How prescription policies have turned me into a child for life
Open letters to policy makers
by Brian Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
March 12, 2026
TO PSSD NETWORK1
I am a 67-year-old ADULT who tried for over a year to get off of Effexor after paying out of my own pocket for a compounding pharmacist -- one who was not allowed to provide extended release formula. The effort failed after a year with my depression returning worse than it had ever been and I also discovered that I had cognitive impairment that only disappeared after returning to the drug. I finally decided to return to the drug full-time and to spend the remainder of my life protesting the superstitious fear-driven drug attitudes that shunted me off onto this drug-from-hell in the first place.
If only it were so easy.
When I complained to my psychiatrist about having been placed on a drug that I can never kick, he "fired" me as a patient. He accused me of questioning his integrity. I told him I was questioning the integrity of the whole system, but he was determined to take it personally. I think he was also motivated because I complained via the Sentara Complaint service, and he was going to punish me as a whistleblower.
Now I have to find a psychiatrist to prescribe the med for me. This means in practice that I have to see a physician less than half my age every three months of my life to share the most intimate details of my life with him or her. In other words, I have been turned into a child for life and a ward of the healthcare state. It is humiliating. And if I work too hard to find an understanding physician, I am charged with "doctor hopping." But the worst thing of all is that no one in the healthcare field seems to consider me to be a victim. They talk plenty about the rights of patients, of course, but they never talk about the rights of people like myself NOT TO BE PATIENTS in the first place.
My personal conviction, based on eight years of philosophical study, is that this disempowerment is the necessary evil result of drug prohibition and the fearmongering attitudes that it represents. However, I will not try to convince you here of that thesis. I only ask you for any suggestions on making my case to the powers-that-be. Who can I tell about this? How can I make it clear to the people in charge that I am sick and tired of being a patient for life!
PS We don't need research: we need the re-legalization of godsend medicines like laughing gas, phenethylamines, coca, and opium. Drug prohibition has turned me into a patient for life -- and this is obviously in the interests of the healthcare industry, not myself.
TO Virginia Department of Health Professions Prescription Monitoring Program2
Good day.
I am a 67-year-old Virginian who has been turned into a patient for life because of government drug policy. I have been "on" Effexor for 30+ years, a drug that is far harder to kick than heroin. I tried for a year but could never get off it with brain zaps and severe depression, worse than I had ever had before taking the drug. I have to keep taking the drug merely to be able to think straight. This means I have to see a doctor less than one-half my age every three months of my life and share my most intimate feelings with him or her -- for the privilege of receiving an expensive and under-performing prescription of a drug that I have come to detest.
I have been turned into a patient for life!
Please keep this in mind the next time the government makes it as hard as possible to get prescriptions easily. I have been taking this drug for decades. Why am I not trusted to use the drug without the constant prying of young adults into my life! It is humiliating!
This is not healthcare, it is Christian Science fanaticism. It is treating drugs like plutonium!
When is Virginia drug policy going to recognize the fact that adults are adults and we are sick and tired of seeing someone half our age every three months of our lives to discuss the same psychiatric "crap" that we discussed 30 years ago!!!!!!!!!!
To Delegate Pence and Senator French of Virginia state legislature
With all due respect, I have been turned into a ward of the healthcare state by government drug policy.
I am a 67-year-old who was started on Effexor 30 years ago, a drug that is harder to kick than heroin. I tried for a year to get off the drug, but I had to pay for my own compounding pharmacist to do that, and even he could not provide extended-release formula for proprietary reasons. After the side effects of withdrawal became intolerable, I resumed the drug, resolving to spend the rest of my life protesting America's fearmongering drug policy. But I still needed the drug. So I had to go to a psychiatrist who is less than half my age every three months of my life and share my most intimate feelings by answering questions like: "Have you considered suicide over the last three months?"
I want to answer that question as follows: "Only when I consider how drug policy has turned me into a ward of the healthcare state and a child for life!"
When are Drug Warriors going to realize that there are more stakeholders in drug prohibition than the kids whom we refuse to teach about safe use?
Drug policy has denied me all medicines that could cheer me up in a trice and shunted me off instead onto a drug that is far far far harder to kick than heroin.
I write this after my latest psychiatrist quit the field -- meaning that I once again have to find a new young person to whom to bare my soul for the privilege of a prescription refill. And if I spend too much time looking for one, I am told that I am "doctor hopping!" This is a big joke -- but only psychiatrists are laughing on their way to the bank.
When am I going to be trusted as an ADULT?!
Sincerely Yours,
Brian Quass
Basye, VA
--
Brian Quass
Notes:
1: PSSD Network PSSD Network (up)
2: Virginia Department of Health Professions Prescription Monitoring Program (up)
Ten Tweets
against the hateful war on US
Healthline posted an article in 2021 about the benefits of getting off of antidepressants. They did not even mention the biggest benefit: NO LONGER BEING AN ETERNAL PATIENT -- no longer being a child in the eyes of an all-knowing healthcare system.
Classic prohibitionist gaslighting, telling me that "drugs" is a neutral term. What planet are they living on?
The FDA approves of shock therapy and the psychiatric pill mill, but they cannot see the benefits in MDMA, a drug that brought peace, love and understanding to the dance floor in 1990s Britain.
The best long-term treatment for OUD would be to normalize the nightly smoking of opium at home, not to addict the user to government-supplied drugs that render them impervious to the benefits of the poppy plant.
The real value of Erowid is as a research tool for a profession that does not even exist yet: the profession of what I call the pharmacologically savvy empath: a compassionate life counselor with a wide knowledge of how drugs can (and have) been used by actual people.
When we outlaw drugs, we are outlawing far more than drugs. We are suppressing freedom of religion and academic research.
Prohibitionists are responsible for the 200,000-plus killed in the US-inspired Mexican drug war in the 21st century.
My cousin says we should punish drug dealers. I say we should punish those politicians who created those drug dealers out of whole cloth by passing unprecedented laws against the use of Mother Nature's bounty.
If we can go overseas to burn poppy plants, then Islamic countries should be free to come to the United States to burn our grape vines.
Americans love to blame drugs for all their problems. Young people were not dying in the streets when opiates were legal. The prohibition mindset is the problem, not drugs.
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Copyright 2025, Brian Ballard Quass
Contact: quass@quass.com
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