However, I suspect that the schools will be the only ones with easy access, and only adults with an actual medical need for them will be stymied.

Literally my life story.

you’ve chosen to set the system up.

Do you really think we had any say in the matter?

A lack of Ritalin nearly killed my grandmother. That was before this, because I’d be dangerously fucking livid if I had to drive halfway across the state to find the my-grandma-keeps-breathing pills, and I would have been the one tasked with picking up her prescription back then.

But they can’t offer benzodiazipines because a-holes will take them and drink to feel great (aka like qualudes or however you spell em in the 60’s and 70’s I assume).

Quaaludes

Indeed, it’s now the recreational drugs that are being looked at to treat things like depression, as noted on Slashdot repeatedly. Angel Dust and Magic Mushrooms being two that are taken very seriously by psychiatrists.

They were being used in clinical practice with good effect when they were banned by the Nixon administration. They weren’t recreational drugs until they were banned, ffs.

I suppose the larger question is: what in the world is going on with the us (in the US) that made such madness happen– both in supply and demand. It feels like I stepped between two parties fighting and now they’re pointing fingers at me.

The Sacklers happened.

I went off one suddenly on medical advice, because shortly after starting it I had begun to hallucinate music.

It was medically necessary, but it was also one of the most unpleasant experiences of my life. Three days without sleep, in bed, flop sweats, unable to eat, while I vividly hallucinated throbbing technicolor triangles. Not just with my eyes. Full fucking synesthesia. Kept going for most of a week, but I could sleep on the fourth night.

I agree with you, but I don’t think you’re really doing anybody any favors with understatement here.

You’re being pedantic, and I suspect you know it.

People can easily become dependent on SSRIs and suffer withdrawals with a poorly managed discontinuation.

If a pill a day keeps the asylum away, I think the pill is probably a winner.

Having said that, you should look into the difficulties of treatment resistant depression. You can’t just check into rehab for some therapy and leave in a month. First off, American health care. You wouldn’t have insurance the moment you needed to use it, for starters! Because a month or two of inpatient treatment will get your ass fired from most jobs. And if you’ve got the rare boss that respects FMLA, wellthat’s still a couple months of unpaid leave, and the average American can’t make an unexpected $400 payment.

But to end on a note of hope, ketamine is beginning to look more and more like a one-and-done cure for many cases of depression, and for those who aren’t completely cured they’re often left with permanently improved symptoms. Likewise, psychedelics combined with talk therapy seem to make permanent inroads into curing or reducing symptoms of depression, PTSD, phobias, and anxiety. So one day, a few rounds of intensive therapy may be the one-and-done cure you’re implying should be available to all.

And frankly it should be, fuck Nixon and his war on drugs.

Getting off Citalopram, I felt nothing. But getting off Bupropion caused me to spend three days in bed hallucinating pulsating colored triangles so vividly I could barely drink water.

The plural of anecdote is not data.

People’s bodies and brain chemistry are different.

Buproprion was one that my GP was hesitant to prescribe because the withdrawals sucked in everyone he tried to taper off the stuff, and most people he tried to get off it simply had to go on a low maintenance dose indefinitely.

Seconded. My GP wouldn’t prescribe Wellbutrin until everything else he could try had been tried, since dependence was so bad.

I can’t remember what it was that I was on, but it had me hallucinating music or not-quite-audible talk radio whenever there was silence. I was instructed to crash off it, not taper (I was at the minimum dose anyway) and after about a very apprehensive week, I spent three days in bed, drenched with flop sweats, consuming only water and vividly hallucinating throbbing searing-bright triangles with all my senses. It took more than three days to be “okay” but it was three days before I could consume anything but water, because it took a supreme effort of will to shuffle to the bathroom, fill and drain a glass, and take a leak because of the sensory overload inflicted upon me by withdrawal symptoms.

My mother is on something which I fucking hope ain’t scheduled, because if she doesn’t carry out a VERY careful and gentle taper, it will trigger a massive heart attack.

Drug cessation needs to be carried out under controlled circumstances for anything more interesting than Tylenol. I was going to use Advil as my example because that’s less toxic than Tylenol, but that has serious implications when combined with blood thinners or Aspirin, so no, even that has to be managed carefully too, in some subset of patients.