Are Your Medications Safe? The Reality of Make America Healthy Again

Episode Summary:
Mental health is under fire—again. In this episode, Maria and Tabitha break down the ‘Make America Healthy Again’ executive order and its dangerous implications for people with autism, ADHD, and mental health conditions. From medication access to Big Pharma’s grip on treatment options, we’re exposing the misinformation fueling public fear and the real consequences of misguided health policies. 

• Why are mental health diagnoses like autism and ADHD being questioned?
•  Who decides what treatments are “valid” or “necessary”?
•  How much control does Big Pharma really have?

We’re diving deep into the political, financial, and systemic forces shaping mental health care, medication access, and military disqualifications—because this isn’t just about policy. It’s about real people, real lives, and real consequences.

Key Takeaways: 

• Mental health medications are under threat, leaving many patients worried about losing access to essential treatment.
•  The executive order questions the validity of psychiatric research, fueling harmful narratives about autism and ADHD.
•  Autism and ADHD aren’t “new” conditions—but society’s understanding is evolving, and that’s a good thing.
•  Many parents struggle to accept their child’s neurodivergence, seeking to “fix” them instead of supporting them.
•  The military’s exclusion of people with mental health conditions raises serious ethical concerns about inclusion and discrimination.
•  Yes, nutrition and lifestyle matter—but medications play a vital role, and we need both, not one over the other.
•  The commission behind this executive order is full of red flags, with unqualified members making critical health decisions.
•  Big Pharma controls more than we realize, influencing medication availability, public perception, and government policy.
•  Misinformation spreads faster than facts—and it’s harming the people who need treatment the most.
•  The future of psychiatric medications is being shaped by political agendas, financial interests, and systemic biases—so we better start paying attention. 

Transcript

Maria Ingalla (00:00)
Hey everyone, welcome to Brain Trash. My name is Maria and I'm a psychiatric nurse practitioner and this is...

Tabitha (00:04)
I'm Tabitha, I'm also a psychiatric nurse practitioner.

Maria Ingalla (00:07)
and we're here to talk about how mental health is impacted by Make America Healthy Again today. So normally we've been talking a lot about neurodivergence and we've been talking about medications and a lot of different things, but this is something that a lot of people are stressed about because there's implications of mental health medications in here. So we wanna talk a little bit about the executive order for Make America Healthy some of the things that are going on right now in America as far as.

psych and psych care. so let's dive in. I think a lot of people right now are worried about Make America Healthy Again. Has anyone come to you so far in practice and said like, my god, I don't want my psych meds taken away? Have you heard anything?

Tabitha (00:47)
yeah, yeah, no, I get like a few emails a week. Most of the clients that I've seen since that made headlines have asked if I'm concerned about it or if they should be concerned about it. It's something that is very widely being talked about amongst the people I see.

Maria Ingalla (01:02)
Yeah. And I think that it's, it's fairly misunderstood because a lot of people are seeing TikToks or news articles that are kind of just saying like wellness farms and they're taking away things. it's really hard to kind of gauge what's misinformation, what's actually given out right now. So we're here to give a, I want to say unbiased perspective, but I'm going to say a solid analysis of realism about what this is, because I don't want to say it's unbiased because we're definitely, we have a bias that's correct. I'll put that on there.

So let's take a look at the executive order and kind of break it down a little bit. So I'll let you kind of start and kind of see like what did you see on kind of like the beginning of the executive order and we'll kind of read it out and see what's going on.

Tabitha (01:39)
Yeah, well, this whole thing, just talks about, you know, here's all of these things that are terrible in the United States about, you know, large portions of adults and children living with mental illness and all this, you know, random things in the beginning. And then it starts to get into creation of this Make America Healthy Again committee.

which is supposedly going to kind of lead the charge on figuring out why we have so much of this going on and make sure that our science is real good science and the things that i really was concerned about on first read through all of this was that it feels like

It is opening up the box for cherry picking whatever research fits an agenda. For every, you know, 10 amazing, brilliant scientists that are using the scientific process as intended, there is one that is going to pander to whatever the Make America Healthy Again people want them to pander to and try to make it look as if it is real research, enough so that the majority of people who follow

this administration are going to listen to it, you know? Which is dangerous. And then the other part that it talks about is, you know, some of this discussion that we were discussing earlier about, the mention of the military right in the middle of it kind of really scares me that this is somehow correlated to us just, like, not having enough soldiers if kids have mental health diagnoses. Seems a little fucked up to me.

Maria Ingalla (03:08)
Yeah, so when we're actually looking at this order, so you can pull it up, you can just like look up Make America Healthy Again executive order, and you'll be able to pull it up from Whitehouse.gov, right? So just to read out some portions of it. Paragraph two, under purpose. Autism spectrum disorders had the highest prevalence in high income countries, including the United States in 2021. So not just us, other high income countries too, right? It talks about autoimmune, IBD, psoriasis, some things like that, right?

So overall, the global comparison data demonstrates that the health of Americans is on an alarming trajectory that requires immediate action. This concern applies urgently to America's children. In 2022, an estimated 30 million children, 40.7%, had at least one health condition, such as allergies, asthma, or an autoimmune disease. Autism spectrum disorder now affects one in 36 children in the United States. A staggering increase from the rates of one to four out of...

10,000 children identified with the condition during the 1980s. Like not bearing in mind that the DSM has changed since the 1980s. Not even like taking that into consideration, but okay.

Tabitha (04:13)
Yeah,

to me, I'm reading this going, of course, of course it has increased because we have been researching and learning and we know more. Also, insurance industry requires us to put a diagnosis to treat somebody. And so.

Maria Ingalla (04:17)
in high-income countries.

Which is new because

now there are new treatments, right? And like medications and risperidone and like FDA approvals, which is new. So now again, like, yes, you need a diagnosis to have ABA. If you want to like go into that route, OT, PT, like to get services, developmental disability services, like anything, you need that diagnosis. So where parents in the 1980s and 90s would be like, fuck it, my kid's a little quirky. Like totally different.

Tabitha (04:52)
Well, it feels like they Googled some stats and were like, no, this is terrible. It's on the rise. The other part of this that like really, I don't know, fucks with me is like, autism spectrum disorder. there's so much of it. Like this is such a terrible thing that we need to stop. It's like.

Maria Ingalla (05:09)
What about Elon? What happened? They don't like their little buddy over there who's like super organized and like doing space?

Tabitha (05:15)
Also, like, I'm pretty convinced a lot of people have the touch of the tism and myself included, right? Like, think that it's actually something that we should maybe, like, embrace and learn to love that, like, doesn't need to be removed from people or make them less qualified for certain jobs or military positions, right? Maybe we need to change our understanding of these things and not the fact that they are there and are not going anywhere.

Maria Ingalla (05:42)
And I think like when I've made posts on TikTok before about it, I get a lot of people who agree, right? Like you and I both being autistic adults can say like, we are successful and we've had challenges, but like we're also like highly intelligent people. we know that autism is a spectrum and that there are people who need more supports, have more challenges. My daughter's autistic, right? Both of my kids are autistic.

what I did notice on TikTok is that there are a lot of moms who would be commenting saying like, no, you don't understand. Like I've been trying to detox my child or like, I don't want my child to have this or like my child was fine before we got a vaccine. So there's a large portion of people who don't want to believe it's genetic and they don't want to look any of that research. They want to say like, Nope, I want my kid to be fixed and I don't want to look at ways to help or support them in the way that I want to look at a way to cure them. Right. So,

I think that's just a lot of misinformation and that's kind of scary.

Tabitha (06:32)
I think it

makes sense to me why you would feel that way, right? If your child has level two autism, level three autism, maybe you don't have access to these things that help you to get through a day, right? Maybe there's aggression that's happening, things that like you don't have a moment to think about anything when you're just like wondering if you need to put your kid in a hold so they don't hurt your other child, right? Like there's a lot to think of, but at the same time...

just going to like this has to stop or we have to make it go away that's not a realistic solution of this and we know that.

Maria Ingalla (07:02)
I think it comes to lot of like grieving, like the loss of your child and the loss of like what you expected your child's life to look like, right? And I think part of that is like, and part of the grieving process is bargaining. And this is part of the bargaining chip of people saying like, maybe there's a way that like we can say this is a vaccine injury or we can say this is like not, you know, because of me or, you know, this wasn't like supposed to happen. So I like feel for it and...

I really do, and I think that research needs to go into it, but this is just the wrong direction.

And then when we continue to read, we see these health burdens have continued to increase alongside the increased prescription of medication. This is where people get worried. For example, in the case of ADHD, over 3.4 million children are now on medication, up from 3.2 million children in 2020. The number of children being diagnosed with the condition continues to rise.

This is where we see the military piece. This poses a dire threat to our American people and our way of life. 77 % of young adults do not qualify for the military largely in part because of their health scores. Why else would this come right after talking about ADHD medication and autism, right? If you have an autism diagnosis, you are disqualified from joining the military, period. If you have ADHD medication, you need to show that you've been off of it for one year prior to being able to join the military to prove you're not dependent.

If you are on an SSRI, an anti-psychotic, a mood stabilizer, you are disqualified from joining the military. People are like, you're just kind of making a reach here. And I'm like, no, this is literally like we're looking at paragraph.

Tabitha (08:34)
Right, it's right there, next to it.

Maria Ingalla (08:36)
Yeah, like

paragraph five, paragraph six, right there, paragraph five and six. Like, let's put it in a bullet point here. One, two, there's the cause. So it's just scary to think about.

Tabitha (08:47)
I've had people

literally tell me that when they were recruited into the military, their recruiter told them to not disclose a history of bipolar or taking mood stabilizers. They were basically told it's like a don't ask, don't tell type situation. And that to me is like, okay, why would we do it that way when what we could do if we need more people to join the military is look at why is this a rule? Why is this a rule that somebody who has a mental health

diagnosis can't join the military. And I mean, sure, there's obvious reasons I can think of off the top of my head, right? PTSD, if I already have trauma, now I'm going to hand-to-hand combat, it's probably gonna fuck me up, right? But something like ADHD that is well managed or level one autism that somebody has a lot of really great insight into how their sensory needs are impacted that wants to join the military and is fully functional.

Maria Ingalla (09:23)
Yeah, that's true.

Tabitha (09:37)
Why are they not allowed to? And why are we now saying that like the reason that it's a problem that people are diagnosed with this thing is because these kids don't qualify for the military? That's fucked up.

Maria Ingalla (09:48)
Yeah, and I think that if we just wanted to look down the avenue of like, I know a lot of autistic people who love routine and who like always wanted to join the military and that's been their fascination and they would be like the best ever in these positions, but like totally disqualified. So.

Tabitha (09:57)
they would thrive, yes.

Think of the marching

band. Every, I mean, listen, I was in the marching band. Everyone else in the marching band, pretty, on the surface appearing autistic, loved it, right? There's like structure, routine. I'm supposed to go here. I'm supposed to do this. I've got to wake up early for a sense of purpose and, you know, this strong sense of justice and all this stuff. Like, why, why?

Maria Ingalla (10:06)
for you.

Tabitha (10:23)
that just be like, this is a terrible thing, we should not allow these people to do what they want to do.

Maria Ingalla (10:28)
Yeah,

but also did the noise bother you? Just like off topic.

Tabitha (10:31)
No, because it was noise that I liked.

Maria Ingalla (10:32)
okay. Just making sure. okay.

Tabitha (10:34)
Noise that I don't like, yes, bothers me, but noise that I choose to like, yes, I like it.

Maria Ingalla (10:38)
Just as a neurodivergent, you know, question. Next point into the EO talks about the Make America Healthy Again commission. What did you gain from kind of looking at this? Because you looked a little bit more deeply at this part than I did.

Tabitha (10:50)
let me get to that part because this is a lot of what like, so section three is where they talk about the actual making the commission right before section two and then into section two. It kind of goes over what they really want to focus on, right? Like,

includes fresh thinking on nutrition, physical activity, healthy lifestyles, over-reliance on medication and treatments, effects of new technological habits, environmental impacts, and food and drug quality and safety. This is where I see a lot of like proponents of Make America Healthy Again and a lot of, people who are like, my gosh, RFK, he's amazing. this is the stuff that they really attach to. And here's the thing is like, I've, I've done autoimmune paleo diets and I felt better, right? I have utilized like food,

exercise and all of these things to help my own health. I don't have any anything against them, right? I do think these are all really great things that everyone should have knowledge and access about. However, that doesn't mean that like taking medications that make us like not want to.

eat ourselves off the face of the planet is a bad thing. You know, this is how I ended up in this field. Like this isn't something where like I was just like, I love big pharma. I'm going to go prescribe medications. I'm going to spend all my money and time in school to do something that I hate. No, I saw like the real actual lived experience of people who were doing all of these other things, nutrition, physical activity, not using technology as much, meditating, not using drugs or alcohol, right? Like doing all of the things and still getting back to this place of like

not really sure I want to exist. And so to take, to villainize the medications and say we need to just do these things instead, it's not a fair analysis of what needs to happen. And so they create this committee. It's got, so the chair of it is RFK Jr., right? And they've got like assistant.

to the president for domestic policy, who's the executive director. And then this is in order how they list the people that are gonna be part of this committee. Secretary of Agriculture, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Secretary of Education, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Director of the Office Management and Budget, Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy.

Director of the National Economic Council, Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, Commissioner of Food and Drugs. And then at the very bottom, we've got these last two, Director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and then Director of the National Institutes of Health. Like those are the two that I would think would maybe be at the top. Those are the people that have, you know, medical doctorates or PhDs or actual research within healthcare at all. But instead we've got like...

the people that are growing the food and teaching the kids that have already established that they are very much going to be yes men for Trump. Sketch.

Maria Ingalla (13:19)
Linda McMahon.

And we did look at like who is the acting director for the CDC, who is the acting director for the NIH, and we know that they are people who have research backgrounds and they're people that we just don't know a lot about. There's nothing wildly scary about either one of them except they're probably not the most qualified people on the planet to be heading those departments, but either are you and I apparently, so we'll just.

of passed by that but yeah apparently everyone else

Tabitha (13:57)
I just thought it was a funny

mix of humans to be on this very important committee.

Maria Ingalla (14:04)
Absolutely. they can... Yeah, well, why would we want medical professionals? That doesn't make sense. There have been statements that have been put out saying like, we want the CDC and the NIH to only focus on research, right? They're not allowed to make any form of recommendations for policies because that's not their job. They don't understand policy and politics or how anything impacts society. That's not public health, not that...

Tabitha (14:04)
to make these decisions about medications.

Maria Ingalla (14:31)
I have a public health degree, you know, but they're only allowed to do that. And then the politicians who have no medical knowledge will interpret it and make policy. So that's terrifying, right?

Tabitha (14:41)
that actually rolls

into this next spot where it starts to talk about the mission of the commission, right? In section four, say like, we're gonna advise and assist the president on how to best exercise his authority to address the childhood chronic disease crisis. right? It's real scary. And so here's how they're gonna do it, right? They're gonna study the scope of the childhood chronic disease crisis and any potential contributing causes, including American diet, absorption of toxic material, medical treatments.

lifestyle, environmental factors, which we're going to like defund the EPA, but we're going to check out those environmental factors, Government policies, food production techniques, electromagnetic radiation, and corporate influence or cronyism, which I went ahead and looked that one up. I thought it was pretty hilarious and terrifying and ominous that the definition of cronyism is the appointment of friends and associates to positions of authority without proper regard to their qualifications.

Maria Ingalla (15:20)
cronyism.

Tabitha (15:33)
such as sitting people as heads of very important things in our country that have no actual qualifications to do so. So, but that cronyism, we gotta really make sure we keep that out of our healthcare.

Maria Ingalla (15:42)
No.

That definitely affects everything. all of these great folks that are definitely not a part of cronyism will advise and assist the president on informing the American people, because the CDC and the NIH should not be doing that, right? Regarding childhood chronic disease crisis using clear and transparent facts, and then provide the president government-wide recommendations on policy and strategy.

Tabitha (16:06)
You know what I really loved that wasn't included in this and I felt like it talked, like it spoke volumes that it wasn't there is like, we're not looking at how things like poverty affect childhood healthcare crisis, Hmm, why would a kid need to eat McDonald's for every single meal? Well, that's because they have a fucking dollar menu.

and that's the easiest place for them to go and get food every single time instead of relying on mom or dad who's maybe working three jobs or they don't even have the money to go buy. Right, like why are we not looking at some of the most well studied and known reasons?

Maria Ingalla (16:41)
Because we're cutting food stamps. That's why, because we're cutting food stamps and welfare is getting cut and let's put lifetime limits on food stamps, let's get rid of WIC, let's get rid of all of the places that people are getting produce and getting food. And I mean, when I was getting my public health degree, I remember like having these conversations in my classes and we would talk about like, well, why can't people just eat healthier, right? Like that's the solution, but people don't know how to cook. People might not have safe.

Tabitha (16:43)
Yeah.

Maria Ingalla (17:07)
places in their homes to cook, to store food. They might not know how to store food. They might not know how to cut produce. Like when you're backing into these things, you might pick up and, you know, like, I don't know, some sort of like a vegetable, like a leek. People don't know what leeks are. I didn't know what a leek was till I was in my twenties, right? Like I had mac and cheese when I was a kid. That's what I ate from a box.

Tabitha (17:26)
There are actually programs that go into schools who predominantly have kids in poverty that teach them how to cut vegetables, how to cook meals, how to replace some of the carbs that they may use at home with healthier carbs, right? I know people personally who are in these programs that are being cut and they're being removed from these schools. So these kids are no longer even having access to learning these things, let alone being exposed to them in their real life.

Maria Ingalla (17:51)
So this is a front, you know, as we're kind of seeing it, that we're going to publicly announce that the reasons for illness are not related to that. And that's kind of what this is, is it's saying that there are other reasons. It's like vaccine injury, right? Like the toxic chemicals, that's what that's relating to. Which now we see, you know, RFK backing on saying like, actually everyone should get vaccinated because people are dying. Surprise.

Tabitha (18:17)
Who knew that

vaccines are like our number one defense against deadly disease? Who knew?

Maria Ingalla (18:22)
You know, he certainly didn't, but he certainly doesn't know a lot either. So then they have this like, within a hundred days of this order, the commission shall submit to the president through the chair and the executive director, this kind of like all of these goals they're gonna look at. like identifying and describing childhood chronic disease compared to other countries.

Assess the threat, now think about the language here, assess the threat that potential overutilization of medication, food ingredients, et cetera, kind of like poses to children with respect to chronic inflammation and other things. So they're not talking about any other overutilization than psych meds. It's the only thing that's mentioned in here, which point three, assess the prevalence and threat, again, the language, posed by prescription of SSRIs, antipsychotics, mood stabilizers, stimulants, and weight loss drugs.

The way that this is written is very specific in the way it's the prevalence and the threat. It's not the overall effect, it's a threat. So we know that the things that are gonna come out against this are going to be very biased. And we know that RFK holds very strong opinions on a lot of these medications and a lot of these things, so we have some clips to share that we can talk about.

Tabitha (19:28)
like that just actually reminded me of another one that I hadn't brought up that he was talking about GLP-1 drugs and saying that like all of these six-year-olds are just getting thrown on GLP-1s and like they're not even FDA approved for kids under 12. And this is only after they've had diet and exercise interventions that have not worked before they can utilize a GLP-1. So like

Maria Ingalla (19:40)
Where?

Tabitha (19:50)
I feel like the information is just coming in from some random source and then he's being like, that's a good talking point.

But anyways, he talks about how...

kids are being prescribed GLP-1s and it's just like this huge thing that's happening everywhere and all these six-year-olds are running around on Ozempic. It's like, no. Just like, just no.

Maria Ingalla (19:59)
Good.

I mean, like,

I can't get prescribed ozumpic for very cheap, and I've been trying for a long time, and it's like $450 a month to get a prescription of a GLP one. So, you know, that could be its own thing.

Tabitha (20:11)
Right?

Right. Yeah. Okay,

so this is the one about school shooters being on SSRIs.

for you blamed school shootings on antidepressants. You said, and this is a quote, there is no time in American history or human history that kids were going to shoot schools and shooting their classmates. It really started happening coterminous with the introduction of these drugs with Prozac and with other drugs. So do you believe as you've said that antidepressants cause school shootings? This should be a simple question. I don't think anybody can answer that question. And I didn't ask that question. said it.

I said it should be studied along with other potential culprits like social media. But I don't know. I would never make, because there's no science on that. there is. So she goes on to say like there is science for this, right? They've largely debunked this to like, we don't have any evidence of correlation or causation, right?

Maria Ingalla (21:14)
And just to

point on that, he mentioned social media is another thing that needs to be assessed, and it is listed nowhere in anything that needs to get researched in this order.

Tabitha (21:22)
Yeah, yep. Every time that he's confronted by somebody who's saying like, here's the actual answer to the question that you think is this new and novel question that you're asking, we've already studied it, here's the answer, he backpedals and says, well, well, well, I didn't know, you know, I'm not saying I know all the things, I'm just saying we should look at it. We already have, we've looked at it. And then their rebuttal to that is, well, it's not been good science, which is why half of this executive order says things like,

using rigorous and transparent data and looking at what the best practices are and the integrity of science, right? Because all of this is to discredit any previous science, again, to kind of lead us into that ability to cherry pick answers that sound better.

Maria Ingalla (22:01)
And then when we're looking at transparent, right? So like how many school shooters have been taking these medications and like did it cause it, right? So like Aurora Theater shooting prescribed Clonazepam, which again, not listed, and Sertraline. Adam Lanza for Sandy Hook had an antipsychotic that was prescribed, but he was never taking it. This guy for Thurston High School in 1998, Prozac. Virginia Tech, Prozac.

Elliot Roger in 2014 refused to take an antipsychotic and then Parkland shooting on antidepressants. So when we're looking at the people who have taken antidepressants, we have to think like, was this the cause? No. Typically we see that there was trauma. We see very tumultuous upbringing, bullying. We see a lot of like other things that are in play. And then there's an FDA warning on

on antidepressants in general, right? It says between the ages of 15 and 24, there could be an increase of suicidal ideation. So people might interpret that to say like, well, there is an FDA warning, bad things can happen with these medications. That study was fairly flawed. And I think if they're going to put out new research, maybe they should get rid of it. Because like what it shows is that like things can occur well on these medications. Yes. During that study that they used to put this FDA warning out, they said like, if somebody who

is self-harming, like an autistic person stimming, then they're going to count that as suicidal ideation. So like the, it wasn't very rigorous, it's just, it's very like, it was very flawed. And then you have like the point of like, between the ages of 15 and 24, we don't often see bipolar erupt yet. And if you give somebody an SSRI and they have bipolar,

that could very well cause suicidal ideation. It could cause homicidal ideation, could cause hallucinations, it could cause manic episodes, it could cause things like this, yes. But this is where really good mental healthcare comes into play in having people who are trained and having people who understand bipolar and having research go into that and programs, but it's not. And you know, it's made comments too, like, it's getting off of it is about as hard as getting off of heroin, right? Do you have a clip for that one too?

Tabitha (24:02)
I sure do. I sure do. So, okay, let's see. Turn this up. And I was at the bottom of my class. I started doing heroin. I went to the top of my class. Suddenly I could sit still and I could read. And I was at the bottom of my class. That's it. That's all you can just repeats that. But.

He's talking about heroin, right? And like, this is something that I say to people all the time. When I talk about psych medications, a lot of times I'll make the joke that we are microdosing drugs. And this is why, right? Because are we impacting neurotransmitters with psychiatric meds? Yes. We're doing it in really subtle way, though. We're typically telling our brains, hey, this neurotransmitter, stop just like getting rid of it and recycling it. Leave it there a little longer. Leave it in the goo in the brain. Let us use it. Things like heroin.

What they do is they cause your brain to flood with some of these neurotransmitters, right? So anything that feels really good, really fast, it's amazing, but also not sustainable long-term. This is why psychiatric meds can be so helpful for people who maybe find benefit in utilizing illicit substances like this. When I look at that and he's struggling in school and then takes heroin and all of a sudden can sit still and focus.

To me, he's self-medicating ADHD. He was not diagnosed, not treated, and he found heroin, and that was the best way for him to be able to self-medicate for this. When we look at the actual, like, pharmacology behind heroin, dopamine, endorphins, all of these things, initially, as our brain is first being exposed to it, these things all skyrocket and boost up. The actual,

inhibitory GABA type effects are until longer term use. So when we are just first utilizing it, that norepinephrine, endorphins, dopamine, they all go up. And so of course he was able to sit there and do his schoolwork. But like to me, he's literally... that clip is an ad for why the fuck ADHD meds are needed. They're going to help prevent people from substance use disorders, alcohol use disorders, all kinds of other shit, but specifically those in relation to his clip, you know?

Maria Ingalla (25:58)
Yep. And I mean, like his concern is like, well, what about the withdrawal after you do these things, right? Because he had done heroin and he went through that. Is it the same? Whenever you take a substance and you stop taking that substance, you can have withdrawal, right? If your body is accustomed to how it's functioning. About 30 % of people who take antidepressants end up having a discontinuation syndrome, which is pharmaceutical industry's nice way of saying it's withdrawal, right? Your body's withdrawing from it.

And unless that's done in like a very slow way, it can give you uncomfortable sensations like brain zaps or feeling disoriented, flu-like symptoms, feeling dizzy, feeling like, I always felt like the computer was lagging when I forgot my medications. Kind of like life feels choppy. It just doesn't feel right. So is it the same as with drawing from something that's like flooded your brain versus something that is like very slowly taken for a long time helped you function? No.

That's not the same thing. And like you don't need to go to a wellness farm to go and feel like the computer is lagging and you know, you're crying in a corner because you're off your medication now and you're just not functioning. Like, what?

Tabitha (27:01)
Well,

just like the black box warning that you're talking about on antidepressants for people between 15 and 24, right?

This is a conversation that you have with your patient beforehand. Hey, this is one of the warnings. Here's what could happen. Let's make a risk versus benefit analysis and find out, is it worth trying this medication? Same thing, whenever I start somebody on a med, I let them know initially from the first time we ever talk about it, this is what it's gonna look like to get off of it. Not only because I want them to know what to expect, but also because so many people maybe...

can't afford their visits anymore or just aren't going to reach out because they forgot to make an appointment or something like that and they take themselves off of their meds. I want them to know what's the safest way to do that and what can they expect, right? I always let people know and I try to be as clear as possible. Like here's the half life of this medication that you're on. When I say half life, I draw it out for them. I say, this is what happens, right? I use my little whiteboard and I say,

If day five after getting off of your Zoloft you're feeling like, I really don't want to fucking live today, just know that's not your brain. That is your brain responding to the lack of Zoloft after five days, because that is when it's like the most depleted. So having these conversations ahead of time and letting people know what to expect and then doing it in like the slowest, safest manner possible.

This is something that needs to happen under the care of a psychiatric provider, right? Somebody who's specialized in these things.

not by somebody saying like, these things are bad for you and addictive. So you should just stop taking them. Like if people are listening to him, this is dangerous. If they're saying like, well, shit, if they're going to take away my meds, I might as well just stop taking them. They're not going to know, you know, five days after getting off of this med or 10 days after getting off of that med or five hours after getting off of an SNRI, I might want to die, but I don't need to listen to that voice in my head because that is just the lack or the depletion of serotonin that's happening. Right. So like there's just no context given with these things.

Maria Ingalla (28:33)
Right?

Tabitha (28:51)
that he's saying and not even him just everybody in this same orbit of ideas it's it's not that simple it's not just they're addictive or they're good they're not just all good or all bad right we have to be able to find that middle ground of like yes there are negative sides to

everything that we do in life, right? I mean, eating fast food, going outside, not going outside, sleeping too much, sleeping too little, drinking too much water, not drinking enough water, medication, no medication. There's pros and cons to all of this and it's all a risk versus benefit analysis based on each individual human and the other things that they've tried, right?

Maria Ingalla (29:26)
And this is like a lot of people are coming to us after trying other things. They've tried cutting out the food days. They've tried cutting out everything else, right? And then they're getting to medication. And I think you and I can kind of both agree in like working in this field and being moms that like, it's not a good feeling to decide to medicate your kid. It's just not, it's hard. And it's like a hard decision to say like, okay, like let's do a psych med for our kids. It's just like, it's not easy for parents and nobody's just showing up being like, just medicate them. I mean, maybe like sometimes I, I...

daydream about that, but nobody's doing that.

Tabitha (29:58)
No, it's usually

not until like the fifth visit of them being like, okay, we're going to try a different supplement. And then I give them more supplement recommendations and go, you know, run on a treadmill and do this and, you know, try this elimination diet or whatever the fuck, right? It's usually the fifth visit. They're like pounding on my door. Like, please give us medication.

Maria Ingalla (30:11)
integration.

We're desperate,

please. We're flunking out of school and the school isn't letting us back. there's just not enough supports. But oftentimes, I was just going to say, yeah, the supports are getting put in in school. We already have everything in place.

Tabitha (30:21)
That's the thing, if that- sorry, go ahead.

Yeah, and if we are just going from the perspective of like, oh, well, all meds are just bad for kids and they're a threat. Like, what are we going to do to support them to do things other than medications then? Because if we're not looking at how poverty is impacting this or social media or some of these other things that, you know, you'll, we absolutely know from prior research.

if we're not going to look for actual solutions in that and we're just like, but the vaccine injuries, like, how is that creating a solution for any of this?

Maria Ingalla (30:58)
Exactly. And this is kind of where this gets scary. But a lot of people were concerned about like, what if my meds get taken away? So what we can say looking at this is number one, it's only directed at children. If you are over 18 and you're taking psych meds, nobody is saying anything about even researching, talking about nothing about your psych meds. Nobody's talking about it. There are like other things that are ongoing with like the DEA, which could impact stimulants, but that's different. So not a part of this.

Again, only for children. So why? would it affect the ability of kids to have this? To have their medication? I think that it's going to be a lot of propaganda from the research that's gonna get put out. We talked about there's a lot of, this is negative, right? But we have to also remember, big pharma is powerful. And big pharma is not going to let anybody in office take away their ability to make money. It's just not gonna happen.

So we know that RFK has invested a lot of money and his family has invested a lot of money into psychedelic research. That is something that we expect to take off, which is a good thing, right? Like it should be researched, but not at the expense of these other medications being pushed out. But there's no regulations currently in the military for taking ketamine or anything like that. So, you know, seems convenient. Then we also have...

Big Pharma as kind of a force of if insurance companies stop paying for children's medications, parents will be forced to pay out of pocket because insurance companies can now say like, well, it's not safe to take these. We don't want to pay for it. Now parents are forced to pay out of pocket, more money for them. Insurance companies can say like, well, we're not going to pay for adult medications or mental health benefits at all. Again, more money for Big Pharma and more money for insurance companies.

So everybody seems to be benefiting here. RFK is benefiting, Trump is benefiting, Big Pharma is benefiting, insurance companies are benefiting. Like all of the big guys are all winning. So no, the medications are not going away, but I guarantee like good RX coupons will probably go away. Insurance companies should stop paying for meds. I'm pretty sure that will stop. That's gonna be a factor. I see Big Pharma just banking more money. But these meds will continue to be made, no question.

Tabitha (33:04)
Yeah, absolutely. That's, mean, this is probably the only time, it's absolutely the only time I've ever been like kind of grateful that Big Pharma has so much money. I'm hoping that like them and Elon will battle it out and become less rich in some way. But even when I look too far down to it, just like you were saying, is like this actually just, it all, it all bolsters all of them together while keeping that divide between and like us and them thing. and the reality, like I tell people this all the time.

when we're on medications, this is the best time to build like all of the systems that would benefit you if you were not on medications, right? And whether that's neurodivergence or depression, anxiety, bipolar, right? Like what are some ways that you can really utilize this time being stable on medications to create systems in your life that support you if that day ever comes that medications aren't available. However,

I also don't see that happening anytime soon. I think that there's too much stock from too many super, super wealthy humans that will absolutely fight to have these things here, which is unfortunately really gross, but also I'm grateful for it.

Maria Ingalla (34:05)
At

this point, I agree with you on that. It's kind of like, you everyone's like, you guys must love Big Pharma if you're in the industry. And it's like, they actually don't pay us. We're just trying to provide and, you know, help people. And I'm trying to just take my own medications because I need my Lexapro too. So.

Tabitha (34:14)
Right.

Well, I'm

like, I mean, drug reps reach out all the time. I feel so gross if anybody even talks to me. I'm just like, this feels so wrong. I don't like it. But yeah, I get why people feel that way because there is so many aspects of this that are just sketch at best, right? But I think that there's enough of us that give a shit that are not invested in that, that are not wealthy, right? Like, I'm certainly not fucking wealthy, that's for sure.

Maria Ingalla (34:27)
We get a lot.

Tabitha (34:45)
And so I think there's enough of us that we can come up with solutions that don't necessarily have to put money in the pockets of the people that don't need any more money.

Maria Ingalla (34:53)
Agreed. And as you bring up the farm reps, I just want to kind of clear, like, what does that look like? Because we get a lot of questions from farm reps and people seem to think that, the farm reps come in and give us, like, money and gifts and stuff. Like, I'll, usually tell the farm reps I want them to pay for my food and I want all of us to get door desk food, including my assistant. And then once they feed us all, like, we'll listen to them talk. We give them a very strict time limit. And they'll usually just give us, a PowerPoint with their own research on,

So we all know it's biased and we're all just kind of like, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, you know, crunching on our food. And then they'll ask us things like, do you guys use this? And we'll be like, sometimes. And then that's like literally it. It's usually so awkward and we just end the day. And it never in my career has been made me be like, my God, I need to prescribe this medication. It's just so amazing. Like usually I just get annoyed, you know? It's weird, but.

Tabitha (35:35)
Great.

Yeah. Well, I think

that's a big part of what people can do to help be a part of the solution is just like that. When we're watching these reps give their presentations of research that is entirely funded and done by the company that made the drug. Similarly, human beings in the world can not necessarily do your own research because I absolutely hate that. I think people who are doing their own research

don't know how to read statistics, don't know how to figure out what a certain value is in a research study or how to tell what kind of study it is or how reliable the data is. Leaning on people in your life who do know these things, who are educated in these things, or going and taking that course, a research statistics course, or figuring out when I look at this article, what do I look at to see who funded this? Is there any bias in this and all that? Because I.

100 % fucking assure you there is going to be very incorrect research that is going to be done over the next four to however many years. And we're gonna need to be able to see that.

Maria Ingalla (36:32)
Yeah. And like,

and we can always put that into chat GPT because we do have the tools and just ask chat GPT for the biases. Ask it like, is there things that I should consider in this? Like, is this like, you know, tainted in any way from a political stance that might be trying to benefit? Are there like benefits to insurance companies? Are there benefits to big pharma in this? Like you can ask chat GPT and it will do an analysis for you. Highly recommend to go ahead and do that.

So this kind of summarizes a little bit about Make America Healthy Again, and hopefully this can give you some peace on medications not being taken away because, again, nobody is taking away your medications. Big Pharma has too much money to let that happen. Would highly doubt that it'll ever happen. And yeah, hit subscribe, leave us a comment, let us know your thoughts, let us know if you disagree with us and you have a total other perspective because we're honestly totally interested in kind of what other people are seeing too. So thanks for listening and we'll see you guys next week.