So I’ve been weaning myself off of Zoloft. There hadn’t been a good time to do it before now, and I figure if I do it now and the experiment turns out to be a bust, I have time to get back on them and get “normal” before we go to Egypt. I didn’t ever really have any side effects from being on Zoloft (except for vivid dreams) and I’m finding the bad thing about not having side effects from the meds is that when you wean off of them you don’t magically feel better. 😉
Here I was thinking that my laziness was a side effect and when I weaned off of the Zoloft I would have more energy, have less cravings, be more disciplined, and be all around a more fabulous person. 😉 Now I’m finding out that I actually am the same person, I just get irritated more quickly and more often, lol. So I haven’t magically become a better housekeeper, an earlybird, or find myself exercising compulsively. Darn.
I have gained weight over the past four years (about 25 lbs), but it would be hard not to gain weight when pre-Zoloft I could hardly eat anything and threw up from anxiety every other day and burned all my nervous energy by pacing around my house all day long. I also hit the “magic 35” this year, so maybe my metabolism left me along with my sanity.
Today was the first day I didn’t actually take a pill in 4 1/2 years. I never once missed a dose — never (one of the perks of anxiety). One of the reasons I decided to wean off completely was that 3 times last week I realized in the late afternoon that I hadn’t taken my crumbs for the day (I have been decreasing my dose slowly over the past year and I’m down to less than 1/4 of a pill and I’m not the best pill cutter, lol) and I was thinking that it would be a good time to stop altogether. No major changes in my life at the moment: no babies on the horizon, no deployments or moves in the next 12 months — it’s been a while since my calendar has been clear of those events. And if I’m drug free, I won’t have to think about trying to get my meds while traveling in the Middle East. Of course I’d rather hassle with getting meds than be a crazy woman running around in the desert. Thus, the experiment.
So far I haven’t had any withdrawal symptoms, and had felt rather satisfied by my progress and was telling Josh last night how marvelously it was going . . . and then bam! Today I started getting the electric shock feelings in my head if I moved too fast and bits of numbness in my face. Blech. So my new plan is to take my crumbs every other day for a bit and see if that is better.
Maybe I have to wait until the drug is completely out of my system to reveal all my wonderful attributes that have been masked by the Zoloft these past 4 years. Yeah, that’s what it is . . .