The Gaslit Truth Podcast

Send us Fan Mail Schools are getting sued, teachers are burning out, and parents keep hearing the same slippery phrases: “reasonable accommodations,” “board policy,” and “trust the process.” We’re not buying it. We sit down with family law attorney Jason Wright to explain why special education support so often turns into delay, confusion, and conflict, especially when districts treat every request...

Send us Fan Mail Nobody tells you that one “helpful” prescription can echo for decades, but that’s exactly what Martin Cranford lived. After 9-11, with aviation layoffs looming and a first baby on the way, anxiety shows up fast and an SSRI seems like the obvious answer. Years later, a new problem appears: Restless Leg Syndrome. What follows is a real-world look at how SSRI side effects, dopamine a...

Send us Fan Mail The recovery world loves simple rules, but real people are complicated. We’re joined by Michael Gonzales, a veteran interventionist known for challenging the one size fits all approach to addiction treatment. Michael gets brutally honest about the years he spent presenting an abstinence-only story while privately using cannabis to manage PTSD, function in daily life, and keep movi...

Send us Fan Mail Medications can change symptoms, but they can also drain the nutrients your brain depends on to function. We get blunt about the trade-offs people rarely hear when they start psychiatric meds, and we connect the dots between nutrient depletion and the exact complaints that get labeled as “depression,” “anxiety,” or “brain fog” in the first place. If you’ve ever wondered why you fe...

Send us Fan Mail The rehab world sells hope, but what happens when the business model rewards volume over care? We sit down with Ronnie Costa, a recovery coach and chemical dependency counselor whose life began in Providence’s crime-heavy mob culture, where money, status, and violence looked like a plan. Ronnie shares how that environment shaped his choices, how opioid addiction with OxyContin and...

Send us Fan Mail A federal plan says it wants to curb psychiatric overprescribing and elevate informed consent. That sounds like progress until you remember informed consent was always supposed to be the standard, and most people never received it. We unpack the HHS MAHA action plan and the “dear colleague” guidance that urges shared decision making, regular risk-benefit reviews, and more non-medi...

Send us Fan Mail Rehab can make millions and still send people home sicker, more medicated, and more likely to relapse. That’s the uncomfortable starting point for our conversation with Dr. Cali Estes, a global leader in addiction recovery who’s trained tens of thousands of professionals and also paid the personal price of loving someone who couldn’t stop using. We dig into the addiction treatment...

Send us Fan Mail You can walk into family court feeling certain you’re the “good parent” and your ex is the “toxic one,” then walk out stunned that the judge didn’t seem to care. That shock is exactly what we’re tackling with award-winning Austin family law attorney Jason Wright, a straight-talking divorce and custody lawyer who reminds clients that family law is about what’s legal, not what feels...

Send us Fan Mail GLP-1 drugs are being sold like a clean shortcut, but the body is not a simple math problem. We sit down with returning guest Dr. Josh Hellman, MD (Harvard-trained physician and lifestyle medicine expert), to get painfully honest about peptides, GLP-1 agonists, and what patients often do not hear before starting semaglutide (Ozempic/Wegovy) or tirzepatide. We break down what pepti...

Send us Fan Mail Chronic pain gets treated like a character flaw far too often, and that’s the first injury. When you’re told “the scans look fine” or “it must be anxiety,” you’re left holding pain that is real while also being made to feel crazy for having it. We wanted a smarter, more honest conversation about what chronic pain is, how the brain and nervous system can keep the signal alive, and...

Send us Fan Mail Gum recession. Tooth loss. Bone density dropping fast. When those problems hit, most people get handed a brush-up-your-hygiene lecture or a “that’s just aging” shrug. We wanted a deeper answer, especially because we keep seeing oral health fall apart in people taking psychiatric medications and other prescriptions, and in people carrying a heavy toxic exposure history. We bring on...

Send us Fan Mail Your doctor says withdrawal should be short because the drug “leaves your body.” Then you stop an SSRI and months later your sleep collapses, anxiety spikes, your body hurts, and you’re told it must be your “condition” coming back. That gap between what you were promised and what you’re living is exactly where protracted withdrawal hides.  We walk through what protracted withdrawa...

Send us Fan Mail One bad assumption can burn down a life: “It’s just stress” or “you’re just falling out of love.” We sit down with Sabrina Lane from Loving Through the Storm to talk about what happens when antidepressants and antidepressant withdrawal collide with marriage, grief, and trust. Her story starts the way so many do, with a therapist recommending Lexapro at a specific dose to “take the...

Send us Fan Mail What if the kindest thing a therapist can do is hold the line? We dig into the boundary problem hiding in plain sight: missed sessions waved off, late cancellations uncharged, and vague money talk that quietly devalues the work. With guest Aron Gilbert, a social work psychotherapist and founder of Boston Evening Therapy Associates, we unpack how a flimsy frame sends mixed messages...

Send us Fan Mail Forget the “born an addict” script. We dig into why the broken-brain narrative persists, where the DSM and twin-study talking points get overextended, and how neuroadaptation—not destiny—explains the very real deficits measured after substance use. From dopamine to GABA and glutamate, we unpack what’s actually happening in the brain, why SSRIs often miss the mark, and how a smarte...

Send us Fan Mail Trusted care should never start with a wink and end without a chart. Naomi Moore joins us to share how her husband John, a pediatric nurse and devoted dad, went from seasonal life stress to a devastating, rapid unraveling after an off-the-books antipsychotic prescribed by his own brother. Over five months, a cascade of medications—long-term Lexapro, new olanzapine, sleep aids, and...

Send us Fan Mail What happens when a crisis call for help becomes evidence of a crime—and the pill meant to steady your mind may have helped set the fire? We sit down with Ben Bathan, a former senior technical artist, to unpack a nightmarish chain of events: a therapist who directed specific SSRIs and dosages, years of escalating side effects, and a conviction for criminal threats after calling a...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz talk about the problems diagnosing bipolar disorder A Wall Street Journal apology letter, a new album on deck, and a claim that top doctors...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz talk about the problems when a spouse diagnoses the other with a mental health disorder.  What if the story you’ve been told about mental he...

Send us Fan Mail A lot of partners arrive with a plan: diagnose the other, prescribe a podcast, and force “the work” through an ultimatum. We blow the whistle on that dynamic and unpack why pressure backfires, how pop-psychology labels fuel contempt, and what ethical therapy actually looks like when one spouse is sent in to be “fixed.” Along the way, we explore the emotional mismatch many couples...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz discuss the martyrdom that exists in therapy practice and the dismissal of client violence.  A therapist in Orlando was murdered by a former...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz talk with Medical Journalist Rob Wipond author of Your Consent is Not Required.  The stories we tell about “care” rarely match what happens...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz talk with Chana Studley, trauma survivor to hollywood award winner.   You’ve been told you’re broken. Chana Studley arrived with police repo...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz explore the new USDA Food Pyramid.  Does food matter?  You would be surprised what some professions think.  You’ve been told the food pyrami...

Send us Fan Mail The Gaslit Truth Podcast is hosted by Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz, exploring mental health, psychiatric medication withdrawal, therapy culture, and informed consent. In this episode, Dr. Teralyn Sell and Therapist Jenn Schmitz explore whether modern mental health care may be unintentionally perpetuating distress, through a candid conversation with Dr. Richard L. Bl...