I hear you! My daughter is 10, so I understand not wanting to be a nightmare, it was the fear of being her nightmare that lead me to a pdoc and a dx.

Why I don't take meds? A myriad of reasons.

Firstly, I'm not anti meds, my first combo was great and kept me functional and at a full time job while I had just lost my grandpa, my brother and my father within 3 months of eachother.

It was when I got retrenched due to the company closing down and having to use state care as opposed to private medical aide, that meds became an issue.

1. For me, I think they're helpful during crisis, and would seek them out should I feel I need them, but I'm not interested in daily med management. Especially not AP's (antipsychotics), studies posted right on this website report a link between longterm AP use and brain atrophy. Stupid is too high a price to pay. I will much rather keep my hallucinations AND my brain. :P

2. What pushed the button to flush my meds was a horrid reaction to lithium and a pdoc who was unavailable for the next 4 months. I was retarded, had zero memory to speak of (with some permanent gaps), couldn't string an intelligent sentence together (spoke at 4th grade level because my vocabulary had gone missing) suddenly was unable to spell or pay any type of attention. I was perpetually hungry, and ate myself broke. I developed horrid acne, and please let's not forget I had zero fine motor skills, kind of like a baby, but instead of having no grip and poor sense of direction I looked like I had severe parkinsons. This crushed what little self-esteem I had, and kept me isolated because I was too humuliated to be in public.
Besides allll of that, I was flat, complete apathy, no joy, no sadness, no hope. I was merely existing, watching my life go right by without me.

3. So I couldn't live like that. I had NO intention of waiting on a pdoc who refused to help. I had zero acces to a different one. According to him, because I wasn't suicidal, and my bloodwork was normal, that spelled stable. Stupid, *cough *cough, I mean stable, was too high a price to pay. I missed my sharp mind, my sarcasm, my sense of humour. My. SPUNK!
I missed my emotions, every level of them, from the "I'm so high I'm deeply inlove with life" to the " YTF did I have the audacity to wake up today? Shoulda died in my sleep stupid b1tch! "

I missed being me. This is the only me I've ever known. A me I had learned to grow accustomed to, grown to adapt to. A me that my friends and family had accepted and adapted to. That muted zombie version of myself caused much unrest in my head. I felt alien in my own skin and didn't recognize myself in the mirror. I had no spark, no smile, and even my actions my reactions were completely alien.

4. I also drew the line at meds being thrown at me to fix problems that other meds caused. This was my pdoc's initial solution. Don't take me off the retard-making meds, and try something new, just add meds to make me stop shaking like an alcoholic in public.

That's a deal breaker and will remain one should I ever decide to give meds another shot.

Sooo, like I mentioned earlier. I decided fk this shyt. I've handled being me for 10yrs armed with only lots of insight and zero knowledge, I can bloodywell learn how to handle me even better now that I know I really have more issues than Playboy

Ps. You're NOT a wimp. You're choosing the safest path for yourself and your family.