Coming off anti depressants after 20+ years

puddy

i think counselling is ideal, i can only speak from experience that i was offered, and used, 6 weeks of cbt which did absolutely nothing. there is nothing more for moderate depression suffers, either here or at my last surgery.

ideally, i would like open ended psychotherapy but thats out of my price range, so the self help books it is. i have an advantage in that i have worked in mental health and most of my friends are CPNs, who also all seem to have their various problems, so i have support on tap and so do they!

mynameistallulah

puddy wrote: »

some are easier than others. i was on seroxat and it was a nightmare the few times i tried to come off them, then at some point i felt they were not working for me and then some months later, realised i kept forgetting to take them, so wondered if i could just do it cold turkey and i did

seroxat are the hardest to come off, out of the ssri versions, because they have a very short half life, i believe that prozac has the longest half life so the symptoms are not as bad

bear in mind its not withdrawal, its just your brain adjusting the levels of seratonin and other chemicals back to normal, so you'll feel a bit odd

does your dr recommend you come off them?

have you written out a plan, like reducing them slowly?

Got to agree with you, I would go as far as to say seroxat should be banned.

ItchyFeet

Have you tried regular exercise? This really helped me in the past, to the point of not being depressed at all. However i can't always take my own advice and have currently gone back up to 40mg of Citalopram after failing at reducing the dose.

bright_side

AbbieCadabra wrote: »

i actually allow myself to be less than 100% instead of beating myself up about it. sounds weird i know but it's what works for me.

THIS!!!!! 100% this is something I have to learn. Whenever I have an off day, I am never quite content until I work out the reason for it.....and there generally is 'a reason', however I need to accept that people aren't 100% all the time!!


Thanks to everyone who has replied.
A bit of background......I was sexually abused from the age of 7-9 by a close family member, but didn't realise/admit that it had effected me until I was 30....weirdly, I had always put everything down to my Dad leaving when I was 7.

I had my daughter at 20 and was diagnosed with PND when she was around 9 months. I was put on anti depressants and saw pyschiatrists and when that didn't seem to help I was given ECT. I also attended a group therapy session for a couple of years. None of it really helped.

I was in an abusive relationship (more emotional than physical) for 13 years. It was only when that relationship ended and I had a very short relationship with someone else that I realised something was very wrong. My reaction to the one month thing was extreme to the point where I wanted to end my life.

I was given valium and put on the waiting list for counselling. Fortunately I didn't have to wait too long and I remember telling the counsellor what had happened when I was a child (first time I had told anyone) and she pretty much said 'bingo'!!.

I remember telling her that I felt my emotional development had stopped at the age of 7. I just couldn't cope with any upset in an adult way.....everything was the end of the world to me. NHS would only allow 6 sessions with the counsellor and then you had to be put back on the waiting list, however she was so intrigued by me that she offered to continue seeing me after that privately, for free.

I saw her every week for about 6 years and she helped me unravel everything that had happened in my life really. Everything began to make sense and I learnt to really understand myself. It didn't stop me reacting the way I did to upset, but at least I understood why I reacted the way I did.

At that point I was on 60mg fluoxetine (prozac) and had been for near on 13 years. I had a few times during my twenties just stopped taking whichever anti depressants I was currently on thinking I could do without, but would end up back on them within a couple of months.

It was about 9 years ago that the doctor told me I would need them for life and as I said before, I just accepted that. I had been pretty stable for a few years until 5 years ago when I lost my sister to cancer. Naturally I took a massive dive and when I hadn't started to improve 6 months later, my GP decided it was time to try somthing other than Prozac and he put me on Citalopram 20mg. He said he expected to see me back to increase the dose to 40mg within a few weeks, however I didn't need to. I did eventually go back last year when I hit a low so have been on 40mg since then.

In hindsight, I think I was too hasty in thinking I needed to increase the dose. I believe now that I have always been so scared of the depression, that if I notice things aren't 100% I panic and head to the GP, perhaps without giving myself a chance to get through it alone.

I do feel that I am more together now than I've ever been and I know myself really, really well. I have dropped down from 40mg to 20mg and am just going to see how it goes. I plan to keep a diary of how I'm feeling and obviously I will get feedback from my nearest and dearest!! I'm feeling quite confident at the moment and less tired than I've felt in a long, long time I don't expect to be completely free from the ad's for a long time yet (if atall), but I do think it's worth a shot!

Thanks again for all replies and sorry this is so long

barbiedoll

I don't know if you're aware but you can get citalopram as a liquid preparation and if you want to decrease your dosage gradually, this may be an option for you. I know that citalopram pills are tiny and trying to cut them in half is a tricky thing to do. It's also very hard to get a correct dosage when cutting pills so it may be worth seeing your GP and seeing if you can set up a dosage reduction plan.

To be honest, your GP telling you that you will need anti-depressants "for life" is very irresponsible. These drugs were always meant as short-term medicines and doctors are supposed to be aware of the problems of patients relying on them for years, especially after the Valium cases of the 60's and later. Seroxat in particular, has been noted as particularly problematic, despite the drug companies insistance that it was a non-addictive wonder drug. I've seen a women who was prescribed this after seeing her GP because she was feeling "tired all the time." The fact that she had a newborn baby seemed to completely pass by the GP and 5 years later, she was still taking it, just by getting a repeat prescription. :mad:

It may be worth seeing another GP and asking if you can reduce your dosage slowly. Don't be fobbed off, the liquid preparation is more expensive but you should insist if you feel that it is right for you to use. Good luck.

raven83

puddy wrote: »

some are easier than others. i was on seroxat and it was a nightmare the few times i tried to come off them, then at some point i felt they were not working for me and then some months later, realised i kept forgetting to take them, so wondered if i could just do it cold turkey and i did

seroxat are the hardest to come off, out of the ssri versions, because they have a very short half life, i believe that prozac has the longest half life so the symptoms are not as bad

bear in mind its not withdrawal, its just your brain adjusting the levels of seratonin and other chemicals back to normal, so you'll feel a bit odd

does your dr recommend you come off them?

have you written out a plan, like reducing them slowly?

I had the same trouble with seroxat too, it was like going cold turkey i found it very hard to come off them and felt awful, this is because they leave the body very quickly. I have been on prozac on and off for years and i find coming off them so much easier, i am usually fine for the first couple of months coming off them but then i notice that i start to go downhill after that.

bright_side

Thank you. Yes I was aware of the liquid citalopram being available and will ask for that when and if I am I ready to decrease to 10mg.

Fortunately I haven't any experience of Seroxat.

bright_side

raven83 wrote: »

I had the same trouble with seroxat too, it was like going cold turkey i found it very hard to come off them and felt awful, this is because they leave the body very quickly. I have been on prozac on and off for years and i find coming off them so much easier, i am usually fine for the first couple of months coming off them but then i notice that i start to go downhill after that.

My GP warned me of this with Citalopram. Whereas with Prozac you could miss a dose here and there and see no effect, with Citalopram, miss a dose and you know about it, albeit a day or two later.

VfM4meplse

Karen23, I am very surprised that you have been on anti-depressants for so long. Are you also under the care of a psychiatrist?

Can I ask whether your GP has reviewed you regularly, or was it one of those things that you just accepted that you would be on for life?

krlyr

If you were taking insulin for diabetes, would you feel the need to wean yourself off it after 20 years just to "go it alone"? I would question whether you have a medical need for antidepressants, e.g. a chemical imbalance that physically causes depression. If that's the case then antidepressants are no different to the insulin for diabetes, anti-inflammatories for arthritis, or other medications.
If it is depression with an emotional trigger, have you dealt with that trigger? Something like CBT could be worthwhile to change your mindsest, seeing a therapist to discuss an event/issue in your life that may have triggered the depression, etc.
I wouldn't just expect depression to have disappeared because 20 years have passed, if you've not done anything to deal with the initial cause.

Edit: Sorry, saw your later post that went into more details, if you feel that your issues have been addressed then good luck in coming off the ADs, but don't feel that you're giving up if you do have to go back onto them.