I can personally vouch for the dangers of going off meds without supervision. I started taking Paxil (paroxetine) when I was an 18 year old kid in 1999. At that point, my social anxiety was way worse than my depression. As time passed I can count around 3 or 4 depressive episodes but I got through them. By 2010-11 I was feeling pretty good and but I was tired of how I looked. I was 180 pounds (I'm a 5'5" woman) because I was hungry all the time - the Paxil. I decided to seek out a psychiatrist for an evaluation to see about maybe lowering the dose or switching to another med. However, this woman made some rather cutting remarks to me, she acted very unprofessionally, and I never went back. I made the fateful decision of tapering off the med myself, and around 10 months later I found myself in the worst depression I had ever been in my life and I was on the brink of having to go to a daily outpatient program at a hospital. This was in 2012 and I have unfortunately never been the same since. At the beginning of this year, my therapist suggested that I seek another opinion of a psychiatrist who she holds in very high esteem. I have seen 2 pdocs since the 2012 breakdown. I took her advice, and she was not wrong. He said that after reviewing my history, Paxil was the most successful because I have equal trouble with depression and anxiety and I had never felt as badly (pre-2012) as I have in the past 5 years. He also pointed out that the other drugs I tried since Paxil do not "hit on" anxiety enough which has left me in dependence on benzos. It was a revelation.

For my part, I came to the realization that I thought I had just "grown out" of my social anxiety and what other people thought of me. No. It was the Paxil doing its job. I try very hard not to beat myself up about this, but I was 29 when I thought I was finally OK, like I had reached the "it gets better" apex. I had heard from so many people who said their 30s are the best years of their lives, they don't care what people think of them anymore and they're more comfortable with themselves.

I have just turned 36 and I'm afraid of my own shadow all over again. I just spent the holiday weekend holed up in my bedroom with the curtains closed in an on/off state of sleeping and playing iPhone games, afraid to leave my home because everything seems like a monumental chore. I am finding it harder and harder as the years go on to enjoy anything in life or to stop worrying that I'm going to have a panic attack if I go out somewhere. I can't see a future for myself where things are better and I have no goals. I've cut off friends and when my depression is at its worst, I can become quite nasty and irritable and then I have to go on the apology circuit.

Pdoc and I are still trying to get the meds sorted out. Both he and my therapist have teared up while sitting with me.

Don't go off your meds without talking to a professional, folks.