How I was legally raped by a Major Pharmaceuticals Company

Stating this "rape" may seem a too strong of a word to use, and that I am dishonoring all woman who have been sexually raped. But according to the definition on my Mac, there couldn't be a better suited word. I will start with this definitition.

"2 Maybe be used as: Rape of the rainforest: Destruction, violation, ravaging, pillaging, plundering, desecration, defilment, sacking. The Wanton destructions or spoiling of an area especially; Personal."

My faith in human kind is near non-existent at this time. I have become caged and held hostage in the great machine that is the Pharmaceuticals Company Wyeth-Ayerst an American Home Product Company. For those of you unaware of the fifth largest pharmaceuticals manufacturer in the world I will give you a brief history.

*American Home Products recent track record in the consumer drug area. Here is a list of some of the companys recent problems:

1998- American Home recalled their drug Duract, a painkiller that caused fatal liver problems in some long-term users.

July 99- the company halted shipments of its rotavirus vaccine, used to prevent diarrhea in young children after it was linked to bowel obstructions in infants.

August 99- AHP recalled 600,000 defective allergy kits used by people at risk for severe reactions from bee stings, certain foods or asthma.

August 99- AHP agreed to pay $50 million to settle a class action law suite brought by women who used its contraceptive Norplant. The drug was reported to cause headaches, irregular menstrual bleeding and nausea.

September 99- AHP is involved in an investigation being conducted by the FBI for allegedly withholding information indicating that their diet drug Redux can result in heart valve problems [and the resulting deaths of thousands of women a few years earlier. For more information I urge you to read Dispensing With The Truth. Which recounts the entire story, lawsuits and deaths due to this withholding of information. It will make you physically ill.]

Feb 1, 2000?American Home Targeted in Wrongful Death Suit Over Vaccine Use
Los Angeles, Feb. 1 American Home Products Corp., the No. 5 U.S. drug maker, is accused in a lawsuit of making and marketing an oral polio vaccine that caused the death of a 2 1/2-year-old Los Angeles boy.

Friday, June 16, 2000?FDA seizes Wyeth drugs, citing quality standards*


Now you may wonder how such a large company is holding me hostage and what I have to do with it. Well they have systematically stolen years of my life. If you know me well you will know I have supposedly struggled with depression for years; nearly a decade in fact. To understand this you would have to look at my past. In middle school, the 7th grade to be exact, I was having trouble as most kids were. I was having flashbacks to my fathers death and feeling down. I was having trouble relating to kids and felt awkward. How this is different from any other tween in middle school is a question for the ages. It seems all kids feel that way in middle school, whether you were bullied or bullying, popular are lost in the crows you felt this. It is a part of the process. What happened to me though is where my story diverges. Instead of being given support through talking and connecting, through be re-assured that it is a phase I was simply medicated. Yes, I have been on anti-depressant since I was twelve years old. I had hardly started my period, if I even had; I was a baby and put on psychotropic drugs that HAD NOT been FDA approved for use in children my age and moreover when I got worse they upped the dosage to ADULT dosages. I was a 12 year old on 100mg of a drug that they are even now unsure of its safety in adults let alone little girls.

I followed directions my mom and being reassured of their safety and effectiveness and went on for a few years. I started cutting in the 8th grade, something I had previously found appalling and sad I felt motivated to do. Thoughts of suicide started entering my consciousness and dizziness and fogginess ensued. Still I remained optimistic for high school. They upped my dosage.

Looking back I had always look forward to high school. Moving states was hard but I thought I had some things in my corner; I was pretty, I knew how to cheer so joining the squad would be no trouble at all, I was smart but not too smart and I was confident. I was leaving Oregon a popular successful albeit an increasingly depressed girl but I knew where I was supposed to be in the social hierarchy and was excited. Little did I know that all hell was about to break loose.

School started well enough, like all freshmen I was nervous but I was also the new girl arriving a month late to the start of the year. I basked in the attention and settled in to my classes. But it wasnt long before the old demons set in. I began to get shaky and dizzy. I would see spots and my stomach would burn. I would start to feel as though at any second I would pass out or go into a seizure. I felt so ill I would stay home I began to hate school and despise myself. They upped my dosage.

My doctor said I had mono for the third time and changed my meds up. I was 15 and still on high dosages for even adults of medicine unapproved for kids my age. I hadnt kissed a boy yet but was on the dose and meds of a depressed 30 year old. At least I was on my period this time.

I left early that year due to the mono and started at a new school. I lasted one semester. I struggled with friends and could never shake that panicky feeling. I felt like an addict at times the white noise in my head was so loud I would cut myself just for the seconds of quietness it would give me. Sleep was a release as well. I threatened suicide twice that year. I spent my 16th birthday in a Mental Hospital.

That was the worst week of my life. I didnt feel like I should be there, I wasnt crazy I just felt sick all the time. I wanted someone to pay attention and realize something else was wrong I wasnt just depressed and pills werent working. The antidote they gave me came in the form of an invasive strip search, and a padded room. The second night was easier, at least I had doctors scrubs to wear instead of a hospital gown and a bed and piece of shiny steal as a mirror. I was okay my first night so I got to take a shower on my own the next day. I was not allowed to have a ponytail holder to hold back my hair I was a suicide threat and apparently they thought I was a genius as well; able to g=fashion a noose out of an inch of elastic. I went to meeting to talk about my feelings with 15-year-old rapists, fathers, mothers and drug addicts. I was a C average student with aspirations and goals that just wanted a Doctor to help her feel better. I ended up coaching and counseling other girls and asked to come back and volunteer when the nurses released me. Nonetheless the Doctors wouldnt listen to them, or me. I was kept another 5 days and put on 2 other drugs in addition to the one I was on and diagnosed with Bipolar disorder. None of the drugs I was on were FDA approved to treat a 16 year old and have been re-submitted to the FDA for safety in adults.

I did not finish my sophomore year but tested into junior level classes.
That year I switched Doctors I was taken off one of the meds and was diagnosed with a benign pituitary tumor They were unable to confirm the diagnoses and never followed up. My symptoms were the same as they had always been and no one suspected the meds. I left school after four weeks.

I restarted my junior year the following school year at a Christian school thinking maybe God would help me through maybe he was leading me there. I switched Doctors again, changed meds an upped dosages ready to start. I was okay for the first few weeks before I was ill again. I felt manic I couldnt sleep I was dizzy foggy and tired. I couldnt see straight I wonder if ending it would stop the torment. I just wanted to feel normal. I just wanted to feel. I dropped out in October.

That was my last attempt at high school. I took a year off, found myself and my place in my family and that following may I began testing for my GED. I have pushed through the dizziness and the symptoms talked myself down from suicide deciding I would rather live through the horrible pain in my head and body than not live at all. Then a funny thing happened.

News started surfacing of kids who where on the medicines I was on were more than twice as likely to kill themselves. I found out these meds were not FDA approved for my age and more over that the drug company who made this most current and most damaging one were allegedly and illegally endorsing the off label or not approved by the FDA therefore unreaserched use of these drugs. I put it in the back on my head until a few days ago.
As I have said I have taught myself to live with this constant state of nausea and fogginess. Until that is I was reading a new book about the very drug company who made my Effexor. They concealed information and paid off Doctors (on average 18 million dollars A YEAR) to endorse another drug of theirs. They even had high-powered politicians in their corner like Ted Kennedy (oddly enough he is no longer connected to the scandal). The book is about a diet drug they paid Doctors to prescribe. As it turns out though Doctors are paid by a lot of drug companies to prescribe medicines; especially antidepressants and other psychotropic drugs like ridilin to people regardless of age. And it seems to be legal. I got curious and researched this company and my drug. The results of that search have left me feeling used, forgotten, abandoned, taken advantage of and thrown into the gutter ultimately... raped.

There are pending lawsuits. Thousands of kids have been put on these drugs, kids like me and have lost their lives. They have been misdiagnosed and wrongly jailed or hospitalized. They have undergone changes in personality and felt sick and hopeless just as I have. So many cases piled up so many people were hurt the Public Department for Health and Human Services had to intervene and send in a request to the FDA to re-evaluate the safety. The FDA has since but a Black Box Label on these medication to kids AND adults which is the highest warning the government has, meaning these drugs CAN KILL YOU (Pharmaceutical companies war against this label spending millions of dollars not to get it. ) A new committee has been called out to re-investigate the safety of these medications and all records of medical trials for all companies have been seized so they can do this. The verdict is still not in.

Health and Human Services Letter

Now I am coming to terms with the fact that I have needlessly suffered. I am not saying antidepressants dont work. I have seen them do wonderful things for my mom but does a 12 year old need to be put on them? My brain has not had the chance to develop without these chemicals and the studies prove so far that the effects for the majority are damaging. I want to know if I need these or not and here is the horrible part. Effexor turns out to be highly addictive withdrawals compared by some to oxycontin i.e. synthetic heroine. The rich have gotten richer off of my seemingly unneeded medication and I cant even stop the medicine. Research says that stopping cold turkey can be fatal and land you in the ER often causing seizures, shock, tremor, head ache, vomiting, diarrhea, confusion, loss of memory and dizziness among other things. In order to be taken off of this medicine I have to go back to the money grubbing rich ass-holes who put me on it in the first place. Unfortunately we have no insurance for 2 more months and no money for a psychiatrist appointment or the meds I need to effectively wean me off this abomination.
I feel caged and used. My health and 7 years of my life have been compromised to countless doctors can get stipends for prescribing a drug now shown to cause the very problems I was going to doctors for. No one told us of the risks. No one told us it was being used against its label in fact we were assured it was safe when really those who were prescribing it had no way of knowing seeing as Wyeth-Ayerst did not conduct or as their history suggests covered up those fact. It seems like a vicious cycle of CAPITOLISM where the rich get richer by CAPITOLIZING on the scared single mother and child. Perhaps the worst part is I have no voice to speak against it.

When I was young I was told one voice could make a difference. I believe that but now I know that, that one voice must have money behind it. The people have no say. We are just pawns in the maniacal games of these giant capitalist machines. Our lives and welfare are null and void if they can make a buck out of our cyclical suffering: the cyclical suffering they cause. I want to scream at the top of my lungs how wrong this is and how violated I feel and luckily I live in America so I can do so the only problem, is that in order for people to listen I apparently need millions of dollars and like most people I assume by the time I get that amount of money I will have forgotten my voice and be just like them.
So I will continue on in the haze until I get the money to safely stop. I will go through approximately 2 months of controlled withdrawal. And if that doesnt work, I can always do as the medical insert says:

If during discontinuation symptoms become problematic patient may choose to re-evaluate need to discontinue treatment and return to original prescribed dosage

In the end I guess that is what all dealers count on, the addict quitting and cleaning up his or her life because withdrawal is so problematic. That is after all where they make their money the ones who return for that post rehab hit. If America cleaned-up and realized depression was a symptom of our society they would be out of business and the capitalist pigs funding of our economy would be broke, all hell would break loose then. That is why things wont change. Maybe Tom Cruise isnt so crazy after all then again it could be the Effexor talking.