1,001 Facts That Will Scare the S#*t Out of You: The Ultimate Bathroom Reader (90 page)

Michael J. O’Dowd, The History of Medications for Women: Materia Medica Woman (Informa Health Care, 2001), 249.

678

FACT :
Accutane (isotretinoin), a drug used to treat severe acne, also has been
linked to phocomelia
.

Women taking the drug have to adhere to a strict regimen to prevent becoming pregnant, including two methods of birth control and a required monthly blood test for pregnancy before a prescription refill is approved.
It’s actually three methods of birth control, including the acne.

Michael J. O’Dowd, The History of Medications for Women: Materia Medica Woman (Informa Health Care, 2001), 249.

Paula Begoun, The Complete Beauty Bible: The Ultimate Guide to Smart Beauty (Rodale, 2004).

679

FACT :
Half of all psychotherapists are
threatened, harassed, or physically attacked
by a patient, and up to 15 percent of them have been stalked by former clients.
If they were better therapists, they wouldn’t have this problem.

Bryce Nelson, “Acts of Violence Against Therapists Pose Lurking Threat,” New York Times, June 14, 1983.

John C. Norcross and James D. Guy, Jr., Leaving It at the Office: A Guide to Psychotherapist Self-Care (Guilford Press, 2007), 44.

680

FACT :
Some
psychotherapists have been murdered by patients
, though exact figures are unobtainable. In a six-week period in 1981, four psychiatrists, one each in Massachusetts, Florida, California, and Michigan, were murdered by patients.
“Sorry, doc, our time is up for today.”

Bryce Nelson, “Acts of Violence Against Therapists Pose Lurking Threat, New York Times, June 14, 1983.

John C. Norcross and James D. Guy, Jr., Leaving It at the Office: A Guide to Psychotherapist Self-Care (Guilford Press, 2007), 44.

681

FACT :
For centuries
processed cockroaches have been used to cure ailments
and physical disorders: cockroach tea has been used to treat dropsy (edema), an accumulation of fluid beneath the skin; fried cockroaches were used in African American folk medicine as a cure for indigestion; and cockroach poultice has been used to cure wounds and stingray burns.
Eh, I’ll just stick with the dropsy and Tums, thanks.

Darrell Addison Posey and Kristina Plenderleith, Indigenous Knowledge and Ethics: A Darrell Posey Reader (Routledge, 2004), 29.

Marion Copeland, Cockroach (Reaktion Books, 2003).

682

FACT :
Urine therapy is the application of urine to the body through the skin or oral ingestion.

Advocates drink a cup of their own urine every morning
, which is to be sipped, not guzzled, and taken from “midstream urine” collected in the morning. The treatment has been prescribed to stop chronic itching, soothe throat aches, and prevent cancer.
I’ll just stick with scratching and Ricola, thanks.

Flora Peschek-Böhmer and Gisela Schreiber, Urine Therapy: Nature’s Elixir for Good Health (Inner Traditions / Bear & Company, 1999).

683

FACT :
One seventeenth-century treatment for acne: chop the heads off two puppies, hang them by their heels to bleed,
mix the collected blood with white wine
, and apply the concoction to the face. A similar serum of “Dog’s Blood” was also once considered an effective treatment for tuberculosis.
Who came up with that treatment, a cat?

Herbert P. Goodheart, Acne For Dummies (For Dummies, 2005).