Coming off and staying off psych meds

Has anyone been able to successfully and safely wean off the meds and stay off of them for good? If so could you please share your experience? It would be very helpful. Thank you.

Olddays14 wrote:Has anyone been able to successfully and safely wean off the meds and stay off of them for good? If so could you please share your experience? It would be very helpful. Thank you.

Yes.

I tapered off Zoloft first, and then tapered off Geodon.

I don't intend to take them or any psych meds ever again, but I'm still young and so I can't say I have been off them for a long time yet, but long enough for the withdrawal symptoms to wear off, and that's what makes most people go back on them, so I consider myself to have finally beaten them for good.

Zoloft was relatively easy to taper off. The main withdrawal symptoms were brain zaps where I felt shocking sensations in my head. Nice medicine, huh? And I got angry at the drop of a hat, for little or no reason at all. I also had crying spells, and I'm a guy. I was an emotional wreck. My anxiety went though the roof. But it all faded relatively quickly. Two months later, the real fun began...

I began to taper off Geodon and I noticed it immediately. I felt cold and then hot, cold and then hot, over and over. Cold beads of sweat on my forehead and face all the f'ing time. Shivering, shaking, trembling, followed by feeling something like a niacin flush. Nausea like I've never experienced in my entire life. Vomiting, the wicked kind. And it didn't matter what I ate, up it went and out my mouth. I didn't have to worry about gaining anymore weight. In fact I started losing weight. Fatigue, but no relief, because then it hit that night-- the worst insomnia of my life. Night after night with no sleep. Week after week with feeling lucky if I got a good half hour of solid sleep. Akathisia began to fade away, thank god. Then psychotic symptoms flooded back in. Voices, paranoid delusions, and cognitive problems actually worsened at first. My mom kept me clean and kept insisting that I change clothes, shave, brush my teeth, etc., or none of that stuff would've gotten done. I was a mess, emotionally and physically. I was shocked when I looked in the mirror. I looked like a dying person. Anhedonia set in and I didn't even play video games anymore. I could hardly bring myself to get out of bed. Then gradually, over time (5 months) the symptoms faded. My nightmarish experience with tardive dyskinesia faded month by month. I was lucky that it was only temporary. Insomnia was the last one to fade away.

My life is so much better now after the withdrawals than it was while I was still on the medications. I am working part time at a movie theatre, and I am working part time as an electrician's apprentice. I'm back to socializing with my cousins and a few friends again, which is cool. I have a future ahead of me. There is light at the end of the tunnel again.

For the rest of my life I will stay as far away from psychiatry as possible.

Thank you so much for taking the time to share your experience. And congratulations for getting to where you want to be in life.

I was on lexapro and seroquel for a while and over the past 3 months with the permission of my doctor and the directions she told me to wean myself off, I done it. I have now been off of both meds for around 3 weeks. And I gotta tell you, the withdrawals are getting tough. Physically, emotionally, and cognitively. The anxiety is getting really bad, the poor sleep sucks, and the hopelessness or desperation makes me sometimes have doubts if i can overcome this all. I don't not want to go back on meds because the side effects were pretty bad and made the symptoms it was trying to treat, such as depression and anxiety much worse.

The fact that there is someone such as yourself who went through hell and survived gives me so much hope. I have not had severe nausea such as yourself and thankfully I am able to sleep every night even though sometimes it is very little, I am thankful, I know it could be worse as other people have went through even tougher situations.

I do have a few more questions but I will pm you.

Thank you.

google - Stevie Nicks and klonopin addiction -

believe she went to a drug rehab clinic to quit that medication .

The above comments make my comments on -WAR CRIMES- and -CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY- ETC. ETC. ETC... look like child's play and or a piece of cake etc. etc. etc... PLEASE I beg of -YOU- post more examples of side effects and or withdrawal from psych drugs etc. etc. etc.... -YOU- ARE
PROVING BEYOND A DOUBT THAT -WAR CRIMES- and - CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY- ETC.... ARE TRUE...

i'd like to see people go to small claims court and ask for a refund .
to see that in my lifetime would take a miracle .

for some reason lawyers are afraid of going to court for someone who is mentally ill .
they think or know the shrinks will make them look like a fool .
lawyers don't seem to realize that what they should be looking at is ---

financial abuse of the handicapped .

not argue if the shrink labels are accurate .

I can't advise it as a course of action but...

Against medical advice, I took myself off of all my medication. That was almost 30 years ago and I have been fine.

I spent 12 years on a slew of drugs and had many hospitalizations. For the majority of the years, I was on Lithium, Tegretol, a tricyclic antidepressant, an antipsychotic, Cogentin, and Klonopin.

I finally realized that I could not get any worse than I was - I was at the bottom. So what was the difference between being completely nonfunctional on meds or off of them? I chose the latter. I left my psychiatrist and took myself off my meds.

To my surprise, once off the meds, my psychiatric symptoms disappeared and I was able to resume a normal life.

I was able eventually to get a job and work long enough to retire with a small pension.