Slow Dancing with Life: Stopping Antidepressants

I have suffered with bouts of depression and anxiety ever since I was a child- I would guess that these fits of sadness began sometime in grade school. I have always been a highly sensitive person and feel the sadness of others in a very deep way, often taking it on as a personal burden.  At times, these feelings become overwhelming and I become trapped in a world of deep sadness and anxiety, frightened to even leave my bed.

I was sixteen when I was placed on antidepressants for the first time. I remember the feeling of freedom when the Prozac took effect and I no longer felt the oppression of a constant stream of bleak thoughts that I felt I had no control over. With this freedom also came numbness, an inability to truly feel joy, but I was so grateful for the lifted weight that the numbness seemed a small price to pay.

In the past twenty years I have had three periods in which I was on antidepressants for a short period of time- the most harrowing time of which was the extreme postpartum depression I had after the birth of my second child.  I consider myself lucky to not have to be constantly dependent on medication, but struggle with asking for help when I know that I am in another bout of depression.

Early this year I took the last Lexapro in the bottle and realized that I was out of refills. With a start I realized that I had been on Lexapro for two years- a much longer period of time than I was comfortable with. I had asked the doctor for a prescription when I realized that the latest bout of depression was out of control and I was having trouble sleeping, eating and going about my day-to-day life. However, I had never meant for the antidepressants to be a long-term solution. I knew that it was time to come off of them and learn to manage my life again.

I admit that it is terrifying to live again without antidepressants, when they have helped to manage my emotions for such a long time. I fear the terrible sadness but fear the unreasonable anxiety even more. When my anxiety is at its worst, I cannot sleep and am frightened and jumpy at all times. It can be a living hell.

In the first months without the medication, I am always surprised at the myriad of emotions I experience. I do notice more sadness and anxiety when I am medication-free but I also notice more joy and energy. Anti-depressants leave me feeling a heavy, measured slowness and without that feeling I feel more alive than ever. If I manage my self-care, the days of depression are few and far between.

I find that life comes at me in stops and starts- days of joy punctuated with days of sadness that only envelope me for a short time before releasing me from their sticky grip back into the arms of happiness. When the days of depression are few, I can sink into the feelings and release them when I am though, even finding worth in the days of sadness as my creative soul tends to come alive and I bleed ink onto the page without any laboring.  I dance with the grief and sadness as easily I spin in the arms of joy, the contrast of the two reminding me that every feeling has a purpose.

For today, I will slow dance with life without medication streaming through my veins. I will find the worth in the good days and the bad and care for myself in the same loving way as I care for my beloved children. However, if there comes a day in which it is, again, time to ask unabashedly for help and an antidepressant prescription to manage the darkness, I will do so unashamed.  This life is a blessing and a curse and some days we all need a little help towards the light.