Withholding Someone's Prescription Medication Is Neglect

There are so many different types of abuse and sometimes it's hard to define a certain type of abuse if it isn't listed. One type of abuse that I experienced is categorised as neglect but I think it should have it's own name as I have heard of others experiencing this too and many might see this as a person 'helping' but they are not, they are refusing your basic care.

As a survivor of family violence from birth I had experienced a lot of mental health issues growing up. Through my teen years I frequently had depression and anxiety on and off. One of the teachers at my school urged my dad to get a medical assessment of me because I was numb and didn't seem to enjoy my life. I was unaware of this. So my dad took me to a GP where they diagnosed me with depression and prescribed me antidepressants. My father filled the prescription at the time and talked to his mother over the phone about it. They apparently didn't believe that 'medication' was the answer so my dad 'held onto' the medication as he did more research on the medication and depression treatment. My dad seemed very unsure and conflicted by doing this and it seemed like this was more his mums idea.

I was really suffering knowing I was depressed but couldn't feel anything. Being numb made me feel like life was meaningless so when my dad was out I snuck into his bedroom and got the medication. He didn't really hide it from me though, he just didn't give the medication to me. When my dad found out that I stole the medication from his room and started taking it he was a bit annoyed but to tell you the truth he seemed more relieved. He asked me how I felt and I told him that I cried heaps at first when I took it but that taking it was helping me to feel better. 

My paternal grandmother doesn't like this story, probably because it was her idea and also they both told me how they did the same thing to my dad when he got depression as a child. She got him to run a lot instead. When I lived with my paternal grandmother as an adult I was on another mental health treatment. She didn't trust the doctors, did a tonne of research on my condition on the internet and tried to convince me that the medication will one day give me alzheimers and kill me. 

So she convinced me to let her ween me off of the medication. This was not a good decision for me. I was very lucky that being off medication didn't do me more damage. It seems to me that my grandmother was the one who didn't believe in antidepressants and didn't trust doctors. She thought she knew better than a doctor. I find that because she did this to me (and my ex) she is a dangerous person and this is one of the biggest reasons why I don't speak to her anymore. She is far more controlling and manipulative than my father but it's easy to see why my father thinks manipulation is normal and 'caring'.

You should never go against a doctors orders and even if you don't trust a certain doctors advice, you should always seek a second or third opinion from different doctors. Never try to prescribe treatment or research treatment in replacement of a doctor. This is dangerous. Doctors spend years studying at university learning from reputable sources and even taking exams to remember sound medical advice. Never trust another person or google over a doctor because that is dangerous.

You are probably wondering why I didn't tell doctors at the time. My grandmother told me not to tell them though which indicates more how shady her actions were at the time. I think it was difficult for those psychologists to intervene because it was a family member doing this.