myndfull Posted July 10 Today is my sixty-second birthday. It is also close to the date five years ago when I joined this website and began my taper off of Celexa. There is a great deal I could say here about how to survive a long taper. I could give advice. But withdrawal is a personal journey. Read what you find on this website judiciously and then do what you think is best for you. As you know, withdrawal makes your head spin. It disorients. It creates a fever. Your body clenches and your nerves prickle and pound. The negative is raised up, the positive is fleeting. You're told in terrible whispers to the heart that you will never be whole again, that your disorientation will be the condition under which you will exist forever. But to that whisper you should stand firm: No! I WILL return. And you will. In my own return, I've watched the changes from a front-row seat. With greater and greater clarity, I saw the road ahead. What I see today is a place, or a state of mind, where a kind of unity within me is possible. The cycling of withdrawal reveals this possibility in a slow unwinding paradox: That as each negative in the cycle of withdrawal peaks the positive increases. (Without pain there can be no gain.) And then there comes a series of tipping points when the positive takes over and the negative begins to fade. I may never get back to who I once was. But so what! I don't want to be that person again, anyway. Time and experience change us all in ways that we cannot predict. I'm fully aware of the fact that whatever comes my way is neither mine to control nor something I should ignore. I accept the ways of the world but refuse to let those ways bowl me asunder. I will accept what is, yet seek-out quiet, sun-lit places where presence and calm are the order of the day. The plasticity of the CNS is a wondrous thing and makes these changes possible. The body wants to be whole. Someday, when the positive and the negative in me merge they will then both fade from consciousness and I'll be whole, I'll be present. In some mysterious though endlessly interesting way, I will have found the bedrock upon which I exist. Something like that. I'm not religious. But I do put a lot of stock in the messaging of good metaphors. One of the books that has sustained me in my journey back from the insanity of withdrawal has been the "The Gospel of Thomas." I've read and studied it as the atheist I am and the former English teacher I was. I'd like to leave you with some of its secular wisdom as a kind of commentary on the growing self-awareness that I believe will come to you, too, as you make your own return to self: Logion 18: Where the beginning is, the end will also be. Logion 58: Good are those who have undergone ordeals./They have entered into life. Logion 61: ...when people are open,/they are filled with light./When they are divided,/they are filled with darkness. Logion 70: If you bring forth what is within you,/what you bring forth will save you./If you do not bring forth what is within you,/what you do not bring forth will destroy you. Logion 84: When you see/your true likeness,/you rejoice./But when you see your true self,/those that were before you existed,/and that never die and never manifest,/what grandeur! Logion 90: ...you shall find repose within you. Logion: 111: Whoever has self-knowledge,/the world cannot contain them. Myndfull Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
India Posted July 11 @myndfull Beautiful, poetic. Gives me much hope. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Hibari Posted July 11 Thank you for that beautiful post. Giving me hope today. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Nena59 Posted July 13 Thanks for sharing! It gives me hope today! I hope your positive journey continues. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
intothewoods Posted July 14 On 7/10/2019 at 4:25 PM, myndfull said: As you know, withdrawal makes your head spin. It disorients. It creates a fever. Your body clenches and your nerves prickle and pound. The negative is raised up, the positive is fleeting. You're told in terrible whispers to the heart that you will never be whole again, that your disorientation will be the condition under which you will exist forever. But to that whisper you should stand firm: No! I WILL return. And you will. In my own return, I've watched the changes from a front-row seat. With greater and greater clarity, I saw the road ahead. What I see today is a place, or a state of mind, where a kind of unity within me is possible. The cycling of withdrawal reveals this possibility in a slow unwinding paradox: That as each negative in the cycle of withdrawal peaks the positive increases. (Without pain there can be no gain.) And then there comes a series of tipping points when the positive takes over and the negative I just love this. Thank you for describing so well what the drugs want us to believe will never happen. Much continued healing to you, @myndfull. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
FarmGirlWorks Posted July 15 On 7/10/2019 at 1:25 PM, myndfull said: Logion 18: Where the beginning is, the end will also be. 💛💛💛 Thank you! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TurkeyCold Posted July 17 On 7/11/2019 at 10:57 AM, India said: @myndfull Beautiful, poetic. Gives me much hope. #2 Thank you, myndfull 😌 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
