Rapunzel - The questions that I get on this site are great. I get to practice tayloring my answers for the crowd here (ie. regular people), which only helps me at work. When I have to think about what may be going in psychopharmacologically and physiologically in different cases it really helps me to understand (ie. too see in my mind) how the various medications affect the brain as a whole. If I can't describe something in plain language, I don't really understand it. Some physicist (maybe Richard Feynman?) said that if you can't fit a description of a theory on a t-shirt, then you really don't understand that theory. Nature is very simple; it's just that there's an enormous amount of these simple things. I have found that you do have to study the trees, but you must regularly step back and see how any new knowledge you acquire changes the look of the forest. If I can't see a change in the forest upon reading about a new pharmacological finding, I don't really understand the information.

If you notice, most in most of my answers I am just on "autotype". I am really just typing what I think; sort of a "flow of consciousness" thing (that's my excuse for all my spelling and grammar errors; I seldom edit ). I also like to give extra info (ie. "buts" and "excepts") over and above the question so that it may help answer similar questions other people may have.

After stopping SJW, or any serotonergic (serotonin-containing - eg. TCA, SSRI, etc.) antidepressant the body may do a number of different things, but only if the antidepressant you were taking (eg. SJW) was working. If you are taking an antidepressant, but are not getting any relief from the depressive symptoms, the neurotransmitter mix probably hasn't changed much from pre-medication times, therefore it does not need to change back. The mix should still be at compensatory levels. That is, the concentrations of the other neurotransmitters would still be at the pre-medication levels. The norepinephrine (aka noradrenaline), dopamine, et al would still be compensating for the lack of serotonin (if indeed a lack of serotonin is what is causing the depressive symptoms).

Taking a serotonergic antidepressant doesn't really do much in a person who has "normal" (non-depressive state) serotonin levels in the brain. And remember, a lack of serotonin is not the "cause" of depression, it is only an effect of depression that can explain many of the depressive symptoms. Adding serotonin by taking serotoneric antidepressants is like adding air to a tire that has a slow leak; you have to keep adding air (taking antidepressants) at regular intervals or you ruin the tire (brain).

I hope that this sorta makes sense. Sometimes my metaphors ar weird. - Cam

P.S. Thanks for the info on "sinister" guys, ..... erm, gals!