[seriouslydisturbed]

That is the question running through my mind at the moment. A full recovery symptom free is very unlikely. I'm tired of being on meds. Being off meds has it's benefits, I feel good in myself, my sexual functioning returns, I'm more caring, I like the atmosphere. Downsides is I normally lose it but can I overcome this. I need some type of brain training.

Should I lower my dose and just go for it because times ticking away and I've already lost the last 7 years to this illness and 9 years in total. What do you think?

I'm interested to see what WeepingWillow23 has to say as she's of meds from my understanding.

[Loial]

With meds it's always a balancing act between controlling symptoms vs. side effects.

It seems to me you know that going off meds entirely probably won't end well, but as you say lowering dose may well be an option. It's something you'll really have to discuss with your psychiatrist.

Ideally people should always been on the lowest effective dose but I know sometimes p-docs can be prone to over-medicating.

I'd say it's worth a shot as long as you do it under the guidance of your p-doc. The best plan would be to step down very gradually to the point where hopefully you have less side effects without too much return of symptoms.

There is also the option of perhaps trying a different med, although if the one you are on works well... it might be better just to stay on that at a lower dose.

I think it's best to plan in the long-term with these things. See lowering dose as testing the water for one day trying to go med-free. The last thing you want to do is jump off meds & end up having a full blown relapse.

[CognitoSchiz1989]

I can agree with this feeling. I too want to stop my medicine. One, because I miss the voices. Two because of my sexual functioning on medicine (or lack there of).