About Laura

Laura Delano was fourteen when she saw her first psychiatrist.

At school, Laura was a good student, earning straight-As, a national squash ranking, and the distinction of class president; at home, however, she was angry, despairing, and self-injuring. At the end of her first psychiatric session, Laura was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which she was told had no cure. Her doctor said she would need to take psychiatric medications for the rest of her life.

Fiery and defiant, Laura did not accept against her diagnosis. She hid her medicine, didn’t tell anyone what her psychiatrist had said, and continued as best she could through high school. Upon entering Harvard, however, Laura’s struggles intensified. She was self-destructive and afraid. Desperate for an explanation and the promise of relief, Laura returned to a psychiatrist and accepted that she was mentally ill.

For the next decade, Laura lived in the clutch of psychiatry, seeking treatment from the best psychiatrists and hospitals in the country, accumulating a long list of diagnoses - major depression, eating disorder NOS, substance abuse disorder, and borderline personality disorder. Her cabinet of medications grew to a total of nineteen over the years. Delano had questions about her diagnosis and treatment but, given her struggles and suicidal tendencies, adhered to the pharmaceutical regimen she’d been told was necessary to manage her “incurable, lifelong disease.” When her symptoms only worsened, doctors declared her condition “treatment resistant.” At twenty-seven, Laura attempted suicide (to hear more about Laura’s struggles with suicide, you can read this article and watch this video).

Despite all her care, Laura never got better. Demoralized by her circumstances and inability to get well, Delano went back to her lingering questions about her initial and subsequent diagnosis. . . . What if her life was falling apart not despite her treatment, but because of it? After years of being a faithful patient, Delano realized there was one thing she hadn’t tried—leaving behind the drugs and diagnoses. This decision would mean unlearning everything experts had told her about her body, mind, and self. It meant exploring the terrifying unknowns of an unmedicated life.

Since becoming an ex-patient, Laura has been writing and speaking about her experiences and the social and political issues sitting at the heart of mental illness and mental health. She has worked for a large community mental health organization, providing support to and advocating for the rights of individuals in emergency rooms, psychiatric hospitals, and institutional group home settings. She has also been consulting with individuals and families seeking help during the psychiatric drug withdrawal process, and educating psychiatrists and mental health professionals about safer tapering protocols. 

In January 2018, Laura launched Inner Compass Initiative (ICI), a non-profit organization that helps people make more informed choices about psychiatric diagnoses, drugs, and drug withdrawal.

Laura’s memoir, UNSHRUNK: A Story of Psychiatric Treatment Resistance will be published in March 2025 by Viking Press in the US, and Octopus Books in the UK and Commonwealth countries.