It depends which medications you're talking about, and which conditions you're treating with them. A lot of them are more like using a shovel on a flowerpot. Still not precisely the right tool, but they get the job done and the porch is still in good shape.
With my ex-fiancee, a psychiatrist had her on prozac and abilify. She had a complete breakdown in her senior year of university classes. They put her on a cocktail of stuff and weren't honest in their dealings (parents and doctor).
She had quite a few voices and things in her head. And the drugs helped that, to a point. It was when she started getting tics that I investigated more, and saw the 3-5 pages of "adverse conditions". Tics (tardive dyskinesia) was a permanent adverse condition, and could be gained at any time after starting just Abilify.
When you're trading one set of nasty stuff for another set of nasty stuff, and then eventually have to quit, is it worth it? Especially if you end up getting the initial set of nasty plus whatever the drugs have induced as well?
Hopefully, better research will target neurons directly or properly calculate for hormonal deficiencies.
Now admittedly, I'm for proper disclosure and informed consent. There's times in which a drug/surgery can cause more damage than what you're trying to fix. And in the case of my ex, it was that she was developing adverse conditions, and she wasn't told. I've taken antidepressants along with other medicines. Nothing wrong with taking drugs to help fix problems. If you're thinking about quitting, talk to your doctor. Some of those drugs are dangerous to quit cold turkey.
That sounds like a horrible experience and it's not surprising that you feel the way you do about psychiatric meds.
You're right that many of them at the moment suck. They have long lists of side effects, some of the side effects are severe (reducing quality of life, sometimes reducing length of life).
At least in the UK there's some push towards patients becoming much more involved in their care. There's a bit of of focus on the informed part of informed consent. But we could do better here.
For some of the severe mental illnesses it's a tricky balance - do we medicate people or let them live with their illness? Mostly this should be up to the patient. If someone has the capacity to decide then they're allowed to "make the wrong choice".
And while the side effects suck they can be better than the illness, which can lead people to die by suicide or live miserable lives.
But if someone just hears voices, and is okay with them, doctors should not be pushing that person towards medication but towards crisis planning and advanced directives.
