Please, mum, no more pills

By Pia Brandt Danborg

Benjamin starts to take Ritalin to treat ADHD symptoms at age four. We follow Benjamin for 15 years, as he experiences worsening of symptoms, psychoses, more medication to get better, forced treatment, until he finally meets a psychiatrist, that is able to help him withdraw from psychiatric drugs.

The book was written in the hope of creating debate about the way we use psychiatric drugs. Do we consider potential harms thoroughly enough? What happens during polypharmacy? Is it even ethically sound to do forced treatment?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Books on Demand
• Release date: Apr 20, 2018
• ISBN: 9788743005452

Pia Brandt Danborg

Pia is a Danish author as well as a trauma-releasing therapist, a social worker in psychiatry all while homeschooling her two children. Pias greatest aim in life is to advocate more respectful and loving environments where people meet, everywhere in society - school, sports, work and so on. "To help the children is to help the whole world, our future. Helping the parents is part of helping the children." Pia is formerly a neurobiologist with fiver years of experience researching adverse effects from psychiatric drug use.

Book preview

A grateful thank you to professor Peter Gøtzsche

for giving me the opportunity to join his research

team.

Thank you very much to child psychiatrist

Lisbeth Kortegaard for checking facts and

proofreading the book.

Benjamin runs to the playground climber, the one that is in the shape of a spider. Benjamin loves this climber. Every time his mum asks where he wants to go, when they are about to go out, he suggests this climber.

He grabs the rope as high up as he can. He pulls and swings himself off the ground, fast. He grabs with his feet as well and continues to climb upwards. Shortly after he reaches the summit and looks out on the playground, like a pirate on his ship. He is far from the ground. He loves it, it is like he is on top of the whole world.

Benjamin's mum looks for Benjamin. There he is, already at the top of the frame, like a little monkey. She waves at him and he waves back.

Vicky, Benjamin's mum, feels the love for Benjamin in her heart, her sweet four-year old big little boy. She feels it in all of her body, like goose bumps and chills, like heartache but in a good way. Nothing must ever happen to him. Vicky promises to herself, that no matter what, she will take care of him, always. She will care for him just as well as two parents can do. Benjamin is the treasure in her life and she is the only parent, so she has to do as good a job as two parents can do.

Benjamin climbs down the climber. Then he traverses, as easy as a fly crossing the ceiling. He is upside down, head hanging down, so he can look around.

One moment later he is back on the other summit of the climber. He is fast. He calls out to Vicky.

Come and play with me, mum. You can be the pirate and I will be Peter Pan. Come on, mum, come and play, please.

Vicky hesitates. She hates to climb the climber. It is always wet and dirty and the holes are too tiny for her to go through them.

Not right now, honey, not right now. I can't climb through the small holes up there.

Yes, you can, mum. Come oooooon. You can do it, I know, I have seen you do it before.

Vicky shakes her head.

Benjamin's eyes go dark. He misses playing with his mum. He misses the good time they have playing all his favourite games.

Benjamin instantly climbs down and jumps to the ground. He runs off to the other side of the hedge. He then runs over to the slide, where he crawls up and slides down on his belly. He then goes to sit under the slide and starts throwing pebbles around.

He waits for mum.

But she is not coming.

Did she not notice that he is gone? She is probably preoccupied with her phone. Benjamin can never borrow it from her, but mum can use it all the time without asking. Benjamin finds that very unfair.

Benjamin's mood is dropping. He becomes more and more sad.

Why is she not coming for him?

Finally, he can hear mum's steps from behind the hedge.

Benjamin, where are you, honey? Honey..?

Benjamin curls into a ball, like a cat hiding. He does not know why. He wants to be found by mum. It has just taken too long for her to notice, that he was not on the playground climber anymore, and to come looking for him.

Vicky looks out for Benjamin by the slide, above, on the slide, below... There he is. He has been digging and throwing pebbles under the slide, so that is has formed a ring of soil around him.

Benjamin...

Benjamin quickly gets to his feet and races past his mum.

When racing past his mum, he kicks at her leg, throws the pebbles up in the air and yells loudly in frustration. He runs towards the small center square with small, quiet cafes, where coffee-drinking couples are sitting leisurely and enjoying their lattes and cappucinos and chocolate cakes with whipped cream on the side. Vicky looks to see where her boy is going.

Oh no, what will the customers outside the cafes think?

Vicky walks steadily towards the cafe area. Benjamin has crawled up onto some big flower pots, he jumps down on the opposite side and is now hiding behind them. Some of the customers are looking at him and then they look to see where the parent of the child might be. They spot Vicky heading towards the cafe area, while they take little sips of their coffee.

Vicky writhes inside. Again, somebody will think about her, thoughts about her, about her being a lousy mother, that she is not able to handle her boy,