Welcome to the Mad in America Podcast, your source for science, psychiatry, and social justice.

Welcome to the Madden America podcast. My name is Brookesyam, and I am the author of the award-winning memoir on antidepressant withdrawal

may cause side effects.

Today I'm with Marsha Zoritsky and I am very interested to talk to her because she reached

out to me about the fact that we don't spend a lot of time talking about women who are prescribed

psychiatric drugs as part of menopause.

And we don't talk a lot about it

when it comes to the older adult population. And so I thought Marcia would be the perfect person

to have on the pod to talk about this. Marsha is a survivor of being a prescribed clonopin

for sleep when going through menopause. She said she was never told what class of drugs she was put on,

and it wasn't until years later that when she became ill with severe digestive issues,

that she figured out she was on a benz-o and that it could be the root of all her health issues.

Very interestingly, Marcia is also a licensed mental health therapist certified in IFS therapy,

which is internal family systems.

She is licensed to see clients in Idaho and Washington, although she did tell me before we started

recording that she is full. But the reason why this is so interesting is because when we have people

in the mental health field who have also had experience with psychiatry

and psychiatric drug withdrawal, that can sometimes change and inform how they practice

and approach the entire industry, if you will, as a whole.

So I am very excited to have you here.

Marcia, I am thrilled to hear what you've been through and where you're at now because even just seeing

you through the screen, I can tell how much radiance and joy there is there.

...