I have spent most of my career doing academic research on depression and anxiety. I would move heaven and earth to stop any loved ones of mine from taking antidepressants.
I interviewed primary healthcare physicians about antidepressants once. I said "Has any patient ever returned to the surgery after you prescribed antidepressants and told you that they work well?" They all thought for a second and said, "Actually, no."
I also asked the physicians how they think antidepressants work. None of them had a cogent answer.
They told me that they prescribe antidepressants because the waiting list for therapy is over a year long (I am in the UK) and they don't know what else to do with desperate people who come to them for help.
I have had a substantial amount of contact with so-called NHS mental health services over the years. I can honestly say that I can’t recall a single positive outcome or experience. In fact, they invariably made the situation worse. I now see psychiatrists as quacks and drug-pushers and would never see one again, ever. Likewise, I would never voluntarily “engage” with mental health services again - which is a good job really given the state of the UK “health” service. I’ve also got similar feelings about medicine in general since the plandemic and am very selective of what and how I get treatment for my physical ailments. Sadly, the UK is a small place and it’s not easy to find alternative routes for healthcare.
Agreed. I know someone who’s married to a prominent psychiatrist and basically, if they have a disagreement he tries to convince her (gaslight, maybe) she has a “mental illness” and advises her to go on medication! Thankfully, she see’s through it and can shrug it off these days.
Throw them into a boot camp exercise program so they are so tired at night they have to sleep. Send in an organizer to organize them. Clean their junk cupboards and stock with good fresh fruits and veggies. Give them some supplements for nutrients they are low in Vit Bs, and amino acids (tryptophan). Teach them slow cooking and eating - no more convivence food or eating out garbage. Get them into a yoga/meditation class. Make them listen to Mozart and sounds conducive to peace and harmony. Sound therapy. Talk Therapy can wait. Most of the steps above would make a huge difference.
well you offer the drug or the lifestyle, LOL. Most will take drugs. Lazy and desperate. Saddest of all, don't understand why they feel the way they do. In some the organic imbalances in the brain are severe, and in others milder. In the milder forms, the life style, the regimentation, the imposition of good health habits are highly beneficial. I find the ones on drugs have a 'some has to fix me' mentality and not a 'I'll fix myself through working hard at x,y,z'. The severe cases though.. they may need some Ketamine or Pilsobycin (sp?)
So you feel that you are authorised to impose your chosen regimen or mood altering drugs known not to work without the consent of the patients. Interesting. You might be the authoritarian your prescriptions suggest. Presumably you'd use psilocybin to obtain uninformed and incompetent consent if you were expected to show some other authority evidence of consent. Or go straight to rohipnol?
The whippings will continue until morale improves to your sort, eh?
Do some reading - here (yes, it is from MSM and probably grain of salt needed)
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/psilocybin-treatment-for-major-depression-effective-for-up-to-a-year-for-most-patients-study-shows So there you are! Noted: used with caution and supervision. And as for Ketamine https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6767816/ So, they work. Question is, many depressive episodes that are milder resolve themselves. The severe cases are the ones that are the question of what is happening here? And which are much much harder to treat and definitely the brain chemistry IS out of whack. But there's much that isn't understood. Talk therapy does very little good in the serious severe cases IMHOP. But neither does the current SSRI inhibitors or other drugs. And yes, my *recommendations* would certainly help a lot of overwhelmed in poor health persons improve if nothing else physically. I believe my approach is covered under Mens sana in corpore sano - Roman poet, Juvenal. I take to mean only a healthy body can produce or sustain a healthy mind. (Its most general usage is to express the hierarchy of needs: with physical and mental health at the root. )
Agree 💯. When you learn to respect and pay attention to depression and pain as valuable signals in order to correct course, you'll never want to quiet it with medication of any sort again. Even small amounts of alcohol, cigs, etc can be dulling the pain you would otherwise be motivated to find relief from by realigning your life, purpose, relationships etc.
I like how this guy did it. He simplified to the extreme. Got rid of all drugs and addictions, decided to kick lifelong depression, and has never been happier:
"Food grows on trees. Water falls from the sky. Oil is never-ending. Squats, push-ups, & crunches are free. And: It doesn't cost you one thin dime to treat others as YOU would be treated. Believe it or not: Earth is an abundant place. You've just been trained to live in scarcity. Why hold on to a system that's collapsing all around you? To Hell with it.
One of the tenants of Buddhist beliefs is that " life is full of suffering, and the sooner you accept that, the happier you will be. " I truly believe that.
There is an insightful piece by the Midwestern Doctor, which has been updated after the recent events. It illustrates the connection between violent crime and SSRI/SNRI.
I also read for a while through a self-help forum where people assist each other to taper off these drugs. It's obviously a major problem to stop taking them, judged by the discussion. People celebrate it as a major achievement once they are completely off the meds, a process which can take years.
thank you for your testimony. 14 years ago, my husband committed suicide while on antidepressants. Later on I was told, that when they come out of the deepest dark, they finally find 'the courage' to do it. A few days after he left the hospital. In 2 weeks ik will be 14 years but the pain is still there.
I love the Rat Park experiments. Really spot-on article, Mathew. I'd add the lack of meaning to exercise and good food, and I think they could all be related. We don't do the physical labor of maintaining our own lives and caring for each other, which is meaning in the simplest terms. I did a YT episode on Bruce Alexander, and mostly Gabor Mate's conversations with Russell Brand. It was pre-Substack so no text version, but one of my favorites. The Epiphany Jumpstart: https://youtu.be/erwJwvid4o4.
I always suspected Eli Lilly paid Elizabeth Wurtzel to write Prozac Nation. They certainly employed PR firms around the world to co-ordinate a global campaign.
In 1971, when LY110141 - the compound that became Prozac - was developed, it was first tested as a treatment for high blood pressure, which worked in some animals but not in humans. Plan B was as an anti-obesity agent, but it didn't work for that, either. When tested on psychotic patients and those hospitalised with depression, LY110141 - by now named Fluoxetine - had no obvious benefit, with a number of patients getting worse.
Finally, Eli Lilly tested it on mild depressives. Five recruits tried it; all five marginally improved. Although in large scale RCTs it is barely better than placebo. Nowadays, it provides Eli Lilly with more than 25 per cent of its $10bn revenue.
Indeed, learning to deal with one's issues, and other peoples shit, is one of the keys to personal survival. The increasingly prevalent susceptible 'touchy feely' everyone's a victim mindset isn't helping, those who would qualify as stowics are seen as unfeeling by many for whom chemical happiness is a daily requirement, as I know from experience.
Neil, I agree. I am an “unfeeling stoic” simply because I do not get emotional about every little thing. Consequently, that makes me somehow unqualified to speak about the subject of depression, or to care about the fact that all four of my kids (they are adults) have been on anti-depressants at one time or another. It breaks my heart, and for an “unfeeling stoic”, that’s saying a lot.
I was on Zoloft for 30+ years. When the “pandemic” hit, I was skeptical from the get go...about everything. While delving into Substack articles and research on the vaxxines, I read a lot about the harms of antidepressants and knew I needed to stop taking Zoloft.
Knowing it would might be difficult, over the course of 6 weeks, I gradually weaned myself off of it. During that time I also started taking Magnesium supplements. Save for a week or so of random crying bouts, snapping at a few co-workers (who kind of deserved it), and times where I questioned my choice, I’m happy to say that I’ve been off of it for 6 months now and am doing just fine!
Your interview with Kim was fantastic, I joined her threads and have been reposting both. We got into a further conversation about grief being described in the DSM as a short term condition, after which antidepressants are indicated. 🤯
When I first heard the term ANTI-Depressant I laughed at its oxymoronic nature, as Depression has a clear obverse, which is Happiness. But as your gang knew, Mathew, Happy Pills is a derisive term, so they couldn't call them that!
As a Chinese Medicine guy, its clear that Depression is a signal that something in your life is out of order, and as always, masking it with drugs can only result in further disturbance to a cascade of neurological responses.
In my work as a drug educator, I spent years looking at our highly profitable licit pharmacological lobotomization industry, its antecedents, methodology, as well as its illicit parallels. They will conduct whatever studies necessary to model a condition to the known effects of a drug, then market that condition and remedy to the public.
"Soma" is the all-purpose drug Aldous Huxley created in Brave New World to ensure a docile, compliant citizenry. We're consuming trillions of dollars worth of it every year.
We are programmable. It's a matter of forming good habits and positive patterns of thought. Something simple like a daily walk in the park can make the difference between a good day and a bad day. I don't watch the TV news and not much TV at all. It's a downer. We get positive feedback by doing things. Do something.
Very true about a daily walk. I started walking every evening after work to alleviate back pain. At 73, have kept it up for 35 years, usually 2-3 miles daily. It clears my head, helps with stiffness, and can reflect on nature.
Adjusting our internal programming is a life long project. Parents and teachers can give children a head start, but only if they have good habits themselves. We have to find our own path eventually.
I have anxiety and I have a bit of ADHD. I have always been urged to take the SSRI's. My own research and reading lead me to say NO WAY JOSE. I saw my overweight friend at work get diagnosed as a depressive with anxiety and watched her balloon out. I had a boss on anti anxiety meds always portly fat and smoking and fake jolly, in short nearly everyone I worked with was on it. Some of them also drank. I realized in short order: 1 in 10 or more are not in their right minds (medicated) 2. the meds don't do much for them but destroy what health they do have (obesity and lack of drive and/or smothering inquiring minds). Perfect for the Big Harmas.
One of the best writers, researchers and practitioners on this subject is Dr David Healy. If you don’t know his work, I would heartily recommend spending some time getting to know it.
I have spoken with Dr. Healy before, and we are planning to invite him to a roundtable discussion this year. I hope that he will accept and join us when we reach out to him.
As a gawky adolescent with braces and headgear who developed crippling agoraphobia and panic attacks with nausea at the thought of facing grade ten in a new school after moving to a new town, I was prescribed Stelazine, a powerful fluorinated tranquilizer I learned years later was for psychotic schizophrenia, and a known cause of Parkinson's and tardive dyskinesia. It made me a zombie (but panic-free). I took it 'as needed' until I made friends and got involved in sports and clubs. Duh. But the damage was done to my CNS and thyroid.
As the dad of a 17 year old who is dealing with all kinds of depression and emotional regulation issues (as well as multiple autoimmune disorders), I can unequivocally say that the childhood vaccine schedule is the root cause of the dramatic increase we've seen in anxiety/depression disorders. There are certainly co-factors, but the massive increase in the vaccination schedule since the early 90s is the elephant in the room.
The aluminum salts in the vaccines are getting into children's brains at a very young age and unplugging/disrupting growth of the neurons. The more acute cases are obvious to see (autism, speech delay, severe ADHD), but there's a whole nother tier of issues that generally don't fully manifest until puberty, when the brain takes another big leap forward towards adulthood. This can manifest in multiple ways. Inability to socialize correctly is a big one, but unexplained anxiety and depression.
We have tried everything with our sun from a diet, exercise, lifestyle standpoint but nothing seems to really move the needle all that much. I'm staunchly against ssri therapy, as I know the potential for violence and suicide lurk there.
Oh yes, I've been following his work for some time. Unfortunately damage to the neural network and the immune system is very difficult to undo. Just coping as best as we can...and trying to warn as many people as possible of the immense risk they are taking if they follow the CDC's childhood schedule
I completely agree.
I have spent most of my career doing academic research on depression and anxiety. I would move heaven and earth to stop any loved ones of mine from taking antidepressants.
I interviewed primary healthcare physicians about antidepressants once. I said "Has any patient ever returned to the surgery after you prescribed antidepressants and told you that they work well?" They all thought for a second and said, "Actually, no."
I also asked the physicians how they think antidepressants work. None of them had a cogent answer.
They told me that they prescribe antidepressants because the waiting list for therapy is over a year long (I am in the UK) and they don't know what else to do with desperate people who come to them for help.
One thing psychiatrists will say when a patient complains about the drugs 'not working': Just think how bad it would be if you weren't on them.
Now where’ve I heard that argument recently 🤔 !?
I have had a substantial amount of contact with so-called NHS mental health services over the years. I can honestly say that I can’t recall a single positive outcome or experience. In fact, they invariably made the situation worse. I now see psychiatrists as quacks and drug-pushers and would never see one again, ever. Likewise, I would never voluntarily “engage” with mental health services again - which is a good job really given the state of the UK “health” service. I’ve also got similar feelings about medicine in general since the plandemic and am very selective of what and how I get treatment for my physical ailments. Sadly, the UK is a small place and it’s not easy to find alternative routes for healthcare.
You do right. I have worked with psychiatrists for most of my career and I would never suggest anybody consult them. Psychiatry is basically a sham.
It is completely dehumanising and the drugs they hand out have worse side effects than the diseases they are supposed to treat.
Agreed. I know someone who’s married to a prominent psychiatrist and basically, if they have a disagreement he tries to convince her (gaslight, maybe) she has a “mental illness” and advises her to go on medication! Thankfully, she see’s through it and can shrug it off these days.
A psychiatrist once said to me, "Imagine how bad she'd be if not married to me," after I mentioned that his wife was unstable.
I replied, "Or else she might be perfectly normal."
Throw them into a boot camp exercise program so they are so tired at night they have to sleep. Send in an organizer to organize them. Clean their junk cupboards and stock with good fresh fruits and veggies. Give them some supplements for nutrients they are low in Vit Bs, and amino acids (tryptophan). Teach them slow cooking and eating - no more convivence food or eating out garbage. Get them into a yoga/meditation class. Make them listen to Mozart and sounds conducive to peace and harmony. Sound therapy. Talk Therapy can wait. Most of the steps above would make a huge difference.
Do they get to consent to any of these measures? Asking for a libertarian. . .
well you offer the drug or the lifestyle, LOL. Most will take drugs. Lazy and desperate. Saddest of all, don't understand why they feel the way they do. In some the organic imbalances in the brain are severe, and in others milder. In the milder forms, the life style, the regimentation, the imposition of good health habits are highly beneficial. I find the ones on drugs have a 'some has to fix me' mentality and not a 'I'll fix myself through working hard at x,y,z'. The severe cases though.. they may need some Ketamine or Pilsobycin (sp?)
psilocybin is a mind altering mushroom
So you feel that you are authorised to impose your chosen regimen or mood altering drugs known not to work without the consent of the patients. Interesting. You might be the authoritarian your prescriptions suggest. Presumably you'd use psilocybin to obtain uninformed and incompetent consent if you were expected to show some other authority evidence of consent. Or go straight to rohipnol?
The whippings will continue until morale improves to your sort, eh?
Do some reading - here (yes, it is from MSM and probably grain of salt needed)
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/psilocybin-treatment-for-major-depression-effective-for-up-to-a-year-for-most-patients-study-shows So there you are! Noted: used with caution and supervision. And as for Ketamine https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6767816/ So, they work. Question is, many depressive episodes that are milder resolve themselves. The severe cases are the ones that are the question of what is happening here? And which are much much harder to treat and definitely the brain chemistry IS out of whack. But there's much that isn't understood. Talk therapy does very little good in the serious severe cases IMHOP. But neither does the current SSRI inhibitors or other drugs. And yes, my *recommendations* would certainly help a lot of overwhelmed in poor health persons improve if nothing else physically. I believe my approach is covered under Mens sana in corpore sano - Roman poet, Juvenal. I take to mean only a healthy body can produce or sustain a healthy mind. (Its most general usage is to express the hierarchy of needs: with physical and mental health at the root. )
We could assemble the desperate people seeking help into cadres and overthrow the system. You know, in our copious spare time.
Agree 💯. When you learn to respect and pay attention to depression and pain as valuable signals in order to correct course, you'll never want to quiet it with medication of any sort again. Even small amounts of alcohol, cigs, etc can be dulling the pain you would otherwise be motivated to find relief from by realigning your life, purpose, relationships etc.
I like how this guy did it. He simplified to the extreme. Got rid of all drugs and addictions, decided to kick lifelong depression, and has never been happier:
"Food grows on trees. Water falls from the sky. Oil is never-ending. Squats, push-ups, & crunches are free. And: It doesn't cost you one thin dime to treat others as YOU would be treated. Believe it or not: Earth is an abundant place. You've just been trained to live in scarcity. Why hold on to a system that's collapsing all around you? To Hell with it.
Build your own system."
https://gab.com/JeffSekerak
Here's another approach: There is no debt, no crime, no homelessness and everyone has a job - but none of them earn a salary.
(better than the utopia Klaus Schwabbie has planned... maybe)
https://www.kentlive.news/news/kent-news/darvell-bruderhof-radical-community-near-5789803
And suffering is, to some extent, a normal event. There are better ways to manage without pills.
One of the tenants of Buddhist beliefs is that " life is full of suffering, and the sooner you accept that, the happier you will be. " I truly believe that.
Life being full of suffering is a tenant of all religions.
When religious traditions are jettisoned, people don't know how to make meaning of their suffering.
Yes! Realigning our life of relationships instead of drug-induced acceptance.
I suspect that ‘happy pills’ are a crucial part of the ‘you will own nothing and be happy’ equation.
And ADD medication
There is an insightful piece by the Midwestern Doctor, which has been updated after the recent events. It illustrates the connection between violent crime and SSRI/SNRI.
https://amidwesterndoctor.substack.com/p/the-decades-of-evidence-that-antidepressants
I also read for a while through a self-help forum where people assist each other to taper off these drugs. It's obviously a major problem to stop taking them, judged by the discussion. People celebrate it as a major achievement once they are completely off the meds, a process which can take years.
thank you for your testimony. 14 years ago, my husband committed suicide while on antidepressants. Later on I was told, that when they come out of the deepest dark, they finally find 'the courage' to do it. A few days after he left the hospital. In 2 weeks ik will be 14 years but the pain is still there.
I'm sorry to hear this, but I thank you for sharing the story. It is important that people hear enough to at least investigate the issues involved.
I'm so terribly sorry.
It's not uncommon, unfortunately.
I love the Rat Park experiments. Really spot-on article, Mathew. I'd add the lack of meaning to exercise and good food, and I think they could all be related. We don't do the physical labor of maintaining our own lives and caring for each other, which is meaning in the simplest terms. I did a YT episode on Bruce Alexander, and mostly Gabor Mate's conversations with Russell Brand. It was pre-Substack so no text version, but one of my favorites. The Epiphany Jumpstart: https://youtu.be/erwJwvid4o4.
I always suspected Eli Lilly paid Elizabeth Wurtzel to write Prozac Nation. They certainly employed PR firms around the world to co-ordinate a global campaign.
In 1971, when LY110141 - the compound that became Prozac - was developed, it was first tested as a treatment for high blood pressure, which worked in some animals but not in humans. Plan B was as an anti-obesity agent, but it didn't work for that, either. When tested on psychotic patients and those hospitalised with depression, LY110141 - by now named Fluoxetine - had no obvious benefit, with a number of patients getting worse.
Finally, Eli Lilly tested it on mild depressives. Five recruits tried it; all five marginally improved. Although in large scale RCTs it is barely better than placebo. Nowadays, it provides Eli Lilly with more than 25 per cent of its $10bn revenue.
An article by Ray Peat regarding SSRIs, including a note that the US military was looking for something that countered the anti-serotonin effects of LSD, which boosted creativity, playfulness--and insubordination. https://raypeat.com/articles/articles/serotonin-depression-aggression.shtml
Thanks for that.
Fascinating.
When people took pills instead of learning life lessons that depression was there to teach....err then we were owned by the big pharma
But first came the stressors. I suspect that these were intentionally introduced to tear America apart, but that's a conversation for another day.
Indeed, learning to deal with one's issues, and other peoples shit, is one of the keys to personal survival. The increasingly prevalent susceptible 'touchy feely' everyone's a victim mindset isn't helping, those who would qualify as stowics are seen as unfeeling by many for whom chemical happiness is a daily requirement, as I know from experience.
Neil, I agree. I am an “unfeeling stoic” simply because I do not get emotional about every little thing. Consequently, that makes me somehow unqualified to speak about the subject of depression, or to care about the fact that all four of my kids (they are adults) have been on anti-depressants at one time or another. It breaks my heart, and for an “unfeeling stoic”, that’s saying a lot.
I was on Zoloft for 30+ years. When the “pandemic” hit, I was skeptical from the get go...about everything. While delving into Substack articles and research on the vaxxines, I read a lot about the harms of antidepressants and knew I needed to stop taking Zoloft.
Knowing it would might be difficult, over the course of 6 weeks, I gradually weaned myself off of it. During that time I also started taking Magnesium supplements. Save for a week or so of random crying bouts, snapping at a few co-workers (who kind of deserved it), and times where I questioned my choice, I’m happy to say that I’ve been off of it for 6 months now and am doing just fine!
Congratulations. I hope you find all your best solutions.
Your interview with Kim was fantastic, I joined her threads and have been reposting both. We got into a further conversation about grief being described in the DSM as a short term condition, after which antidepressants are indicated. 🤯
When I first heard the term ANTI-Depressant I laughed at its oxymoronic nature, as Depression has a clear obverse, which is Happiness. But as your gang knew, Mathew, Happy Pills is a derisive term, so they couldn't call them that!
As a Chinese Medicine guy, its clear that Depression is a signal that something in your life is out of order, and as always, masking it with drugs can only result in further disturbance to a cascade of neurological responses.
In my work as a drug educator, I spent years looking at our highly profitable licit pharmacological lobotomization industry, its antecedents, methodology, as well as its illicit parallels. They will conduct whatever studies necessary to model a condition to the known effects of a drug, then market that condition and remedy to the public.
Create a solution, create a problem
Sound familiar?
My dear, talented, beautiful friend took her own life because of the unbearable pain of coming off Cymbalta. I write about it here: https://marypoindextermclaughlin.substack.com/p/the-unseen-element.
"Soma" is the all-purpose drug Aldous Huxley created in Brave New World to ensure a docile, compliant citizenry. We're consuming trillions of dollars worth of it every year.
We are programmable. It's a matter of forming good habits and positive patterns of thought. Something simple like a daily walk in the park can make the difference between a good day and a bad day. I don't watch the TV news and not much TV at all. It's a downer. We get positive feedback by doing things. Do something.
Very true about a daily walk. I started walking every evening after work to alleviate back pain. At 73, have kept it up for 35 years, usually 2-3 miles daily. It clears my head, helps with stiffness, and can reflect on nature.
Exactly. The biofeedback and subsequent positive self talk/awareness that envelopes me as a human doing versus a human being is utterly profound.
Adjusting our internal programming is a life long project. Parents and teachers can give children a head start, but only if they have good habits themselves. We have to find our own path eventually.
I have anxiety and I have a bit of ADHD. I have always been urged to take the SSRI's. My own research and reading lead me to say NO WAY JOSE. I saw my overweight friend at work get diagnosed as a depressive with anxiety and watched her balloon out. I had a boss on anti anxiety meds always portly fat and smoking and fake jolly, in short nearly everyone I worked with was on it. Some of them also drank. I realized in short order: 1 in 10 or more are not in their right minds (medicated) 2. the meds don't do much for them but destroy what health they do have (obesity and lack of drive and/or smothering inquiring minds). Perfect for the Big Harmas.
One of the best writers, researchers and practitioners on this subject is Dr David Healy. If you don’t know his work, I would heartily recommend spending some time getting to know it.
https://davidhealy.org/
I have spoken with Dr. Healy before, and we are planning to invite him to a roundtable discussion this year. I hope that he will accept and join us when we reach out to him.
As a gawky adolescent with braces and headgear who developed crippling agoraphobia and panic attacks with nausea at the thought of facing grade ten in a new school after moving to a new town, I was prescribed Stelazine, a powerful fluorinated tranquilizer I learned years later was for psychotic schizophrenia, and a known cause of Parkinson's and tardive dyskinesia. It made me a zombie (but panic-free). I took it 'as needed' until I made friends and got involved in sports and clubs. Duh. But the damage was done to my CNS and thyroid.
Thank you for sharing. They targeted you as a life-long customer. It's doubly sickness the way children are targeted.
As the dad of a 17 year old who is dealing with all kinds of depression and emotional regulation issues (as well as multiple autoimmune disorders), I can unequivocally say that the childhood vaccine schedule is the root cause of the dramatic increase we've seen in anxiety/depression disorders. There are certainly co-factors, but the massive increase in the vaccination schedule since the early 90s is the elephant in the room.
The aluminum salts in the vaccines are getting into children's brains at a very young age and unplugging/disrupting growth of the neurons. The more acute cases are obvious to see (autism, speech delay, severe ADHD), but there's a whole nother tier of issues that generally don't fully manifest until puberty, when the brain takes another big leap forward towards adulthood. This can manifest in multiple ways. Inability to socialize correctly is a big one, but unexplained anxiety and depression.
We have tried everything with our sun from a diet, exercise, lifestyle standpoint but nothing seems to really move the needle all that much. I'm staunchly against ssri therapy, as I know the potential for violence and suicide lurk there.
Brendan, you're completely correct about the aluminium.
Have you heard of Prof Chris Exley? He's the foremost aluminium toxicity researcher in the world.
He says the aluminium can be bound up and excreted. See here: https://www.hippocraticpost.com/nursing/why-everyone-should-drink-silicon-rich-mineral-water/amp/
Oh yes, I've been following his work for some time. Unfortunately damage to the neural network and the immune system is very difficult to undo. Just coping as best as we can...and trying to warn as many people as possible of the immense risk they are taking if they follow the CDC's childhood schedule