The second corner of the Triangle of Mental Health is appropriate medication.

The goal in getting quicker individualized treatment is that you will require lower doses of medication. For 16 years I took only 5 mg.

A lucky few can discontinue medication and be fine. I wasn’t one of these people.

My Grandma lived to be 91. My uncle is 93. I doubt my life will be cut short because I take medication. It’s simply not true that everyone who takes schizophrenia medication dies 25 years early. A good friend is now 72. I’m 50 and fitter than I was when I was 22.

For a great number of us taking medication and engaging in therapy when it benefits to talk to a therapist is the foolproof way to having a better life.On the other hand, not everyone requires medication–thus the qualifier “appropriate.”

Too high doses aren’t the solution. I also think it borders on being unethical to prescribe Zyprexa since it causes weight gain. Yet for a lot of people their symptoms are severe and only Zyprexa knocks out the symptoms.

This circles back to the idea that when a person gets quicker individualized medication they could be able to take a pill like Geodon that doesn’t always cause weight gain. It didn’t cause weight gain for me and I’ve been on it for nine years now.

I will return on Thursday with the most imperative corner of the Triangle of Mental Health: practical career counseling. As a librarian who helps people with career discovery and job search stratgeis I’m acutely aware of this missing link in mental health treatment.