Can you live without your meds?

hi just,
I tried living without meds for 7 years after I quit taking Zoloft . I was fine w/o the meds until it hit me so hard that my former choir director noticed that I couldn't cope with things in my life . So I started to go to counseling after 14 years . then my therapist now who is an experienced registered nurse asked me to go back on the medication to continue to be my therapist . I told her that I was very adamant about going back on the meds cuz of the meds that I was on 14 years ago never worked and every time I saw my old psychiatrist she jacked up my Zoloft to 275 mgs daily. I fired both my therapist and psychiatrist at the clinic that I went to for treatment cuz both my old therapist and old psychiatrist did nothing for me . it was the wrong fit for me working with these people who didn't know jackshit about my problem . my therapist now she knows what she is talking about with medication and counseling is a twofold process . my psychiatrist knows more about meds than an actual psychiatrist . they are monitoring my meds very carefully .









Diagnosis: Anxiety and depression
meds: Cymbalta 90mgs at night
Vistrail 2 25 mgs daily for anxiety prn
50 mgs at night for insomnia

I'm going to have to try to get off my meds, so I'm not sure if I can live or not without them. I'm showing early signs of TD. I know in the past it has been detrimental to discontinue or decrease my meds so this will be an adventure.

I have successfully come off of 2 x 30MG Adderall XR in the AM, 4 x 10MG Adderall IR's throughout the day, and then another 30MG Adderall XR every afternoon.

I have been on the medication for 15+ years which is why the doses built up as much as they had.

Coming off of this was the hardest thing I had ever done. I basically couldn't get out of bed or stay awake during the day for 2 months straight.

The symptoms I get when cutting down on meds outweigh the negatives I get from being on them. My biggest complaints are fatigue, weight gain and lack of mental acuity. But I can be dulled and still function, whereas without meds I cannot function at all and would probably wind up divorced, jobless and homeless, if not in prison or a mental ward.

I quit meds cold turkey and ended up in a residential treatment facility. To say I learned my lesson the hard way is putting it mildly. My stay in that hospital created so much more emotional distress and brought up so many new problems that I am still working on and have yet to work on in therapy that I completely regret my decision to quit meds. I may be able to go off or at least reduce the dosages but I will be way more considerate of the timing, and have my pdoc on board to oversee things.

The only thing meds have done for me so far is make me sleep. They don't work for my other symptoms. So I could do without most of my meds besides the one for sleep.

Hi Justmedarkstar,

You might be interested in Laura Delano's story



She was also diagnosed bipolar and successfully got off meds and has organized a collection of resources

http://www.madinamerica.com/psychiat...drawal/#/home/

- vital