Paxil and Celexa

The FDA approved the physician prescribed use of DES to prevent miscarriage years after it had been used "off-label" by physicians. It was another seven years before it was researched and found to not only be ineffective, but was detrimental for the unborn baby. It was prescribed for another decade or so before it gradually was seen as too dangerous to use. YEARS later, these babies were experiencing high rates of cancer. THIS is the pattern of evolving, advancing medical care that has helped to save the lives of many birthing women and babies; yes, but, what is the overall cost to our society? We have huge campaigns, the March of Dimes, Cancer Foundation, the Race for the Cure, etc., etc., etc. to find cures to many physical and psychological issues that might be best prevented by socially and medically demanding and supporting impeccable prenatal, labor, and birth experiences.

Now, we have the Celexa and Paxil research coming out that show us that a baby is twice as likely to have heart defects when the mother took these SSRI's (Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitor) during pregnancy. And, like DES, it will be years before it is stopped. Meanwhile, the departments of children's cardiology and pulmonary and the early intervention system in every state will be fed amply. And obstetrics will openly fight the emerging wish of those craaaazy naturalist women to birth at home. These are the women, less likely to use drugs during gestation, who also want to also birth naturally, without drugs. One percent of the birthing population in the US births at home and one study, according to one doctor, with apparently poor sampling indicates babies born at home also are twice as likely to die, and there is an Internet uproar about it. A drug taken by millions of women shown to cause heart defects in equal incidence is ignored. I am shaking my head in disbelief.

Meanwhile, it's even worse!! Research is also showing that babies whose mothers took these SSRI's during pregnancy increase their baby's chance of a lung defect by SIX times. WHY is any woman allowed to use these drugs while pregnant now? Considering this, along with the research about epidurals and cesarean section surgical birth contributing to heart and lung issues during labor and birth, it is no wonder we have an epidemic of asthma in children. I was shocked when I enrolled my daughter in public school last year to see a one page/front and back form dealing ONLY with asthma. What the heck has happened in the last fifteen years?

Doctors dispensed these drugs because they believed it was safe for the baby? Who tells them and how do they know? Drug companies and the FDA, chief residents who learned from attendings. And, yet the drugs are not approved and are so not safe. Doctors frequently tell women, "Well, it hasn't been shown to cause problems." RED flag, ladies.

So serious is the severity and incidence of heart and lung damage to babies, that there is such a thing as a "Board Certified Celexa Lawyer. "(ttp://www.celexababydefects.com/id35.html.) Say WHAT !?!? And, yet the dispensing of these drugs to pregnant mothers continues today in 2007 and these women believe that they are safe because "the doctor says so" and they want it to be true, because hey, HELLOOOOO, they are already depressed women. Women diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, Obsessive-compulsive disorders, and anxiety and depression are not very good candidates for great decision-making. And, yeh, I'll be the one to say it, maybe not for mothering at this time. And seriously, who is really to blame here? Can the finger point to any one person -- doctor or woman?

I actually feel very sad for and defensive of practicing physicians and the double bind that they are in. First, they rely on the drug companies and young, slick drug reps to inform them about the drug (the furnish lunch and lots of office supplies and other big perks). Then, the drug companies advertise drugs for certain conditions so that the public comes in telling the trained physician what they need and want. It used to be that decades+ of grueling training prepared the physician to be the expert and diagnostician, not drug makers and the general public. Second, they are not only not taught up-to-date scientific truth about the body and healing, but they are taught to abhor those who do know it. Spirit magazine reports that it takes seventeen years for new research to find it's way into practice in medicine. Basically, sadly, because society heaps such responsibility and liability upon them ("Check with your doctor before you pass gas") physicians are held accountable. They are lacking some huge understandings and tools and given all the liability for others. Candace Pert, so aptly says in "Molecules of Emotion" that physicians in training learn on "dead hunks of meat", not the vibrant, energetic living flame that we really are. We are energetic beings --- it is scientific, not New Age woo-woo.

Interestingly, a new drug, which I unfortunately can't remember, is advertising that PAIN is the cause of depression. One article said that the average person goes to the physician nine times before it is depression that is diagnosed. This is consistent with what we know in the field of body-mind connection. But the approach to treatment (or healing or resolution as we refer to it) differs greatly.

Energy psychology and medicine are leading the way in treating pain and depression and every other malady and disorder that is currently drugged or chopped out. It works on the energetic, electric meridian system of the body, not taught in western medicine, so denied and vilified as quackery, New Age, or just plain evil and unscientific. The research shows otherwise.

Check out Emotional Freedom Techniques at http://www.emofree.com/. You might think the claims sound too good to be true. I thought so too after earning college degrees to "help" people and was even insulted at the claims. A few years later I checked it out and it is absolutely true.

Other resources:
http://www.bodymindpsychotherapy.com/background.html
http://www.energypsych.org/

More about SSRI's Paxil and Celebrex and other forms of treating anxiety and depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder (not shown to be helped by SSRI'S but prescribed none the less)