Re: I have read it all - It is SAD that we all fight instead of helping each other

Dear Archus,
The most pertinent experience with mental illness, is my own. I suffered from this in the past for about 37 years. I was treated by psychiatrists and psychologists and put on, I don't know how, many drugs. Of course in those early days drugs were different from what they are now. Most of the drugs I was on were of the addictive type. One drug - Nembutal - was so powerful I overdosed a couple of times.

My treatment was government sponsored and when the money ran out, doctors declared me "cured". This left me with my own devices getting my drugs on the black market and so I became a illegal druggie in the true sense of the words. I was prepared to do anything for my drugs.

I was lucky enough to get a government scholarship grant to go to the university and study first law. But I soon switched over to psychology. Because I wanted to help myself. I found out that psychology was not going to help me either, but I still believed that somehow psychology would give me the answers. It did not. After graduation I joined a drug rehabilitation program. I completed a Psychotherapy course. I was then asked to teach voluntary counsellors the basics of counselling and psychotherapy. It was during this period I discovered the wonderful world of nutritional biochemistry. I learned that addicts were hypoglycemic. When I went of the hypoglycemic diet I recovered from my addiction and entered a new world altogether. I had no idea what the connection was between hypoglycemia and addiction. Teachers of biology could not help me either. So I decided to do a course in Clinical Nutrition. It took me many years to understand the significance that nutrition plays in "mental illness". I am internally grateful to my teacher of clinical nutrition - a university lecturer in toxicology - with whom I spent many hours discussing biochemistry.

My work with addicts came to the attention to the director of Corrective Services Department of NSW. Many of my early clients were on probation under supervision by that department. About 75% of prisoners were addicts or had "mental" problems as a comorbid condition to their offence. The director invited me to join the Probation and Parole Service. I completed their course an the started running groups for drug addicts. Of course, there were other clients with a variety of "mental" symptoms, which to our surprise were found to be hypoglycemic according to a special test designed by Dr George Samra. He wrote a book:

Dr George Samra: The hypoglycemic Connection II at

http://users.bigpond.net.au/gsamra/


which was an update of an earlier book with a similar title.

When the director was replaced by an other director I started to lose the support of the hierarchy in the department. Conventional psychiatrists and psychologists were very critical of the introduction of Nutritional therapy into counselling. The saga has been explained in a book by Dr Jay Harley who wrote a thesis on the Probation and Parole Service of NSW. Her chapter about nutritional counselling can b e found at:


http://www.hypoglycemia.asn.au/i-plesman_segment.html


My life experiences as a victim of mental illness and as a counsellor are such that I have developed a contempt for most of what passes on as conventional helping industry centering around the sale of drugs - a huge commercial industry - and useless talk therapy by psychologists. Many if not most of them keep on doggedly ignoring the biochemical aspects of human behaviour and are trained to believe that "mental illness" can be cured by expensive talk sessions.

My approach to psychotherapy has been explained in my book "Getting off the Hook" and in the following articles;

Principles of Psychonutritional Therapy at:

http://www.hypoglycemia.asn.au/psychotherapy/principles.html


and

Assumptions in Psychotherapy at:

http://www.hypoglycemia.asn.au/psychotherapy/assumptions.html


I rest my case there.

“A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.”

Max Planck (1858-1947) German physicist and Nobel laureate.

_______________________________________________
Jurriaan Plesman BA (Psych) Post Grad Dip Clin Nutr
Editor of
The Hypoglycemic Health Association of Australia.

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Author of "Getting off the Hook"
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