An ordinary & successful, middle-aged man’s story of going down the antidepressant rabbit hole

This is the story of an ordinary and successful, middle-aged man going down the antidepressant rabbit hole. He had no history of psychiatric care or psych drug use until he was well into maturity. We’re so often told psychiatric drug withdrawal issues are from “pre-existing conditions.” There are many who hang on to that belief and try to deny the harm the drugs cause. Folks like this man help make it clear that this is something that can happen to anyone who takes these drugs and it does happen to us without discrimination of any kind. There are many thousands and maybe millions impacted in some way by how these drugs debilitate. A lot of people don’t even know that is why they’re sick. These drugs make people sick and doctors don’t even know that is why there is so much chronic illness in those labeled with mental illness. The drugs create illness that was never there. It’s an epidemic that is being denied.

Paul describes how a virus led to a prescription for Prozac and other antidepressants. He ended up on Effexor and has spent over four years in horrific withdrawal from the drugs, leading to the loss of his career and the disruption of almost every other aspect of his life.

hat tip: CEP

Below is a copy of a page from the navigation menu for reference:

Antidepressant info

SSRIs are no better than placebo. Really?

Scroll down for collection of additional links to antidepressant info posts

I wrote the below short paragraphs in response to a question on Surviving Antidepressants (a very good withdrawal board where one can get support when tapering off of any psych med). I’ve now posted it on Facebook and I thought I’d also do a little post with a collection of articles on SSRI antidepressants. This post will find a home in the navigation menu at the top of the page since it’s another post that brings together many articles on SSRIs. I’ll update it as appropriate.

This is what I wrote about SSRIs and the same can be said for SNRIs too, really. It’s been slightly edited from the original comments:

SSRITo refer to SSRIs as no better than placebo is misleading because while it’s technically true in clinical trials — SSRIs are also very different than placebos…they are NOT inert…they are very active and they make EVERYONE feel differently.

People who are very depressed like to feel differently. Different can sometimes feel better even if only for a while. Sometimes different feels much better and sometimes different feels really bad and even dangerous (think homicidal and suicidal–SSRIs are associated with both).

They are not inert and they will act in all manner of ways in different people. And, then of course, yeah, they also cause iatrogenic damage…often severe…

So I think the placebo line is overused and extremely misleading….it makes it sound like SSRIs do nothing at all which is absolutely not true. They are potent psychoactive and neurotoxic drugs.

Info on SSRIs from Beyond Meds (not an exhaustive list of info):

New posts:

More posts on psychiatric drug withdrawal:

Please do not attempt to discontinue psych drugs without first very carefully educating yourself on the risks involved so that you might minimize the chances of developing grave iatrogenic illness if you decide to withdraw: Psychiatric drug withdrawal and protracted withdrawal syndrome round-up

●  Psychiatric drug withdrawal and protracted withdrawal syndrome round-up

 ●  Online Support in Withdrawal

See also: Peer support? This is the real thing. Free of institutionalization. (psych drug withdrawal)

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