Kristin (who works in the Gingko Psychology Group and not to be confused with Kirsten) is a therapist who ruined my life. She gave some helpful tips about how to advocate for work and helped me interpret my family situation. She is terrible at anything that has to do with race and class and told me that there's "not much hope" for my inner-city students.
However, the most damaging thing that Kristin did was normalize and advise me on medication.
At the time, I was on 150 mg of an SNRI and 2 mgs of an antipsychotic. After three months of this combination, my psychiatrist switched me from one antipsychotic to another, then another. I gave up on the antipsychotic (with the blessing of the resident psychiatrist instructed by my actual psychiatrist). I couldn't sleep at all afterwards.
Kristin looked it up and said that it was probably the SNRI that was too activating. Several of her clients had to switch out of it because it was. I asked her if she was serious, she said yes and to talk to my psychiatrist (I can only see my psychiatrist one month out from the day that I scheduled the appointment). I discontinued the SNRI. When I returned for a session three days later, I informed her that I stopped taking the SNRI. She had concern that I was going to lapse back into anxiety, but that's about it. She said nothing about the lack of tapering or the danger of cold-turkeying my drug, nor did she try to say that i should go back on it immediately lest I risk brain damage from going off the drug so quickly.
Within the next month, I started going through psychiatric withdrawal due to cold-turkeying the drug. My nightmare had just begun.
My body started going through psychiatric withdrawal/iatrogenic brain injury. My withdrawal was so severe that I was basically disabled. I was fired from my job and my husband sent me divorce papers with intent to have full custody of my son because I was such a mess of either deep apathy or hysteria. I will attempt to list all of the symptoms I experienced: I couldn't sing, write/listen to music, watch TV/music, read, take my son out to parks because I was either too tired/depressed, or the activity would send me into paroxysms of anxiety. At work, I slept through all my prep periods and had to leave early/show up late often because I was so beyond tired, even after sleeping for 8 to 20 hours. I couldn't eat, I lost 70 pounds in 3 months, I lost 50% of my hair. I had heat dysregulation that would wake me up at night (heat would roll down my body), my skin peels off like a snake. I couldn't eat sugar or carbs or else it would hyperstimulate me or make me super sluggish. I have tinnitus in my left ear, I still feel tremors at night. If I turn suddenly, either in my sleep or awake, my heart will start to race. Eating food or taking naps will also stimulate intense anxiety. I had to wear sunglasses while using the computer because the light was too bright. I will never be able to take cold medicine, drink coffee or alcohol ever again as it will bring on more symptoms. If I ever get cancer, I will probably have to choose to die rather than receive therapy because of how badly I would suffer from receiving treatment.
Hypnic jerks, waking panic attacks, fractured sleep, intense fatigue, floaters in the eyes, sound sensitivity while sleeping, expressive aphasia, inability to exercise for more than 10 minutes because it exacerbates symptoms, I often mix up homophones, and my short term memory suffers.
In the end, I still have autonomic dysfunction, which means that my body overreacts to stimuli. Had I been given the guidance to taper and had I had the appropriate counseling none of this would have happened. My central nervous system is damaged forever, and my son and husband will never know the dynamic activist/musician/educator/footballer/dancer that I was. I am a sickly shell of myself because of the reckless advice of Kristin Nielsen.
I tried to call her and tell her that these actions ruined my life, but she hung up on me when I mentioned it. read more
