Dave’s Blog
We are the Radium Girls.
Little remembered snippets from our history provide illuminating insights for today. The calomel story is one example. From the 1890s to the 1940s, calomel or mercury chloride, was used in powders to ease the pain of teething in babies. The powders contained 0.21 percent mercury, a potent neurotoxin.
Read MoreEnemy of the People?
....We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes.
Read More“Looking at all Avenues?”
A culture that ascribes homicidal ideation and behavior to “mental illness” and then fails to explore the biological avenues that contribute to these behaviors is a culture stuck in the past, incapable of accurately diagnosing and treating those whose brains are broken.
Read MoreDear President -Elect Trump
For those of you following this now occasional blog, note that the emphasis is changing from the small picture (my son) to the big picture, those institutional memes that prevent him and others from being treated for their diagnosable illnesses. For those wanting to know more about this I refer you to two books, both entitled “Beyond Mental Illness.” One, by academics, discusses the path of the typical “mental” patient from denial to regression to hospitalization and finally to acceptance that they have truly have a “mental illness.” The other, by me, advocates a path that is currently not taken or supported by most mental health care...
Read MoreLessons from Malakoff and my Backyard
On July 21st, the Nevada County Planning Commission will consider a request by a Verizon-affiliate to install eight antennas on top of the Friar Tuck Building. Peer reviewed studies point out harmful health effects for those living near such antennas. However, federal law prevents this as a consideration. Local history may provide perspective. In 1853 hydraulic miners dissolved mountains to harvest the gold in an area now known as Malakoff Diggins. The silt traveled downstream. Farmers in the valley began to complain about the tailings that flooded their land. In the late 1860’s, Marysville and Yuba City were buried under 25 feet of mud and rock. Sacramento flooded...
Read MoreMy Son Does Not Have a Mental Disorder
Overview of one of my son's illnesses. It is not bipolar disorder.
Read MoreA Path Not Taken
