral disorders.
For some time and not until medicine was more sophisticated, the treatment of the insane remained focused on body work and manipulation and how the mind reacted to that treatment. The methods remained cruel in many ways but at least society was beginning to deal with the fact ‘the mind’ had it’s own illnesses and made a commitment to address them.
As always what coexisted with psychiatry was the success being found in places of psychology and the development of true mental illness not traceable to any physical malady. The late 1800s found itself with a gifted man by the name of Sigmund Freud who wrote a book on hysteria. Hysteria was the first ‘diagnosable’ malady of the mind whereby there was no physical condition but only traumatic experience related to a person’s understanding of life which lead to psychosomatic illness. This book was based on an experience Freud had with a woman who had gradually over time lost use of her body as a form of hysteria related to caring for a man that would eventually die. The illness was psychosomatic and without any interventionary medicine Freud treated the hysteria with patient psychotherapy to reverse the understanding of the trauma and allow the body to stop it’s sympathy with the mind. The treatment was legitimate and Freud coined it in analogy to ‘lancing a boil.’
Freud would come to be respected in some circles demonstrating his ability to captivate society with an understanding of ‘developmental’ psychology based in sexual development of people. First Freud realized the physical needs of the body were satisfied through orifices and hence named his developmental stages as oral, anal and sexual. He divided the mind’s development into Id, Superego and ‘the ego.’ It was the healthy ego society sought to capture.
The trend of psychotherapy spread like wildfire throughout Europe and eventually lead medicine down a path to treat the physical aspects of psychiatric disease as all illnesses of the mind were not satisfied by psychotherapy alone. Some physicians did not see all mental illness as metaphysical as Freud and his followers and detractors did.
In the 1920s and 1930s it was usually some type of shock to the body that was the methodology of treatment including the horrors of Metrozol shock, insulin shock, electroshock and psychosurgery. It wasn’t until the 1950s and 1960s did we realize psychotropic medicines were effective. These medications were originally developed for treatment of physical ailments but side effects were showing control of behavior as well.
One of the earliest discoveries resulted from a chemical used to treat shock in post surgical patients. The patients undergoing surgery were experiencing shock due to anesthesia. A talented French surgeon by the name of Henri Laborit attempted administrations of large amounts antihistamines to reduce swelling and wake people sooner from anesthesia improving their outcomes from surgery. He found a drug by the name of chlorpromazine had an effect on his patients and decided to encourage the use of it in psychiatry. These were the early beginning of psychopharmaceuticals and were discovered to be effective quite by accident. The early drugs psychiatrists used were never developed for psychiatry. It was after this that brain biopsies of cadavers and live patients at times allowed microscopic understanding of what is know today as chemical brain balance. The chemistry of the brain has been come to be called appropriately neurotransmitters. It is a grossly boring subject of which would take a great deal of time to begin to explain and I will not go into it here.
The physical attributes of the brain are quite interesting in the defense mechanisms that exist to protect it. The brain tissue never truly comes in contact with the blood and therefore brain chemistry is not measurable in blood tests. There are intricate mechanisms of specialized cells that compose the brain-blood barrier which protect and nourish brain tissue. Our thoughts are dominated by chemistry. There really is nothing mystical about it, except to say it is an amazing quality of our lives we need to appreciate and hold in esteem. The ‘workings’ of the mind that conducts thoughts is still somewhat distant in understanding but we know through modern diagnostic tools there are ways of looking at ‘normal’ functioning vs. what we as a society call ‘dysfunction.’
Needless to say it wasn’t until journalist got involved did the treatment of the insane take on a humane character. Through film journalism such as Geraldo Rivera’s expose’ on Willowbrook disclosure of cruel and inhumane treatment of society’s discarded people came to light never to remain the same.
Today, psychiatry has honed itself into a specific discipline that still has large avenues of perfection to pursue and one of the most areas of the practice of psychiatry with little emphasis is in the area of women’s disorders known as the Baby Blues, Post Partum Depression and Post Partum Psychosis. Even in the year 2005 these disorders of women are grossly unemphasized by American society and ostracized into prisonable and or institutionalized offenses by women with little regard for the depth of understanding needed in an empathetic society whereby supposedly family and children are the primary focus.
A very healthy discussion regarding the treatment of women experiencing post partum mental illness has begun in the USA and it has it’s basis in the sound understanding of grossly neglected treatment of hormone (steroid) imbalance after parturition. I suggest we return to a venture into understanding the potency of uniquely ‘female’ hormones and their effect on the psychi as well as recognition of the lack of adequate pre-natal preparedness for the event that could easily destroy a family as well as build one.
"Footloose" performed by Kenny Logins
Been working so hard
I'm punching my card
Eight hours, for what
Oh, tell me what I got
I've done this feeling
That time's just holdihg me down
I'll hit the ceiling
Or else I'll tear up this town
Now I gotta cut
Loose, footloose
Kick off your Sunday shoes
Please, Louise
Pull me offa my knees
Jack, get back
C'mon before we crack
Lose your blues
Everybody cut footloose
You're playkng so cool
Obeykng every rule
Dig way down in your heart
You're yearning, yearnkng for some
Somebody to tell you
That life ain't passing you by
I'm trying to tell you
It will if you don't even try
You can fly if you'd noly cut
Loose, footloose
Kick off your Sunday shoes
Oowhee, Marie
Shake it, shake it for me
Whoa, Milo
C'mon, c'mon let's go
Lose your blues
Everybody cut footloose
We got to turn you around
You put your feet on the ground
Now take a hold of your ball
I'm turning it
Loose, footloose
Kick off your Sunday shoes
Please, Louise
Pull me offa my knees
Jack, get back
C'mon before we crack
Lose your blues
Everybody cut footloose
You're playkng so cool
Obeykng every rule
Dig way down in your heart
You're yearning, yearnkng for some
Somebody to tell you
That life ain't passing you by
I'm trying to tell you
It will if you don't even try
You can fly if you'd noly cut
I'm punching my card
Eight hours, for what
Oh, tell me what I got
I've done this feeling
That time's just holdihg me down
I'll hit the ceiling
Or else I'll tear up this town
Now I gotta cut
Loose, footloose
Kick off your Sunday shoes
Please, Louise
Pull me offa my knees
Jack, get back
C'mon before we crack
Lose your blues
Everybody cut footloose
You're playkng so cool
Obeykng every rule
Dig way down in your heart
You're yearning, yearnkng for some
Somebody to tell you
That life ain't passing you by
I'm trying to tell you
It will if you don't even try
You can fly if you'd noly cut
Loose, footloose
Kick off your Sunday shoes
Oowhee, Marie
Shake it, shake it for me
Whoa, Milo
C'mon, c'mon let's go
Lose your blues
Everybody cut footloose
We got to turn you around
You put your feet on the ground
Now take a hold of your ball
I'm turning it
Loose, footloose
Kick off your Sunday shoes
Please, Louise
Pull me offa my knees
Jack, get back
C'mon before we crack
Lose your blues
Everybody cut footloose
You're playkng so cool
Obeykng every rule
Dig way down in your heart
You're yearning, yearnkng for some
Somebody to tell you
That life ain't passing you by
I'm trying to tell you
It will if you don't even try
You can fly if you'd noly cut
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)