Kim Witczak Exposes Dangerous Drug Practices: SSRI, Su!c!de, Violence, and Big Pharma’s Deadly Secrets

How can a seemingly harmless prescription for a sleep aid turn fatal? When Kim Witczak's husband Woody died by suicide after just five weeks on Zoloft—a medication prescribed not for depression, but for trouble sleeping—she was thrust into an unexpected role as a pharmaceutical safety advocate. Her journey from successful advertising executive to FDA committee member reveals the shocking truth about how drug companies manipulate research, hide side effects, and prioritize profits over safety.

Kim's discovery of internal Pfizer documents exposed that pharmaceutical companies have long known about dangerous side effects like akathisia—a state of extreme inner restlessness that can trigger suicidal impulses—yet deliberately kept this information from general practitioners who write most prescriptions. Through her wrongful death lawsuit, she uncovered evidence that drug companies had even created "prosecutor manuals" to defend cases where their medications were linked to violence or suicide.

The conversation pulls back the curtain on how medications get approved. Contrary to what most believe, pharmaceutical companies—not the FDA—control clinical trials from design to data analysis. These trials are often brief, include carefully selected participants, and can be fast-tracked through loopholes that allow companies to cherry-pick favorable results. Once approved, medications are marketed for continual use despite being tested for just weeks, and off-label prescribing becomes a multi-billion-dollar revenue stream with minimal oversight.

Perhaps most disturbing is how the system gaslights patients who experience harm. When medication side effects emerge, they're often dismissed as symptoms of the underlying condition or labeled as "treatment-resistant" cases—a marketing term that blames patients rather than questioning the medications themselves. As Kim points out, we've lost our ability to think critically about what we put in our bodies, accepting without question that medications with known risks are "safe and effective."

Ready to reclaim your agency as a healthcare consumer? Start by questioning what you're prescribed, researching potential side effects, and remembering that your lived experience matters—even when it's dismissed as merely "anecdotal." Your vigilance could save your life or someone you love.

Chapters

• 0:42 Welcome to Kim Witczak, Drug Safety Advocate
• 2:41 Woody's Story: Death After Five Weeks on Zoloft
• 9:41 Connecting the Dots: Uncovering Hidden Drug Risks
• 19:46 How Drug Companies Control Research Process
• 29:05 The "Treatment-Resistant Depression" Marketing Scheme
• 38:18 Critical Thinking: Our Defense Against Harm
• 53:55 Lived Experience vs. Clinical Research Data
• 1:02:53 Final Thoughts: Healthcare Is Business

Transcript

Jennifer Schmitz: 0:22

Well, hey everyone, you have been gaslit into believing that antidepressants are safe, effective and ethically researched. We are your whistleblowing shrinks, dr Terrilyn and therapist Jen, and you have landed on the Gaslit Truth podcast. We want to welcome to the show a special guest today, kim Witzak. Welcome to the show, kim.

Kim Witczak: 0:40

Ah, thanks for having me?

Jennifer Schmitz: 0:42

Yeah, everybody. Kim is a leading global drug safety advocate. She's a speaker with over 25 years of professional experience in advertising and marketing communications. She became involved in the pharmaceutical drug safety issues after the sudden death of her husband due to undisclosed drug side effects of an antidepressant. Kim co-founded Woody Matters, a nonprofit dedicated to advocating for stronger FDA and drug safety system. She co-founded Woody Matters, a nonprofit dedicated to advocating for stronger FDA and drug safety system. She co-created and organized the International Multidisciplinary Conference Selling Sickness People Before Profits Conference, which is in Washington DC, and in 2016, she was appointed the Consumer Representative on the FDA Psychopharmacologic Drug Advisory Committee and she's now on the board of directors for the National Physicians Alliance and MISSD, which is Medication-Induced Suicide Prevention, which is in memory of Stuart Dolan. She is an active member of the DC-based Patient, consumer and Public Health Coalition, making sure the voices of non-conflicted patients and consumers is represented in healthcare and FDA-related legislative issues.

Jennifer Schmitz: 1:50

Holy shit, kim. Welcome to the show. You are right where you're supposed to be in the universe here with us. So thank you for coming on. Oh, thanks.

Kim Witczak: 2:01

Yeah, it's funny when you listen to all that, but if you actually look at where it all started from, that's the result of 22 years, almost 22 years this August next month.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 2:16

That's where your story started was 22 years ago. Mm-hmm, all right, would you mind sharing the story where it all began, sure.

Kim Witczak: 2:23

Sure. Well, for starters, I always like to say I call myself the accidental advocate because I didn't choose to do the work that I'm doing today. It kind of chose me and sometimes I believe, our greatest purposes choose us in life. So mine, you know, I was living just life. I was happily married to my husband of almost 10 years. We both had successful careers. I traveled a lot for advertising, he traveled a lot for sales. He had just started his dream job with a startup company. But on August 6, 2003, so almost 22 years ago, next month I was out of town and I got a call from my dad that literally, when I still think about it, I cannot believe that this was actually my life. But my dad called to tell me that my husband was found dead hanging at age 37. I was out of town. I hadn't heard from Woody all day. So I'm like, hey, dad, do me a favor. Woody's been having trouble sleeping. Could you go and check on him? I? Maybe he hit his head. That's what I'm thinking Um. Literally, I would never cause.

Kim Witczak: 3:40

Woody did not have a history of depression. Woody wasn't depressed. Five weeks earlier he had gone to his doctor, his GP, who and I always could say that Woody was kind of a humpty dumpty. You know he was a big athlete so he trusted the doctor. He was a military kid, you know. The doctor tells him, you know, take this.

Kim Witczak: 3:55

And he was given an antidepressant because he was having trouble sleeping and said it would take the edge off and help him sleep. It was a three-week sample pack. I happened to be out of the country the first three weeks that Woody was on that drug, so I wasn't even in Minneapolis when Woody was put on this drug and it was a total of five weeks. Woody went that he was on this medication. But I'll never forget something about a week before he died I was now back from New Zealand, excited to see him, and Woody walks through our back door in a blue dress shirt like completely drenched through. He's crying. He drops his bag at the back door and falls in a fetal position on the floor and he's like Kim, you got to help me.

Kim Witczak: 4:46

I don't know what's happening to me. My head's outside my body and he's like rocking, like this, and I'm like, oh you know, I had never seen this behavior ever. And we calmed him down, we did yoga, breathing, we prayed, and he calls his doctor and the doctor said you got to give the drug four to six weeks to kick in. Oh my God, yeah, I mean clearly that was a side effect, but we didn't know. But that night that I, you know, when literally I'm in the middle of a shoot, when I got that call from my dad and when I, you know, I walked back in, I mean my whole life was just like what. Just like literally what just happened. And so I, the guy that one of the guys that I was working with, brings me back to the hotel.

Kim Witczak: 5:31

The coroner calls me and asks me a question what medication was Woody taken? And the only medication Woody was on was Zoloft and she says we're going to take it with us. It might have something to do with his death. The other clue that happened that same night the front page of our newspaper had an article that said the UK finds link between antidepressants and suicide in teens. Woody left no note. Those were the two things that night. And then, in a deep intuition of like there's no way Woody killed himself, although everybody around me was like, oh, you just didn't know he was depressed, I'm like right, you missed the signs, you missed it.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 6:14

Yep yeah.

Kim Witczak: 6:16

So that's really the backstory of what started. You know what started the work that I've been doing for the last 20 years. Again, I would never have chosen this work.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 6:30

It's hard and you put yourself out there, like I'm sure you get terrible backlash sometimes. I've seen some of the videos. I've seen the comments. They're not good yeah.

Kim Witczak: 6:43

And you know, if you think back then, when this was 2003, there were no black box warnings. There were no warnings. And so when you were out there, like we, I was like wait, when my brother-in-law so that night, when my life fell apart, my dad had called down my sister and her husband come over and nothing made sense to anybody who knew Woody, because he loved life, right, like we were just planning, we just booked our 10 year anniversary trip to Thailand, talking about having starting the family, because I had to go through it in vitro, like we were just in the like the best phase and he was doing his dream job, right. So nothing made sense. But that night my brother-in-law went home after, especially after the coroner said that the Zoloft might have something to do with his death, goes home and Googles Zoloft and suicide and finds out that the FDA had hearings in 1991 on the emergence of violence and suicide with Prozac. Only Now we didn't know anything. I was like like I was in, you know, in college, like that wasn't even in my ether, like even thinking about that and like why would we? Right, and so that you know, we, I don't even know when, like I connect back to like head outside the body, I don't know that at that time I didn't question the drug. Woody didn't question the drug. It was given to him by his doctor, advertised as safe and effective, and it was FDA approved. And so, you know, we were like completely blindsided.

Kim Witczak: 8:18

And so when we started connecting the dots of like 91, there were hearings, the dots of like 91, there were hearings. And this is the same category of medication, ssri we were like we have to do something about this. And and but let me tell you to your point, even all these years later, I still people are like she's crazy. You know, whatever I'm like no, no, no, I've been like in this work. And and have come full circle because I also like no, no, no, I've been like in this work.

Kim Witczak: 8:45

And have come full circle because I also said, you know, I had a seat at the FDA, the same committee, that in 91, all those guys that sat on that committee took money from pharmaceutical companies making antidepressants and at that time the FDA. So they all voted no, nope, we don't see any issue. And then the FDA never followed up with them. And so now we're here, and now we have Zoloft on the market, we have Paxil on the market and Approve for Kids. So that really became like we got to do something and that was the start of my journey.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 9:26

I want to just backpedal and make this clear in case the audience wasn't listening. Woody didn't go in to get an antidepressant to fight depression. Yes, it was a sleep-related thing. So it's so bizarre to me to be like, well, you know, he was depressed, he's on an antidepressant and I'm thinking, yeah, after the antidepressant, clearly it caused him to be something. Right, um, so I, I love the level of gaslighting that that that story brings in and of itself. Right Um, it was. He must've been depressed, but I find that to be true.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 10:05

And so many people who are on psych meds that take their lives, people don't want to hear that. They don't want to hear that they weren't suicidal before but they attempted to or actually took their lives after. That just means that we missed. We missed all the signs. We missed them before they were prescribed. We didn't. And I'm like, why can we not see this? I don't even want to call it an alternative truth, because it's actually a truth of the psychiatric medications. Why do we want to dismiss that so badly? I don't understand it. I mean, I understand it on the FDA level profits and big pharma profits and all that stuff but as consumers, I just don't get the lack of critical thinking around this, because to me it's easy to see.

Kim Witczak: 11:53

Yeah, you know it's, it's very true. I think it's like the perfect coverup in a way, because, well, why wouldn't you? I mean, of course you're taking the antidepressants cause you're depressed, right, or that's what they're saying. But I think why Woody's story was super powerful then and still is today, and why it clearly showed somebody who had no history of it, right, I mean, he during this whole time was still running. He was like training, he was only running. He couldn't run for his long, like 10 mile runs, he was running three, but he was super anal. So, thank God he was because he kept a running journal and it showed all the time Like this guy was still like doing everything like and depressed.

Kim Witczak: 12:38

But I remember. So, of course, you know, when your life like blows up like that and you don't even know what to do, like everybody's, like like oh, you must, you need to go to a suicide group, right? So I go to this suicide group, like literally a week after, because I'm telling you that heartache, I was just like oh, my God, I can't imagine reality, like what the hell you know?

Kim Witczak: 12:59

so I go to this suicide group and I'm listening to people who had been like through this whole thing some of them maybe 10 years earlier, five years, you know just all levels and I remember saying I think it's. And granted, it's a week later, right, I go, I think it's the drug that killed him. And literally the person like that was running it patted me on the head and she's like oh honey, you know, don't blame yourself. We didn't see it coming either. And I was like oh whoa, like my whole body was like get your hands off me. And then I come back and my friend that picked me up said well, what did you think? And I go, I can't go back. She goes why are you going? And I go well, isn't this what I'm supposed to do? Well, fast forward, I learn. I learned that a lot of these suicide support groups get funding from pharmaceutical companies and like and this is from NAMI.

Jennifer Schmitz: 13:51

Did you go to NAMI group?

Kim Witczak: 13:53

Yeah, it was. Well, it was NAMI, but it was SAVE, which is suicide awareness group, but it was funded by NAMI as well, right, but I went once and I was like, oh, like this is not gonna help me. So I ended up going into a um. I went to a faith um group at church and that like really was um. You know, that was like my healing and. But you know, I think back to um, the early, early days, and it was after the funeral. And I come home from the funeral and I'm bawling and I'm like trying to scratch my heart out, because anybody who's had like it's real, right, heartache's real, pain's real. But I remember crying and saying God, take my pain and use it, it does me no good. And I kept praying that over and over and over.

Kim Witczak: 14:42

And meanwhile my brother-in-law was like reading all these books like by David Healy and doing like. He didn't go to bed for like literally that first week. He was like this doesn't make any sense. So we're both like having these things happen, right. And so then he came to me and he goes Kim, I think this is what happened. He brought all this research and like, and I mean I'm like what? And so we're getting ready and I tell this story because I think it's way bigger than um, uh, than obviously, woody's story.

Kim Witczak: 15:17

But we're in the middle, um, woody always said it goes, when I died, like put my ashes in the middle of Lake Michigan, which is where, um, we met. And so we're in the middle of Lake Michigan with Woody's ashes and I'm like this is our bot, like this doesn't make any sense. And my brother-in-law, who my sister's husband, who became my partner in my advocacy, we looked down in the middle of the lake and I and there's this book floating by, this red book, and I go, does that say what I think it does? And he goes, yeah, it said in gold letters it was a red book, the Holy Bible, and it floated right by. And at that moment that was kind of our sign of like trust me, like I'm like it's way bigger than you even know, but just trust me and go, you know. And so, anyways, that became a really important sign and symbol for all the years of going back and forth getting on a plane from Minneapolis to DC.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 16:14

Wow, I you know there was a few years. A few years back, one of my kids' classmates took his life and I was at the funeral and the mom said, oh, he'd struggled with so many mental health issues and just started meds a few weeks ago, but it was too late and I was like, don't say it, don't say it, don't say it, don't say it, don't say it Like cause I'm like you guys didn't see what, what, what, what? It's the same thing. Like that first few weeks when somebody does that. But then the dismissal of well, it was just too late for them, their depression was just too much. The meds didn't give it a chance to get in their system the way they should. All of these things that we perpetuate ends up killing people actually. So, and that was just a few years ago. Yours was 20, some. So we're still having the same conversation in the same language now. Well, that's.

Jennifer Schmitz: 17:16

that was what I was going to say. So the language that you're even after he had this out of body type experience that was happening, right, the language that was was given to Woody was you've got to give it more time. It takes four to six weeks to be able to kick in. I had a client this last week say that to me as well who's trying to work on getting off of their medications. Okay, and they're having a lot of withdrawal.

Jennifer Schmitz: 17:41

That's happening, and we were talking about the idea of you might have to reinstate and straight out of their mouth was okay. But if I reinstate again, doesn't that mean I need to wait another four to six weeks until I can start to notice things again? And that line 2003 was being said and 2025 is still being said to patients. And so here he was on a very short, short duration of taking this medication, right? So I think that's something else we have to be clear about with everybody. We are not talking about a story of somebody who is taking psychiatric medications, taking antidepressants, for many, many, many years of his life. This is someone who took this for five weeks, right? So you said there was a three-week starter pack which was given.

Kim Witczak: 18:31

He had an episode and doubled the dose.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 18:35

Oh geez.

Jennifer Schmitz: 18:36

Oh, even though we're supposed to wait four to six weeks for it to truly kick in, we are going to up a dose after just a few weeks of taking it we are going to up a dose after just a few weeks of taking it.

Kim Witczak: 18:48

Yep, it was the three-week sample pack that Pfizer gave was 25 milligrams week one and then 50 milligrams week two, and so everybody always says, oh, that's just such a low dose, it's a baby dose, it's a baby dose, yeah, baby dose, that's a baby dose, yeah, baby dose.

Jennifer Schmitz: 19:07

Even on that small of a dose? That's what I hear all the time. Yeah, even on that tiny of a dose, that's such a small dose, jen, that doesn't yeah. So three weeks on that he has an episode quite an out-of-body experience Definitely.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 19:21

Not just a psychotic episode.

Jennifer Schmitz: 19:22

it sounds like Significant side effects, right, yes. And then we up the drug and say you've got to give it four to six weeks.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 19:30

Imagine, looking at some, he didn't I mean the prescriber didn't see Woody. Like to see somebody in that state like you saw him right In a fetal position, sweating, profuse. I'm guessing he probably had either psychosis or serotonin syndrome or something, but anyway, yes, guessing he probably had either psychosis or third-donor syndrome or something, but anyway, yeah, um, yes, but but to see him and then be like just wait it out, yeah, I mean fucking kidding, I'm sorry, are you fucking kidding me? Like there'd be no way, like you're like, just wait it out.

Kim Witczak: 19:58

The amount of suffering down and I remember like what he's saying. I don't know if I can handle another one of these well, and so I actually think that the night before he passed away I had a conversation with him and he sounded really like that, almost like, but I didn't cause I, you know, I was out of town again right For work and my busy time. But now looking back I was like wait, he kind of had that same like like almost zombie thing and I actually believe he was having another one.

Kim Witczak: 20:29

Well, it turns out. So one of the you know, one of the things that I ended up doing is, you know, not only going out to DC. Using Woody's story helped to get the black box warnings. I was very involved in the congressional hearings because there were bipartisan congressional hearings on the link of suicide, but I also had a wrongful death, failure to warn, lawsuit against Pfizer. And when we went and called the attorney and there I didn't have, I had no idea that there were all kinds of litigation against the antidepressant companies at this point when Woody was around, because there were no warnings again.

Kim Witczak: 21:09

But I remember we told the law firm which is Bomb Headland, now Wisner Bomb out of LA, about Woody's head outside the body and they're like well, little did I know until I went out there.

Kim Witczak: 21:24

They had a document, that internal document from the South African FDA equivalent agency writing to Pfizer's chief medical officer, roger Lane, and said that they had doctors reporting patients on 50 milligrams which is what Woody was on now standing outside their bodies looking in and the guy from Pfizer writes back oh, it happens on all SSRIs, we don't know why. Well, that was something that they didn't tell the doctors right. Then the side effect, another document that we got out, and I'm telling you. It's like, if you don't want to believe Woody's story, I have binders of documents that, through my lawsuit that the judge released that Pfizer for years had argued it was trade secret. And they weren't trade secrets, they were like internal company documents that showed that these guys, including the FDA and other drug companies, have long been aware of the link between violence and suicide on these drugs. But the side effect that Woody had, and they call it akathisia, which and you guys, as you know, doctors and therapists, know I had never heard of it.

Jennifer Schmitz: 22:41

Well, we hadn't really either, Kim. To be fair, this is a newer term and, as you're talking right now, I know what this is and I was actually going to say it a little earlier. But for Terry and I, this isn't a term that like we learned about in school. This isn't a term like I learned about it, because I had it about six months ago and didn't know what it was but didn't have a clue. Or a year ago a couple of times, but didn't have a clue. Or a year ago a couple of times, but didn't know. So we actually aren't given that knowledge that language at all.

Jennifer Schmitz: 23:10

It doesn't exist. And we're the, we're in the, we're the professionals right Like in the field. And this, this is not something that we are. We are taught. So we're in that same surprise basket that you were in when learning that term.

Kim Witczak: 23:25

So that to me like if you well. So here's the thing. Like that article that he wrote, it's, you know, talks about akathisia and not so much about the disease. But it could be, it's drug induced, right. But that article was public. But what wasn't public was a memo that he sent out the same chief medical officer that wrote the article and send it out to the sales staff saying the attached journal article is not suitable for general practitioners but may be of interest to neurobiologically inclined psychiatrists. So they intentionally kept that side effect, which clearly they kept it from therapists as well, and and physicians going through like and knowing that that is a potential. Instead we can just say, oh, it's the depression, or the drug didn't work fast enough, you know, and so it's the perfect cover-up of lies. And and this is the stuff that people don't know and now you're not the first that I've heard this from doctors and therapists. But if you don't know, and we don't know, we are all blind.

Jennifer Schmitz: 24:40

We're all blind.

Kim Witczak: 24:41

We're all blind to something that somebody knew and we're trying to do the best for people, but that's not called the best.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 24:51

So did you just say and cause I have to get this straight in my head that document, the research article in the journal, did they? If what I'm gleaning from this is like, this is so high level for only specific people that nobody else will really understand or really know what it means, is that what they were trying to say with that document? Yeah, yeah.

Jennifer Schmitz: 25:13

Well, they said nobody's going to get it, or?

Dr Teralyn Sell: 25:15

understand it Like neurobiological experts.

Jennifer Schmitz: 25:18

Those experts get that document.

Kim Witczak: 25:20

Yeah, they'll understand it. But you know what I also believe it was. Remember what I also believe it was. Remember 70 to 80 percent of their business is written by GPs and internists and you know the other kind of physicians, and so you don't want to like hurt your business. That's a business model Right, that's a business model decision. And so you know it's funny.

Kim Witczak: 25:44

I look back and what do you used to always like joke. You know, because I funny, I look back and what he used to always like joke, you know, because I was, I was in advertising and I still am, and so my whole like I understand the marketing game and he used to go Kim, you could be doing so much more than advertising. You know you're part of the problem. Well, I fast forward and I go wait.

Kim Witczak: 26:04

Now I understand, like I actually believe that I was in the exact same kind of right role because I can see through the marketing right, and also, like I mean I've never worked on drug ads, but you know we're one of only two countries in the world that allow drug ads and so if you think about what that does to our psyche as consumers and everybody just is like, oh yeah, they're safe and effective, safe and effective they're advertised, like everything is. You know, I think we've become almost like numb to to this, that we've lost this ability of critical thinking and like when you are experiencing something. And I mean I will tell you I was shocked when I saw these documents. I mean, I will tell you I was shocked when I saw these documents, including even violence, ones to do with, I don't think, because you know again, the 91 hearings were on Prozac, the emergence of violence and suicide, 91?, 91. 1991.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 27:05

13 years. I thought you meant 91 different hearings, but you meant in 1991. Okay, I was falling off my chair over here. Okay, go ahead In 1990, but still.

Kim Witczak: 27:14

But that's what you know. And so Pfizer, there was an internal document of saying I don't think Fluxatin, which is, you know, prozac generic, is out of the woods with its association with violence. Out of the Woods with its association with violence. And here meanwhile Pfizer also had helped create a prosecutor manual for the Zoloft defense. And so there were like yeah, so when? And I'm like again, I'm just a lay person, right, who just had this thing happen. But I'm like why would a drug company have to have a prosecutor manual Like that in itself, like I don't even like, even if there's whatever, because you can say you know mental health or whatever, but you still gotta wonder just the general, like why is a drug company even helping with a prosecutor manual?

Jennifer Schmitz: 28:00

That's fucking fascinating. Oh, yes, that's. Oh my goodness, Can you talk?

Dr Teralyn Sell: 28:08

to speak about, if you know this, why drug companies are so heavily protected now, like because it seems like okay, so you were back in the early 2000s and you're you're bringing on lawsuits because there weren't warning labels and things like that. So a little warning label like that a little I'm air quoting little because it's pretty big but everybody ignores it A warning label like that protects them from lawsuits.

Kim Witczak: 28:37

Yep and well. And so back then, remember, there were no lawsuit or there were no warnings, and even I think the whole system is really built about protecting the companies and not, obviously, the consumer. Even back then, most people don't realize that they were trying to get a lot of the litigation was getting thrown out by judges because of something called the FDA preemption brief, which people, if you knew about it, pfizer paid this guy, dan Troy, who became the chief counsel at the FDA and he was writing basically amicus briefs, intervening in lawsuits, saying that even if the drug company wanted to warn, we're the FDA and we wouldn't let you and we have federal over state rights. So a lot of judges were throwing it out. Well, we exposed that Pfizer had given him $300,000 before and because my lawyers were scrappy and they got into a meeting a drug company lawyer and outside counsel meeting where the FDA chief counsel, dan Troy, was speaking and he was saying, hey, make it a Hollywood pitch and I will intervene, we can maybe intervene in your lawsuits. And so we exposed it through my lawyer, etc. We exposed it through my lawyer, et cetera, and he eventually left and became, ultimately became global chief counsel for GlaxoSmithKline, and so that was that revolving door.

Kim Witczak: 30:19

But in the meantime, that preemption brief, even today, you know, most people don't realize because we're all forced to take generics. You can't sue a drug company over generics either if something happens. So there's all types of things that are protected, the companies. But that preemption brief, all these years later, like my friend who I sit on her board, the MISS Medication Induced Su suicide, which their organization does, only akathisia, which everybody should go and look at what they do. But she was one state where they were able to hold the drug company even though he was on a generic. They were able to hold the drug company accountable for the label GlaxoSmithKline and she did get a verdict of she had a full on jury, she did get a verdict and eventually it got appealed and thrown out because of preemption. So the whole system is really set up about protecting the companies and and so it's really not about you and I, Again, it's not about you and I no, so I've heard you on other podcasts talking about research practices of big pharma.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 31:38

Is there anything that you would like to talk about? That was the most surprising thing that was happening before and continues to occur within the research practices of big pharma.

Kim Witczak: 31:50

Sure. Well, I think for one thing, the idea that to get a drug on the, you know a lot of you know. Now I sit on the committee so I see how drugs come right. But a lot of one thing I didn't know and I learned after was I mean the drug companies control every part of the process. They control the trial design, even though they work through the FDA to get the drug on the market. They control the results. They control all the patient level data. Everything is controlled by pharma. They control the summaries of what gets presented to the FDA and so ultimately they're the ones in like I thought that the FDA did trials. I thought that isn't the case. So it's, the drug companies do control the to get the product on the market.

Kim Witczak: 32:47

And then when you look at and I call it the spider web and how it all starts to connect, you know Congress, you know there was a lot of. It was during the AIDS crisis where you know everybody was putting public pressure on the FDA, saying they were too slow, and so they created something like the Prescription Drug User Fee Act, like PDUFA, which is legislation. But everything's now about fast tracking. So fast tracking is there, could be like it's a breakthrough Like a lot of times I'm always like some of the drugs that have come forward to our committee means that, like for a drug that doesn't or a disease that doesn't have an official drug for it, they can get something called like a breakthrough designation, a fast tracking, which means that they have even less clinical trials. Sure, and then the clinical trials. Also, when you think about even just the initial antidepressants, they were short duration of time yeah, not for years which are what we're finding.

Jennifer Schmitz: 33:55

People are on Four weeks, five weeks, six weeks, right yeah?

Dr Teralyn Sell: 33:59

Well that's because they have control over all of it, so they can shut it off before the bad shit happens.

Jennifer Schmitz: 34:05

Right. So what you're saying even now, kim, is, depending on what, what the the hot button is that they're trying to, you can fast track, essentially, if there is no drug yet that has been like, proven at any point yet, to help with whatever fill in the symptom or the ailment or the issue that they can find a way to present that quicker, faster, do less time with drug trial, because we are just looking for us a drug solution to whatever it is.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 34:34

So it can go pretty quick.

Jennifer Schmitz: 34:36

Even still, even still now in today, right, like some people will. Some people will argue that point with us or don't quite understand that point and that when we talk about ethical research and how research is being done, it's almost like this thing that people can't believe that, even still in today's day and age and we're not talking about the early 90s, okay, late 80s, but even today that studies don't happen, that quickly and that there are double-blind placebo-controlled studies and they last months and these things go on, but you're sitting here telling us that that is still grossly inaccurate, especially if it's a drug that we haven't used or found a solution to yet for an ailment.

Jennifer Schmitz: 35:18

We can fast-track it to get that moving.

Kim Witczak: 35:21

Yep, and so a lot of the drugs, especially because I was sitting on the psychopharm, which so it's the psych, you know, a lot of the psych drugs and there be like treatment. Resistant depression was now considered a disease that we don't have. We don't have an official drug.

Jennifer Schmitz: 35:40

Oh, no, oh, and I've seen stuff now for, like the treatment, do you have treatment? Resistant depression? I see the commercials for it all the time. So this is one of those fast track drugs.

Kim Witczak: 35:50

Yes.

Jennifer Schmitz: 35:53

A lot of those this idea.

Kim Witczak: 35:54

So even like Parkinson's, like I will never forget one of the drugs, parkinson's psychosis, which is they go and find like a symptom that doesn't have a disease, which you know, the psychosis. A lot of that time, like I had to go learn about Parkinson's and and sometimes it's the drug that actually causes some of that, the, the the psychosis right.

Kim Witczak: 36:18

Sure. And so when I remember looking at this new drug, I started like really looking at the business behind it, right, Not just the trial, because there's only like one trial, 180 people, like, and you think half of that goes to placebo, right, and because it was, it could be fast track and they use surrogate endpoints. I mean there are all these things about the research that I don't think the lay person or even our doctors even actually understand of what is really happening. But I remember with this, with this new plazid drug that was the name of it there were some deaths in there, like just that you could even see in the drug arm. And I remember like, and I was one of the only two no votes and the other no vote was a Parkinson's patient who lives with Parkinson's, and both of us voted no.

Kim Witczak: 37:14

But even before that I started like looking at the company. It was make or break. They had tried before to get the drug approved when it was using two double-blinded placebo, you know, and under, like you know, I think they had like 19 questions or something like that. Well, they resubmitted now with this fast-tracking, you know, ability, and they selected only nine questions from the original and I was like wait a minute, like they of course they're going to.

Kim Witczak: 37:47

Yeah, you get it and you're going to pick the ones that it works because you got to.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 37:50

Yeah, we're cherry picking the ones that were affirmative yes.

Kim Witczak: 37:54

The FDA is a hurdle to get your product on the market Right. But even more interesting of this whole, for this example, I went in and started researching and reading what Wall Street had to say and the analysts and people like there were analysts that said this drug has the potential to be a $2 to $3 billion off-label drug. And I was like, oh my gosh, I just figured it out. It was used the fast track and to get the drug on the market because once it's on the market, a doctor can use it anyway. The FDA has no authority over how a doctor can use it anyway. The FDA has no authority over how a doctor uses a drug, except for when COVID happened. And so I was like, wait, they're going to use it small number, but it's really the potential off label.

Kim Witczak: 38:43

But what's more interesting is I remember when the FDA, when we did our vote and we got to go around and say why we voted a certain way, I said, mark, didn't you ask me why I voted no back then? Because at this time now it's in the real world, real world scenarios, like people like Woody, you and me, who take it that we're not in the clinical trials because it's always going to be designed in the best possible you know, scenario, situation, the type of patient, etc. Now it's in the real world and there's all these deaths that were happening, and so I'm like, yeah, and the harms? And like the harms always happen in the real world once it's on the market, and that's what I think people have to remember. The system is set up to approve and always talk about benefits. We don't like to talk about harms, but the reality is the harms are a huge part of the problem that we're seeing today.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 40:02

There's so many people that dismiss the harm, right. This happens so frequently. Well, it hurt me, but it saved me. Somebody else will say like it, but it, but it saved my, well, okay, so the harmed person has no voice, only the people that were quote unquote saved. That's, that's who we care about. We don't care about the. You know how many tens of thousands of people had to be hurt so you can be saved, right? How many tens of thousands of people had to be hurt so you can be saved, right? Like I, I, I'm having such trouble wrapping my head around that idea that you can hurt. You know all these people can be hurt, but if you saved one quote unquote saved one then it's worth it. Like, what about all the other people whose lives were lost or quality of life is no longer there? Like. I don't understand that line of thinking at all.

Kim Witczak: 40:52

It's very interesting. I learned pretty quick when we actually met with the top officials after Wood died about, and I thought for sure they would be interested right In, like what happened. They would go, like NTSB, like a plane crash goes down, you know you go and investigate. Like NTSB, like a plane crash goes down, you know you go and investigate. They literally said to our family members that there are other families there too. These are just anecdotes and I'm like anecdotes Like these aren't, they didn't happen in the double-blinded, placebo, controlled study and I'm like this is what they literally.

Kim Witczak: 41:24

I'm like these anecdotes happen to be somebody's life. But you know, I think the thing like you just said about harms, I'm like these anecdotes happen to be somebody's life. But you know, I think the thing like you just said about harms, first of all, nobody thinks it's going to happen. Like if you're going to go jump out of an airplane, you know skydive, and they say that a percent, you're like thinking, oh, that'll never happen, right? So I think there's already a dismissal, just a general dismiss attitude towards harms or risks that we've been kind of trained as people to not think it'll ever happen to us.

Kim Witczak: 41:55

And then I think the other thing is harms happen one-off, you and you know, like you and you and you, and they don't happen in. Like imagine a plane goes down, but they're. I mean, what do they say? I mean, right now they're guessing that properly prescribed medications are the third leading cause of death, properly prescribed, but the thing is they happen one off. And so if it was a plane going down and all these planes at the same time went down, you better believe people are going to go investigate, but otherwise they don't. They'll be like oh well, this was the. You can see it all the time, like they blame the person, right, well, that's treatment resistant depression.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 42:36

In a nutshell, that's, that's patient blame, you know, because that person who is treatment resistant is not going to look at, be looked at like they've been harmed, you know, by being trialed on all these medications and whatever. Because I firmly believe that someone who is quote unquote treatment resistant has been medically harmed and that's why they're in the space that they're in, so that person doesn't get labeled as medically harmed. They get labeled in this new category of treatment resistance. So their voice in that and they're also gaslit into believing that their voice in that, is completely shut down as an idea that they could be actually medically harmed or iatrogenically harmed, right. So I think that's a problem and finding solutions for that person now just keeps on perpetuating harm to them.

Jennifer Schmitz: 43:30

Yeah, I think, kim, you said something that really resonates with us and with a lot of our listeners, and it ties into what you're just talking about here and you said earlier this loss of critical thinking. Okay, oh God, and I imagine even myself going through this, deprescribing myself after 20, 22 or 23 years of antidepressant okay, not realizing all of the harms that are caused along the way because you are so spellbound. The narrative that's given to you is well, you're having issues with getting pregnant. That wouldn't be from your medications, right, that's because you've got some problems with your body. You're having issues with metabolic things? Okay, do you have first degree relatives that have this? Let's talk about what you're eating, right. Hair loss that's my newest one. Fucking losing hair like crazy, right, all of these things that happen.

Jennifer Schmitz: 44:25

But along the trajectory of this, if we aren't thinking critically. One, we're spellbound. Two, the narratives we're given is that it must be something else, right, like it's not, as though what's presented to us is well, jen, maybe the reason you're not sleeping well is because of the medication. Perhaps the reason you're having weight issues is because of the medication. Perhaps the metabolic problems you're having is because of the medication.

Jennifer Schmitz: 44:49

So when we lose that critical thinking piece. We take what's given to us at face value, and so you become very spellbound in Bregan's words, right, like you start to not believe that the drug could cause these things. But you lose curiosity and the people who are the experts that we look up to they don't offer that as a possible thing that could be doing this either. So it did save my life, right, it did save the depression that I was going through. It did save all of these things. But now the anxiety you've developed, that's from something else, right, like the issues that you've got with your body going on, that's from something else right. And I think that is a key piece to some of this, because those extra critical thinking parts, if we lose that, we are stuck as treatment resistant in these spaces of being that forever consumer, which is a marketing genius ploy. Your pain points you have are not coming from the drug. The pain points that you have are coming from something else, and so now you're resistant. It's marketing genius, right, it really is.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 46:02

It concocted a whole new name for this treatment-resistant depression. It's not something that's listed in a DSM or diagnostic manual. It's a created name, so now they can market new medications to this.

Kim Witczak: 46:16

Yeah, because, and it can be, fast-tracked because there's no drug on the market for it, and so you have to really like and again, that goes back to critical thinking too, right? So every time even like I was using that example that you'll start seeing PR or the press releases or the way it's in the media, this is a breakthrough and breakthrough, breakthrough, treatment, breakthrough. And so then you like as a consumer, and if you're hurting or if you're like looking for something for your loved one, you're like, oh my gosh, it's a breakthrough and it's a hope, right, and you're selling hope. But when you actually look at it, you're like wait, that was just the name. So I always tell people do be very critical whenever you see something breakthrough, um, that it, yeah, we're selling hope and there's so much hope until it's like the other side of, until you're not, it didn't sell hope, right.

Kim Witczak: 47:13

But I think the critical thinking is something that you know, I, I don't know that I ever was that way until after something like this happened, right and right, like everything explodes. So you have to like kind of go back and like rethink and I'm like why do I believe that? Like, where did that belief come from? That we have to trust outside experts, that we give away our power blindly and we don't even like ask the question. Like I remember, I went to my doctor and she asked me do you think you need something after Woody died? And I looked at her and I go, oh yeah. And I go, I think it's what killed him. And she was like you know, yeah.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 48:00

And then she goes.

Kim Witczak: 48:01

But I go, more importantly, like aren't I supposed like? I asked her just a simple question. I go, aren't I supposed to hurt Like my husband died.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 48:10

Tragically.

Kim Witczak: 48:10

Yeah, tragically, she goes, but you don't need to hurt. I'm like what? Yeah, I remember literally, and I think that's that idea of for me. That didn't even make sense to me, but, trust me, I would love to have not felt that hurt, right, and so I understand why and how people get caught up in it. But I think it's really important that we always like I just wrote a sub stack about looking at and where people's like what's in it for, like, when there's something like what's in it for them, like what everything is like, why are they saying this? For what reason? And why are they telling me to take this? For what reason? Who is behind it? Like, I've learned to just ask a lot of just I guess it's kind of the onion of questions.

Kim Witczak: 49:05

You ask this question and then you go. Oh well, then that brings me here.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 49:07

There's never an answer to these questions by the way there's never a question.

Kim Witczak: 49:10

But maybe that is the answer, right, questions, yeah, just continually question Like there's nothing wrong with questions. And if you find somebody who doesn't even want to even or makes you feel like you're wrong, then maybe you need to get somebody new, because there's nothing wrong, yeah, there's nothing wrong with going. This doesn't make sense. Help me understand. Oh, it's you Really Like that seems like. And also, just, I don't know. I think I just get so mad when I hear where we've been just told like oh, it's you and, um, you know even, or that we don't even question. Like I was just looking at I was down in Arizona and my friend's mother was in a nursing home and they called and she hadn't approved a new med. And I go hey, I'd love to see your mom's medication list. So I'm looking at all of it and I go there were all sorts of they use generics, right? So I you don't know what they are, but I'm like what's this drug? And then I look it up. I'm like why is your mom on four different antidepressants?

Kim Witczak: 50:11

yes and I go, and she didn't even know and I go. Why is she on four different antidepressants, like I go? If I were you, let's call your doc, let's call that nursing home doctor. Right now I want to hear what they what like for. Like, if one isn't good, put another one, and if another one's not good, put like a couple more. And I literally I was like, wait a minute. These are the things where I think if we don't ask questions or be critical about it's not to say you're anti. Like asking questions does not make you anti-drug or anti. You know like, like you're anti-vaxxer or you know all the things that we're hearing, the narratives, those are just like being smart, like that's just putting.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 50:58

I don't know it is Well. I feel like, when they go, you're anti this, like it's such an extreme. I don't want to live in extremes, right, I don't live in extremes. Well, it feels like a threat.

Jennifer Schmitz: 51:11

It feels like a threat to those on the other side by having an inquisitive patient, a curious patient. They feel like they are being threatened in some way and sometimes they are yeah, they are wrong. And you're starting to challenge and ask questions that they don't have an answer to. The answer that they're given is the narrative that they have been fed or their limited knowledge on something, and it goes back to the providers that can say humbly, say I don't know the answer to that and that's okay.

Jennifer Schmitz: 51:48

It's okay, and that's a good thing, right, let's take our egos for a hot second and pull it off the shelf. And our last guest that we were just talking to said something very similar to this, and it's like you don't have to know all those answers and, in fact, as patients, yes, we might be challenging you with inquisitive questions, but if you don't know the answer, like you should take a deep look at why you don't know the answer.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 52:14

And it's all right that you don't.

Jennifer Schmitz: 52:16

Say that, Tell your patients. I don't know. You're asking me something.

Kim Witczak: 52:21

I'm all right with hearing that right.

Jennifer Schmitz: 52:23

I don't know, I remember.

Kim Witczak: 52:23

I was getting ready to. I had to have a what's it called Endoscope or something. So anyways, I was getting ready, I'm getting, before they put the anesthesia and I kept asking questions of the doctor. And I was just asking questions.

Jennifer Schmitz: 52:43

You're an owl now You're just an owl, I feel like get anesthesiology in here quick. She's asking so many fucking questions Knock woman out.

Kim Witczak: 52:51

But he looked at me and he goes um, he goes. Do you know how many? He literally said to me goes. Do you know how many of these I do every single week?

Kim Witczak: 53:01

no, how many, I'd say and I looked at him and I go do you know how many I've had in my body? Never, I'm not. I'm not literally. I am not asking you these questions because I'm quite like second guessing you. I'm like, how about the fact that I'm afraid that you're putting something in my body and I'm the one, and I've heard too many?

Kim Witczak: 53:21

Of course, I live in the world of harms, so I hear a lot of like the harm, like what if you nick something? Like I'm the one that has to live with it. I'm not judging and I'm not even. It's not anything about you and your ego. I'm just because I'm a nervous, like I'm worried because you're putting something in my body that I've never had done before, and so it really made me like stop and go, wait. Like we have to look in the mirror sometimes, as every you know, as people and he should look at, he should have looked in his mirror and think that my patient, maybe my patients, aren't actually thinking like, is this my problem? Maybe I am like either God or my ego, but like what if they're just worried and they're asking questions because, not because I'm second guessing, I'm just nervous, why is it a bad question to ask, like what happens if something goes wrong?

Dr Teralyn Sell: 54:17

And same thing with psych meds? Like what happens if something goes wrong? Or what happens when I went off of them? Same thing we get met with Well, well, let's not worry about that, we're trying to save your life now, right? Like we're not going to worry about those outcomes why not? Those outcomes happen all the time. Negative outcomes occur constantly with psychiatric medication. And if you don't have the answer to what's next, if this doesn't occur to me, that's a problem If you don't want to engage in that kind of conversation. I was just on social media, like having a little. There was a nurse practitioner having a little fit on social media with me and she told me that I needed to fix my post or change it down because, even though she agrees with everything that I'm saying, it might prompt people to come into her office and start questioning why they are on antidepressants in the first place. And I was like, and and why is that a threat? Because you don't have the confidence.

Jennifer Schmitz: 55:23

Because they can't explain their way out of it and they can't answer the questions. Why is that your?

Kim Witczak: 55:29

problem to take down a post that, like I'm like wait, you agree with it, but you just don't want to hear people coming in and asking you the question why do you want to have to explain it? Why do you want to have this? Yes, you don't want to explain that.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 55:43

Just like you, I would want the explanation, like why are you offering me this? Why, why was Woody offered an antidepressant for sleep? Like to me that's, that's a valid question, like what's the research behind that? And I also want to kind of bring back when you were talking about anecdotal things, right, why do we like to dismiss the lived experience? Someone's lived experience is not, you know, an evidence-based practice. But I want to tell people, qualitative research exists. Summarize a human experience with numbers, which is quantitative, so qualitative. Think about quality of your lived experience. Quantitative is like numbers. Quantity, right so, but we always want to distill down mental health into numbers that we can put in a chart and a graph instead of you know the lived experience on things. Well, that's just what you felt happened. I'm like all of this is what I felt happened.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 56:53

Everything about mental health is fucking subjective a checkbox for everything, except when it's in the negative, then it doesn't count.

Kim Witczak: 57:01

Right, exactly, but isn't like. So even if you were saying like, let's say, even for researchers that are really want to live in the quantitative, but isn't like again, I'm not a scientist, but I'm just remembering, like, if you have a bunch of anecdotes, isn't that a data point? Like yes, it's a data point. Those are numbers that are all like. You know, you think about what? The FDA, just their MedWatch system, which is the reporting system, those they'll be like, oh well, those are like what? Like no.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 57:36

Those are just people's experiences.

Kim Witczak: 57:37

Well, yeah, and if you have a trend of it that should tell you, oh, we got to go look at it further Right, look at it further right. So these things we should never. And I you know, right now there's that whole study that just came out on the withdrawal and and that literally just came out and it didn't really include any lived experiences. But if you would go and talk to the lived experienced people which was not in the study, but it was, I think it was to to actually quiet the, the, the noise, for doctors and people are like you know, and they're like oh, we just did a meta-analysis, we looked at everything and there's no issue.

Kim Witczak: 58:14

Well, if you actually go-.

Jennifer Schmitz: 58:16

Meta-analysis of shit that was done in the first place. Right? Like it's so dumb. We just took garbage and just stirred the garbage and then we gave it to you on a pretty plate Like it's still fucking garbage, Okay.

Kim Witczak: 58:30

So garbage, but that's what I say. I'm like garbage in, garbage out, yeah, you know. But all of a sudden I'm like wait a minute. Well, did this meta analysis talk to real people and lived experiences of all of these groups that are?

Jennifer Schmitz: 58:44

out there what's already been out there. And we just re, we just re re, stirred it made it look a little different, handed it out again a little package, and here you go doctors, Don't worry, we're not going to.

Kim Witczak: 58:57

you don't need to tell anybody. It's really easy to get off these meds.

Jennifer Schmitz: 59:00

Uh well, that's not what people tell you but that was true, terry and I wouldn't exist. That's true, deprescribers like us, we would not exist in this world.

Kim Witczak: 59:09

We wouldn't have a job.

Jennifer Schmitz: 59:10

We wouldn't be needed.

Kim Witczak: 59:12

Yeah, I mean, but that's where like. So you guys see it all the time. You probably have heard all which. I love the idea of the gas lit, because you have probably had personal experience of yourself. But then also when you have all your patients and you're like whoa, we've been doing this, we're all here and it's the exact same line of BS that everybody's been told.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 59:36

Yeah, but we're all outliers. Just so you know. None of us count as data points, none of us are.

Jennifer Schmitz: 59:43

Nope, none of us. We're the thousands of social media followers we have that are in the same spot. None of us. Nope, none of us. Thousands of social media followers we have that are in the same spot, like none of us.

Kim Witczak: 59:51

We're all one off. But I also laugh, like back in the day when I'd be, like, when we came out and they're like, you're a Scientologist, I go, I am like it became. I'm like, I am like if and I and I remember like if we were well, we would never taken these drugs. So, like I've seen what, I've seen, the whole, I know Right, I'm like, but I see what you guys like have to deal, like this idea, like wait a minute, we wouldn't be here. Like if we weren't all, but this is part of the game. Like, oh well, meta-analysis, this is your problem, it's not your, you know. Like no, these are issues. People, we've got to start paying. This is the real world.

Kim Witczak: 1:00:34

And again I go back to the research and what the FDA does. It's a hurdle. It's a hurdle to get the product on the market and it's going to always sell benefit. It's a business. Healthcare is a business. We're customers, not patients, as I call us. And it's not about the harms, because the drugs are always be put in the best light, in the best situation, the best patient, the best everything. And that's not real world. And that's why the work that you guys do and like the real lived experience is where the real real issues exist and lie and the real opportunity is in the real world.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 1:01:19

Love it.

Jennifer Schmitz: 1:01:20

That's a great wrap up right there.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 1:01:22

That is a wonderful wrap up.

Jennifer Schmitz: 1:01:23

Really good wrap there, Kim.

Kim Witczak: 1:01:25

Well, I just get like, I get like, I just get, so We'll have you on.

Dr Teralyn Sell: 1:01:28

We can have you on again and we'll talk more. Yep, it'll be fine.

Jennifer Schmitz: 1:01:32

There's more to come. Well, if you guys have stayed this log with us and I know most of you have because, kim, your story and your advocacy is so powerful, how you even can sit on an FDA consumer in a consumer position Like we didn't even get to ask that question We'll have to come back to that one Blows my mind because you're putting yourself in those positions where there is a lot of trauma and harm that has come and yet you are accidentally that advocate right Through what has happened. It found you. It really did find you, and people like you are so needed and are making changes. So thank you, kim, for being here and everybody. We are the Gaslit Truth Podcast. You can find us anywhere that you listen to podcasts. If you want to send us your Gaslit Truth story, you can send it to us at thegaslittruthpodcast at gmailcom. Go ahead, give us five stars, hit us up on any of our DMs and stay curious. Everybody, thanks for having me.