Coming off my SSRI
NOTE: This is the full version of this essay, which began on my Substack. I started it there thinking I could just write a short synopsis for my newsletter, but I quickly realized I needed more space. You can read the first part of this along with other commentary and newsletter items by subscribing to my Substack here.
ANOTHER NOTE: Please don’t listen to me on how to do this. Aside from anxiety and an autoimmune disease, I have another illness and it’s called “I can do it myself” and it comes from trauma. I would NOT advise what I did; I absolutely should have spoken more closely with my doctor and I’m lucky it didn’t go worse than it did. If you’re considering something similar, for the love of god do not do what I did. Call a professional to work with you to do this the right way.
Around the middle of August, I felt the pull to try to go off of my anxiety medication. I have been on Celexa for four years with only a short stint of trying to wean off of it while pregnant with Lucy, but in the end, I stayed on it throughout my pregnancy. My anxiety and depression were just too much at the time. After having Daisy, I was dealing with postpartum depression and anxiety, and so this medication quite literally saved me. After that, I was honestly afraid to not take it because I didn’t want to feel the way I felt before. But I felt like it was a good time to try. As far as motherhood goes, I’m out of the Newborn and a Toddler Trenches and now I’m in the Toddler and a Preschooler Trenches—VERY different—but in truth, the former felt way harder, which is just to say that now was a more appropriate time for me to attempt going off the meds.
I weaned off for about three weeks, which in hindsight was not NEARLY enough time. I should have gone slower, but I was dumb. I’d already spoken to my doctor about it prior to trying this, but truth be told, I did this on my own with her previous advice and whatever the dumb internet told me. After about a month of not taking it, I stopped taking any at all. And I felt fine!
“I honestly don’t know how I got through this.”
I thought I was in the clear, but I was very wrong.
Photo by Daisy, complete with her little finger in front of the lens. This was around the time I started weaning off of the medication.
After a few days of nothing in my system, I started having “the zaps”, which lasted for about two weeks. If you don’t know what this is, just imagine feeling like you’re dropping over the highest hill of a rollercoaster, but just for a split second, almost like you black out, and that happens every few minutes, for the whole day, for days at a time. Plus, I had bouts of feeling like my skin was crawling as if the anxiety itself was just pumping through my bloodstream.
I honestly don’t know how I got through this.
One Friday, I texted Kyle and told him I HAD to go home, so he would have to get the girls (typically he is drop-off and I am pick-up). I was in bed from 3:30 to 6 when my family got home, just trying not to crawl out of my skin, and then I had to put on a brave face for dinner and bedtime for my kids. It was honestly awful, and weirdly, writing this now feels like I’m talking about someone else.
The following Sunday on a walk with a friend, I shared all of these things with her, and felt just so incredibly validated, which is exactly what I needed. I felt okay to give it another week.
And then I turned a corner.
I woke up the next Monday feeling so different. Not like a different person but just a clearer version of myself. A little lighter. Kyle said he noticed almost immediately, which makes me both grateful and emotional. It makes me think “What have I missed all these years?”
“Good night to me and my 700 mg of caffeine! ”
This goes a little deeper than just feeling like my head was clear. In the last year or so, I have really noticed how little energy I have, to the point that I have had my doctors check all the things: thyroid, hormones, etc. Everything has come back totally fine, and my doctors and I chalked this up to having kids and being a teacher and having an autoimmune disease. Of course I’m tired, right?! But this was different, and I knew it in my bones that something was up. It was something I couldn’t shake, no matter how much rest I had or how much I tried to push through it. Looking back now, I can see so clearly that something was way off.
For example, I was drinking a 40-ounce travel mug of coffee every day, and then often I would also drink an Alani energy drink. And people, I would go right.to.sleep every night. Like I couldn’t wait to get to bed. Good night to me and my 700 mg of caffeine!
That ain’t normal.
And then, I was setting my alarm to exercise every morning—not because I love getting up at 5 a.m. but because the is literally the only time I could make it happen with my schedule—and when I could make myself get out of bed within hitting snooze 12 times, I would just go for a walk or do some yoga. Those are GREAT things to do, and I’m still doing those things, but I am also able to go for jogs or lift weights some days, too. Since the zaps have subsided, I have been to the gym every day for nearly two weeks at 5:30 a.m., something that I literally could not fathom a few months ago. It’s not because I didn’t want to go, it was because I physically couldn’t find the energy to do anything extra. For the past couple of weeks, when my stupid ass alarm goes off at 5 a.m., I still curse it. But I get up. No snoozing. No fighting the inevitable. I just…get up. I can’t explain it.
But of course, things are not all perfect rainbows, because last Sunday, I had a panic attack at church.
It was building up starting on Saturday—I could just feel the anxiety working through my veins like little daggers—and by Sunday morning, I knew it was coming. I pushed through. I got the girls ready for church and got us out the door, even as I was on the veerrrrrggeee of losing it.
For example: Kyle is notorious for leaving garbage in his passenger seat which sends me into f***ing orbit every time I have to get into his car. Today was not the day for a rogue Coke can and junk mail to be in my way. I opened the door with my giant purse full of emergency snacks for Lucy and saw like three coffee cups and empty cans and random papers and I swear to you, as I type this, I am feeling all kinds of rage all over again. I CHUCKED that shit into the back seat, throwing it so hard that Daisy said, “Mommy, why are you throwing that?” Sorry, kid.
Then, at church, I took Lucy to the nursery/toddler room, where of course she cried and wouldn’t stay. I was sweating through my clothes and my purse was falling off my shoulder and Lucy was crying, so I just took her to the sanctuary with me. I was carrying all this crap and a big ol’ toddler, and then I had to scoot past a woman at the end of the aisle, desperately trying not to knock her plumb out with my purse or my toddler or my literal ass.
This all sounds hilariously stupid when it’s typed out now, and I know in my heart of hearts that what happened after this was not because of any of these events; it was all because of my brain.
I sat down, looked at Kyle, said “I’m going to have a panic attack,” and then proceeded to hide my sobs for the next half hour. I was internally spiraling, as often happens during a panic attack. Should I just get up and leave? Will someone see me if I get up? If someone asks me if I’m okay, I will lose it. Maybe it’s better to just sit here and hide my face behind Lucy’s head. I can’t even listen to this sermon. I have no idea what’s going on. I’m not even getting anything out of this. I wasn’t ready to come here. I can’t do this. My kids are going to have a mom who has panic attacks. Kyle is trying not to even look at me. Oh no, now he’s putting his arm around me and that is making me cry more. This is stupid. I am worthless. I am going to have to take medicine again. Please God help me.
I did the stupid breathing exercises you’re supposed to do during a panic attack, and I closed my eyes and did my very best to get through it. The logical side of my brain was whispering, “Ride it out, it will go away, you’ll be okay,” but it was hard to hear over all the other shit going through my head.
And let me also just say as a side note, when this happens to you and then your kids want to watch Inside Out 2 over and over, it feels a little raw. IYKYK.
Once I came down toward the end of the service, I felt like I’d landed back on earth and made it to the car. I had already asked Kyle before this even happened to take me back home after church so I could possibly go to the gym to work off some of the anxious energy I was having. Needless to say, I absolutely did that after having a literal panic attack. He dropped me off back at home and took the girls with him to his mom’s house, our Sunday routine, and I went for a run. I listened to these songs and tried not to cry more on the treadmill. I ran what felt like sprints to me, which are probably little warm-up jogs for others, but I NEEDED to get some of that energy out.
When I left, it was raining. And it felt so good. I held my head up to the sky and felt so much lighter and calmer. I am not naive enough to think that going for one singular run is going to cure my anxiety. I know better. But in that moment, I was proud that I made it through the morning. When I arrived at my in-laws’ house for dinner, I felt so much better and was able to spend good time with my family by being present and happy, not trying to fend off anxiety.
“I am trying so desperately hard to keep moving forward this way so that I can experience what I’ve been missing.”
And after all of that, I still want to stay off the meds for a while. I want to work more closely with my doctors and my therapist and make sure I’m doing the right things, but I also want to work hard to figure out a plan of action for days like Sunday so that I can live for the good things and make it through the bad ones.
Please let me be so so clear: I would never advocate for anyone to NOT take anti-anxiety or antidepressant medication when that is what they need. I am a huge advocate for medication, because I literally NEEDED IT to get through motherhood, and there is no way to know if/when I will need it again. But for now, I am glad I tried this and made it out on the other side.
I’ve found myself just feeling like I can exist so much more easily. I absolutely think the medication was numbing my anxiety—which like, okay good!—but it was also preventing me from doing and feeling things. I feel fortunate right now that my panic attacks are not keeping me from my daily life, and I absolutely fear that one will happen while I’m at work or somewhere it isn’t as easy to hide like in church. I know this can, and likely will, happen to me at some point. But I am trying so desperately hard to keep moving forward this way so that I can experience what I’ve been missing.
I want to cry because I love my kids so much. I want to have ideas and make things and use my creative mind in ways that feel like they’ve gone dormant. I want to be moved by life.