Editorial Note: This post is by James Bennett who is organizing RxISK research on PSSD.
In the last two decades there has been an explosion in the number of children being prescribed a range of drugs including antidepressants, antipsychotics and stimulants.
There is also a dramatic increase in the number of children exposed to these drugs, especially antidepressants, before they are born. Doctors often play down the risk of taking medications during pregnancy, particularly SSRI antidepressants. But, SSRIs can cause birth defects, and there is a large body of evidence now linking them to autistic spectrum disorders.
SSRIs can be shown to have a profound effect on brain chemistry after only a single dose. If they pay close attention to it, almost everyone who takes their first dose of an SSRI will be aware of some degree of reduced genital sensitivity within 30 minutes of taking the dose.
If an expectant mother is taking an SSRI, so is the unborn baby. It is also important to note that all antidepressants transfer into breast milk.
A previous article on RxISK by Adam Urato MD, discussed the growing evidence linking SSRI use during pregnancy to an array of birth defects, with increasing concern and emerging evidence that there may be long-term neurological and behavioural effects. I would encourage anyone interested in the topic of antidepressants and pregnancy to read it.
Implications for sexuality
Besides the immediate and almost universal numbing effect of SSRIs, a very large proportion of both men and women who take these drugs experience some degree of reduced sexual functioning. In some cases, these side-effects can persist even after the drugs are stopped, or can sometimes begin suddenly on discontinuation of the drug. The problem can arise from just a few days exposure and may last for years or indefinitely for some people.
When the problem endures after treatment, this new condition is called Post-SSRI Sexual Dysfunction (PSSD) and has been covered extensively on RxISK.
A recently published paper on one hundred and twenty cases of enduring sexual dysfunction from RxISK added to the existing peer-reviewed medical literature on PSSD, and reported enduring sexual side-effects from a variety of drugs including SSRIs, antipsychotics, finasteride (Propecia), and isotretinoin which is used to treat acne. We now have approximately three hundred cases.
Given what we know about enduring sexual problems caused by SSRIs, it is reasonable to wonder how a prenatal or childhood exposure would affect a person’s long-term development and functioning. No studies have ever been done to investigate whether children exposed to psychotropic drugs either directly, or during pregnancy, grow up to have an unaffected sexuality.
The only research that has been done has used animals. All studies reported to date have shown that rodents exposed to SSRIs during pregnancy or at a young age, exhibited reduced sexual interest and behavior as adults.
There is a clear implication that we could see the emergence of a large group of people whose perception of sexuality is quite different. A group of people who may not understand what it means to be sexually attracted to someone. How they would live in a world with people who all experience feelings for which they would have no frame of reference, is an uncharted area.
If such a group of people existed today, they would likely attempt to seek out others like themselves, on-line.
AVEN
The Asexual Visibility and Education Network (AVEN) was founded in 2001, and hosts the world’s largest asexual community. Their website is asexuality.org, and it includes a great deal of information for those who think they might be asexual, as well as for friends and family. There is also an on-line forum.
The defining characteristic of members of the asexual community is that they do not experience sexual attraction. Some, not all, engage in relationships and form romantic couplings, but without the desire for sex. Those who experience romantic attraction are often attracted to a particular gender, and in that sense they conform to the traditional profiles of straight, gay and bi.
Those who have engaged in sexual activity, often report little or no enjoyment.
Some within the community are unconcerned by their lack of sexuality, and are content within themselves and with their lives. Others appear to have a more difficult time, feeling isolated and outsiders in a world that is overwhelmingly occupied by “sexuals”.
Many of their members are young adults who are looking for answers.
The community is very diverse, and there are some who identify as variations of asexuals. These are people who do experience some degree of sexual attraction, but only rarely, in certain circumstances, or with low intensity.
Asexuality may be a natural variation of the human condition. It likely didn’t come into existence because of prescription drugs. But, as it increases in visibility, it is important to consider the possibility that at least some now connecting with the community may have been exposed to harmful medications, in childhood or during pregnancy. Serotonin reuptake inhibiting antidepressants first began to be used by pregnant women over fifty years ago.
Similarities
Some parallels can be drawn between the asexual community and those affected by medications.
People with PSSD and related conditions can experience diminished sexual attraction and desire, as well as a reduction in physical erogenous sensation, including weak or muted orgasms. Those who are able to engage in sexual activity describe the process as feeling somewhat mechanical, and very different to how it used to be. They describe a sense that something fundamental is missing, and say that it feels as though their entire sexuality has been switched off or significantly reduced.
Many who suffer from PSSD are extremely troubled by their condition. But interestingly, others are completely at ease with it, showing no concern for the harm that has befallen them. They seem to lose the connection to how they used to be, and simply become accustomed to the “new normal”.
This is one of the reasons why sexual side-effects are under-reported. When it comes to identifying those who are harmed by medications, it is those who don’t shout that are the hardest to find.
If someone was affected in this way from birth or at a young age, and never developed normally, perhaps they would be equally at ease with their impaired sexuality, since they wouldn’t have a baseline to compare it to.
A hidden legacy?
Faced with defects at birth or autism at a young age, a parent might question a link to a medication that was taken during pregnancy. But, given the very personal nature of sexual problems, and the length of time before they might emerge in a teenager or young adult, it is unlikely that a connection would be made.
It seems reasonable to assume that people could be affected in different ways and to varying degrees. While some may feel that asexuality is a good fit for what they are experiencing, there could also be young adults who are completely sexual, but nevertheless feel that something about their functioning is different to others.
Could we be creating a whole new generation of people shaped by medications before they have reached adulthood, and some before they were even born?
If we are, then it is hugely important that this issue is brought into the spotlight.
Is anyone there?
We are appealing not only to the asexual community, but to anyone who might identify with the issues in this article. We ask that you give thought to any medications that you may have been exposed to over the years, or during pregnancy. It might be useful to pay particular attention to antidepressants, antipsychotics, and isotretinoin which is used for acne.
There are almost certainly other drugs that can cause enduring sexual problems, that haven’t yet been widely reported. Pain-killers like Tramadol, herbals like St John’s wort, and anti-nausea drugs like doxylamine (Diclegis) are serotonin reuptake inhibitors, with doxylamine widely used in pregnancy for morning sickness.
If you think you might have been affected in this way, please get in touch and help raise the profile of this issue. You can file a RxISK report by clicking here. Please record the side-effect as either asexuality, Post-SSRI Sexual Dysfunction or Post Drug Sexual Dysfunction.
All and any comments are welcome – please post at the end of this article.
Patient X says
The only people who know the reality of what it is like to take these drugs and more importantly what it is like to stop taking these drugs are those who have taken them and these are the most important voices to listen to, they are the only true examples of first hand empirical evidence.
Having taken these drugs, what I suffer from now is totally unrelated to the “depression” I suffered before taking them. I thought they were risk free, I thought they would help me through a difficult stage in my life, not destroy my very being and the rest of my life. Suffering from anti-depressants is so much worse than suffering from the “depression” I had before. Anti-depressants are madness and those who prescribe them are dangerously deluded.
Jovvo says
Thank you for this excellent article. The asexuality and antidepressant link needs to be brought into the spotlight. The public needs to be warned that these drugs can and do cause a permanent lose in sexuality.
Jim says
Speaking on this, does anyone here feel like they have PSSD, or have had it and actually recovered from it? I feel like I do have it and have for a few years with no real improvement. I have tried cabergoline and testosterone treatments and they haven’t done anything. It is extremely scary and almost can start defining you as a man. I can see how someone can freak out and become suicidal, etc when you feel like it isn’t going to ever improve after a while. If you never experienced the feelings and started on medication very young, I could see kinda not knowing what you are missing out on, but when you have felt it before and you lose it, it is a whole new level of depression. If there is anything I can do to help research on this, I would be happy to help. I wish I could have physical tests done!
Anon. says
I am sorry to say it appears to be permanent. Since the SSRI damage and addiction, I have tried selegiline, bupropion, mirtazapine, reboxetine, moclobemide, St John’s wort, ginseng, ginkgo biloba; all short term, but none of them bring back what has been burned out. I have even tried in my desperation, doses of cannabis, cocaine and amphetamine and even they don’t work. It is like pouring petrol on an extinguished fire. Apparently my total testosterone is in the normal range. The SSRI damage is permanent and my life has been destroyed. I have no sexual reaction whatever the situation and if you don’t respond to that stimulus, nothing else matters, it’s like you are already dead. High flying professional career is rendered pointless and is down the drain, destined to remain single and childless the rest of my life and a once great personality has been carved out of my brain and thrown away. GPs act as if they know better than the patient what it is like to take SSRI poison, they put the withdrawal effects and permanent damage the drug has caused down to “the disease returning”, or “they are just side effects”, like if you put the word “side” in front of “effect”, it is no longer a real effect and doesn’t really matter. They may as well say that lung cancer is just a side effect of smoking, so keep on smoking. These drugs are horrific, the drug companies and their accessories the GPs must be mad. What is it that makes GPs so arrogant and ignorant regarding the truth about SSRIs? At what point do GPs completely lose their capacity for independent critical analysis and reasoning? Knowing what it is like to take citalopram and what it does, leads me to conclude that the drug company – GP alliance is criminally insane, in that they hand this stuff out to even treat premature ejaculation. It is complete and utter madness, it really is.
Jovvo says
You are right, I don’t believe there is any recovery in PSSD. SSRIs and psych drugs change the brain’s structure and reduce connectivity to parts of the brain. I don’t see how any drug could or time could “reverse” that.
These drugs truly are a crime against humanity. I used to be happy, healthy young man with a high sex drive and dreams of one day falling in love and having kids. But I let medication propaganda fool me and make me decide to try an SSRI for my completely normal social anxiety. My social anxiety is gone and so is every other human emotion I used to have. I had no idea that’s how these drugs “worked” to relieve anxiety and sadness. I want to cry because I can’t feel sex or love anymore. The two things that make life worth living.
Antidepressants cause depression and suicide. Simple as that. Its even on the “side effect” sheet, but nobody thinks twice about it because the drugs are called “antidepressants”. Everyone on these drugs cries about how real depression is only after they touch these drugs. Nobody sees that its actually the drugs that have made everyone so suicidally depressed. Well over 80% of all suicide victims took psych drugs like antidepressants at some point. People don’t look twice at that figure because it “makes sense”. It really doesn’t.
The FDA needs to put warnings on these drugs for permanent brain changes and effects. Such as emotional loss and sexuality loss. These effects are what’s causing everyone exposed to these drugs to commit suicide. That’s why all these people are so depressed. They can’t feel good emotions anymore like love, happiness, or empathy and they can’t enjoy life’s most pleasurable experiences anymore which is sex. Look at all the horrific murders and mass shooters who were on these drugs. The media will never report it because the drug companies are huge sponsors for nearly all media sources.
Sadly, the world will continue to turn and antidepressant users will continue in their uncaring numb existence and tell everyone that everything is fine when they take their numbing drugs. They will continue to warn everyone else in the world that they need to get help for their “depression” or else they could end up like them. They act like anyone can catch depression like its a contagious disease that can sneak up on you. Its the antidepression drugs doing all this and its disturbingly ironic.
What’s horrible is doctors are telling pregnant mothers to stay on their antidepressants and that the drugs are safe for the baby. We are creating asexual children with mental problems like autism and who knows what else with these drugs. And science is “still searching” for the cause of the rate increase for autism and mental illness? They must know, but the pharma companies are probably paying off whoever to keep the studies from being funded.
The drugs are destroying humanity and nobody sees it.
Ove says
Every Word you say is true.
These sinister pills makes people numb.
If you become numb, in just about the right amount, you are one to call these pills a gift from God.
On the other hand, if the numbness becomes to great, as for me and perhaps you, the pill is the gateway to Hades.
I’m no scientist, but this far I have not seen any better explanation to how these meds work!
To move forward, as humans, there is no place for SSRI’s.
Not until we can guarantee that the “numbing effect” cannot become to great in any individual. Because the outcome of “numb people” is people who stops caring about the next person. If you don’t care anymore, then a school-shooting becomes a viable option in your distorted brain.
But even among us, the critics, there are those who don’t fully accept the outcome!
John S. says
I am planning to end my life due to PSSD and anhedonia/apathy. Congratulations to psychiatrists around the world!! Congratulations to SSRI’s. Heartiest congratulations!
Johanna says
Dear John (and Michael and Bob as well) – Maybe this doesn’t even need saying, but we all really want you to stay alive! You are clearly good and thoughtful guys, and if nothing else you have a passion to find the answer to your problem and warn other people. (That counts for something, as bad as it feels. There are folks who can’t feel sorrow or grief at all on drugs, but you’re not among them.)
As one who’s wrestled with suicidal thoughts I know it’s possible to start feeling like suicide might be a cry of protest at least—like it might make folks understand what you’ve suffered in a way you can’t seem to do while you’re alive. That’s baloney, of course, and we’re all too mature and realistic to believe it, right? So that feeling goes underground, where it still has its effect. I say that because it was the most useful thing a doctor told me while I was in this state. He used the fact that we were both atheists to good effect: “You and I know that this life is all we have. You would never come back to tell me why you did it, and even if we thought we understood, it would make no difference.” I “knew” that of course, but his reminder shook me out of my bad reveries for awhile. So I pass it along.
These are weird drugs whose effects we haven’t nearly understood. In the past six years I feel I’ve recovered about 50% in emotional and sexual terms from thirty years of bombardment with every class of antidepressants in the book. Many others bounce back from the sexual suppression of SSRI’s very quickly – there are even a few freaky people who can take these drugs all week and go off them every weekend so they can have sex. I can see how that fact would appear a torment – I try to take it as a sign of hope. The bloody things aren’t all-powerful, and we’ll learn more about their tricks as time goes on.
If you can’t say NO to suicide right now, just say Later, OK? Put it off for a week or a month at a time. And stay in touch with each other because having someone who knows what you’re going through is the best thing. And good luck.
John S. says
Thanks for your words -I really appreciate it. But PSSD is permanent and without sexuality there is no life. I am already dead, therefore I don’t care about suicide. The only solution for PSSD sufferers is to Kill their psychiatrists so that people can realize the real picture of these poisons. It is one of the biggest fraud in the history of humanity. Ιt is one of the biggest crimes in the history of humanity.
Dr. David Healy says
Are you proposing a movie – a medical version of the movie Calvary – See Father Munchausen I presume – on davidhealy.org?
Johanna says
No, I think he’s mulling over that most American form of suicide: “Go out in a blaze of glory” (a.k.a. gunfire) and take at least a couple of the bastards with you. We have a lot of this, sad to say. Some of it may be a direct effect of SSRI antidepressants and other psych meds. I know a lot of folks in other countries find it hard to explain any other way.
There’s no glory in it, John. In the end you are simply seen as a loser … worse yet, as one of the “dangerous mentally ill” whom we need to medicate, by force if necessary. Your victim, if remembered at all, will be remembered with more sympathy than he would have earned in life. And you will be gone, that’s all folks, story over, no need to deal with you anymore.
I think this idea tempts us as Americans and haunts our culture for a lot of reasons. Fear, isolation, ready access to guns – and the behavior of those in power! Our government gets more militarized and more addicted to violence every year. You could say the same for the banks, big employers, etc. etc. (and Hollywood for sure!) Pretty soon our very minds get militarized without our knowing it.
How’s that for an intellectual rant, huh? All that is just to say … take a deep breath and let that idea go. Seriously.
John S. says
There is no other way to stop this crime -sorry for that. The only reason is: FINANCIAL GAIN…
“I killed my doctor because the pills caused to me permanent emotional anesthesia , permanent sexual impotence. Τhere are many chances the same to happen with you, and then nobody will care for this.”
Nothing more and nothing less than this.
andy says
Well so much for this site’s credibility. By letting this thread run on you’ve made Oz and Mercola look professional.
Anon1 says
John S. I know how you feel. You are not alone. There was life before the drugs, then there were the drugs and now there is nothing. There are many crazy things you can engage in other than suicide, things that might eventually help, other ways of throwing the dice of life up into the air to see how they fall. I don’t know, maybe go travelling, go to the wilderness, take a dog, so you have company and something that needs you and depends on you to be alive. Live simply, re-engage with nature, walk in the woods. What do you have to lose? Try to construct a plan of escape which doesn’t involve your self destruction, then you still have time and with time there is hope. Keep busy with something, so that your thoughts are not permanently turned in on yourself. Take a leap of faith, make a big change, move to a new place, a new climate, anything other than the final solution, you can save that card for later, much later. Best wishes to you.
kiwi says
I am now 4 years paroxetine free after10 yrs use (given to me to cover the manifestations from a cold turkey from Effexor which had been given to me for a sore hand from keyboard overuse) made a drug addict by stealth.
The wdl was ‘hell’ its a miracle I didn’t do a Robin Williams. I have been left very damaged. The damage includes but is not limited to total impotence. I am unable to feel , experience or even manufacture sexual feelings its as if they have been completely vaporized from my being.
I have no doubt that in this area of my life I have been ‘Helen Kellered .
One would have hoped that in 200 or so years the competence of doctors would have improved. Sadly if you think that you are very mistaken!
Michael says
I’m over 8 years post-paroxetine now and have not recovered a spark of my former Libido. 8 years ago I was 24 years old…it’s a tragedy and by far the most traumatic experience in my life. Suicide is an background option for me too.
Bob says
Agree with all of the above, it’s the same for me. As far as suicide goes, there is not a day goes by when such thoughts do not haunt me as a solution to this nothingness. Thing is, the SSRIs have already taken my life. They have left a hole in the middle of my head where my happiness, my daydreams, my fantasies, my memory, my plans, my goals, my personality, my very self used to be. It doesn’t matter how long you wait, the problem never resolves, the brain can’t repair the damage. You could give me a hundred million pounds, fly me to Rio, cover me in chocolate and throw me to a bunch of women and still I would feel NOTHING. Everything is rendered pointless. Emotionally dead.
Bob says
P.S. And just to say, I thought SSRIs would be a laugh. Prozac Nation? Prozac DAMNATION more like!
maeve says
I took Seroxat for 15 years. While still on the drug in 2009, I stopped being able to experience the most basic human emotions. I stopped taking the drug in 2009 hoping things would go back to normal – they never did. I have been 100% sexually dysfunctional with female anorgasmia for the last 5 years. I also suffer from chronic anhedonia and haven’t been able to sleep either in these last 5 years. My circadian clock is all out of sync. I cannot sleep, climax or feel any human emotions. I wish I was dead. There isn’t a day I don’t think about ending my life. None of my family believe my situation or doctor. Everyone is putting it down to mental disorders and a returned depression. I’m emotionally dead. My life has bee taken by GlaxoSmithKline. I will never see a penny for what they have done to me and I will never see a cure. Any compensation would only will given to family members as I have no interest in anything. I do need a house though as my situation made my parents ask me to move out. I am homeless and unemployable a I cannot function. Luckily, I live in rented accommodation paid for by the government. What it all boils down to is me receiving “DISABILITY” checks for something caused by defective SSRI drugs. They said I had a mental disorder and wrote me off for life as having a “DISABILITY”. I have never “FELT” so humiliated in all my life. Before this I worked, earned my own money, had a boyfriend and lived independently. I am now considered a write-off.
Ove says
On the topic of sexuality, I have seen all sides of what SSRI can do.
I have been totally disgusted by emotional and sexual feelings towards women.
I have been sexually promiscous, in search for the next “Buzz”, anything but normal sex could give that Buzz.
Even tried and fantasized about things that aren’t considered sex.
When starting the pills, totally unable to reach climax.
Then slowly the climax came back, but only if extremely aroused or by doing extraordinary sex.
And Believe me, I was once a Young man that was never bothered to look beyond “missionary and doggystyle”.
Giving oral pleasure was the “naughtiest” thing I knew, wich I was in turn disgusted by when on Paxil…….
Jester says
I’m also gonna commit suicide due to SSRI-induced brain damage after I have done all the necessary arrangements. I am now 2 years off and nothing has improved. I am left with the chemical lobotomy and sexual castration.
sarah says
lester
Hon, I contemplated suicide many times, fantasized and idealized the best possible manner in which to leave this planet and be free from the excruciating excuse for existence, this included as to how I would take my daughter with me also.
Had it not have been for the inability to take my daughters life, I would not be here today.
Two, almost three years since my last dose of Venlafaxine, I am still with many Venlafaxine attributed physical and psychological problems, loss of sex drive being merely one of them.
Words on a screen seem so matter of fact but, we know different and we also know, one dysfunction (esp something like sex) leads to a multitude of psychological issues, the cycle just seems endless.
There is no telling as to how any individual feels and how much a person can emotionally tolerate, so I cannot sit here and type `Dont do it, life aint as bad as you think` because I indeed know otherwise.
However, I can offer you a realization that may alter your perception?
You, have a life purpose, unlike the unfortunate many upon many who have taken their lives because of the brutality inflicted onto/into the brain and psyche
YOU ARE FAR, FAR MORE THAN WHAT YOU EVER COULD BELIEVE YOURSELF TO BE!!
You hon, are not a statistic, you are a person, with a real life story to tell, you are worth a million pHARMas with your truth against their lies.
You have the opportunity to educate others. You, unlike the medical profession and profit obsessed pHARMa, you know the truth via first hand experience and knowledge.
Your experience is reality expertise, their text book education and clinical trial observation is nothing in comparison –
YOUR EXPERTISE IS NEEDED IN THIS WORLD HERE AND NOW!!
pHARMa needs people to disappear and/or despair to continue its reign of barbarity but, by standing your ground you alone can prevent someone else from being mentally, emotionally and physically abused/scarred etc, whether you educate one person or a million? You have in effect saved a life or lives and in doing so can save your own because the sense of worth will return to you and when it does? you realize the psyche begins to heal itself
In the two and a half years since my last dose of Venlafaxine, I have prevented 3 people from taking antidepressants on advice from a DR. People may well scoff, but, I know I have saved 3 lives.
Much Love and Respect to you
If you need to talk? just post a reply
Geena says
Though I was on a wide variety of antidepressants for many years, and had no intimate relations with men for over twenty of those years, I always chalked it off to “being too busy, not meeting the right guys, etc.” But in 2009, after taking careful stock, I decided to taper off of all drugs, realizing finally that I had never needed them in the first place. One year later, I got back in touch with an old boyfriend, and the rest is history…
My story may not be the typical one, but it may give someone here some hope.
sam says
It’s called ‘population control’ Instead of rounding us up for extermination (because often we cannot return to normal function and are therefore ‘useless eaters’) we do the dirty work for them by doing it ourselves and leave our families with the bill. Our families end up on the antidepressants then too. Numbing half the population means they are less likely to procreate and produce more ‘useless eaters’. Personally, I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction. They won’t change a system if the system is ‘working’ for them ie; us taking our own lives. ‘Oh no, a conspiracy theorist’………… whatever, I’ve just spent 20 years of my life wondering why the system hasn’t changed. Now I finally understand duh ! I would have preferred to have had a choice in the matter regarding the loss of all emotion and feelings (although I still have fear). Now I’m a compliant fearful useless eater. I have a right to be here and no one will tell me otherwise.
sarah says
Sam, indeed it is so
But remember…………. No such thing as a conspiracy theorist (such titles were invented to insert the conditioned mind to believe those who think outside the box are ridiculous over thinkers,)
Anyone who calls you as such, please remind them that to theorize a conspiracy expresses a discrepancy in the so called facts presented.
It does not automatically mean (as most are conditioned to believe) a ludicrous belief from nowhere
The drugging of the masses and the fact hundreds of thousands of induced suicides, psychosis and the multitude of other emotional, mental and physical are attributed from these drugs goes ignored on continuum indeed pose the question why?
sam says
Here here Sarah…………Why ?
sarah says
Sam………..
My personal belief involves the dumbing down of the masses in every way possible as a means to control, that being psychologically, spiritually, we are nothing without our emotions, they are what make us people as opposed to robots
How else can the hierarchy be a hierarchy without keeping the masses dumbed down?
It starts early on, conditioning from infancy, the medical profession and medicinal science placed firmly in our heads as experts with cures, advanced intelligence, the dr and pharmacist are one of the believed most intelligent in society.. (No cures out there, merely so called clinically proven treatments, that we are beginning to wake up to for the sham they are and at great cost to lives)
We forget that medicinal science itself has the most macabre onset of murder and grave robbery to get results and that the mental health process has been a continuum of brutality and experimentation, (that continues to this day). A great book to read is Toxic Psychiatry by Peter Breggin… it gives you quite an in depth introduction of methods used under the guise of healthcare. Medication Madness is another good read (same author) concerning case files of brain medications
As I said being conditioned from an early age is the onset of being dumbed down, the progress in technology has the masses moving forward, understanding themselves what life is really all about (that being living, not slaves to a hierarchical system that deliberately keeps health on a low note via GMOs and chemical crop mass distribution) we know why we are in such ill health, so there must be a way to nip that in the bud asap – how better than to destroy our mental capabilities by telling us our emotions are in fact mental diseases.
Spiritually speaking, once there was religion that dominated the human psyche, killing and annihilation of the free thinker, again today, there is such an advancement that people no longer are controlled by that notion of hell, no fear? no control.
Nazi Germany (esp the scientific medical experimentation) and The Vatican go hand in hand (many books to read, a good one being The Vatican, The Nazis and The New World Order by Mauri)…
I could go on forever ha but, I am sure I will annoy admin via such a tangent 🙂
prochoice says
WHAT is wrong with asexuality?
The only problem I experience is the fact that I am not being left alone!
I could have made such an video as the “catcallers”one most days of my life!
I am fat, a limping cripple, and old, meanwhile, too!!!!!!
Because of poverty, this gets worse, stalking by landlords and neighbors.
And being born unwanted into an abuse family does not make me fall into the “everybody has sex”-ideology.
As for medication: NONE. We were poor. (I think the males have used alcohol as a form of self-medication, but that does not make me forgive).
I do not want to have anything to do with the lifeforms of living together with anyone.
I do not and did never want to enhance this street risk of being raped and at risk for pregnancy.
I have CRAVED any sort of painkillers since I came of age and left for good.
Since the retard formula became available I get a daily dose of Tramadoll (I was over 40 back then). I feel better with reduced pain.
sam says
Sarah, I couldn’t agree with you more………Although I find myself simply unable to do any more research. The more I look, the less I want to know. I’m horrified to the core.
sarah says
I sincerely respect that of you Sam. It is enough alone to know the horrors of which these drugs do…
another_ruined_life says
I have another horror story to share.
Back in April, after suffering a severe anxiety and depression episode (which is nothing compared to what I deal with now) spurred on by numerous relationship and job issues, I was prescribed Citalopram HBr (Celexa) by by doctor, @ 20mg/day. I wish, wish, wish I could rewind time and never step foot in the doctor’s office that day, or at least had done more research as to what damage these drugs cause.
The first day that I took the tiny pink evil little poison tablet, I didn’t notice much originally, and then it grew into the most severe, terrifying anxiety attack in my chest. It felt like it was actively burning and deleting whatever emotions were living in my heart. I remember going to sleep that night, and barely sleeping. It caused severe, debilitating anxiety and insomnia.
Finally when I woke in the morning, after getting maybe an hour or two of sleep, I felt like the world had lost all meaning. This was the beginning of anhedonia, little did I know. I went to work that day and it all felt pointless. Just absolutely void and pointless. I’m someone who used to be happy, engaged, dare I say intellectual, dare I say a humanist; and I just felt so dead inside. I thought, “maybe this is just the depression”. And I kept hearing that it “takes two week for the pills to kick in” and other such “common wisdom.”
So I kept taking Citalopram for approximately the rest of the week. Only about five or six total days. During that time, I had transformed into a completely different, empty, hollow, shell, monster of a person. I vividly remember having a nightmare one night, maybe after day 3 or 4 of the pills, that I looked into the mirror in my parent’s bathroom and saw not my face looking back at me; but a human skull. As if to say that my personality and soul had been deleted and completely removed.
Add to all that, I became absolutely asexual and castrated. It was like the neurons/synapses in my brain that control my cock and balls and sexual power had been fried.
Being in my mid-20s, I used to be a libido powerhouse. I loved everything about a woman’s body; having a lot of sex with women. Hell, seeing a woman’s exposed bra-strap could cause me to get hard. After about three days of Citalopram (“treatment”), I noticed genital numbness, erectile dysfunction, and a general dis-interest in women at work – women that I normally thought about f—ing all day long, I barely even looked at them or thought about them anymore. I remember going into the work bathroom and trying to masturbate and my penis simply didn’t “work”. It felt numb and didn’t respond to touch; nevermind trying to think sexual thoughts.
I normally live alone, but after this Citalopram exposure, I was spending all of my time at my parent’s house. I was terrified to be alone. I wanted to kill myself. It was all I thought of every moment of every day — when your emotions are deleted and your sexuality is deleted, the entire range of human feeling and experience forcefully removed — there is no longer a point to get out of bed. There’s no longer a point to do anything. I ended up losing my job because of the anhedonia.
I would stay in bed all day, feeling extremely sick, low-energy, fatigued, and crushed by the complete lack of anything approaching an emotion. The world felt static, dead, and desolate; as if there was “another reality” outside of my window that I couldn’t touch. I had entered this state of non-existence where no emotions or sexuality exist. In addition, it removed my hunger, thrist, and I swear I was suffering some sort of IBS as well. (Apparently there’s a lot of serotonin in the gut, so it isn’t surprising that SSRIs cause digestive issues.)
My only exposure to anyone would be when I’d go outside once every so often to get a coffee, just to see people. But it felt like nothing. It felt like a foggy dream each time I would go outside. Seeing people happy, laughing, clearly looking forward to sex, clearing enjoying themselves, in their convertibles and motorcycles on sunny Spring and Summer afternoons… and not being able to feel a single drop of emotion, or anything.
I stopped talking to my family, I barely talked to friends. My mom would message me in the morning and at night with smiley faces and hearts trying to cheer me up. I would talk to her so many nights before bed where she would cry her eyes out telling me that “She feels like she lost her son”. But I couldn’t cry. I felt nothing. I remember going to the endocrinologist which completely ignored my concerns, and seeing my innocent sweet mother in her Betty Boop shirt, with tears in her eyes, saying to the doctor, “I’m afraid I’m going to lose him” (clearly implicating that she thinks I’m going to kill myself.)
My brother would call me crying, telling me how worried he is about me. Nightmares he’d have about me.
I turned into heartless person. I started saying crazy things like I wish I could stab certain people. All of my empathy disappeared. Yet, I used to be the most emotionally connected person that would cry reading poetry, or hearing a touching song, or even thinking a powerful enough of a thought.
It has been about eight months since I was exposed to just a few days worth of Citalopram. I am still not back to my old self. My cognitive function has improved, and while I can articulate myself again, and don’t feel as “brain dead”, my emotions have not returned to their once powerful state. Sexual function is also still extremely damaged. No more daydreaming of having sex with women, numbness in genitals, poor quality erections, and orgasm doesn’t feel as earth-shattering as it used to. Basically, my life has been destroyed, thanks to a haphazard choice by my doctor to prescribe, and by me to be enough of a fool to believe this shit would “help”.
What is going to be done about this?
sarah says
another_ruined_life
Sadly, at present hon, nothing is going to be done about this.
There is only one way forward, educate everyone around you about the devastation of these drugs.
As I say above, I have managed to save 3 people who were offered (pushed) these drugs – I say pushed because one of which that was offered them felt so pressured by the GP he took the prescription as a pretense just to get them off his back
Only by educating others can we prevent the drugs being taken unwittingly.
another_ruined_life says
That’s not a good enough answer. Someone needs to pay dearly for this.
L says
How are you doing these days?
My story is the same as yours….same time period, same drug.
Carla says
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
Mahatma Gandhi
If some humans believe they can conduct unethical research, karma has an extraordinary way of dealing with such beings. There is such thing as Natural Justice.
Ruined says
Nearly six years free of any meds and I remain dead. After all the hell of long term withdrawal I am left emotionally empty and sexually expired. I tear my brain to pieces trying to remember, trying to understand what happened and the only conclusion I can draw is that I started to take meds. There was life before meds and there are scrambled memories of bits and pieces of unreal life post meds. The destruction of memory is one of the remaining effects. My mind no longer records or recalls, my IQ has been wiped out, my identity erased and any sense of dreams, goals or future deleted.
With hindsight I can recall how quickly prozac got hold of me. How quickly it warped my mind, how quickly it deadened my sex drive and how long that brief encounter left me affected, such that I subsequently had a brief affair with seroxat. Seroxat sent me up, and on quitting dropped me down into a depth of mental hell I never even knew existed. And where had my sex drive gone? Wiped out after a month of seroxat, never to normally return again. That’s when the suicidal thinking and planning started as well. After the seroxat. It had never been there before, but remains as a part of my life. Repeating phases of suicidal hell, clinging on to sanity and life until it passes, fighting not to try and kill myself, but fighting to stop myself killing myself.
And you have to go back on the meds to stop the pain of withdrawal. Whilst on them you can superficially appear to be functioning normally, but it is all unreal. The concept of a lost weekend on recreational drugs is well understood. Try rediscovering your real self after a lost 20 years on filthy pharmaceuticals. I can remember who I was when I started taking them and indeed why I started taking them. I have learned what they do and what they have done to me, but the lessons do not enable me to reconnect with myself, to be who I am, to have my life.
On them, whether its seroxat or citalopram or whatever, when you are right up on them, taking your full daily dose everyday, such that you might flood with sweat and not be able to stop talking, feeling so high, like your hair is standing on end and your head is on fire, there can be times, oh yes there can, when you love everyone so much and you are so unreserved that brothels become like sweet shops or fun fairs, just going in to enjoy the rides. How terrible to recall scattered visions of those times, whenever they were. How sad, how seedy, how filthy, how wrong, how so much not me. But once off the meds there is no love, no sex; those functions have been burned out.
And the hell of withdrawal, years of it. When on the meds, just a brief encounter with them will have a long term effect. When on them and up, the dose can be drastically reduced, but will hold you up there, but when you stop, prepare yourself for hell. Concentrating on the withdrawal effects that come long after stopping, there is the sweating. This goes on for ages and once you start, you can’t stop. Then there is the bone pain, shooting, agonising, enough to wake you up. Always the forearms and lower legs, shooting right down through tips of fingers and toes. Also the brain zaps. What the hell is going on there? These start early on in withdrawal, but can go on for way over twelve months, even though there may be months with out them. They are zaps, they are spasms, they are waps, they are like your brain trying to reestablish connections, like its trying to reboot, but can’t, sometimes occurring on waking. There is the one sided pain in the head that comes and goes, the facial numbness, the endless recurring flu like symptoms, the almost blacking out, the getting lost on familiar local roads, but most of these things pass, given time, given time, if you are in a position where you can just cling on to the planet and wait and hold on and hold on, unable to work or function in anyway over and above base survival. But you are left with a lost life, a deadened brain, no sexual function, no good emotions, a compromised memory and intellect and no hope, no future. And even the then your brain will still reach out to try and find an answer to be able to function, to flow, and one side will nag for the drugs to be returned, even after all these years, but the other side will say no, you have learned the reality and you know if you start to take them again, as soon as you feel them starting to do what they do inside your brain, it will remind you and confirm to you, that the drugs did the damage and you will once again throw them in the bin and kick yourself for having given in to them once again. And yes, you will have been tested by your Doc for everything under the sun and he will tell you it is all depression, but it ain’t, it’s the drugs. SSRIs are like burning your house down to remove a temporary stain on the living room carpet.
Ruined says
….and the screaming tinnitus, that’s another late onset withdrawal symptom, except it feels completely unconnected with the ears, but is rather in the centre of your head. It starts when you try to “think”. And the sensation that you are conscious on each side of your head, but that thoughts won’t join together and flow over the top of your brain as one. These feel not so much a withdrawal symptom, but more a damage trying to be repaired symptom. There are lots more, I could go on forever, the crippling fatigue, the dense brain fog and an inability to think. Loads!
Carla says
Once you are ruined, I understand that one feels like they are in a complete state of nothingness.
You try to regain a part of your identity knowing that the pill from ‘hell’ sucked all the living life force out of your veins.
I keep trying to create changes regarding the safety of these medicines, until you reach a place where you just can not do it on your own, anymore.
No one listens, no one cares and you feel like giving up because you feel like you are invisible.
The ‘gioia di vivere’ was taken away from me, with just a ‘blink of an eyelid’.
OK, I get it: “I am blessed to be alive however the quality of life I have been given just seems like an up hill struggle”.
I struggle to come to terms with what I am left with because it kills me when I am unable to do the things I use to do.
I feel like I am trapped in the body of an eighty year old.
My mind wants to do so much but my body will not comply.
I feel tired upon awakening. I have to make up excuses for my limitations. I want to scream out on the top of my lungs and tell everyone to leave me alone because this is how I feel at times: USELESS!
Oh, then there is the endless labels that medical professions have put on me. It just does not equate to the suffering I have endured. If you had a stroke and someone gave you a clinical label that does not fit your symptoms, you feel let down. I am just over labels and western medicine. They do nothing for me.
I had no idea the damage/destruction or unwanted devastation a medicine could cause. I knew something had gone so, so, so, so wrong. I remember waking up one morning feeling like my jaw was ‘double in size’. It was numb, heavy and felt so big. I realized then, that this was the beginning of something not so good. My mind was telling me that something was not right and then it all happened: the intense pain and pressure in the head. It felt like there was a kink in one of the vessels of my brain. I could feel that this pill had caused injury to one of the pathways of my brain. The pain and pressure was unbearable at times, there were many times when I nearly contemplated the: ‘s’ word.
Not one professional was able to tell me what was going on. I heard them all tell me that it could be a number of things: mini stroke, meningitis, depression etc………. I knew that my brain had been severely injured and for seven months I had to ‘everything’ I had to do to survive.
No doctor, no naturopath, no wonder drug could cure me. I had to heal myself. Yes, I am alive today however, left with many residual symptoms.
I have learnt more about the human body and how it heals through patience, being kind to myself and listening to what it needed to survive. I am a survivor.
Did I need a pill to teach me a lesson?
All I can say is that it is not a fun ride when you have to work hard to regain some ‘normal brain functioning’. I did not know how to drive a manual after all this happened. How do I change from first to second and so on and how do I alternate between the clutch and brake. It was all too hard for me. So many memories have been deleted. Even now when I am unable to learn something I get easily frustrated. Something is not right but I am learning to deal with this ‘ruined body’.
Drug manufactures, you tell me if it is all right to ‘tamper with’ the divine.
God gives us a perfect package and man has to find ways of damaging what is so perfectly created.
One thing I do know for sure is that we can never turn back the hands of time and ‘undo’ what has been done.
I hope that one day we can all come to a place of forgiveness and acceptance.
Me again says
“Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor”. How sexy that sounds! How simple, how scientific, how specific! What could go wrong with that? Zoloft, Prozac, Seroxat, what great sounding names! What are they trying to do, come up with a name for a Japanese sports car? I’ve got the SSRI 4.2 litre Prozac V8!
Why not be a bit more real with the name? Perhaps “Suicide Sometimes Results Instead”, or “Sudden Suicidal Reaction Initiator”? At least these would make people think a bit more seriously about all the effects of these poisons before taking them!
Doesn’t the length of time people end up on these drugs tell the clinicians nothing? i.e they do not work, but just create a whole new and even greater problem.
Carla says
Perhaps they should have a skull with crossbones going through it.
They market this drug as if it is meant to solve all your problems.
If you read the pamphlets, contained with these drugs, which I never got, it clearly states:
‘People who are depressed should not be given this medicine’.
Why do professionals give this drug to people knowing this? _ Drug manufacturers have already covered their ‘proverbials!’
I am not entirely convinced that professionals are not aware of how much harm these drugs can induce. The systems and processes lie when a person is harmed by these medicines. They can make an incident look like something else.
SHAME ON ALL OF THOSE WHO proclaim to have taken an oath of ‘duty of care’ to thy patient. WHAT A JOKE!
Surely, professionals must witness the devastation that it causes to their patients.
Just look at all the horrible stories we witness on our TV screens every night. If one digs deeper, we need not look for any answers. Most of these people who have committed these terrible atrocities were taking these drugs.
I think it’s about time, professionals be our advocates and stand up for those who have no voice. If we want this ‘vicious’ cycle to end, the ‘buck’ has to end somewhere.
We were given a perfect body and when that part of that body that gives you joy is taken away from you, there are no words to describe what this form of harm can do to ones well being. Education about these drugs start with us- the ones who have been harmed by them. If we don’t get louder, it only gives permission for those who do harm, to keep doing harm. We do not need to seek enlightenment through suffering. We need to be given opportunities to ‘speak up’ and state our case. Unfortunately, if we live in fear, we are only doing harm to ourselves and our brothers. We may be ‘ruined’ however, it should not deter us from coming forward and speaking the ‘truth’.
I am sorry that every individual who contributes to this forum, has a cross to bear. Be the change and educate every one who comes in contact with you. We are the change. Many voices create a ‘ripple effect’. If the Law can’t help us, we are the ‘LAW’ for the people, by speaking the ‘TRUTH’.
Carla says
deliberate omission of information= FRAUD
Jovvo says
Something very frightening is happening on the internet. One of the biggest antidepressant withdrawal forums, PaxilProgress.org, has just permanently shut down. Years upon years of antidepressant user experiences and data all lost overnight. Many of the PSSD discussions are gone now. PaxilProgress.org was very anti-antidepressant and everyone there tried to warn others to not start the drugs if the could help it.
And now another forum dedicated specifically to PSSD is now shut down too. It was one the front page of a web search when searching PSSD. Again years of data and user stories all gone. Two widely used antidepressant side effect forums that have been around for years have both been shut down within the same month. It makes no sense. Neither site had a warning of their shut downs. They just mysteriously shut down out of the blue. Now there aren’t many places to discuss the damaging effects these drugs have on the internet. And the discussions that were there, are now gone. What could be going on?
Bill says
The same type of vanishing act occurred with the large Accutane/RoAccutane Action Group forum of over 5,000 members when the drug was garnering huge media attention. Years worth of patient stories ranging from long-term sexual dysfunction to inflammatory bowel disease disappeared overnight. What a tragic string of coincidences….
Ann says
Here’s some information about the paxilprogress shutdown: https://truthman30.wordpress.com/2014/12/18/the-end-of-paxil-progress/
Ann says
Also, here’s some information about the closure of pssd.forumotion.com, from the replacement http://www.pssdforum.com/ : http://www.pssdforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=2&start=10#p746 – and it has a copy of some PSSD-related posts from paxilprogress, too: http://www.pssdforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=244
Carla says
If everything is disappearing, Iovvo, we have to keep getting louder.
I am currently reading: “The Evidence, However, Is Clear’ -The Seroxat Scandal, by Bob Fiddaman. This book is a real eye opener. Experimentations are taking place, world wide. It would not surprise me if they can concentrate a dose in one pill, perhaps 100x over and alter the molecular structure to random batches. Nothing surprises me! These pills can damage our libido, memory, rip us of our energy, leave us with neurological problems and the list goes on. I am fully aware that this ‘poison’ stays lodged somewhere in some part of our brain, long after we have ingested it. I will never have the ‘old’ me back and this nonsense that they say you regain yourself after you refrain from ingesting this poison, is NOT TRUE! We are the clinical evidence. Not their clinical data that is tainted with lies. I believe that there are millions of people out there left damaged. They can continue to get rid of the vital information however, unfortunately they can not get rid of us. Perhaps, if there was one blog where everyone can come together, so that we can ‘weed’ out all medicines that are causing harm, I am sure that we can STOP this UNETHICAL TREND that is destroying peoples lives.
Carla says
Dr David Healy is a genius and a sincere humanitarian. He has already created this sanctuary for us. More needs to be done. Imagine what all us people who care, can do. Imagine………………………! We have been silenced and ignored for way too long.
Carla says
What does it take to get through to the safety regulators? They can not keep ignoring what is happening to people whilst they are ingesting these drugs. What does it take before they listen? I just don’t understand their level of reasoning and logic. Do I have to write a book, or create my own blog or study to become a Pharmaceutical Lawyer, so that I can create the necessary changes…………………… If the peoples stories are inadequate conviction, what does it take to create changes, so that more innocent lives are not impacted. It seems the more we do, the more they don’t care.
Daniel says
I have no comment on what effect pharmaceuticals may have on children, but I would like to say:
Asexuality is NOT a “sexual problem”. It is a sexual orientation, it is not low libido. You describe in the article that people can be gay, straight, bi. So it is possible to be attracted to either gender (gay and straight), but also possible to NOT be attracted to a gender (gay and straight). It is even possible to be attracted to more than one (bisexual). Why not be NOT attracted to more than one (asexual)?
Asexuality is as much of a “sexual problem” as homosexuality. File under: not a problem.
Dr. David Healy says
Daniel
If the asexuality arises because exposure to antidepressants in utero – would this be a problem. In the case of someone exposed to an antidepressant who becomes homosexual and finds this to be a problem for them – or the lawyers doctors and judges who exposed to dopamine agonists engage in promiscuous prostitution including homosexual prostitution is this a problem?
A similar debate plays out in the autism field – and it may be a closely related debate. While autism may be totally natural which presumably means genetic, a proportion of case appear to arise from environmental insult – quite possibly antidepressants in some cases. This is unnatural and for a majority of parents of affected children this is a problem. Are they wrong to view it as a problem?
DH
Bill says
Asexuality, by definition, can be defined as the absence of libido.
As much as one who lacks a specific sexual orientation may feel misunderstood, having a strong sexual desire suddenly removed from your persona via unconsenting chemical castration is something you almost have to live through to understand.
I’m not “cool” with it and consider it a life-altering sexual problem.
Fred says
Acronym fun of the day:
Suddenly Stops Romantic Intentions
Stops Sexy Romps Indefinitely
Suicide Sounds Rather Inviting
Carla says
Now that many have reached a level of understanding and how these medicines impact many individuals, we have to somehow educate physicians. Some caring physicians would be devastated knowing what these medicines induce. I have compassion for some physicians working in the dark. How can they practice their profession without knowing the truth? For those physicians who already have some understanding on how these medicines impact individuals, the truth is all that is needed to create positive changes. Once the truth is put out there, physicians can be better equipped to educate patients about the pros and cons, despite what ‘glossy’ pharmaceutical companies are portraying.
Min says
Asexuality is not a disease, or an abnormality. By asexual, I am meaning a lifelong state of being, not a response to any medication or procedures, and not a change from a previous sexual orientation. It’s just a state of being for me and for many others. The only problems it causes me are related to the endless pressure from the world around to conform to their ideals of relationship/libido. I’ve never had any desire like that, and certainly see my asexuality as predating by many years any medications I have taken. And, no, my mother was not on medications during her pregnancy with me either.
This is not an illness or disorder, but the world seems to want to make it one. Think of the drop down menus on forms for sexuality – there is never an option for ‘neither.’ Occasionally there is an ‘other’ option.
From the comments on this thread, what is really disturbing are the ideas that life is less fulfilling or even less worth living because it is not driven by a sexual desire. I find that so inexplicable. I have a great life, a successful career and social circle, and it does not bother me at all that some other people like to have sexual relationships – the fact that I don’t is just part of who I am. I don’t have a problem with this, so why should people try and turn it into one?
Dr. David Healy says
No one is turning it into a problem. In many ways a life free of sexuality seems desirable. But, while the state may be totally natural, what if it could also be triggered by drug treatment – such as an antidepressant taken in the womb or in early childhood. Is it not reasonable to at least explore if this is a possibility?
David
Zoe says
I think, as a fellow asexual, the problem is more surrounding people who used to experience sexual attraction, but have had that stripped from them. For us, it’s a little different, because we’ve never had a libido and most times don’t desire one — but for them, it’s a part of their personality and human entity that has been forcibly taken from them. These are two separate issues: natural asexuality and PSSD, a result of psychologically damaging medication with too few warnings on the label.
After sitting in on one of Dr. Healy’s discussions, I think it’s important to understand the difference between the asexual community, and the allosexual population.
Ann says
I am an asexual adult, and I am content with that. But I was also the victim of paroxetine and risperidone wrongfully forced on me in my early teen years, by abusive parents and the biased psychiatrists who sided with them, and I’ll never know what my life would’ve been like if that hadn’t happened.
Revy says
I find it fascinating (in a morbid sort of way, for which I apologize) that many of the male voices being lent to this conversation view asexuality, permanent or otherwise, as an immutable end to one’s purpose of existence.
For those who offer support in favor of the orientation, I feel the need to encourage you to remain on-topic in regard to the fact that this is very explicitly about the connection between pharmaceuticals and asexuality.
There’s no valid argument against the fact that this is happening is ethically wrong on an outrageous number of levels, although I have some serious doubts as to whether vigilantism is even a remotely appropriate answer to the problem at hand. It seems fairly logical that an effectual response in the interest of removing this threat would be one generated by a level head, or better yet, a collaboration of well-informed and level-headed individuals.
An alarming number of the comments posted above appear to be written with more emotional involvement than could be ultimately beneficial to any “cause”, although that’s certainly not to say there’s no justification for emotional involvement.
Reading over the responses has made it difficult to take the issue very seriously, from an impassive standpoint.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned from spending well over half my life in countless forms of therapy and being medically bombarded with nearly every marketable pharmaceutical used to treat depression and/or anxiety without respite, it is that DRUG COMPANIES ARE NOT OVERLY-INVESTED IN THEIR TARGET AUDIENCE’S STATE OF EMOTIONAL WELL-BEING.
Is there burgeoning evidence that this phenomenon is not uncommon? Absolutely.
Is there evidence that the phenomenon is irreversible? It would appear so.
Is it damaging/has it already damaged enough people to warrant a cooperative retaliation? (At the very least, in an effort to cease further damage?)
From where I’m standing, the answer is an inarguable and resounding “YES”.
Pharmaceutically-induced asexuality is an abnormality on the grounds that it would otherwise not likely exist if it weren’t for the implied abnormal chemical conditions.
If there is evidence that exposure to these drugs, prenatally or relatively early on in life, can run the risk of causing indelible damage to the affected party’s sexuality or psyche, then efforts must be made to eliminate the potential harm.
…Past that, I dunno what to tell you guys. I’m sick of being drugged near to drooling and then trying to explain to the people with the gall to ask why I don’t dabble in relationships that I’m not “wearing Ace as a fashion statement”; I have never been drug-free long enough for a chance to develop any kind of natural biological libido.
john says
For those of you saying PSSD is permanent, i’m here to tell you that you can recover 100%. Google search ‘surviving anti depressants and pssd’. There are stories of men who successfully recovered from PSSD.
Carla says
Honestly, what makes clinicians think that all mental ailments can be cured with a drug?
Is everyone deluding themselves when they believe that a drug can cure all mental illnesses?If these pills are causing more harm than good, I would be very careful with my prescribing habits. PTSD or any other disorder can not be ‘zapped’ away with any pill. Any trauma an individual survives, stays with that individual for the rest of their life. The pharmaceutical companies have got it all wrong. The clinicians collaborate with the futile nonsense that pharmaceutical companies ‘brainwash’ them with and the consumers who are gullible accept all the lies and deceits that cost them dearly in the long run. At the end of the day, I ask myself, what type of a person believes everything that the clinician tells them. When you are gullible and in a vulnerable state, many take advantage and unfortunately pharmaceutical companies have the upper hand. I am somewhat horrified that vital information can be withheld and that we accept this as the norm.
-Why are our laws so primitive?
-Why do we allow those to do harm without being convicted?
A criminal kills.
Big pharma maim and kill and get away with it.
It makes no sense if science can cheat the LAW and innocent people are used as guinea pigs, no matter what the outcome is.
Plain and simple English: If you ingest something and it harms you, it is not coincidental. It is a man made drug that has caused you harm.
PCNG says
It’s crazy how some serial killers can be judged sane, but someone upset for more than a couple of weeks or so at the death of their mother, or some other heartbreak, can be diagnosed as “mentally ill” and in need of medication. That’s the real madness.
jette says
Grief is NORMAL, and the time it take each individual to recover as much as possible varies. Grief should NEVER be medicated! Some grief you NEVER get over fully! Many a spouse has died, and the other mourned until they day they die, others are remarried in 2 months! How deep was the love. Some people don’t mourn the death of a love on, because they either don’t feel love, or have never loved very deeply! JMO
JanCarol says
A 50 year history in as few words as possible:
Difficult repressed childhood, fundamentalist upbringing (Dawkins would say “child abuse.”) Adopted from disturbed shattered family into this “normal” fundamentalist family. As a result, achieved benefits I wouldn’t have otherwise – like university education, love of books & reading, insatiable curiosity and desire to “look it up.”
Fast forward to my teenage explosion – extreme behaviours and rebellion, somewhat narcissistic self-centeredness. Promiscuity and recreational drugs.
After Uni (and being fired from my career), I settled into an oppressive marriage – the rebellion settled into “spiritual quests.” During this oppressive marriage, Prozac came out. Many drugs were tried, SSRI’s, Tricyclics, each having different side effects. None lasted more than 3 months, but it had to be a stretch of the rubber band that was my brain. (that man committed suicide – possibly psych drug induced – in 2007)
Freedom from that marriage (1995), earning my own living, still promiscuous and drug experimenting, but not as extreme as before. This became a full blown “manic episode,” the only documented one (though the university one could have been, as well). Both times were times of escape from oppression – there is psychosocial cause for the extremes, as well.
TBy 1997, I had met my birth family, and saw the madness there. My birthmother’s life had alternated between manic grandiosity, and deep depressions. She was not medicated during pregnancy with me, though she had probably had tricyclics prior to me.
In 1998 I accepted the “bipolar diagnosis” and “meds for life.” Intertwined with this was a harsh relationship with a narcissistic yogi, who changed my sexual practices and beliefs forever. I got away after just 4 years of that abuse, but was then firmly medicated.
Wellbutrin, Venlafaxine, mirtazapine, lithium, prothieden, reboxetine – cycled through my life. The lithium was the longest, 12 years now, the Wellbutrin was 5 years, the effexor was 5 years, the prothieden was also 5 years. I have been tapering via Surviving Antidepressants. Very slowly. Am only on 337.6 mg lithium now, after 20 months in Surviving Antidepressants.
Somewhere between the Wellbutrin and the Venlafaxine, I remarried, and shortly after I remarried, the lithium was added. After that, I was given statins, and then PPI’s, which drove me suicidal until discontinued (I think it was the combination of lithium, statins, and PPI’s which brought this deep depression).
Throughout all of these drugs, I always “functioned,” both in life and sexuality Sometimes better than others. But what I can trace throughout the years since accepting the bipolar diagnosis (1998) is a decline in interest in sex, coupled with kidney, thyroid, adrenal, and intestinal failures. I am now disabled, mostly housebound.
I don’t understand why people want it, focus on sex, need sex, want sex, do sex. It’s there for me, but I am completely uninterested.
It’s hard for me to separate the psychosocial aspects from the chemical ones. Like I said, never had PSSD, always “functioned,” but it was my brain’s connection to the drive that went away, especially as my health declined on lithium, statins, and PPI’s. Both my genetic mother and my real mother stopped having sex around age 45. The yogi did undescribable things to me which altered my views about sexuality. I think of sex as messy, and more of a hassle than it is worth. Especially with my health problems. I have had radical hysterectomy and thyroidectomy, and these could also affect my drives. I do not do HRT.
This is not good for my husband. I can “fake it,” express affection, but he finds it arousing then I feel guilty. He is kind, but it only makes me feel cruel.
I am interested in this new asexual movement, as that reflects my feelings perfectly. I often feel like an alien species among humans – human in so many ways – but why would humans want to do THAT? How is the desire for sex drive? What is the appeal that motivates so many humans on this planet, that I seem to lack?
Thank you David Healy for bringing this connection to light.
jette says
Sex is a normal part of a relationship! I can understand being kind, empathetic & gentle, but no sex for your mate is unacceptable. I knew a man who could no longer function because of prostate surgery, he confided that he hadn’t had sex with his wife in a long time. You please your sexual partner HOWEVER you can! I would find pleasure bringing pleasure to my love, if I had one! There are many ways to give an orgasm if your genitals are not working! It feels great to give pleasure, as well as receive it. I used to have severe PSSD and low testosterone that I was lied to about. I was on Zoloft 5 years. Was recouping some before doctor LITERALLY mutilated my genitals! Don’t make comments to your therapist, about you PCP chemically castrating you, cuz they got “GOD Complex” only one cure for that! SSRI DO cause low testosterone – they are an endocrine disrupter! Was on Tramadol for 3 years after my testicle & urethra/penis were mutilated & allowed to go infected for a month. On Butrans for pain but still horrifically miserable. Never regained my pre Zoloft sensation, function,or libido. I take a bunch of amino, vitamins, supplements, dopamine simulators & pro-hormones. The SSRI was one thing, but the genital mutilation is a felony crime!
jette says
There is a thing called OPIAD, which is a well known problem with pain patients – Opioid Induced Androgen Deficiency. There is also SSRI-IAD, and they will NEVER admit to that! SSRI & SNRI are poison! Serotonin bad, dopamine good! Get ALL your hormones checked! Try a little DHEA or Pregnalone! Do your research, there are natural Aromatase Inhibitors, & testosterone stimulators. Since doctors don’t like to continue testing, unless they are prescribing, make sure you don’t pull your estrogen too low! Men need estrogen for their sex drive & women need testosterone for their sex drive. Women can have hypogonadism too! I pulled either my E1 or E2 to like a level of 8 which is the lowest on the normal scale, too low for heart health, but I was glad to start getting my body hair back. Cut back on the methlflavone and it came back up to 20 which is were I want it, much lower is not good for your heart or you libido! Lowering my SHBG too as my free T was .8% and normal is 1.5% to 5%. Average free T is 2-2.5%, so if you T level is 247 you already have hypogonadism, then if your free level is .8% you can basically divide the 247 by 3.
sadie says
Since taking these drugs, I have no happiness left in me, no sexual function, no sexual response or sexuil or romantic feelings. I find pleasure in nothing at all, not even the nice sunny weather. I have become a shadow of who I was and honestly think about death every day, but I have a daughter, and who knows the same fate would probably fall on her- I a sure in my absence someone would end up medicating her, and I am horrified that I could have been changed this way. I feel like my daughter has lost me already, like I am so hollow I cannot laugh with her, or enjoy our time together even, as I enjoy nothing. Nothing is helping me come to terms with how I am now…. nothing…. I just want my life to be over, but I am alive for my daughter. I am not really alive though- she has a shell for a mother. I don’t think I will ever be able to connect with people again.
nonameanymore says
Tramadol, decongestants, 5htp, curcumin (weak maoi), and Mdma (being used now in trials for ptsd) can also cause pssd, genital anesthesia, asexual behavior, zero libido etc …anything that affects your serotonin. People are getting this from things that mess with serotonin period.
Dr. David Healy says
Can you point us to more evidence or more accounts about this? Tramadol is easy to explain – its a serotonin reuptake inhibitor.
David
Jones says
I took 9 pills of lexapro on july 2013 and i was left COMPLETELY impotent one day after i stopped it. I was 17 years old back then.
My life seemed completely ruined. After seeing some articles from David Healy about the devastating and PERMANENT (as he stated) sexual side effects of SSRIS i was considering suicide too.
I mean there was NOBODY that could identify it, no doctor, no scientist, no proffesional, yet alone suggest a treatment or cure for it.
I thought that this was the end of my life. My sexuality was extremely important to me as for the most people i know.
But guess what. As time went by i was seeing small improvements in all areas of my diminished sexuality and one year ago i was around 70% BACK! And it lasted a year!
I felt more blessed than ever in my life and i chose to use and enjoy what i had rather that mourning about what i had lost!
Now im feeling bad again but i know that it will most probably improve because i have been in worse and yet recovered.. This thing flactuates.
All the “suicidal-permanent damage” posts are dangerous to people who get pssd and they search about it online. Every person is different and recovery varies.
I cannot deny that David Healy is the only recongized professor that identifies our condition and is helping to spread the world out.And that is very positive.
However, i have observed that he is mainly interested in sharing nightmarish stories and spreading depair, rather than trying to adress the etiology, find a treatment or support the people who suffer from this.
Jasmine says
I believe I am suffering from PSSD. At a young adolescent age (circa 15 if not before) I have experienced the first symptoms of depression (even though at that time at a reduced degree). It grew and turned into a fully blown clinical depression diagnosed at the age of 18. After consulting with a psychotherapist, I was given antidepressants. Throughout the following few years I have taken Asentra/Zoloft and Seroxat (I refused to take Xanax cos it made me feel too tired and I preferred even negative energy to no energy at all). I haven’t suffered from depression for almost 10 years now and haven’t taken medicine for almost 10 years now. However, the sexual problems I have experienced throughout all this time have not subsided even all this time after healing from depression and no meds. I am veeery liberal and confident of my body and have no shame nor inhibitions when it comes to sex. However, my body does not follow. Or should I say, if I get a physical symptom of arousal, I dont feel any sensation (wetness). I have never experienced an orgasm, don’t feel like I have a libido and no matter what I tried and who I was with, it made no difference. There simply is no sensation, and if I manage to trigger something, it doesnt build up, but it’s like a tiny little firecracker that lasts literally a second. I strongly believe my sexual issues stem from neurochemistry caused by SSRI for I don’t see anything else that could be the cause.
Derek says
Im 17, took these pills 3 weeks a couple of months ago and stopped because of the side affects, one of them is the feeling that I had no attraction to the opposing gender anymore wich is really scary because I’m normally hetero. I also don’t have libido anymore. All the strong feelings that I had for my girlfriend are all gone after the medications.
Before the SSRI prozac I was a very emotional person with hobbies and friends that I loved. But after the pills it seems like every emotion and feelings are just gone. I lived for music, I used to listen every day atleast 3 hours to it but after the meds I can’t feel the music anymore.
It’s 3 months ago and still nothing had changed. Everyday is a living nightmare and I’m considering to just kill myself because I can’t live like this. Every thing that I loved is slipping away from me because I turned into a emotionless zombie.
These pills ruin lifes. I had dreams and ambitions.
This has to stop.
Jeff Potts says
Hello, I’m 64 years old and have been prescribed antidepressants and antipsychotics for 30 years. I would now consider myself as asexual, though I was married, straight and a father of two for 25 years, with an above average sex drive. Although I would agree at my age a testosterone loss is normal, a complete sex drive loss isn’t. Living alone I have had to come to terms with this loss which is so deep I no longer have an attraction at all to even form a relationship. Masturbation doesn’t even cross my mind. I still identify as heterosexual though its more from memory. I am grateful for some of the medications I took as I’ve been suicidal in the past, I regret listening to the doctors who said I needed to take it for all of my life. People should be informed of the risks.