My poor cognition (post-med) and a bit on TAC–Treatment Advocacy Center–yes perhaps this should be two posts!

I was looking at someone’s blog the other day. He had a page on comment rules. He stated that he would not hesitate to ban people for a myriad of reasons. One of his reasons was if anyone suggested he was stupid. He proudly announced his IQ which was 145 which he pointed out was at genius level. Apparently to qualify as genius you need an IQ of 140. I had an IQ of 136 once upon a time–can we say just shy of genius?

I know now if I was tested I would be lucky to have an IQ of 120. I’m pulling that number out of a hat–I don’t really know, but I do know I don’t have an IQ of 136 anymore. I can no longer analyze information. While I can read dense material with a certain amount of comprehension I can’t summarize what I’ve read and most often I can’t tell someone with any clarity about something I’m enthusiastic about what I’ve just read. I can get the gist out, but I can’t make an argument as to why it moves me or how it connects to all sorts of other information I have read about. I trust that the judgments I make concluded by what I’ve read or heard can be quite accurate–I still have an intuitive ability to process information–something that allowed me to make powerful arguments in my rhetoric classes at university. But the language, the cognition needed to articulate myself artfully is gone.

I’ve looked at the GRE a number of times since being on meds. I entertain going to grad school on a regular basis. I’ve bought GRE study material and I’ve taken the sample tests. Frankly, I test stupid. And not just with reading comprehension and analytical writing, but especially in math and algebra. I was never strong at math and algebra, I had to work really hard to get the A’s I got in those subjects. I never had to work hard at any of the liberal arts or classes in which writing was necessary, but now I can’t even remember pre-algebra. Yes, that’s right, junior-high level math. I don’t even know how to begin to solve the easiest of formulas.

I won’t have the rule this man had for his comments–you’re welcome to call me stupid. Challenge anything you want. At the very least it might make me struggle to come up with an intelligent comeback–practice might help.

Besides having severe cognition problems of the sort I speak about above, I also forget everything. I can have everything written down in a calendar and forget to check it and space on a commitment. This has become so bad I’ve alienated some friends. No, not my best truest friends–they understand. But I haven’t been so lucky with close acquaintances. I am not a flake by nature. I have always been anally punctual and feel awful when I’m late. No one would ever have called me a flake pre-med taking. So you can imagine how disappointing it is for me to completely forget to go somewhere I’ve committed to.

In college I didn’t keep a calendar. I had an incredibly busy schedule and I kept it all in my head. I never missed an appointment, class or date. I imagine this ability is rare for the best of us. I had an amazing degree of recall at my fingertips.

Losing my cognition to psychiatric meds has been the hardest part of my psych journey. Most intelligent people identify strongly with their intelligence and I was no different. It’s still painful, years into my impairment that I fail to have the acuity I once had. Give me my intelligence back and I’ll stay fat for the rest of my life. I value my brain. I crave the capacity to articulate myself on important issues I can’t even begin to discuss anymore. In particular the politics of mental health. (many other social and political issues move me too, and I often feel at a loss on those too, in my life outside the sphere of this blog)

For example, Marissa at depression introspection posts on TAC–the Treatment Advocacy Center and how they’re full of shit. Philip Dawdy at Furious Seasons critiques them often too. I really want to do a piece on them. I wrote a response to Marissa’s latest post on the issue. I tried to make a comment on her blog but for some reason her blog thought it was spam–a bad joke perhaps? I was writing shit and the spam filter knew it? Well anyway, I didn’t think it was half bad for what my poor drug addled brain can muster–here is the text:

These people really scare me. In your other post asking about what people think of them a reader commented saying that TAC was not targeted at people like “us.” They’re targeted at the really sick people. Why then do they still scare the shit out of me for personal reasons? Who’s to say that one day if they get their way we won’t all be targeted. “oh, you’ve been diagnosed bipolar once upon a time? Forced meds for you–you could become dangerous.” There is so much being written about preventative measures–where does this prevention start? My fear is that it will start as soon as a supposed diagnosis is made known to the people supporting these legal actions. Our civil rights are clearly at stake and anyone who doesn’t realize this is simply living in fear of what they don’t understand.Meds are not the only answer. Many “violent” people can be reasoned with but are not given that opportunity. In my career as a social worker I “talked down” three different people who were exhibiting frightening behavior which, under different circumstances, (like being confronted with someone unlike me–someone afraid of them) could have acted out violently. Approach people with love and respect and alternatives to coercive treatment (something the people at TAC refuse to see as an option–cannot even fathom that there is an option) and things can go dramatically different. This is not to say that people like Cho can be stopped. But most ordinary people labeled with mentally illness, even if potentially somewhat violent, will never even begin to approach doing anything vaguely similar to Cho. And most people will respond to alternative, loving, respectful, unfearful treatment.

I like what you said, Marissa that Cho clearly had a mental health problem, but did he have a mental illness? Mental illness can be treated and cured often with alternative approaches. Meds only mask the problem, never making them go away. The pharmaceutical industry and their studies have completely obfuscated all other options. You have to really search for the alternatives and then if you want to use them you are maligned and treated with distrust by all the people backed up with pharmaceutical money or brainwashed by them.

Those with a “scientific” bent refuse to consider anything that doesn’t have large expensive clinical trials to back them up. Who pays for these trials? Pharmaceutical companies and then they twist the results to serve their profit margins. Strong, oft repeated anecdotal evidence is simply completely dismissed. I don’t understand why.

I just wish I could do it with more finesse and I wish I could study all the posts by Philip and other critics and then read TAC’s website and blog and do a real good smashing of them. But I can’t–I get overwhelmed immediately and can’t keep all the facts straight. But I figure my emotional, intuitive response counts for something–I hope that someone will be moved to do more research with what I suggest. Not everyone demands fully-formed, developed thinking to simply get them started thinking–that is what I hope anyway and that is why I write in spite of feeling extremely limited.

End note: I realize this may to some extent for some people seem self deprecating. And it very well may be. And I suppose I should be grateful what I can still do. And I do know I’m not actually stupid. It’s just really hard to let go of what I used to be able to do. Should I let go? Or should I hope that this all clears up post withdrawals and that I might finally be able to go to grad school? Or maybe I should do both.