u/Adventurous_Law5342

I went to ditto for health insurance for my family, gave them the details, history and everything, and they recommended and HDFC, Aditya Birla and Care. The latter two are horrible, idk how they came up with the recommendation, and I wanted to go for ICICI elevate. They're like since it's not our recommendation, we can't help you with buying it, buy from the agent directly, like WTF dude, Basically don't come to us if you don't buy from our 3 recommendations.

Their recommendations are shit too (except HDFC) as several others are literally getting recommended the same here. I'll be going with ICICI Elevate with two riders of room rent modifier and non-consumables, but I don't want to buy directly, or is buying directly safe? Or should I go with policybazaar? Or some other agency? Or directly?

Folks, it's my story of how I got caught up in this downward spiral of psychiatric drugs, as mental health being promoted left right and center, and people taking help for depression, anxiety and other general mental health issues. Just like most teens these days I failed competitive exams back in the day, ended up in bad career path, felt hopeless and eventually entered this pathetic state with no way out, eventually realized I needed to get out and being a modern educated guy of the 21st century, I took help and visited a psych, thinking they're docs, just like a cardiologist or gastroenterologist you usually visit, and drugs they prescribed not much different from your metformin or telmisartan, but was grossly wrong dude.

Thankfully was treated by one of the best psychiatrist of Mumbai, who keeping my cognition, brain health and future in consideration, took cautious approach, initially on 3 drugs, to reduce suci*al tendencies, hopelessness and better sleep. The first month went fine and and I did see changes, but few drugs didn't work, some things got better, some didn't, some caused worse sleep, some made drowsy, all this while I had no one to actually document the side effect I was experiencing, I'd visit each time, saying this got better and that got worse, leading to cycling of drugs and a cascade, from SSRIs, to SNRIs and various subclasses within them. Eventually developed sexual issues as a side effect. All this while my emotions, processing speed and all cognitive parameters severely affected, feeling even more numb engaging in sinful behaviors, doing and saying things to parents, friends, I'd never have, and never realizing it's not normal, it's not me. I actually got worse in certain areas because of all this, and at some point parents realized and wanted me to quit, but I didn't want to, thinking a chemical imbalance was being fixed by these drugs and I shouldn't until I was cured (lol). I was a waking zombie, normal guy from outside and zombie from within.

All this while not realizing how much damage my brain was taking, but I quit, after nearly 9 months going through all this crap, I went cold turkey, and immediately the withdrawal kicked with terrible restlessness and anxiety, it was worse than what I was pre med. Maybe lasted a few days and finally a sense of peace returned, and that's when I hit sobriety, felt like I woke up form a super deep hangover, having clarity and full awareness of all my actions, with a massive embarrassment/shame for my actions.

It's NOT OVER yet, the real gravity of all this kicked in of what I had become and who I really was. My brain functioning was severely impacted, imaging getting 93 percentile in JEE and then working in a call center, from doing calculus to making excel, That's the level I had fallen to. Imagine the pain, like stuck in a foreign body with previous identity. I thought this was it. My years of problem solving, memory techniques, pattern recognition, controlled speech, vibrant emotions. All subtle aspects most essential for your career, personality, relationships and quality of life, phew! GONE! Worse than death!

Eventually started researching, and found I wasn't alone, hundreds of thousands across globe were left worse off than these drugs. Sometimes irreversibly brain damaged, permanently impaired and converted to retards. Normal healthy with minor medicated to oblivion by these drugs. And when I see all these so called treatments getting promoted in the guise of fixing depression, a chemical fix to social problem. The big pharma involvement, the biased trails, downplay of life ruining effects. No accountability.

For those thinking going down route, think twice. Some of these drugs like anti-psychotics, or benzos directly cause brain damage, which thankfully my docs avoided, and mostly switched between different classes of anti-depressants. Psychiatry itself isn't very established, there are little to no long term trails for anti-depressants, which psychiatrists put people on for years, years of benzodiazapines when it should only be few weeks etc. These are horrible drugs, the worst of all medical drugs, work by smothering your emotions and numbing you, so you're not aware enough of your own emotions, hence not acting on them. Despite nearly 1.5 years off now, most of what was real me has returned but some still hasn't, and not sure if it ever will (no it's not a relapse).

The worst part is all this is getting promoted in the guise of promoting mental health, which is justified for maybe bipolar, OCD or other severe conditions, but not for social issues being labeled as chemical imbalances. You can walk into a clinic with minor symptoms and easily get labeled with some disorder, and put on meds. These drugs should be used at lowest doses and shortest duration, and only in the worst case, or never if possible.