 So it's no secret that Big Pharma does not give a f**k about us. All they care about is padding their own pockets. So this week, we're going to be doing a series focusing on the work of Dr. Irving Kirsch, alright? And he's pissed a lot of people off in the psychiatric community because he's exposed all of the lies that they've been telling us about anti-depression medications. So I don't know about you, but I feel that it's important to know the truth. And in this video, to kick this series off, we're going to talk about why it's so important to know the truth about anti-depression medications. What's up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul where we talk about the problem, but focus on the solution. And if you're new to my channel, my channel is all about mental health as somebody who is in recovery from addiction, as well as being diagnosed with depression and anxiety. Mental health is something I'm very passionate about. So if you're into that stuff, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. And while you're at it, make sure you're following me over on Instagram and Twitter at the Rewired Soul, alright? So yeah, this is going to be a series that we're focusing on this week. And this is something that I don't like talking about because it was kind of like the Matrix where I was offered the two pills like a few years ago. And a few years ago, I read the book Lost Connections by Johann Hari. And that was when I first kind of learned the lies that we've been sold about anti-depression medications. And like the experience I went through with it, I was like, oh my God, right? And it's a difficult subject to talk about because it's so widely accepted, especially here in the United States, that any problem that you have, here's some pills for it, right? So to tell people the truth about it, it can be a difficult truth to accept, alright? But I want everybody out there to be able to make informed decisions about what they're putting in their body, alright? So like I said, this week I'm going to be focusing on the work of Dr. Irving Kirsch, okay? So he is a psychologist. He has been researching the effectiveness of depression medications for a long time. He's done more research in this space than anybody else. He has discovered the ways that not only does Big Pharma kind of cover up what they're doing, but also kind of the way that the FDA is even lying about results and everything like that. So like I said, for us, it's up to us to make more informed decisions about what we're putting in our body. So I'm going to start the series off by talking about three reasons, three reasons why it's so important to know the truth about anti-depression medications, alright? So the first one is, the first one is side effects, okay? Like if we were just getting these medications and you could just take them and nothing would happen, like you know, it's like you either take them and you know, you feel just as depressed as normal if you don't take them or if you do take them, you know, it's not a big deal because nothing will happen. But the reality is most of these medications come with side effects, not only side effects when you start them, but side effects when you get off of them, alright? Like I feel that as a society, like we are way too quick to just toss whatever medications we're giving in our body, right? Like how many of us actually question what doctors are giving us? Like personally, I have to as a recovering drug addict, I always have to like question the doctors about what they're giving me, like is this addictive, you know, what's in this thing, you know, and stuff like that. But for the most part, a lot of us just get these medications and we just take them. You know, some people when you go pick them up from the pharmacy, you'll ask them and everything like that. But like think about it, we are putting these mind-altering, body-altering chemicals in our body, alright? So if there's a chance that we don't actually need these, we should stay away from them because side effects from antidepressants, like they can be rough. Like on the mild end of the spectrum, you can have nausea, dizziness, headaches, but like on the more extreme side, on the more extreme side, especially with withdrawal, you can have more anxiety, more depression, suicidal thoughts getting off of them. You know what I mean? So we need to be informed about these to see if we really do need to take these medications. Alright? So reason number two why it's so important to know the truth about antidepressant medications is because of the cost, alright? I don't know if any of you got the memo, alright, but here in the United States, our mental health care system sucks, alright? So if you have insurance and your insurance covers these medications, dope, alright? But I know that I am one of many Americans in the United States who has had difficulties, right? So this year, a lot of you know that I just started working a full-time job as well as a part-time job and my health insurance just kicked in, alright? So I am on antidepressants, I'm fully transparent about that. If you want me to do a video about why I'm on them and discuss that, I might do one because that can get a little confusing based on this series. But anyways, for a good chunk of this year, I didn't have health insurance because I was self-employed, I wasn't making enough to really buy my own health insurance and the medications I was on, like Prozac, was extremely expensive. So thank God, here in Las Vegas, we have a pharmacy called Smith's. You might know it as Kroger, but they have like this little discount card or whatever so my medications were actually affordable, alright? So like, again, if you don't need to be on these medications, like you're incurring a cost that you might not need to have, right? So say if you get laid off, say if you get fired, say something happens where you lose your health insurance, again, the withdrawal side effects from these medications can be really brutal and you can be worse off than you were before. So that's something else that we should take into account. So third, the third reason why it's so important to know the truth about medications, this is the most important reason, alright? This is what I want to focus on, alright? Because we are not being told the full story about what depression is, alright? The easiest story to tell people is that this is a chemical imbalance, this is a disease, take this pill, it'll balance out the chemicals. That is for the most part an absolute lie with no scientific evidence behind it, alright? And here's why we need to know this. For anybody out there feeling depressed, feeling hopeless, something else that I'm learning more about is people who are depressed about being depressed, right? When people ask a lot of people with depression, what's the most difficult part about having depression? And they're like, being depressed, right? That is the worst part, right? So if we believe the story that this is something chemically wrong with our brain that's never going to get fixed, we are always going to rely on those medications that aren't even nearly as effective as we think they are. And that's something I would be talking about this week during the series, alright? So to put it in perspective for you, alright? One of the ways that they, you know, see if you're doing better with your depression, if your depression is going into remission and things like that, they use something called the Hamilton scale, alright? This Hamilton scale, zero is no depression at all. And then at the top of the scale, I think it goes up to like 50 points or so. That means you are just severely depressed, okay? So listen to the words coming out of my mouth, alright? The best antidepressants out there move you an average of 1.8 points on the Hamilton scale, alright? Now some of you are like, oh, okay, almost two point difference. That's pretty dope. I'll take a two point difference in my depression. So listen to this, okay? When you get better sleep, that improves your Hamilton score of six points, alright? Are you hearing me right now? You get six points from better sleep. So if you can fix your sleep, that is three times better than the best antidepressant medications, okay? And throughout this week, I'm going to be talking about other ways to treat your depression, to work on your depression. Some of it involves therapy. Some of it involves exercise, eating better, meditation. There's so many ways out there to improve your depression that are scientifically proven to be better than medications. But we need to understand, like I was just telling Tristan about this the other day, the United States is one of, I believe, one of two countries in the entire world. On the planet Earth, out of hundreds of countries, we are one of two countries where it is legal for pharmacy companies to market directly to consumers. So all of us, since we were children, has been being told that pills and medications are going to fix us, right? And we've been brainwashed since we were kids. Like, think about that for a second. We are one of two countries on the entire planet where that's even legal, okay? So like I said, this week I'm going to be going through like a bunch of different studies and everything like that about antidepressant medications. If you have any questions, let me know down in the comments. I just put up a survey on the community tab about how many of you are on antidepressants or how many of you would like to be if you could afford it and things like that. And I might do something with that information. But like I said, it is important to know the truth about these medications, all right? But anyways, that's all I got for this video. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up. If you're new, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. And a huge, huge thank you to everybody who supports the channel over on Patreon as well as everybody who buys my mental health books at therewiredsoul.com and the merch from the merch store, all that stuff helps me do what I love, which is educate people about mental health and increase awareness and all that kind of good stuff. All right. Thanks again for watching. I'll see you next time.