Creating a new self after withdrawal

[LoveandLight]

I have no idea who I'll be when this is over..I was 17 when I was first put on them and I once again often feel like the scared alone 17 year old most of the time, even although 15 yrs have passed. Who I was before wasn't great, during the drugs not so great after? I've yet to see.

[Junglechicken]

I totally relate to what you are all saying. 

 

I feel like a photocopy of my old self, don't know who I am anymore - if I could go back to who I was 10 years ago I was at least capable of having fun.  Now, I'm scared to have fun, because I can't drink alcohol, can't dance due to back pain, too tired to stay up late, I just want to sleep - the list goes on.

 

Midlife crisis? you could say I am in the middle of a major life crisis which; like you all wonder, when will the chaos end?? When will I get my life back? I just want to feel normal again......

[Fresh]

I think it's hard to get a handle on what we'll be like after recovering whilst in the throes of withdrawal.

 

I started tapering Pristiq in February , and the past 10 months have been the best , most fun , least

scary period of my life in the last 26 years , i.e. since I started on antidepressants.

 

I can enjoy activities and other people again , I have a wicked sense of humour , and I've been able to learn

a bunch of new skills that were overwhelming in the past.

I have a deep core of strength now , perhaps due to my experiences , perhaps in spite of them.

 

The future's looking a whole lot rosier than it did 12 months ago , that's for sure.

[ChessieCat]

bump

 

[India]

On 7/12/2012 at 8:11 AM, GiaK said:

I know lots of people who report that once the horror is over that life is delicious in a way they never knew possible.

@giak and everyone else who has posted with similar sentiments. I cannot wait. This helps me to keep going.

[JackieDecides]

On 2/10/2014 at 8:22 AM, mammaP said:

It is an amazing feeling when you suddenly realise that you

can remember, think straight and appreciate things. It's good to cry, laugh and feel things when there was no

feeling on meds.  It's good to feel angry and know you aren't going to lose control, to feel hurt and get over it. 

 

 

@mammaP  this is what I want: to remember, to think straight, and to feel angry (when appropriate) but know I'm not going to lose control. 

 

thanks for bumping this thread @ChessieCat

[withhopeinmyheart]

Even just to imagine the "after withdrawal" is difficult. I'm scared. Definitely don't know who I am currently, although I knew very well before all this. 

 

I really want to be able to do this, to find myself again and embrace life. 

 

It's just that I might still be housebound after withdrawal because of chronic illness. Which certainly gives me a feeling of not being able to leave it all behind and grow from all this. 

 

Sure hope I'm not a complete lost case... 

[JackieDecides]

7 hours ago, withhopeinmyheart said:

Sure hope I'm not a complete lost case... 

 

just from your signature it's way too soon to think that way - just a few months ago you were in hell. it takes lots of time to come back from that bad.

 

it's natural to be scared; I don't blame you. but try not to look so far ahead. like, if you were mountain climbing, don't look at the peak and say "I can't imagine ever getting there!" - instead, look down and say "I can take this step, right in front of me". 

 

there will be time enough to look ahead when you feel better. 

 

 

[rafatennis]

Hello , I wanted to share some experiences of withdrawal from an anti-depressant and anti-anxiety meds and some of the discoveries I'm having by working on my issues with a fellow traveler. I grew up in a very abusive environment and took alot of wounds from both parents. As I've been withdrawing I've realized after a long 4 month hold that this process is not about 10% drops or schedules entirely its also about learning how to heal not only our brains and bodies but our frozen sometimes panic-stricken emotions that were traumatized years ago and start to reemerge as we reduce the numbing meds. I know I have viewed this tapering process from one dimension and that is what I can control, the physical. Well emotions positive and negative will come to the surface not only in feelings but hypercritical voices from our past that the drugs have kept quiet. It helped me today to recognize I'm holding right now to practice self care and let these wounded emotions surface in a safe environment and the Parent of that safe place has to be me!

[Altostrata]

Valuable insights, rafa. I joined your post with this existing topic about many of the same concerns.

 

I agree, for many people, going off the drugs also requires acknowledging old wounds and moving forward in our understanding of ourselves.

[Felisbela]

On 7/12/2012 at 3:59 AM, MrAnxious said:

Angie I am really curious how you are doing to this day after withdrawling?

 

 

Thanks and look forward to your response,

Well done I'm happy for you

[mich37]

I lost myself too. After so many years of using meds and after 6 years off hell of a withdrawal i dont know who i am anymore and what i am capable of and how to trust myself. Still have many issues that dont seem to getting better. Neuropathy is not improving a bit after 10 years and i am thinking to try gabapentin, cos i cannot bear my pain anynmore. I lost years when i had a chance to have a family. After this i dont see myself having a child because this world is too cruel. So yes all those years lost is causing me depressed. All trauma i got from this are now effecting my future. I am scared that with my fears of future ill be again on meds and in hell again. How can we cope with this trauma? I am seeing therapist. But my body pain is affecting my live miserable.  

[Gonzo]

I also lost myself in this process of psychiatric drug use and withdrawal. My recovery is pacing up, even if it's still slow. I want to share what I found useful to start recovering my lost true self:

 

1. Learning psychology, specifically trauma related content: traumatic emotions, how they manifest in the body, trauma/stress responses, the impact of trauma and traumatic environments, etc. Many many many mental health services users have a traumatic background and lots of unprocessed trauma, all that trauma can shatter your sense of self. I specially recommend using the Power Threat Meaning Framework, and learning about oppression and alienation.

 

2. Journaling. A lot. You need to rebuild the story of your life, your own narrative, and take the power back. You need to be the main character of your own story, to really be in charge. This can help you to figure out many things that you forgot about yourself and your life and start making sense of your experience. It can take a bit of practice, but it's worth it.

 

3. Accept that maybe you're now a different person than the person you used to be and that it's possible that that person is never going to come back. Because things happened, and those things changed you, for better or worse, it happens to everybody. I strongly recommed learning about Theory of Positive Desintegration, by Kazimierz Dabrowski. Maybe it's not for you though. It's about personal development and self-actualization. It helped me to gain new perspectives. In any case, change can be an oportunity for growth.

 

I hope this is helpful.

 

[Altostrata]

Thanks, @Gonzo Please tell us more about Power Threat Meaning and what you've realized from it.

[Gonzo]

Well, I discovered this approach, that is actually a trauma informed approach, when I was looking for alternative views on mental disorders/illnesses.

 

PTMF is out of the psychiatric label/diagnosis system for the most part, it's about how power operates on people, people reacting to these powers in their lives and giving meaning to all this.

 

Our society follows a hierarchy structure, people at the top have more power because people at the bottom have less power, that's why it's oppresive and alienating by nature. Your value as a person, because the narcissistic/extrinsic values that guide our societies also depends on your capacity to fill a role in society. If you're more productive, you are rewarded, because you're more valuable. If not, you're punished, you have less value.

 

All these things, put psychological pressure on people, different people have different reactions, and many families are also a rigid, oppresive and alienating hierarchies.

 

PTMF call these reactions threat responses, while psychiatry use its diagnosis system to describe them, which is built around the biomedical model of mental health for the most part. The different is where the source of the suffering is mostly located, PTMF says it's on the environment and social/family hierarchy, psychiatry says it's on the brain, people and their reactions, thoughts, behaviors, feelings...

 

Psychiatry is about shaming, PTMF is about empowering. Bad things happen to people, and we react as best as we can to survive.

[Gonzo]

I want to add one more thing. Sadly, many psychiatric drugs users have traumatic stories, that means stored and unprocessed traumatic emotions and stress, emotional pain, and living under oppresive and alienating circumstances in the present or in the past, that creates this painful emotional reality for which psychiatric drugs can offer some relief, disconnecting from it more or less. When the withdrawal happen, specially cold turkey, we reconnect with this painful emotional reality that actually never went away, but now is stronger than ever before and we lost tolerance for it, coping skills, etc. This emotional reality for some people comes from the past, specially if its related to childhood trauma, but for some people it's present, because we live in a high demanding social environment/hierarchy that puts a lot of pressure in us to be productive, to achieve certain standard, to be valuable. It's really confusing to come back to reality after years being disconnected, when you're suffering withdrawal, or after overcoming the withdrawal, only to find more pain, no relief indeed, because sometimes life sucks, and suffering doesn't mean that there is something wrong with you, but that in fact you're healthy, because you're responding in a healthy way to the difficult, alienating, oppresive circumstances that many of us experience in our environments and social hierarchy, it means that you're emotionally connected to your environment. After withdrawal, maybe there is more suffering, or the same suffering that never went away, and it can make you think that there is something bad going on with you, but there isn't, sometimes that's just how things are, which is sad, and painful, but true.

[JackieDecides]

On 9/24/2023 at 3:40 PM, Gonzo said:

Psychiatry is about shaming, PTMF is about empowering

 

I wonder if it's any better in other countries?

 

 

On 9/24/2023 at 8:36 PM, Gonzo said:

suffering doesn't mean that there is something wrong with you, but that in fact you're healthy, because you're responding in a healthy way to the difficult, alienating, oppresive circumstances that many of us experience in our environments and social hierarchy, it means that you're emotionally connected to your environment. After withdrawal, maybe there is more suffering, or the same suffering that never went away, and it can make you think that there is something bad going on with you, but there isn't

 

 

in theory, it's possible to get better at dealing with the reality so while there may be as much or even more that is difficult, perhaps the ability to appreciate what is good improves and, over all, life is then worth living?  

 

I think the current Zeitgeist is not helping!  

[Gonzo]

I'm from Spain, I know people from other Western countries and is almost the same everywhere. It's just the way this society works and approach mental/emotional distress, and psychiatry, with its biomedical model, is keeping the Status Quo.

[Gonzo]

I'm learning that this new self or whatever it has to be adapted to the reality of our society. Our society can put a crushing psychological pressure in people, many dysfuntional families being a huge part of that psychological pressure, and some people, understandably, can't stand it, so to find emotional relief we take these drugs. We have the hope that after withdrawal things will be better, and in some ways it is after the withdrawal and the suffering it causes comes to an end. But the reality of this society has always been the same, with or without psychiatric drugs, and it's alienating and oppresive by nature, that means psychological pain. There is nothing wrong with us as I said previously if we feel this pain, due to the psychological pressure we are exposed in our social, work and family environments, in fact it's a sign of mental health, because we are connected with what is happening around us. The problem is when psychiatry tells us that there is something wrong with us because we feel this pain and that we need medicine, treatment, whatever, basically shaming us for feeling this way, this pain. That's gaslighting, and adds even more suffering to our existing suffering. We don't need that. It's true that psych drugs can offer emotional relief, and that therapy can be very helpful to deal with underlying issues, but our suffering is not wrong, is quite right. So after the withdrawal maybe there is more suffering awaiting, the same suffering that never went away but that we disconnected from. In some ways, I see this as the blue pill VS red pill dilema in Matrix. Both options are legitimate. But if we "come back" to the painful emotional reality of this society, of our lives, we need to tolerate the distress again, tbe psychological pressure. These drugs make us lower down our tolerance.