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SSRI and Stimulants: Frying the Brain
Written by Carol Sieverling, this information is ...
Written by Carol Sieverling, this information is based on tapes of her October 2000 visit to Dr. Cheney. He gave permission to share this information, but has not reviewed or edited it.
Dr. Cheney recently came across some information regarding the dangers of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIÌs), such as Prozac, Zoloft and Paxil, and stimulants like Ritalin and Provigil. During office visits, Dr. Cheney shows patients the book
Prozac Backlash: Overcoming the Dangers of Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil and Other Antidepressants
by Joseph Glenmullen, M.D.,
a psychiatrist at Harvard Medical School. It includes endorsements from other Ivy League psychiatrists. Cheney calls the implications of this book "staggering".
When talking with patients, Cheney usually opens the book to a picture of a monkey's brain before and after it received a very potent SSRI. The "before" photo shows a dark background filled with fine white lines and white blobs, healthy neurons. The "after" photo is very dark, only a few white lines and blobs remain. Most of the brain cells had been "fried".
SSRIs and stimulants work by increasing the firing of neurons. While this often has great benefits in the short term, doctors are now realizing that long term use "fries" brain cells. The body views any neuron that fires excessively over time as damaged, and destroys it.
SSRIs and stimulants, taken over a period of 10 years or so, can lead to a loss of brain cells, causing neurodegenerative disorders. Many doctors have recently seen a sudden increase in patients with neurological symptoms, and most have been on Prozac, or a similar drug, for about 10 years. Cheney is seeing this in his own practice.
During office visits, Cheney also shows patients a copy of the May 22, 2000 issue of Newsweek with Michael J. Fox on the cover. It has an excellent article on Parkinson's Disease, a condition that involves a loss of neurons in the area associated with motor control. Parkinson's drugs stimulate the remaining neurons to "perform heroically", firing excessively. However, the article notes that while benefits are seen initially, neurological symptoms get much worse at the three to five-year point. Patients experience wild involuntary movements, etc. These drugs, though helpful in the short term, actually speed up the degenerative process.
What mechanisms are at work causing neurons to be "fried"? SSRIs are often prescribed for depression, which involves a lack of serotonin. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter, a chemical messenger. One neuron releases a burst of it into the intersynaptic cleft, (the gap between neurons). The serotonin is then taken up by special receptors in the adjacent neuron. Thus a message is sent from one neuron to another, with serotonin carrying the message across the gap. Excess serotonin is cleared away before a new message is sent. A "reuptake channel" in one neuron vacuums up the left over serotonin.
SSRIs are designed to address a lack of serotonin by blocking the reuptake channel from vacuuming up excess serotonin. While this allows more serotonin to connect with the receptors, often too much is left floating in the intersynaptic cleft. The only way the body can get rid of this excess serotonin is to oxidize it. Unfortunately, this turns it into a toxic compound that, over time, kills both the sending and receiving neurons. Cheney stated, "What starts out as an attempt to increase serotonin and reduce symptoms ends up with the destruction of the serotonergic system itself. It takes about a decade, more in some, less in others.
Now when the serotonergic nerves are dead, you start getting these motor neuron problems, which is what we're seeing." Cheney commented, "You know what a lot of doctors (who do not understand CFIDS) are doing? They're saying 'Well, let's just give them an antidepressant'. And they are frying their (patients') brains and they don't even know it. In fact, a CFIDS patient on one of these drugs fries their brain even faster than a non-CFIDS person." (See the article on Klonopin for an explanation.)
Cheney went on to say, "The other way some people with CFIDS are going is stimulating the brain, using drugs like Ritalin or Provigil. They do the same thing - they fry the brain. They cause neurons to fire at lower stimulus by lowering the firing threshold. All stimulants are dangerous, especially over the long haul. I'm not saying that you might not find them useful in the short-term. But over the long term, the physiology demands that neurons that fire excessively be killed."
Cheney strongly urges anyone taking antidepressants or stimulants to read Glenmullen's book. It lists safe alternatives to SSRIs.
The brain heals itself when you stop the drugs, it usually takes 6-12 months.
I looked up on brain scans of meth addicts just after they quit and 9 months after they quit, the neurons or whatever branch out, its like damaging nerves, you kill off afew and others grow out to take there place.
either way for adhd its better giving fishoil + l-tyrosine a shot before starting drugs. and for depression fishoil or even 5-htp, not sure about combining them though should be ok.
I used to get little bouts of depression on occasion, like really shitty depression, not sadness or apathy, but feeling really down as if my serotonin levels just dropped like someone comming down from xtc.
Ever since taking fish oil this has stopped.
The brain heals itself when you stop the drugs, it usually takes 6-12 months.
I looked up on brain scans of meth addicts just after they quit and 9 months after they quit, the neurons or whatever branch out, its like damaging nerves, you kill off afew and others grow out to take there place.
either way for adhd its better giving fishoil + l-tyrosine a shot before starting drugs. and for depression fishoil or even 5-htp, not sure about combining them though should be ok.
I used to get little bouts of depression on occasion, like really shitty depression, not sadness or apathy, but feeling really down as if my serotonin levels just dropped like someone comming down from xtc.
Ever since taking fish oil this has stopped.
For brain, I've good result with Krill oil, tyrosine, B complex and phosphatydylserine, hydrocortisone help to.
The brain heals itself when you stop the drugs, it usually takes 6-12 months.
.
What evidence do you have that axons regrow with suitable connections after axonotomy caused by these drugs? How do you know that incorrect connections with inappropriate neural gain are not what you observe or think you observe on your meth addict brain scans? Wouldn't a neuropych evaluation before abuse and after "recovery" be more useful?
It's been since 1997 when my wife and I took phentermine and fenflurmaine. Fenflurmaine is a similar molecule to MDMA with similar ability to release serotonin and block serotonin reputake. The major difference is fenflurmaine it taken chronically for weight loss compared with MDMA which is taken episodically at higher dose for recreational use. Consequences have been life altering and so far Irreversible to us both. Symptoms include confusion, memory loss, fatigue, pain, anger, lack of impulse control and dysautonomia. I have not taken SSRI's or stimulants since and so far I have no "healing". I never took any recreational drugs.
So, what is your basis for saying neurons branch back out making correct connections? The consequence for us has been devastating and without recovery. In fact, symptoms grew worse, I speculate while axons made incorrect connections. One consequence of these excess connections has been Raynaud's and neuropathy.
The study Cheny describes concerning SSRI and monkey brains rather concerned MDMA and methamphetamine . This study was later retracted by Ricaurte and McCann.
SSRI and Stimulants: Frying the Brain 
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