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• Friday, February 9, 2007 06:27 AM

  My father-in-law Nearly went insane

  AncientAssyrian wrote:

  "These days, you go in and say you're blue, down in the dumps, sleeping a lot, can't deal with winter, lonely, gaining weight, losing weight, sleeping too little, and so on, and they whip out the scrip pad, and you're walking out with Prozac, or Paxil or Xanax or Klonopin -- oh, and some Ambien to help you sleep of course."

  That was our experience exactly.

  For years my father-in-law was a motivated, self sufficient individual. He owns several businesses in a small town (you sometinmes have to do a little of everything in a small economy) that have done well. He has always been a quiet, relatively contented individual.

  There came a period in his life when he began to worry about retirement and the usual things that concern an older person. He complained to his country doctor about some sleeplesness, and was prescribed Paxil and Ambien. Long story short, he nearly went insane before getting completely off mood altering drugs.

  I think these doctors are invloved in kick-back schemes, as we soon found out that nearly half of the members of his small town church (mostly older people) were on the same medications.

  I seem to be dealing with more and more people who don't seem to care about anything. They function, but have no spark. No ups, no downs, just a drone-like life. I think it is a conspiracy of some sort. For people who are not on these drugs, it can be very difficult to work with those who are. Their house could be on fire, and they will just smile and say "why worry?"

  I am thinking about writing a book: "Living Straight in a Prozac World"

  Poco

  —Poco Read Poco's other letters
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