This is my detailed recovery story:

https://www.survivingantidepressants.org/forums/topic/33600-didiyana-thank-you-you-will-remain-in-my-heart-forever-♥%EF%B8%8F/#comment-759937

This has been quite a journey.  I sometimes feel like Frodo Baggins, who had to go through all kinds of harrowing circumstances and circuitous paths to achieve his goal of destroying the One Ring in The Lord of the Rings. Because I have been in protracted withdrawal, and have other issues, I don’t think I’m ever doing to wake up one day feeling perfect, and say “now I’m healed!”.  Instead, it has been glacially slow, with a very nonlinear path.  I’m not completely healed, but I would say that I feel that I’m about 90% healed from withdrawal.  I was exposed to alcohol and drugs in utero, and I have major trauma, so I feel these factors may play a large role in my current symptoms as well. It has been 3.5 years since I’ve ingested any psychiatric drugs.  

I will say, to qualify this, that I do still have some protracted WD going on.  However, I still did successfully get off the drugs, and have no intention of EVER going anywhere near another psych med.  At times, I still have some sleep issues, minor agitation, intrusive thoughts, and neuro emotions, mainly sadness and crying.  However, when I do feel this way, it is so much milder than it was, and it usually only lasts from a few hours to a few days. And, I believe my other issues play into this as well.  Most days, I feel almost normal. And, these symptoms are slowly going away, and becoming milder and less frequent.

On a positive note, I can now feel my emotions fully.  I feel like a complete human being again!  My husband says he can connect with me better, and I’m back to being the person he knew prior to the drugs.  My cognitive skills are sharper, and my memory is even improving!  My intuition and perception are much keener.  (I was always an intuitive person, but the drugs took that away too).  I am more creative.  The colors are sharper and brighter, music touches my soul now and gives me joy and peace. Now that I’m no longer numb, I’m better able to stand up for myself and set boundaries, instead of just letting unacceptable behavior from others continue.  I feel my spiritual life is much richer, and I actually have a conscious contact with my God, instead of just feeling spiritually dry and far from God.  All of these are priceless gifts that money cannot buy, and I will never take these things for granted again.

Here are the tools that got me through withdrawal. I didn’t practice them perfectly, but when I did, they sure helped:

- Prayer and bible reading.  Cultivating a close relationship with Jesus and trusting in Him had been an immeasurable help.  I could not have done this without him.

- Acknowledge, accept, float.  When the dark intrusive thoughts came, and there were many, this helped me not to freak out about the thoughts or take them seriously, and to let them go.

- Distraction by doing a physical task.  This was a big one, especially in early recovery.  I did lots of knitting hats using that circular knitting loom you can buy at hobby shops.  I also did gardening, cleaning, walking, and cooking.

- Walking Outside.  This was a huge help.  I feel that it really helped my nervous system to regulate, as well as to burn off excess stress hormones.  Being in the fresh air and sunshine is always very therapeutic and calming and grounding.

- Setting Boundaries.  There are some people in my family who are still abusive and toxic, and I’ve had to set very strong boundaries with them, and in some cases, eliminate them from my life.  Having all the unnecessary drama was just not an option for me.

- Al Anon and ACA (Adult Children of Alcoholics), and counseling.  Because I am now off the drugs, I’ve had to find non drug ways to deal with all the trauma and my own dysfunctional ways of thinking and behaving.

- Mindfulness.  When I find myself ruminating or dwelling on the past, I use mindfulness to bring my attention back to the present.

- 4-7-8 breathing.

- Weighted blanket, relaxing music, sound machine, earplugs help with sleep.

- clean healthy diet, and getting off sucralose. 

I am confident that with time, and continuing proper self care, that I will complete my healing from protracted withdrawal.

Here are the links to my threads on SA (survivingantidepressants.org): 

My Intro Thread, the Saga of my Tapering and Withdrawal

My Success Story

In 1999, I was prescribed Paxil for anxiety and OCD. It never really helped me other than to deaden my emotions and make me gain about 20 pounds. In 2006, my father died and I had to be the one to decide to take him off life support. That took me deep into a downward spiral, and I finally sought therapy, as I should have earlier.  That took me down a three-year road of withdrawal and recovery. 

I tried to taper way too fast at first, and had to reinstate twice.  My lifesaver was finding Paxilprogress.org, where I could share my struggle and get advice. My experience there made me realize how important support from fellow sufferers is.  I learned how to taper correctly and gradually, and in 2008 I found a therapist who understood the reality of withdrawal.  By late 2009 I was done with Paxil and by early 2010 through recovery.  After PaxilProgress closed, I followed Altostrata to Surviving Antidepressants, and from SA I cam here.

My lessons learned from my journey:

1. Give yourself time and space--and forgiveness.  Recovery is not linear--it has hills and valleys (windows and waves) and don't be too hard on yourself when you hit a wave.

2. Find and practice coping strategies.  Create a toolbox of coping tools. For me, the various tools offered by CBT and ERP work best.  Intentional catastrophizing, reality checking, and others work for me. 

3. Deal with what got you on meds in the first place.  I took Paxil for anxiety and OCD.  But because my PCP didn't refer me to therapy, the med just masked the symptoms.  Until I learned to deal with my issues constructively, I wasn't really doing anything to heal myself.

4. Accept that anxiety is a chronic issue.  I don't think anxiety just "goes away" anymore than  diabetes or any other chronic ailment. That doesn't mean we're doomed to a lifetime of suffering.  I see it as an incentive to learn how to manage the thoughts and sensations and put them in their proper perspective.  If we learn to accept the way we think and feel, and use tools to manage our feelings, we can enjoy life.

I am still on my journey. I still feel anxious sometimes. I still take a low dose of Klonopin before I fly (I'm the guy who keeps the plane flying by sheer will 😄). But I know thoughts are just thoughts and feelings are just feelings.  Through all these years, I've learned anyone, regardless of the depts of their current suffering,  of suffering can recover if they give themselves a chance and actively work toward recovery.  I've also learned to be more empathetic to others' suffering.  We're all in this together! 

I wrote a success story on SAD, but it was a little rushed since I was trying to get in before it closed.  I'm going to try and be a more thorough here, for better or for worse  😁  

Long story short, back when dinosaurs ruled the earth in 2012, I tapered successfully off of Venlafaxine with the help of the Paxil Progress community.   That took around 4 or 5 years, and life got busy and I didn't feel like I had the space or energy to taper off of Bupropion(generic Wellbutrin) at that time.  I thought it was easy to get off of anyway, and thought I needed it and didn't want to be bothered with another taper.  So fast forward to 2021 and I had cleared the space in my life to do this. Plus, I had always been told it was soooooooooo easy to get off of!  Just quit taking it, I was told 🤣  It's EZ, just takes a few weeks.   

Well, I wouldn't be here if that were the case.   😊  After my Venlafaxine experience, I thought this would be a piece of cake.   Turns out, it wasn't.    

At this time, I had been experiencing constant headaches and burning sensations for years, and an elevated, floaty feeling in my head that I really didn't like.   I had been maxed out at 450mg of Bupropion for 20 some years.  I'm embarrassed to say I didn't even make the connection between the meds and the head issues.   I sure did later, however!  😭

So I read up on tapering(I thought I did, at least) and it was confusing, I figured I'd just dive in and work it out as I went along.   I should mention that Bupropion has 3 different time release variants, which was a whole other kettle of fish I wasn't expecting.   

Immediately I got migraine like headaches and head pressure, brain fog, dizziness, burning, brain cramps, the whole 9 yards, along with visual strobing and other issues later on.   For that first 3 months or so, I tried to find a way to taper, hoping I would get to a steady baseline eventually.  Then I reinstated on an immediate time release(felt like a whole different medicine than the XR extended release I had been taking) and held on that for 6 months or so, hoping it would settle down into something tolerable.   Then I went back to where I started, and reinstated the XR, and held for 3 months.  

During this time the symptoms were constant.  I even got name brand Wellbutrin XL from my doctor to see if that might help, and indeed it did feel 10% better, but now I still had all these head issues that I didn't before I started that first reduction.  My quality of life was still around 40%, I was functioning but not well.   

So after much study, this was my conclusion.   I read that for some people, after being on a med for 20 years like I had, that it can 'break' if you make any changes, and never work the same again.  That was my experience.  I decided to taper through the situation, which I call poop-out.  I also read that some generics are better tolerated than others, so I had my doctor send my prescriptions to honeybee pharmacy, who let you choose the factory, and I got one that did indeed have less intense headaches.  

So I switched from the XL that I'd attempted to stabilize on, back to instant release, because it dissolves in water easily unlike the extended release, and I hoped for the best.   Some people try and mix and match time releases for best results, but at this time I was worn down by the symptoms and not up for another battle.   

I started with a small reduction, and then did an even smaller reduction, to see if that might ease my symptoms.  No luck there, they remained the same regardless.  So against the advice to stick to 10% reductions, I went with larger amounts.   I was at the highest MG amount of Bup they would prescribe, so the old rule of thumb was that you could reduce more quickly at the beginning of a taper, and you slow down as you get to the end, making adjustments along the way.   

I felt no different reducing by the larger amount, so I continued to reduce at a measured pace that was greater than 10%.   At this time, my WD normal was the previous symptoms as described.   During the first 3 weeks after a reduction, I would have a roller coaster of emotions and symptoms.   They seemed random, but that was before I kept a daily WD checklist.   Once I did, I could get pretty close to knowing what symptoms I'd have on what day after reducing, when they'd start to improve, etc.   It let me plan life events around WD.  

I should also mention my use of comfort meds.  I sparingly took benzo crumbs and Clonidine to manage the bumpiest days.  I recorded how much I used and managed not to get addicted.  It was suggested to me not to take the benzo crumb more than 2 times a week or two weeks in a row.   I never got close to taking that amount, I kept it to under 1/2 a benzo pill per month.  

Which connects to some Rules of Tapering that I got from Dr. Shipko.  My line in the sand was holding a job.  If tapering was causing my performance to suffer so much that my job was at risk, I knew I had to reinstate to the last stable dose, or take a comfort med, whatever it took to hold on to my career.   Personal life was next to zero, but keeping a roof over my head was a necessity.  

I also recall being told that because I'd been on the med for so long, that it was likely I would have to stay on a small amount of it for the rest of my life.  That's a tough thing to hear.   That said, I heard it, and took it to heart.   I accepted that when I went to zero I might have to go back on a small amount.  

So I kept tapering, and started slowing down as I approached 150 mg. I tried to do reductions, hold for 3 or 4 weeks, then do the next reduction.  Every 3 or 4 months I would do an extra long hold to let things catch up and for me to rest a little.  

I worked my way down to around 2.5% of my starting dose, and jumped to zero.   Had the most vivid nightmare of my life that night 😁 In a perfect world, I would have worked my way down lower before jumping to zero, but that's what I did.  After 2 or 3 weeks I got The Big Fear, that super spicy 11/10 anxiety.   Turned out great, I got counseling and learned more about managing anxiety than I had in my entire life.  

After about 6 months at zero, I was able to work.   There was still construction going on in my brain, but I was able to manage.  I did come uncomfortably close to not being functional, I had some dark days, and somehow pushed on.   

Then around 9 months, things started turning around.   Less brain fog, less construction work, less headache.   Around a year I felt like I was still sensitized, but my symptoms were mild.   That's when I decided to taper off of Finasteride, which took me about 9 months and was like tapering an AD in many ways, with the ups and downs.   

Around 2 years at zero, I felt less sensitized, like my CNS was settled.   Now at 2.5 years I don't get any noticeable windows and waves any more, outside of those hypnic jerks now and then when I'm tired.  I think I'm somewhere close to being normal, but I wouldn't be surprised if I were even less sensitized as time goes by.   

I got better.  And. So. Can. You!

I have the practice that when I find something encouraging I send it to somebody who is presently in a bad state to give them support and maybe new hope. I thought it might be a good idea if we start a collection of encouraging success stories that we find outside the forum (and outside SA, because they have their own forum for their member’s stories, it’s easy to find.)

I will begin with a little list of my latest favorites:

https://youtu.be/lDvyrIinjts?is=fnGtY8_iTrxyNILB

this is an akathisia recovery story.

Shelly shares progress healing from antidepressant withdrawal, benzodiazepine injury, medication-induced akathisia, and severe medical trauma

https://benzobuddies.org/topic/289488-things-are-looking-up/#comment-3657172

„Just wanted to share a little hope for anyone in the thick of it right now. Hang tight and don’t give up! I am 20 months last dose, and I can finally say that life feels more normal again.“

https://youtu.be/GvSJ6lTUnO0?is=HfHVU9goHzycZ_SA

Two and a half years off meds, and two years after a reinstatement injury, I’m sharing what happened, what symptoms hit, and what helped me hold on until healing took root. This is my personal story

https://benzobuddies.org/topic/289000-things-are-better-there-is-hope-an-update-from-my-wife/
quote from the post:

I believe and know that you will survive, just as my wife did. It took a very long time—over two and a half years—before she felt even the slightest improvement. Then, she began to improve rapidly day by day. Now she's getting better. In fact, within three months, she became calm, functional, and normal, just like she used to be. She can talk, laugh, think normally, her memory has returned, and she says she finally feels like herself. She still has some symptoms, but they're reduced enough that she can live with them. We spent the first normal Christmas in three years, where my wife could sit peacefully at the table with her family, eat everything she wanted, including Christmas cake. She felt so happy that she could participate in normal life, the holidays, shopping, holiday preparations, and even cook a few meals.

I know you're terrified, just like my wife. She felt it all: the feeling of dying every day, the inability to escape, the feeling of being trapped with no way out, the lack of hope. It's all over. It will be the same for you, too. 
 

 ( @Chippy, maybe you want to position this thread to a different location, I don’t know if this is the right place, I think he only members can read it and it’s a bit hidden)

Everyone: please feel free to share your own favorite encouraging stories in this thread!
 

I am writing my story, having found this website after watching Dr. Jozef's Youtube channel about withdrawal from psych meds and thought I would share my story.

Maybe it can help someone.

Born in 1974. I was in and out of counseling since I was in middle school through high school. Just a sensitive kid, nothing bad. I have a high IQ, and was a poor student.

Just turning 21 in July 1995 and after failing out of two colleges, my mother went to my old psychologist to get me put on medication because my sister met someone who took medication and it helped them, I sat w a new PCP who had me answer questions on a pamphlet., like "Do you ever gfeel sad, etc? " Sure, everyone feels sad, right? Left the appointment w dx of depression and anxiety. Anyway, put on 200mgs of zoloft and 60 mgs of Ritalin and clonopin of 20mg at night. I started having suicidal thoughts and wanted to hurt others, insomnia, and my hands shook. I was told to keep taking med because "based on these thoughts, you need med". within 2 years, my daily Ritalin was 140-180 mgs per day w the same amount of zoloft and clonopin. No, that is not a typo, I know now that I was basically on meth/cocaine levels of stimulation. I had to exercise at full insanity for three hours a day every day., and had to drive my car 2 hours a day just to be in motion. I could not sleep. but when I did, I would be so exhausted, I would sleep through fire alarms in my dorm, in fact I didn't even know they happened. I finally graduated in Dec 200, so I quit taking the Ritalin.

People in college would say "how can you be on an upper and a depressant?" I was not reassed, and the suicidal thoughts and wanted to hurt others were w me at all times. trapped in my head. I would occasionally feel like "I was crawling out of my skin or my skin was shrinking", and I would loose control and do reckless behavior, and just "stop". Like I was possessed.

I'd ask my mom for weekly therapy, and she said no. it's not like my parents couldn't afford it.

In 2002 I got married to my wife, who is from Europe. We met in 1998 and fell in love. She went back to Europe for long periods for her school, so by 200-2002 after stopping Ritalin, the Zoloft side effects got worse.

In 2002 after 7 years of med, I was a different person. 2003 our son was born and I was a horrible father and husband. The zoloft wiped me out. I was soooo tired. My 1 year old son would pull on my eye lids to wake me up while I was supposed to be watching him. We went to family therapy, and the counselor would challenge me on being a better husband. In Jan 2005, I took myself off of my meds on my own and went mad. The family therapist recommending me a doctor out of Western Pysch who DX me w Bi-polar along w depression. I was then put on 4700 mg of Depakote, 45 mg of Abilify and 200 mgs of Zolofy along w 40 mg of Concerta and 20 mgs of clonopin. w/in a week, I was "crawling out of my skin or my skin was shrinking", and I would loose control and do reckless behavior. I would explain to the doctor this feeling, like turning into the "wolf man", but he just said I was bi-polar and this was just part of the deal. I lost my job in 2006, another in 2007 and another in 2008. I gained 40 pounds and was basically sedated, except for the periods of "crawling out of my skin or my skin was shrinking", and I would loose control and do reckless behavior. In 2008 I went to see Gary Sachs at Mass General, the 1# bi-polar guy in the world for a 2nd opinion. He told me I was dx'd correctly. I also could not have money in my name due to reckless spending. So, I was still having constant, suicidal thoughts and wanted to hurt others were w me at all times. trapped in my head bi-weekly "crawling out of my skin or my skin was shrinking", and I would loose control and do reckless behavior. being a sedated person, horrible father and husband, and could not hold a job, but my wife stayed w me. In fall 2009, I told my doctor, how I was afraid "the wolfman would become permanent", and I didn't want to be a bad husband, but he said I would only get worse. In Dec 2009.I took half a bottle of clonopin and tried to kill myself. (first time put this pen to paper) I didn't;t want my wife to see become a horrible person.

My wife saved me, and I became exactly what I was afraid i'd become and was willing to kill myself to stop. At hospital, my horrible parents blamed my wife, I got new doctors and were told I was going to get divorce. (my parents are monsters) I was put on 200 mg of zolof, 1350 mg of lithium and 45 mg of abilify 40 mg of concerta and 20 mg of clonopin. Well, from Dec 2009- Dec 2011, I blew thew $100,000 US, because I was constantly "crawling out of my skin or my skin was shrinking", and I would loose control and do reckless behavior. I was going through a divorce, horrible dad and could barely hold a job. I would beg to the doctors "I can't feel anything like loosing my marriage, friends, loss, etc other than rage, some laughter and exhaustion. I wanted to hurt myself all the time and others, and they'd say come back in a month"

My hands and knees shook violently. like, my foot was playing the bass drum on a drum kit. I had to continue to drive incessantly.

Part 2 tomorrow

Here's a link to my old intro thread:

https://www.survivingantidepressants.org/forums/topic/24016-toast-looking-for-peer-support/

Here's a link to my success story: 

https://www.survivingantidepressants.org/forums/topic/32469-toast-recovery-after-19-years-on-ssris-including-since-childhood/

Healing is always happening! There were many times I thought I wouldn't heal but I did and my life is wonderful now. Never give up hope!

Luke: "A copy of the text in Toast's success story linked above is below"

Like many on this website, I have dreamt of this day. I spent hours reading and rereading the Success Stories during my withdrawal and now it is my turn to add my own.

It was not always clear to me that I would get to add a "Success Story". By that I mean there were many points where I did not necessarily think I could make it through to the other side. I thought that my particular situation meant my brain was too damaged. I spent nearly every day for a full year debating whether that would be the day I would end things. Making it through all of that and not only surviving, but reaching the point where I am not actively experiencing intense and debilitating emotional pain every single day has changed me so profoundly. I thought I was a lost cause. But, I was not, and this means none of you are. We can all make it through and reach the point where living is no longer a burden and is a joy again.

My history:

I was put on Zoloft at about the age of 11 for childhood anxiety. I was told the drug was completely harmless, it would only help me if I needed it and if I didn't actually need it, it would not hurt me to take it. Looking back, my problems at the time were developmentally normal and I did not need to be medicated. My parents reached for medication as the easiest solution, as they also did for other members of my family that they medicated unnecessarily for other reasons. However, although I do think there was some level of Munchhousen by proxy at play here, I don't blame them, because I don't think they realized they were setting me up for years of torment in my future. They were being sold a lie by the doctors: that SSRIs are mild, safe and harmless.

I stayed on Zoloft, eventually switching to Prozac, throughout my childhood and into my early adulthood. Ironically, my anxiety got a lot worse in the years AFTER I started taking the medication, going to doctors, and having them tell me my anxiety was a clinical disease. Hmmm. I also experienced periods of being "down" throughout my adolescence, periods which at the time I thought were "depression", and more proof I needed to stay on the SSRIs (though I never felt suicidal during these times and my functionality in my day to day life was not affected. In retrospect these were normal teenage moods). No doctors suggested I come off, except for one single doctor I saw when I was 20 who said something like, "You seem to be doing well, you might want to try to come off of the SSRI", to which I responded, very brainwashed, "I think I need it, I can always come off of it later". He was the one who switched me to Prozac; he said it would be easier to come off of than Zoloft because Prozac has a much longer half-life.

When I turned 24, I felt like my life was in a place where I was ready to come off of Prozac. I had always thought I would come off of the SSRIs eventually, I just was in no rush, and so I had never tried to discontinue the medication at any point between the ages of 11 and 24. I took my pills every day, as I was supposed to and as the doctors had prescribed. But at age 24, I felt ready. From age 24 to 25, under the approval of my psychiatrist who I greatly respected, I tapered from 40 mg to 10 mg of Prozac. I felt no adverse affects. In retrospect, there is only a small difference between a dose of 40 mg Prozac and 10 mg Prozac if you look at the dose-response curve, which is hyperbolic. Your brain sees an extremely similar effect from 10 mg Prozac as it will from 40 mg Prozac. There are scientific papers which quantify this using PET scans. [Later, from fitting a hyperbolic curve to data from one of these papers, I estimated that at a dose of 40 mg Prozac the brain will see about 83% serotonin reuptake transporters occupied, and at 10 mg of Prozac the brain will see about 75% of serotonin reuptake transporters occupied -- not a huge difference between the two doses].

When I was 25, I asked my psychiatrist if I could try completely coming off of Prozac and she said yes. At this point in my life, I had no symptoms of "depression" and relatively mild symptoms of my "anxiety". She told me to simply stop taking the 10 mg, which she said was a tiny subtherapeutic dose which should have not been affecting me at all anyway. I stopped and psychologically all Hell broke loose for me within weeks.

My work life became stressful around this time. I did not immediately put two and two together that I was experiencing withdrawal (in fact, I was told by my psychiatrist that withdrawal was not possible to experience for SSRIs). I blamed work, even as my entire face broke out in acne worse than I had ever experienced, as I lost weight. Even as I felt levels of aggression which my previously zonked out Prozac'd brain had never known. Even as I experienced my first ever panic attack. Even as every waking moment felt like existing in a horror film.

Months passed. I reached a state of torment I had never known was even possible for a human to experience, making all of the time I had thought I had been "depressed" as a teenager seem completely trivial. The mental agony and anguish was indescribable; although most on this forum will know what I'm talking about. I also felt uncharacteristically helpless, like an old person in a life alert commercial, "I've fallen and I can't get up!". My psychiatrist urged me to reinstate the Prozac, at a higher dose than before. "Some people just need medication. There is no shame in it. Would a diabetic be ashamed of needing insulin?" Despite being stubborn, I was also confused and desperate. Perhaps they were right? They were my doctors, after all.

I reinstated my Prozac. Almost immediately, after only a few days, I felt better. I felt relief from the tormented thoughts constantly torturing my brain. My acne, which had only started after I had ceased taking the medication, and which had persisted for months, finally cleared. But... something felt weird. I also felt *drugged*. I had been drugged for so long as a child, *drugged* had felt *normal* for me. But, being off of the Prozac for a few months and then coming back on, I could feel that on Prozac my mental state was now drugged, a little bit cloudy, a touch hazy. I did not like this feeling. Suddenly, back on Prozac, my problems at work didn't seem so severe. But was that a real signal? Shouldn't I be taking my work problems seriously, to the extent at least where I should do something about them? I didn't think undrugged me had been wrong to be concerned about work, the problem was undrugged me was just non-functional. Not only that, but the fact that taking the Prozac nearly immediately relieved my anguish raised a red flag for me. I had always been told SSRIs can take a few weeks to start working. Why did it only take a few days for me when I had reinstated? Even though reinstating the Prozac (at 10 mg for a few days) gave me relief and made me feel basically "normal" again, I quickly stopped taking it again because I felt like something was deeply sinister about the way that I had suddenly felt better after reinstating.

I told my psychiatrist, "I think I was experiencing withdrawal from coming off of the Prozac". In response, my psychiatrist told me that was completely impossible, and Prozac did not have withdrawal associated. She said it was however possible I needed to switch to another drug. She prescribed me Effexor. At a desperate moment, and feeling tormented again as I had stopped the Prozac, I took it. It made me weirdly sleepy during the afternoons (to the point where I involuntarily fell asleep and I have never been a person to nap during the day), but it did make my problems fade away again. I remember lying in bed, feeling doped up and unbothered again by any of my problems. I didn't like the feeling of being drugged, so I stopped taking it after only two days without telling my psychiatrist. For a week after I stopped the Effexor, at random points throughout the day I felt brain zaps, weird tingly jolts in my skull that I had never felt before in my life.

I still believed if I could find the right psychiatrist, they would tell me exactly what to do. I saw a second psychiatrist who told me that any withdrawal I would have experienced from the Prozac would have only lasted one to two months maximum. She told me it was possible that stopping the Prozac had "uncovered" a new mental illness I might have, though she wasn't going to diagnose me quite yet at this point. I was able to speak with Mark Horowitz during this time and he told me this is a common move that psychiatrists will do with people experiencing withdrawal, deny the withdrawal and blame the symptoms on an "emergent" new disorder. I had never before in my life been diagnosed with this mental illness, I have no family history of it, and no other doctor had ever suggested it as a diagnosis. This psychiatrist prescribed me Abilify. When I expressed concerns that I didn't think I needed to take an antipsychotic, she told me if I did not take it, I might not be able to get our sessions reimbursed by my insurance. I told her I was taking it. I never took it.

It was not long before I began to question everything I had believed all of my life about psychiatry and mental illness. I began to read articles and books by Mark Horowitz, Joanna Moncreiff, Peter Breggin, Robert Whittaker. I found this website. At this point, I knew what I was experiencing was withdrawal. The severity and types of symptoms were unlike any thing I had experienced prior to being medicated or while on medication, and they resolved for me when the medication was reinstated. Given I had not had any symptoms at all right before I tried to come off of the SSRI, this was a clear hallmark of a withdrawal syndrome, not a "relapse" or the onset of a new condition. But I had never been warned withdrawal could happen. At any rate, I had no desire to be physiologically dependent on a substance which was probably bad for me [i asked Mark Horowitz about some studies which show that taking SSRIs result in neurogenesis in the hippocampus and he pointed out that this is a hallmark of brain damage; there is also neurogenesis immediately following a stroke] and caused me to feel drugged when taking it. I resolved to come off of the Prozac, even if it took a while. Reading about others' experiences, I felt devastated to think it could take years to come off of the medication through proper tapering. Before all this I had never thought I would have any problems coming off of the medication.

I realized I would have to take matters into my own hands if I ever wanted to come off of the Prozac. I found another psychiatrist who was more open to the idea that I was experiencing withdrawal, and agreed to prescribe me Prozac. However, this psychiatrist suggested tapering down 1 mg at a time, rather than doing a hyperbolic taper. Rather than try to get them to understand, I lied about the dose I was actually taking and implemented my own tapering protocol. I ordered a scale and pill capsules and started to make my own tapered pills. I felt scared and sad and alone. I was still in a terrible mental state. But I knew I would rather die than live my life dependent on this drug.

As a side note, what I went through at work during this time is its own story and its own trauma. Outside of the medical gaslighting happening, I was also being heavily gaslit at work. And I don't use the word gaslit lightly. This is a situation where in the past (while on SSRIs) I naively said the wrong things to the wrong people at the wrong times, and then during my withdrawals I had to suffer terribly for it (social rejection, negative gossip, gaslighting). I am not a political person. Being Machiavellian does not come naturally to me, but unfortunately it's an essential trait for my field of work. Even minus the SSRI withdrawal, this would have been a difficult time. But with the SSRI withdrawal on top of it, it almost ended my life.

My withdrawal experience:

The next two years were agony, unlike anything I had ever experienced in my life. My introduction thread lists out much of what I experienced, but one thing I was always too paranoid to post about there was the level of SI I had constantly during this time. I never told anyone because I was terrified I would be forced to take medication against my will. Again, ironically, I NEVER had any of these thoughts before I started SSRIs, back when I was first prescribed them at the ripe old age of 11, or even while I was on SSRIs! So much for "SSRIs save lives"! During withdrawal I had these thoughts nonstop for over a year. For me, they were on some level a comfort, to know that that option remained open. However, the reason I want to mention them here is in case anyone is reading this and also having SI. If you are and you think this is proof you are truly a lost cause and you won't ever recover, I am proof that that is not true.

What helped and what I learned:

After two years, I very gradually began to feel better, day by day. The improvement was incredibly slow and not monotonic, but very steady. Whenever I got discouraged, it helped to remind myself that how I felt at that moment was better than how I felt three months ago, which was in turn better than I had felt six months ago, etc. Even at the two year mark, I still felt miserable more than half of the days of the year. But I was doing much better than I had been. I completed my taper to 0 in April of 2024. At that point I felt well enough to be generally enjoying my life again and already basically considered myself to be recovered, although I still struggled with intrusive thoughts which left me feeling miserable 10-20% of the time. I became aware of a woman named Lauren Kennedy who has a youtube channel called Living Well with Schizophrenia. That year she tried the keto diet and this put her schizophrenia into remission and allowed her to completely come off of her antipsychotics. I decided to try keto as well as I was finally coming off of the last bit of Prozac. There is some evidence that the keto diet can help people with traumatic brain injuries, which I think is close to what I have from taking this drug for 15+ years. I believe the keto diet helped me immensely to banish the last remaining intrusive thoughts that were making me miserable. If you try this diet, I would recommend getting a blood monitor, otherwise it's hard to tell if you're actually in ketosis. I don't know if I would necessarily recommend it unless you have enough resources and you are in a good enough place mentally to not cheat on the diet, because it is expensive and very hard to follow (I'm not sure if I could have followed it during the worst of withdrawal) but I believe it did help me a lot and so I wanted to mention it here.

Other tips and things that helped me:

• Avoid sugar and caffeine
  
• Exercise, even if only a small amount
  
• Find ways to remain social
  
• Taper slowly! Genuinely, if you have been on SSRIs for 10+ years, it will take several years to come off. I think it might actually hurt your brain if your taper is not adiabatic enough.
  
• Try your best to improve what you can about your life, externally! I believe this was huge for my recovery. You may not be able to change the chemical depression, but you can try to make your life more tolerable by setting and meeting little goals. When in withdrawal, it is easy to allow your life become worse and worse because it is harder and harder to keep up with what you used to be able to do. Try not to let this happen to the extent you are able to, because if your external circumstances become objectively bad this can lead to being depressed both because of withdrawal and also because of external factors.
  
• Take charge of your own tapering/recovery. We are taught to place a lot of trust in doctors, and the impulse that I had initially which I suspect many other may as well was to find a trained professional and do whatever they said. Unfortunately, as I found out the hard way, this will only always lead to you being prescribed more drugs. If you want to lead a drug-free life, you may have to coordinate a lot of it yourself. I remember thinking how unfair this was, like people don't expect people with broken bones to set their own limbs. Unfortunately modern psychiatry is Broken and this is the current state of affairs. Life isn't fair and getting off these drugs may be the hardest thing you ever do, but it will also be the most rewarding.
  
• Time
  

Ways I changed:

This is going to sound dramatic but I believe my old self literally died when I came off of the Prozac. Effectively my brain "grew in wrong" because I grew up on Prozac. Coming off of it also altered my brain in a nontrivial way. If you see someone addicted to opiates who is high all of the time, and you see them after they've gotten clean, they look like two entirely different people. The same is true for SSRIs.

I kept a list of ways I felt I was different off SSRIs compared to on SSRIs, which I started shortly after I realized I was experiencing withdrawal. I'm not going to list everything here but a lot of these things are more related to personality than mood. For instance I was a lot more trusting and socially a little bit goofy on the drugs. To me that makes sense because the mechanism of action for SSRIs is similar to MDMA (increase extracellular serotonin in the brain) and MDMA users can be overly trusting/feeling inappropriately connected to strangers.

Ironically, I also had a lot more anxiety ON SSRIs, throughout my late childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood, than off (not counting the period of immediate withdrawal where I had a panic attack). I remember, while ON SSRIs, I used to feel anxiety so intensely I would constantly get a severely upset stomach over relatively trivial things or from the most random worries, like worrying will I go blind from trying to dye my eyebrows. Coming OFF of the SSRI blunted this anxiety! Now (and for a few years now), I only get anxiety before things it is normal to get anxious about, like job interviews. And when I do have anxiety, it doesn't cripple me like it used to and I don't get nauseous or stomach aches. Ironically, my anxiety was at its worst while I was taking the drug that was supposedly treating it!

When I look at old pictures of myself from when I was most drugged I don't recognize myself because my eyes look weird and glazed over. I had that thousand yard SSRI stare. I would daydream a LOT -- and when I came off the SSRI my ratio of "doing" to "thinking" increased a TON. I also used to cry much more easily while on the SSRI. Coming off of the SSRI improved the way emotions are processed in my brain, so they aren't immediately shunted down the "start crying" pathway. In his book "Psychiatric Drug Withdrawal", Peter Breggin talks about chronic brain impairment, injury to the brain that happens to psych patients who have been medicated for a long time. While I was taking the SSRI, I was suffering from this - I had affective dysregulation and anosognosia, two hallmark symptoms.

I feel embarrassed more easily now, which is a good thing, because I think my inhibitions were too low due to the drug before. I even used to dress differently (more sloppily, as I was more careless in how I was perceived, due to lowered inhibitions) while on the SSRI and my style changed slightly when I came off of it!

I can say though that I'm now a better person than I ever was. In a way it was like I never fully grew up until I came off the drug.  It's like coming off of the drug gave me a step to stand on so I can see further and see more than I ever could before. I can see more clearly; the drug haze is gone and the fog of withdrawal has cleared.

Rethinking mental illness:

Psychiatry is modern-day bloodletting. In the old days, when you were sick, the doctor would come and drain out some of your "bad blood". If you recovered, it was because the technique of draining the blood worked (and not that you healed in spite of the blood draining making you weaker). If you didn't recover, it meant you were too sick and too far gone for the bloodletting to ever help you (and not because the blood letting weakened you and helped kill you). Psychiatry follows the same logic. If you go to the doctor and they prescribe you an SSRI and and you feel better from your depression, the SSRI helped you. If you go to the doctor and you take an SSRI and you don't improve or you have long term problems, you were just too sick to be helped by the drug.

This unnecessary mass drugging of millions worldwide is a tragedy at an unfathomable scale. These drugs have been approved without any long term studies, and they do not "fix" pathology in the brain, instead they create an abnormal state. Paraphrasing Joanna Moncrieff, you can also "treat" social anxiety with alcohol, but are you really "treating" the disorder, or using a drug to alleviate symptoms? After going through what I went through, I know that I never actually *needed* the drug for "anxiety" or "depression", and instead it gave me iatrogenic brain damage. There is a VAST overdiagnosis of psychiatric conditions in America today. The CDC says that in 2020, 18.4% of U.S. adults reported ever having been diagnosed with depression. Do we really believe that evolution works so poorly that 1 in 5 people is doomed to experience a clinical disease which requires them to be potentially medicated for life? These numbers do not add up. Even among those who genuinely could be said to have a mental illness; do psychiatric drugs really help them? Or could this be modern-day bloodletting, aided and abetted by the pharmaceutical industry, the same people who brought us the opioid epidemic?

A year has passed since I finished my taper, and I can say I consider myself to be completely healed. More than that, my life is so much better than it would have been were I to have stayed on my SSRI, in ways I never could have imagined or hoped. I have significantly less anxiety and I am so much more clear-headed. I have literally transformed into the person I was always supposed to be. It's like I was an alcoholic for 15+ years and I finally got sober. Life is beautiful for me now and I am finally productive, happy, healthy and functional. And now I am here to tell you that you can get there too.

I was born in Southern California in 1960 and lived there all my life.  Looking back, I suffered from anxiety since my 20’s, but it was mostly episodic and triggered by major negative experiences.  In 1999, my anxiety became constant due to work and family issues.  I went to see my GP, who prescribed a daily dose of Paxil.  At first, it helped me deal with daily life, but like many others, I gained weight and found myself unmotivated to exercise.  I soon realized it just masked the symptoms and dulled my feelings. I didn’t see a therapist nor seek any non-medication-based help.  I continued to have anxious episodes but managed to handle them.

In 2006, my father died, and I had to make the decision to take him off life support.  It wasn’t a clear-cut decision and caused me a lot of anguish.  I began a descent into constant anxiety exacerbated by feelings of impending doom, both in my personal health and my professional life. Every ache or pain became a sign of a deadly disease, and every mistake I made at work would get me fired.  I began seeing a psychologist to help, but didn’t have much success until 2008, when I found one who could help me with my feelings of guilt over my father’s death, and used EMDR and CBT to help me identify the root of my anxiety and use behavioral tools to manage it.  It was then I began to develop my approach to anxiety as a chronic, though manageable, condition.

In 2006, I tried to quit Paxil since it didn’t help my anxiety.  My doctor told me to taper, but didn’t offer many details, and I tried tapering much too quickly.  In late 2006, I discovered the Paxilprogress.org website and got great advice and support on tapering.  I began a very gradual taper in 2007, and was Paxil-free by 2009.  It wasn’t easy and I had many setbacks, but paxilprogress’ members and my psychologist gave me a ton of support.  My wife, a woman of great faith, reminded me I was meant for better things than to be lost to anxiety and depression--God had work for me to do. 

I continued seeing my therapist every other week up till September 2019, when my wife and I moved to Portugal to explore Europe for a few years.  Our sone has moved away to graduate school, so the time was right for us to make a move.  We moved back to the States (Southern California) in late 2021 because COVID put the breaks on our travel plans and we reassessed our priorities, realizing family and friends meant more to us than we thought. 

Anxiety is still part of my life but it doesn’t control me or the decisions I make.  I still take a low dose of Klonopin when things get too much, (I hate flying), but no more than a few per year.  I use CBT and “reality checking” to keep my catastrophic thoughts in check.  In 2019 I joined Surviving Antidepressants.org to help others recover but that site will be closing in a few months.

Looking back, even at its worst, my life with anxiety was good.  I was able to function, and participate in our son’s life, even if I had to force myself sometimes.  My advice to those just starting the journey:

Don’t be too hard on yourself.  Even with a slow taper, there were times I had to use a higher dose sometimes, until I was ready to take the next step. It’s not a race; do what works for you.

Find a therapist or at least someone who can offer you support and keep you rooted in reality.  Medication alone will never be the answer.  Whether its CBT to other tools, find the behavioral practices that work for you.

Accept the fact that anxiety is part of who you are.  Whatever the cause, anxiety will be with me until the day I die.  I’ve learned to manage it, and most days its just a dim feeling far in the back of my mind.  What I now understand is that it only has the power I give it.  It no longer controls my actions or decisions, and therapy has helped me separate irrational anxious thoughts from genuine concerns and problems.

The short story is, like any other chronic condition, it takes the right tools, the right people, and determination to manage anxiety and reduce it to an inconvenience instead of a monster in my own mind.

The racing thoughts continued practically nonstop for several months. It was like a never-ending cortisol rush. There was nothing I could do to calm down, and by December it felt like it had clearly transitioned into depression with the telltale symptoms of low mood and inability to experience genuine human emotion. Taking time away from work unfortunately didn't help, and I spent my days trying to figure out how to make it to bedtime because sleep was my only reprieve.

By January I began to feel dizzy like I was floating three inches outside of my body and I felt like I was observing my own interactions rather than partaking in them. I later came to realize this was disassociation, derealization, and depersonalization. I began seeing a number of doctors, neurologists, and other specialists but none could find anything wrong with me in blood tests, physical exams, and brain scans. All of them strongly recommended that I begin taking psychiatric medication.

By March I was having serious trouble sleeping, namely early awakening around 3am and unable to fall back asleep. After a few weeks of this I was becoming increasingly desperate and checked myself into an inpatient psychiatric clinic, not seeing any other viable option given how long this had been going on. I had also lost a significant amount of weight such that people were frequently telling me they were concerned about my health and that I looked unwell.

Alongside some therapy and other coping sessions, the clinic focused heavily on recovery via medication, and put me on Olanzapine (generic Zyprexa) and Sertraline (generic Zoloft). I never got the relief I was hoping for even after waiting six weeks and so the clinic doctors upped my doses, and when that didn't work (and the depression was getting even worse), they put me on Venlafaxine (generic Effexor), eventually upping the dose to 225mg.

After two months at the inpatient clinic and feeling no better, I decided to check out in May and try to get on with my life as best I can while staying on the medication. By early July I was feeling worse than ever and often physically ill. I decided to get off the medication because it clearly wasn’t helping.

The psychiatrist warned about the dangers of being unmedicated but added that if I’m going to get off them then I should taper off over a period of two weeks, consisting of a drop to 150mg and then to 75mg before quitting. In my ignorance at the time I thought I’d be extra careful and add another week of 37.5mg, which the psychiatrist claimed was unnecessary.

Once I began the taper I started feeling much better and this continued with each step downward, and my taper completed in mid/late July. I had a few days of brain zaps, which were triggered by sudden eye movements to the side, but they were not painful. Overall, I was feeling much better and had a positive outlook on life for the first time in nearly a year.

However, about three weeks after that in early/mid-August I began experiencing a very unpleasant type of unwell feeling, which I described as a chemical nausea at the time. After conducting a large amount of internet research I came across the SA forum as well as the few doctors talking about the real dangers of psychiatric medication and the risks of coming off too quickly. It was then that I realized I had walked off a cliff with my taper despite thinking I had gone slowly. And it was only then that I learned about the need for hyperbolic tapering.

At this point I paid for a telephone consultation with a psychiatrist knowledgeable about this topic and was given the choice of sticking it out and or trying to reinstate a small amount of the drug, stabilizing, and then slowly tapering off. The discomfort was just too great so I decided to reinstate 2mg of Venlafaxine, and it initially felt like it was helping, but within two or three days I could no longer sleep at all. This caused me to go off the drug again and sure enough the discomfort came right back.

I went back and forth with this, even adding a small amount of Mirtazapine for sleep, and I was getting very desperate with frequent passive suicidal thoughts. I leaned on all the resources I had, including friends, family, crisis hotlines, fellow SA forum sufferers like Luke as well as natural and religious healers. All of these things were ultimately beneficial to my recovery.

By December I was taking OTC painkillers for relief and realized I needed to make a decision about how to move forward. I opted  to completely go off all meds for good and to never reinstate even a small dose. I felt that whatever decision I made could end up killing me if it was the wrong one. This was such a dark, gloomy period that was magnitudes worse than the original depression I had been dealing with.

In January 2024 I was outside walking in the dark trying to get my mind off the misery and I fell down a flight of concrete steps due to not seeing it. I had giant bruises and gashes all over and seriously injured my shoulder, and friends and family were appalled at the sight of the injuries and expressed much sympathy. In spite of this, the pain and discomfort from the brain injury I had sustained from the improper taper far outweighed the agony of the fall down the steps on the day it happened.

The turning point for me came around mid-February, when I started to notice that my symptoms were getting considerably more mild in both the windows and the waves, although they didn’t fully go away until about mid-April. By May 2024 I was feeling recovered and looking toward getting my life back together. Lingering symptoms were dry eyes and weight gain, although both have lessened considerably over the past year.

During this horrific ordeal of approximately 18 months, I felt so incredibly lost and hopeless, but here I am now feeling nearly 100% recovered with a renewed vitality and making a point of living life to its fullest.

My best advice to people who are suffering is to be patient and focus on the making the present as tolerable as possible by relying on all available coping mechanisms. If there’s something you can do to make your suffering 10% less bad, then make the effort to do that and don’t dwell on the fact that it won’t cure you completely or fully relieve your misery. The recovery will come in time.

Pros

• Feeling hugely better and operational - I'd say 95% full healed
• Completely functional now - don't have to put anything off or cancel any events etc. Nice to get out and do everything I want without feeling I have to push through it and put on a brave face when feeling shit. 
• Have most of my inner feelings and emotions back - that is a huge relief and makes connecting and interacting with people so much easier.
• I feel much much more grounded - like I'm properly back in the world and aware. That was a huge problem when suffering an "out of it" feeling on Mirt and then when battling withdrawal symptoms
• Its nice to have my appetite back fully. Getting off Mirt I never felt I had the same hunger and eating wasn't as enjoyable. Love tucking into great food now. 
• its made me realise how important it is to be in your body. Sitting in the sun and enjoying the feeling in your body of peace and stillness and an inner contentment - that is what Mirt took from me. Its so nice to do now.

Cons

• Still have feelings of tiredness  - sometimes still feel really flat.
• Still get weird feelings across my skin and chills. I know those are mini-waves still - much more minor but annoying to still be battling it.
• I still get muscle aches. Its not super painful but just an achey and stiff feeling often in the morning. That stops some of my liveliness and energy.
• Still don't feel my emotions and sensitivity are 100% back. I was a creative person and while that is mostly back I don't feel quite as sharp and energised.

It does worry me after 4 years completely off Mirt I still have symptoms and not 100% back in my body with full sensitivity and energy. I am 53 so maybe some of it is old age. I'm hoping after another year I will be fully back to where I was. The reality was my nervous system got shredded by Mirt and its taken a long time to fully heal. But I can say the absolute nightmare of it is over and now its the fine tuning stage. Good old time will keep doing the job - it really is the best healer 🙂 

My intro thread on sa;

My Introduction topic is here:  manymoretodays: off many years of many medications

Simply honored to be writing this. And kind of have tears in my eyes, as I begin.......the good kind. The oh wow kind, the unbelievable understanding of my most excellent, and wonderful good fortune for all that has come my way in some 30 years, and well, even before that. A little bit of the oh wow, I wonder if......or what my life might have been......tears too though.

I am now 5 years and 10 months off my last psychoactive prescribed drug!!!!  Last drug off was Trileptal/oxcarbazepine.  Used as a "mood stabilizer".  It's actually a drug developed for seizures I believe.  I never had seizures.  Lucky me on that.

I started my “psychiatric career”, somewhere around 1988 or thereabouts. At the tender age of around 30 years, I believe. At that time, I was thriving, by all outward appearances. A newlywed, and we had recently bought our first home, and I was in graduate school and working in my chosen career.

I think I was, well I was just me really, and was struggling a bit, sometimes really down.....yet, I could always pull myself up to get to work most days. A lot of strange changes around menses. I would suddenly pop on out of a low down, somewhat perceptually changed funk, when periods came along.

And well, hearing all the hype about the new “cure” in the form of Prozac, as well as being privy to what was in medical circles at the time, I wandered on in to a doctor, an Internal Medicine doctor, no less, as I had heard they were really good and I hadn't really had any need for doctors, up to that point, in my young adulthood. I had however, prior to leaving my home state, in the U.S., had a pretty good case of mononucleosis, the second half of my senior year in high school.......I had completed all the work, and was working away to earn some money for college, when that hit.  Recovered.  Continued on.  To college and beyond.

I didn't mention my doctor visit to many, or if any.......I'd be surprised. It still all felt so very hush, hush to have any problem with adapting to life. And sheesh, now I was about to be branded with my first, of many labels of “diagnonsense”. And thank you, who ever used that term first. So......henceforth, some kind of mental defective.

First trial of an AD(antidepressant), I think was of the Tricyclic class. Oh my gosh, dry parched mouth to the extreme, and totally anxious fearful was the result of that. And on to the Prozac, I believe next. Well, not too long into that experiment, I began to have some flickering flashes of suicidal ideation. So, that was all swell and seemed to prove that I was even more mentally defective and got me a referral to a psychiatrist. Possibly, a few more drug trials with me. Then I lost my job. I mean they were nice about it and all, and I honestly have to take some responsibility for my part in that job loss. I got to stay employed at the same place and all too. And well, I took that all pretty hard, to say the least.....turned inward a lot.

So...... then on to my first horsespittalization(hospitalization). Highly recommended by my then therapist. And even switched psychiatrists.......to her hubs. Geeze, the one I had prior was good too. I felt like a amoeba under a microscope with the new one. I cooperated though, on all levels. I mean I was really “mentally ill” right?

Last I heard, that shrink was trying for more fame and fortune, doing some pretty invasive brain stuff. We hung out though, for a good while......in that doctor/patient way. Me being scrutinized, and he knowing all.

Horsespittal back then. Like a country club really.......back in those days. And I had good insurance. The place wasn't so crowded as most psychiatric wards and hospitals are now. We did all kinds of therapeutic things. And I think a got another diagnonsense there. I found it in my chart, which they did let me look at. My shrink, didn't disclose that one to me though, the diagnosis. Kind of weird, eh? Left that place, after a couple of weeks, on an MAOI AD. Oldschool stuff. Lot's of interactions, with food stuff, and other medications and what???!!!! Why???!!!! Stayed on it for far too long, if you ask me. I was at first a bit super charged on that drug(my problems were magically over and I had a lot of energy) and then........ pretty docile on that drug, gained a fair amount of weight, and then managed to bring it down again. Kept on going with most things, doing all that was expected of me and all. Did a lot of therapy...... Just kept getting my prescription filled and taking my doses.

I think it was the brand Parnate, seems like I was on another MAOI too at some point......maybe Nardi.  I did, however,  a few years into it.......have the dreaded tyramine reaction.  Treated with nifedipine, under the tongue......2 doses.  I think I could have stroked out, glad I did not.  Horrible occipital headache that had me crawling on the floor and I managed to get to the phone, call my shrink, who had me take my pulse(rapid it was) and remind me to take the nifedipine he had prescribed for "just in case".  Sun/son was a baby and napping after lunch.  I had both aged cheese and sausage at lunch.......I never was great, nor was it reinforced for me(the dietary and drink restrictions), with the dietary restrictions.  I guess they thought since I was in graduate school, and in the medical profession that I would be good?  I mean I don't know.  Anyway......I thought I was a goner with that reaction though.  I could not even stand up the pain in my head was so bad.  Nifedipine helped......probably dropped my BP(blood pressure) a lot.  My pulse went back to normal.  I called my then husband home from work, and crawled into bed.   Next day off to work maybe?  I don't remember, likely or maybe it was a day off.  I had gone to PT work with my then baby dear Sun/son, my MAOI baby.  He's doing good, well, at age 30 now.  Both of us have some just "on the edge of" idiosyncrasies I think.  I don't really know any more what my "before" was truly like.  And he is okay, for all purposes.  My favorite person ever.

Fast forward here to 1999, now that was a big year.  I was still on the Parnate.  Not doing horrid, but into that weird drug induced change of persona or something.  A little dulled mentally.  I still could get pretty down and out, and didn't really have a clue what to do......but fake it?  By now we had moved, and I had a shrink closer to home.  AND once again, a job loss......good enough......I wasn't bringing in a whole lot financially to the now merged practice I was part of......so a lay off really.  I took it hard though.  But decided to get off my MAOI at that point.  I knew this wasn't right somehow.  Taken off that over 2 weeks, and started on a little dose of Zoloft then, after 2 weeks. 

Oh my heck ahello.  WD(withdrawal) set in.  Only I didn't know that, and if my doctor did, they were not telling me.  Urgha.  And on and on I went......for awhile.  More drugs, multiple drugs at once and of course diagnoses to match up with the drugging.

The second shrink, well......at one point as I was walking out the door he says, "Hey, I'm almost certain you've had some childhood trauma".  No further exploration with me.  Nothing.  Wow.  O....kay.  I kept that to myself even.  For already I was branded and labeled and.........you know the drill.  Felt like a nothing nobody in that system of care.  Anyway.....I've since pinpointed the trauma(s).  Won't go into that here.  Mostly thriving now.  Do work on things, with the pros every now and then.  And with myself.

So, next up........ I latched on to being bipolar.  Read everything I could.  Checked the DSM bible.  Version III, or maybe IV......I don't know.   And it did not add up.  Because.....at that time, it was still in there.......these ups and downs, and that if they could have been caused by drugs/medications that the diagnosis should be questioned.  I also drank and smoked and had dabbled with "recreational" psychoactives from the time I was a teen.  Happy to report -clean and sober for over 6 years now.  And....an ex smoker of tobacco now, again.  I'll make it though.   It does strike me now how extremely fortunate I am, given it all, to still be alive and most days grateful for it all as well.  I can't live on consistent persistent anger.  I do struggle to feel anger and it sometimes comes out wrong.  Not dangerously so.  It wasn't allowed for me, as a kid, to learn healthy expression of anger.  I was the youngest child, and very much the observer, of all things good and bad.

When I got here I was 6 months or so off Lexapro AND remedicated with 2 drugs, and had a lengthy decades long history of medications/drugs.   So May of 2015.  Was I 58 years old?  I think so.  And had a passing knowledge now of WD and tapering.  An Icarus guide.  Was reading Beyond Meds.  Was also a certified peer in my state and was getting into the peers helping peers movement.  Met some like me too.  Much help.  Much appreciation for those friends.  Some here still, some gone now.  I had tried some naturopath things while on drugs and also to come off them.  Drugs being prescribed medications.  That wasn't great and cost a fortune.

Okay, so I'm here now.  Learning more.  And then even in my early acute WD state, was able to come to the conclusion that reinstatement would probably not be for me.  I based it on the time since off Lexapro, and the other drugs I was on, and somehow reached the right decision for me.

Oh, of course it would have been nice if the knowledge was there, at the hospital I went to, to give me a mini-dose of Lexapro.....after my too quick tapering.  But it was not.  I even had my liquid Lexapro with me at that time.  Acute WD for me was......well indescribable....yet, I'll try to sum things up a bit.

Total psych hospitalizations for me over what I call my psychiatric career were 5.  All were voluntary.  After a drug change of some type.  Off one, on another or what have you?  Some likely adverse effects from my prescribed drugs.

Drug history:

Started with psycho meds circa 1988 I think 27 or 28 total.

AD's, antipsychotics, antiseizure mood stabilizers. Lithium, lamictal ,benzos, and stimulants. Some med. for narcolepsy once(Provigil,) Gabapentin........probably more.  Ask me?......I probably was on it.  Haphazard W/D's by Dr. recommend or uneducated self.

10/2014- off Lexapro--had been on highest dose 20 mg., then 10 mg, then 5 mg. for a couple of years, went from 5 mg. to 3 mg. liquid and then CT in hospital(voluntary).  I got out of the hospital on a combination of low dose adderal salts x1/day and trileptal 150mg. x2/day.

5/28/2015-off Adderal salts 2.5mg. (I had been on that since hospital 10/2014)

12/2015---just holding, holding, holding, with trileptal/oxcarb at 75 mg. 1/2 tab at hs.  My last psycho med ever!

12/16/2016- tapered down with the oxcarbazepine, split the dose into 2, 12 hours apart, tapered at 2 week intervals near the end, and then jumped at 24 mg total dosage to 0.  

Withdrawal symptom history:  

And I will go to page 2 of this for that.

I am not a sailor, pre Sun/son I did Windsurf though.  Still have my sails and board in the garage too.  Soon to get donated or something.  I hope.

And okay.  My WD(withdrawal) symptoms.

I think I had most all symptoms possible.  Some when I did not even know of WD.

akathisia thankfully, if it was that.......was brief......the pacing, the utter inability to be still of mind or body.

A ton of the mental symptoms- cog fog, confusion, busy wizzy thoughts, thought disorganization, utter despair, fearful-ness, paranoia, disoriented, so many symptoms.......how I made it?.......sheer grace I think.  And a lot of faith.  Perserverence.

physical symptoms- dizzy, balance was off, ummm......poor appetite, hemorrhoids(was that a WD symptoms or a med side effect? Idk), dehydration maybe as I would have to remind myself to eat sometimes.....my hunger signals were off kilter,  brain wooshes- I never really had zaps......they were whooshes.....like I could feel my brain settling or moving in my skull.  That was odd.  Later in time- pretty severe headaches, they often went in tandem with stuff that did not used be stressful- but became very stressful.

Body aches and pains-check.

Blurry vision, loss of visual acuity-check

My glasses now are good, and I'm doing well with them.....so, thankful for that.

Some could be aging and or early arthritic changes too with the aches.  And some WD for sure.

Mouth dryness, dental problems- some of that was WD.  Some was other too.

Depersonalization/derealization-check

Somewhere around 3 or 4 years off, I didn't refer as much to WD anymore and just started to go with iatrogenic changes, ?harms, done knowing or unknowingly, but yes, most definitely had the protracted withdrawal syndome picture.....or it fit.

Most symptoms gone most days.  Some days still though I do have to apply my skills, my non-drug coping skills to get through.  And......when I stay disciplined to use some of my practices......I tend to do better, stay well enough.

I still struggle with fears/anxiety from time to time of varying degrees.

I am just now learning how to "adult" and be a real "grown-up".  I mean I did okay at it, but often have had to pull back, and take a day or a week, or quit a job, or something.  Embarassing but true.  And I am the older generation now, parents gone.  This is it.  Life, I'm an adult.  And I need to be a good, better example in all I do and say.  It's good work.  Trust me.

What helped the most.  Physical, not mental stuff.......physical- movement, music, swimming, walking, getting outside. Yoga, Qi gong.  Therapy did help-and does still.  Talking.  Self help.  Empowerement.  Learning.  Support-which I could find even when they did not know exactly what I had.  I couldn't always explain WD and still can't always explain it briefly.  So I learned.  People.  My tribe(s)....multiple tribes.  We're all one.

Having enough money to live.  That helped too.  I'm still on SSD, or social security disability.  I have enough for all my needs really.  Or I hope so.  I hoarded money for a long while out of fear. Of course I hope to employ again, just PT, for pay.....someday.  It's good for esteem and balance both I think.

What have I learned?  Well, I can go beyond survival and thrive now.  And life is good.  A whole new appreciation for life and respect.  I am far from being truly wise yet.......so don't ask me?  Or don't ask me too much or ask too much of me.  I'm a full time job.  Well I  have had to relearn how to care for my home and grounds again.  Many things that  I  have had to relearn.  How to relax.  Step out of myself and ego. Hoping, as always for some PT, non-career work up the road.  Maybe paid peer work, or fluff work, fun work, or something in the arts- doing support or something.

So.  That's it.  Gracious thanks to so many here and elsewhere.  I honestly love my life as I finish writing this, and each and every one of my fellow humans, animals, plants, and well.  I knew this wouldn't be so hard to write.......just emotional.

Here's to today.  And manymore tomorrows too!

and tomorrow is my 70th birthday so it feels like the end to an era in two ways....

I enjoyed helping out a wee bit at SA from time to time when I could so I hope I'll be able to do the same as time permits

the good news for those people just starting out or in the middle of a taper/withdrawal/healing journey is that you DO get your life back and it can be busy and wonderful again

here is a link to my long Success Story from SA 

https://www.survivingantidepressants.org/forums/topic/19203-happy2heal-my-victory-statement/page/17/#comment-606399

busy with another volunteer project today but will be back tomorrow to have a look around

so happy to have found this place

(hmm I think I said almost the exact same thing when I found SA...)

2 years and 3 months ago I had an immediate ADR to Zoloft. Like many of you reading this, I was terrified I wouldn't heal and swore I must be the worst. My injury and suffering was profound...something I didn't know was possible to experience. I was literally in the worst place I've ever been but by God's grace I've recovered. 

My Success Story Thread on SA 

My Recovery Thread on SA

I started climbing out of that pit at 6 months and then by 10 months, I really had turned a corner. By 12 months life had begun to return to normal and since then has only improved. At this point I'd say while I'm not 100% who I was prior to injury (minor memory and occasional dr/dp), I am doing well, life has moved forward and this is behind me. If I didn't heal the last minor things, I'd be ok. 

I know if you are reading this, it seems really dark and hopeless and maybe you're afraid...but I promise you it's not hopeless. Time is our friend...slowly our brain returns to homeostasis. We get there so just hold on and don't give up.

I want you to know I've personally been in contact with many ADR survivors who have recovered. I know of doctors who have treated hundreds over the course of their practice...we get there and you will too. So don't give up! Press on everyday and just get to the night. Every morning gets you closer to having this behind you. 

Some tips and truths that helped me:

- Eat well. I ate food that was healthy and good for my brain.

- Rest as best you can (insomnia is difficult but your body can rest some without moving even if you're not sleeping)

- Avoid alcohol, recreational drugs, more psyche drugs, ..let you body heal itself. Be very careful with supplements too! Stick to the magnesium and fish oil.

- Be careful on how often you are on  forums...especially if you can't filter. Remember many people on forums only post while suffering 

- Adrs are similar but not exact to WDs. We really don't cycle through totally different symptoms. Often the symptoms we have, we keep and feel them to a greater and less degree during the healing process

- Some people who speak about having an ADR, may also have a history of other psyche meds so be careful assuming you are similar even if they took the same medication as you for the same amount of time. Everyone here is different 

- Recovered adrs are out there...it's just we stop posting and don't update once life gets back to normal...also this is traumatic so not everyone returns to share their updates 

- Be mindful who you listen to...protect your subconscious

- Everyone heals on their own timeline.

- Your body will do whatever it needs to recover.

- Distraction and being busy is your friend. Serving others gets your focus off yourself. Also, doing a gratitude journal really helped me.

- Find safe people to help you and be gentle/kind to yourself. This experience is very hard.

- It gets easier...You will get there!

       ****If I can heal, you can heal!!!****

Thank you to everyone on SA that helped me. Thank you to the moderators who answered all my questions. I am so thankful for everyone of you. You helped me tremendously.

I thank Jesus for giving me another chance and healing me. He is able!

Please feel free to contact me if you need encouragement. I would love to help if I can!

A Survivor of ADR, 

Lzieb

Below is a link to the "Success Stories" section of the Surviving Antidepressants forum:

Success stories: Recovery from psychiatric drug withdrawal - Surviving Antidepressants