Dr (Tom) Cruise’s health advice starts feud with Brooke Shields

[HuckleB]

Dr Cruise’s health advice starts feud

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1632032,00.html

"THE golden rule of Hollywood — do not rubbish your fellow actors — has been broken by Tom Cruise, one of the film world’s most image conscious and reserved stars.

A feud with Brooke Shields has erupted after Cruise criticised her in a television interview for taking antidepressants to help her cope with postnatal depression. Shields is currently appearing in the musical Chicago in London and has a two-year-old daughter, Rowan.

“Here is a woman — and I care about Brooke Shields because she is an incredibly talented woman — where has her career gone?” Cruise said somewhat gratuitously on Access Hollywood, while promoting Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds, in which he stars.

“These drugs are dangerous. I have actually helped people come off them,” he said. “When you talk about postpartum depression you can take people today, women, and what you do is you use vitamins.”

..."




Clueless Cruise Strikes Again...

[MADem]

1. And if he were a REAL MAN he'd come out of the closet

...instead of screwing up the lives of heterosexual women to advance his career.

Stick it, Midget...where the sun don't shine! Brooke Shields has been through enough crap in her life without having to listen to advice from a cult follower.

[suziedemocrat]

7. Why do people think he is gay?

Wouldn't Nicole Kidman have disclosed something by now if he were gay? He's been married twice. He's dated a lot of women. Why do people think he is gay?

I think all of these drugs might be dangerous too; and I think vitamins (and especially minerals) are overlooked when it comes to depression. His mistake was talking to the press. You should never diss other actors/musicians in the press. It's the kiss of death.

[MADem]

13. She was a starlet, he was the heartthrob of America

It certainly was a quid pro quo (to quote Poppy) at the time. Now she is at the top of her game. She owes him for the leg up, so she won't speak up. But she and Mimi, his first, no doubt have tales to tell. Now he is chasing a child, half his age, who doesn't know any better. He is a foolish, empty man. He should be ashamed of himself.

I think anyone who proclaims that vitamins in and of themselves can combat postpartum depression is an ASSHOLE. An ignorant, perhaps unintentionally vicious, daydreaming asshole. And an asshole who is certainly not a mother suffering from this disorder...and not being one, I would not presume to speak for these mothers who have serious, debilitating, hormonal issues. And I sure as hell would not question their choices--they are theirs to make. Until the Supremes rule, anyway.

Ask Andrea Yates...I doubt her One A Day helped her while she was drowning her kids in the tub. The man is a fool. He is an obtuse clown, meddling where he has no business. Some things are best left between a woman and her caregiver, and he is neither. Shame on him.

However, that said, and just so you don't think I am ripping you (and I truly do not mean to), I agree with you that vitamins ARE IMPORTANT. But sometimes, they are not enough. Brain chemistry is a helluva thing, and with all the shit in our environment, it will probably be more of an issue in future, rather than less.

And if vitamins aren't enough, I say leave it to the mother and her doctor, certainly not Dr. Scientology Cruise, M.D. I simply find his attitude arrogant. He has no children from birth mothers, and he hasn't a damn clue. He needs to stuff his sock in his mouth, and work on his OWN self perception, rather than telling others how they should live their lives.

[marylanddem]

2. Cruise is a Scientologist

He's a Scientologist & Scientologists oppose psychiatric drugs -
I guess because it steals their business of "fixing" people

[alarimer]

17. yes

Kelly Preston (Travolta's wife) has a post on Huffington Post that is frightening in its ignorance:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/featuredposts.html#a002033

Where in all of medicine is a diagnosis of disease made strictly by talking to someone? Would a parents subject their child to chemotherapy if there were no evidence of cancer cells? Would they take a doctor’s word for it that he could diagnose their child with cancer simply by asking the child some questions or observing his behavior? Yet parents are being told that their child has a mental “disease” and that they need to take dangerous and unproven drugs -- when there is no medical proof that anything is wrong with the child.


I am also opposed to kids being forced to take drugs against the wishes of their parents but to speak of psychiatry as if it were some kind of "witch-doctoring" (my word, not hers) isjust ignorant. I noticed that unlike a lot of posts, there is no place to comment on this one. Pure Scientology talking points.

[HuckleB]

18. Well, brain scans are starting to be used as adjunct pieces...

for diagnosis. Of course, insurance companies don't want to pay for them. At any rate, the Scientology hoax is scary, and it's scary that it gets so much press.

[alarimer]

19. My personal opinion

Is that psychology and neuroscience go hand in hand. It doesn't have to be either/or. I don't think there is anything evil about psychotherapy or in drugs. Some drugs may be overprescribed and people may be too dependent on going to the doctor and getting a little pill that will solve their problems. But the view of Scientology really scares me.

[HuckleB]

20. Indeed.

Most research indicates that, for patients whose intensity of symptoms warrants medication, combined therapy and medication offer the most benefit. So your statement rings quite true, IMHO.

[Inland]

3. "gratuitously" is one word for it. nt

[jobycom]

4. Sadly, I halfway agree with him on meds

There is a lot of overprescribing of meds when simple dietary changes or vitamin intake would do more good and less harm. It's easier and more profitable for a doctor to prescribe meds than to try to convince someone to alter their diet. Pharmaceutical companies spend tons on misinformation to doctors about meds and research, and I'd love to see more money spent to educate the public and the medical profession--to counter the pharmaceuticals. Watch "Super-Size Me," and note the disinformation from lobbyists for the food industry, and realize the pharmaceuticals are even worse.

The wrecklessness on Cruise's part comes when he points to a specific person, as though he understands her situation. He'd do better to fund a documentary or an education program to make his point, than speaking off the top of his head.

Just my opinion. I don't get the hostility around here towards him, frankly. I guess it's just more of that "hate anything popular" mentality. Dude is a decent actor, and a Democrat--Let's attack James Woods, he's five times the asshole and ten times the nutcase Cruise is, and with a much bigger ego.

[suziedemocrat]

8. I can't stand James Woods!!! He may not be gay - but he sure hates women!

[jobycom]

10. My favorite comment on James Woods came from Sean Young

when they broke up. She said he'd have been a nicer guy if he'd been born with a smaller dick.

Cool actor. Absolute jackass, though. Typical Repub, too. Everyone else is there for his pleasure and use.

[Warpy]

12. Post partum depression is a life threatening disease

I know three women who had it. Two are dead. One is disfigured from trying to burn herself to death.

Anybody who whines about drug companies in this case needs to take a step back and get educated.

Women who have this need HELP, CHEMICAL HELP, and anybody who suggests anything to the contrary might as well just pull out a gun and shoot them.

That's how bad it is.

[MADem]

14. I had a friend who had a wife with this problem

She set the nursery on fire. No one would have thought she would do that--she simply flipped. Completely out of character. They did not have the drugs back then that they have now...by a miracle, the child was saved, but the poor woman was put in a thorazine straightjacket from which she never emerged.

Now, they have much better, targeted drugs for these serious issues. The problem is when Big Pharma starts encouraging the docs to hand them out like candy, and they become abused drugs.

But you are right, some cannot do without them. They will end up doing harm to themselves or others. And the families pay, some with their lives.

[jobycom]

15. Let's assume for just a moment that other people do also

know what they are talking about.

Americans are overmedicated. I didn't say the drugs shouldn't be available. I said they are overused.

Post partum depression can mean anything now from mild blues to life-threatening depression. I'm a male, and I went through a great number of symptoms of post partum depression when my child was born. My wife went back to work in two weeks, I stayed home and raised her, because I was in graduate school. A doctor later told me I had every classic symptom, from near suicidal depression to baseless bouts of terror. My wife had none of it, and laughed at me when she caught me crying in a corner for no reason.

My doctor, a woman, told me that I was proof it wasn't as hormonal as is commonly claimed, and attributed it in my case to the complete disruption of sleeping and eating habits combined with the overwhelming emotional drain of caring for an infant. She told me if I had been a woman she'd have put me on medication. Which made her and I wonder how often women are diagnosed with hormonal depression when it was really a combination of what I went through.

I've known women with extreme PPD, too. I've also known people to develop chemical dependencies that have destroyed their lives from drugs prescribed by doctors. More of the latter, in fact. Medication is over-prescribed in this country, and a lot of times all that is needed is adjustments of diet and vitamin intake. Not always, but a lot of times.

And one of my close friends didn't survive PPD. So don't lecture me.

[tallahasseedem]

5. Tom Cruise is an ass...

I had post-partum depression and experienced some of the same things Brooke Shields mentions. This cannot be cured by upping a dose of vitamins. I wonder what he would say about the fact that the overuse of vitamins can damage your organs.

[patricia92243]

9. The woman in Texas that drowned her five kids had post-par tum depression.

Will always wonder if those children would be alive today if their mother was taking her meds.

Anybody that urges another person to stop taking their meds,better ready to face the consequences.

[tallahasseedem]

16. Her situation was horrible...

Her Husband and Doctor are partially to blame. Why they took that poor woman off her meds I will never know.

[MichiganVote]

6. And Tommy had a baby when? Like never?

[Warpy]

11. I hope any woman who listens to this empty headed

religious wack job and runs into trouble sues his ass.

Want to bet he's revving up for a run for office? Repthuglican, of course.