The Heartbreaking Reality of Quitting Mental Health Medication
Medication saved my life. It rescued me from a decade-long depression and a 20-year fight with PTSD. It relieved my symptoms of schizophrenia. After a long time and much trial and error, I owe these meds my life.
Yet I still don’t like them.
I don’t like the side effects of weight gain — which for me is now a constant issue. But I especially dislike the feeling of dependency. I know that my survival depends on those tiny pills I have to take three times a day. What if they stop working? Can I claim I’ve recovered and am living my ideal life if I’m still at the mercy of medication?
Side effects and frustration.
I was first put on medication by a psychiatrist in 2007 to help my PTSD and depression. I was terrified of taking that step, scared to acknowledge the hold that mental illness had over me. Taking meds made it all seem real.
At that time, I’d shown no symptoms of schizophrenia. Yet he still gave me a potent antipsychotic, which he said would help me sleep. He was right. It made me a zombie. I slept 15 hours a day, my speech slurred, and I gained 80 lbs in a year. I couldn’t concentrate, and my quality of life was at zero.
Thus began the era of alterations. Antidepressants take around six weeks to work. Different brands work for different people, and no one knows why. Every six weeks, after feeling no benefit, doctors would tweak the meds. Waiting six weeks when depressed feels like a lifetime. I never got used to the crushing disappointment when they failed to work.
In 2009, a psychiatrist diagnosed me with schizophrenia. They ramped up the antipsychotics. I heard voices every day, but the worst symptom was paranoia. I felt a magician was stealing my thoughts and implanting new ones in my head. I was convinced that the government of the UK was working with Obama to round up sick people and send them to concentration camps in Siberia.
Most antipsychotics were horrendous. They did little to quell the chaos in my mind, and the side effects were plentiful:
Insomnia
Hypersomnia
Weight gain
Inability to concentrate
Rage
Sexual dysfunction
Heartburn
Cholesterol
The great deception.
I spent time in a mental hospital and was on the brink of suicide. I’d been in this nightmare for years without relief. Doctors had already told me I was 100% disabled for the rest of my life. I’d never accepted that diagnosis, but I was starting to feel that they were right.
As I hit rock bottom, the miracle happened. I woke up one day, and the endless chatter of voices in my head had stopped. I no longer had the urge to barricade my front door in case government agents got me. And I never had the crushing weight of depression draining the life out of me.
It took me time to accept this was real. Every morning, I’d do a mental checklist — starting with my toes and working up, I’d look for signs of depression in my body. There were none. I’d ask myself why I’m not scared anymore. Why did I no longer believe in telepathy? Why did I think I was at risk of kidnap by spies? People think recovery is the end of the nightmare, but I had never-ending questions about what I’d been through.
I lived with a new fear — the fear that my symptoms would return. As time passed, I came to believe that maybe I was better. Doctors had told me I’d be on meds for life, but what if they were wrong? Now I was “cured,” I no longer wanted the reminder and inconvenience of taking these pills. I reasoned that if I had a headache and took paracetamol, I wouldn’t keep taking painkillers after the headache had gone.
So, without consulting anybody, I made the most reckless decision of my life. I decided to stop my meds cold turkey.
When bliss precedes a nightmare.
For six glorious days, I felt better than I had since 2003, when I first became ill. I was doing so much better that my family started to notice. On the 5th day, I confessed to my mum and my girlfriend that I’d stopped taking the meds. They were shocked and worried, but they weren’t experts and could only judge my actions by my behavior. They felt excited for me. Maybe I was cured and could now go back to life pre-PTSD.
Life changed on the seventh day. I woke up and felt dead inside. It felt like my worst days of depression magnified by a hundred. I could barely move, and I felt like the worst failure and the most disgusting person who ever lived.
I could find no interest in anything. Deep inside, I felt a visceral fear that threatened to overwhelm me, yet I couldn’t find a reason. This is the worst kind of fear because it can’t be overcome.
Maybe the thing that terrified me was life.
As day turned to night, I sat alone on the back doorstep with my head in my hands. The experiment had failed. I wasn’t cured. The meds were alleviating my symptoms. How could I have been so stupid? I’d read enough to know this could happen, yet optimism blinded me.
I couldn’t bear the pain or the failure. I got up and staggered out into the back garden. I was sobbing so much I could hardly stand. I thought about my loved ones, but their love wasn’t enough to keep me here. I wanted to take my own life.
My attempt failed early on and it shocked me back into reality. I realized I had one chance to keep myself alive. I had to go back on my medications immediately, see a doctor as soon as possible, and be brave enough to withstand the pain in the meantime.
A second chance.
My biggest fear was that the meds that had worked so well before would stop being effective after the break. To my eternal relief, they worked again. My depression was brought under control.
I’ll never make the mistake of coming off my meds again. Many experts have told me I will be on them for life, and I had to shed my arrogance and follow their guidance.
So many people give up their mental health meds when they feel better. They think they’re cured but don’t realize that’s the effects of the medicine. Some go on to commit atrocious crimes or hurt themselves.
I can understand the desire to get off medication. You want to be healed in the true sense of the word. The side effects can be life-changing. They aren’t easy medications to take, and their reputation is poor.
Yet, thanks to these meds, I now live a life I never dreamed possible. The side effects are minor, and if they enable me to live a good and happy life, taking meds is the price I’m willing to pay.
Always let a doctor or psychiatrist guide you. Your life is too meaningful to take such risks.
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