Symptoms: Akathisia, brain zaps, emotional blunting, sexual dysfunction, cognitive impairment, insomnia, depersonalization/derealization, suicidal ideation, tinnitus, neuropathy, severe anxiety/panic, muscle/joint pain, anhedonia, GI disturbances, visual decline, adrenal fatigue
I am a 51 year old trying to get off of medication that has kept me in chains since the age of 14, when Prozac was marketed as the latest and greatest medicine for chemical brain imbalance—in which there is no such measurable thing. My parents put me on this for what we would call today as normal human suffering. I was not suicidal until going on Prozac, but while on it I had my first attempt.
This would be the beginning of decades of being under psychiatric care in which I endured polypharmacy involving over 20–30 medications, including SSRIs, SNRIs, benzos, antihistamines, and antipsychotics. During this time I was committed 3 times at different stages in life during excruciating mental health crises. I was cold-turkeyed off many of these and put on different ones due to building up tolerance or a relapse in depression. Sadly, it was the medication all along. I came to this conclusion after my most recent FMLA involving my mental health.
Despite these challenges I had two wonderful children and was able to work some. I had no obvious reasons for feeling the way I was feeling. Now here we are, my family not functioning fully because of these obstacles. These meds touch more lives than just the person consuming them. I dream about what I could have aspired to be without the feelings of angst and fear that have held me back from so many things in this world.