While I still taught in the public schools in the 70’s, a label was attached to children acting out in class. Those needing help to handle their behavior in my class were sent for a hair test by the school psychologist. Missing minerals and other elements were detected to balance the child’s chemistry through a hair test. Proper nutrition was provided through the specially prepared school lunches, for two boys in my room. After two weeks, the boys were acting appropriate in the classroom. After the psychologist retired, Ritalin was prescribed rather than using diet to help the students. In my experience, I found that drugs are toxic and stop emotional growth and good feelings.
During my research for another article, I found a common thread among the many school shootings in the news. In speaking with a security guard at one of the schools, he divulged that the shooting students were on prescriptions, including Ritalin.
The following excerpt is from my research article, “Are the Psychiatrists, Psychologists, and School Authorities Manufacturing Insanity”,
…In the Columbine incident great attention was in the media, without the real cause. That the students were on drugs was not widely shared. One survivor of Columbine, Mark Taylor, in his testimony before the FDA 9/13/2004 stated, “As Americans we should have the right to feel safe and if you were doing your job we would be safe. Why are we worrying about terrorists in other countries when the pharmaceutical companies have proven to be our biggest terrorists by releasing these drugs on an unsuspecting public? The manufacture did not disclose the negative side effects of antidepressant-induced manic behaviors like fire starting, violence and aberrant behavior as the high profits came in. They are potentially habit forming, meaning addictive and create long-term patients and then profits. A pill does not assist in dealing with life. Let us support our youth in dealing with their problems utilizing effective, natural drug-free solutions…
US American psychiatrist, Leon Eisenberg, born in 1922 as the son of Russian Jewish Immigrants, who was the “Scientific father of ADHD” said at the age or 87 in his last interview, “ADHD is a prime example of a fictitious disease.” Since 1968, Leon Eisenberg’s “disease” was expressed in the diagnostic and statistical manuals, first as “hyperkinetic reaction of childhood”, now called “ADHD in the United States.
The use of Ritalin raised the question that it amounted to interference in the child’s freedom and personal rights, because pharmacological agents induced behavioral changes but failed to educate the child on how to achieve these behavioral changes independently. The child was deprived of an essential learning experience to act autonomously and emphatically which “considerably curtails their freedom and impairs their personality development.
The issue led to the investigation of “financial ties” to the pharmaceutical industry. They found there was a financial association between those prescribing with companies in the medicinal manufacturing. In addition, they found a one hundred percent financial tie to drug companies for other prescribed drugs, especially for the treatment for mental disorders.
In my practice, I found that one child in a typical dysfunctional family will act out the family’s emotional baggage. The student carries the anger, shame and other emotional weight of the family and becomes the scapegoat. Placing children in the hands of a pharmaceutical market because the entire society cannot handle the products of its misguided theories of human behavior and raising children is a form of insanity. Let us return to the basic matter of individual psychology and education where the child is to acquire personal responsibility and appropriate behavior under sensible guidance involving the family and the schools.
