I hate January

I feel really flat now, I always feel flat after Christmas, even though it's my birthday tomorrow and I should be looking forward to that. I hate January, after all the excitement and build up to the Christmas holiday everything seems so dreary. Roll on summer!!

1.90ml Now breaking the 2.0ml barrier!!

Yes today I am going to 1.90ml, waited quite a long time for this new reduction because the last one was quite a biggish one and you should never drop more than 10% of your current dose.
I have been feeling very well on the whole but there are subtle shifts of feelings in that I am aware that in certain situations I feel more anxious which is probably the "real me" without the prozac crutch and it's probably no worse than many people deal with anyway on a day to day basis.

Who is reading my blog?

Can't help but wonder, I have my little gadget (to the right) which shows the location of people who visit but I would love it if someone made themselves known, maybe left a comment even if to tell me my blog is dull as ditch water LOL

I've been feeling so so tired today, and woke up with a splitting headache, felt like a prozacy type head today.

Dizzy

Yes this picture is how I feel today, low blood pressure? or something to do with the prozac going down? felt like it before so I expect I will just wait for it to pass.

2.00ml (8mg)

Nearly breaking through the 2.0ml barrier

This week end I am going to drop from 2.20ml to 2.0ml, I should probably go to 2.10 ml first but actually it's such a fiddle to measure out the 0.10ml on that skinny little syringe I decided it would be easier to take a chance and go straight to 2.0ml. I've read that you shouldn't reduce by more than 10% of your current level and this is still within 10%.  Will be interesting to see if I have a withdrawal reaction in a couple of weeks or so.

2.20ml and redundancy

Down to 2.20ml today, I did wonder wether to take it down to 2.10ml but there is quite a lot going on in my life at the moment, both my jobs are under threat of redundancy now in about a years time with all the cuts this government are making so me and Peter are having to plan for this eventuallity, after all my money, child benefit and tax credits pay the mortgage and all the direct debits/ utility bills :(     ....and jobs are very hard to come by at the moment.

Whistleblowing

This is an interesting link.

New reduction today - 2.30ml

Hopefully I will break the 2.0ml barrier by Christmas.

Losing a job

I have two part time jobs and we had a staff meeting at one of my jobs this week, and it seems definate that we are closing down with all the cuts going round, and this job will be going, at least I have plenty of notice to start looking around but it is very sad for all of us. I haven't been there long enough to qualify for any decent redundancy so I may as well start looking.

Weight loss

I'm not complaining but I'm wondering if my metabolism has speeded up a little as the prozac has gone down, I'm always fairly careful about my eating anyway as I have a big appetite and can eat like a horse so I do have to "reign" it in and exercise or I can find myself piling it on, however what with working pretty much full time and family commitments I do find it hard to fit in the exercise, but my weight seems to have dropped somewhat without me trying. Wonder if prozac does cause weight gain and coming off it speeds up metabolism?

Feeling blah and interview

OK so it's just hit me this morning that I am in fact feeling very "blah" this week. I had a job interview on Monday, it was only a little 7 hour a week job in a school with the promise of other hours in the school office, when I got to the interview it was so not what I expected, the job described at the interview differed greatly from the job description and what I had applied for, in fact it wasn't a little 7 hour a week job, it was a huge challenge he wanted someone to fulfill on a totally inadequate pay scale and hours and he was desperately trying to convince me what a great idea it was and how I could achieve it, and I felt I'd been led up the garden path somewhat, so needless to say I totally lost interest and wasn't offered it. I was a bit gutted because in my head I'd run away with the idea of this nice little term time only job and having more time at home in the school holidays and maybe during the week as well, that'll learn me!!
I since learned the didn't manage to appoint anyone and no one who went was prepared to take on what he was proposing, suspect it was the misleading job description and the fact he's not paying enough for what he wants to achieve.
Since then I've been feeling quite rough in my head, just really flat, confidence knocked,  is this a withdrawal? is it a normal emotion? is it withdrawal triggered by an event? who knows, all I know it that "this too will pass". The sooner the better.

2.40ml

Down to 2.40ml today and over half way now. I've decided from now on to make only 0.10ml drops and no more 0.20 ml because now I'm lower each drop is steeper and I'm getting more withdrawal effects like the cotton wool fuzzy head and wiered dreams!
Slow and steady wins the race.

My morning regimen...

.. one Boots own brand multi vitamin, four multi vegepa Omega capsules and 2.50ml prozac!

So true...

Funnies

Prozac reduction timeline

Pink Floyd - Comfortably Numb

This song is so incredibly beautiful and I always thought "comfortably numb" was a really good description for the effect prozac has. It certainly does make you comfortably numb.

Dream again

I had that recurring dream again last night, packing away I was, no one else was worried about having to get the packing done, and I was getting really annoyed because it was the end of the holiday and no one else was worried about missing the flight or whatever. Still puzzling over this, same dream, I'm sure there is a higher power trying to tell me something.

So dizzy today!

Today I was just feeling so dizzy, like I might fall over, it wore off as the day went on, but I almost thought I was going to have to come home from work, I just felt so fuzzy :(

officially half way - 2.50mls (10mg)

Yup, I am officially half way, it's only taken me a little over 2 years LOL.

Vivid dreams and emotions

I've been having such vivid and bizarre dreams and the other morning I woke up in tears but couldn't remember why!
I've also been feeling much more emotion coming back now and in a really good way because I think I have been emotionally a bit numb for so long. I'm finding myself easily moved by different things now and it's soooo good to have that feeling back!!

I feel SO much better now!

Phew! How nice to feel "normal" again instead of profoundly depressed and sad, at least I know yet again it is a withdrawal and I can "ride it out".

That dream again

Yup I've had it again, in fact I think I've had it a few times lately, this time we were back at old two up two down first home, and it was a right mess.

Some reassurance was needed

 My question

I'll try not to ramble, I have been very sucessfully withdrawing from prozac (after 10 years of failed attempts). It's taken me two years to reduce from 5ml to where I am now at 2.60mls (that's how slow I've been taking it! All has gone well up to now, the past week I've been getting feelings of profound sadness a little anxiety, the waves come and go and feel like my old depression/failed withdrawal attempts in the past.


 Is this a withdrawal that will pass in time? or is this the real me? feeling a bit confused but rationally I think this is a withdrawal reaction but it's something I've not felt for a long time. Anyone relate?



The answer

**, this is normal in withdrawal/recovery . Your chemistry will be changing regularly and will do so even for years after you have totally discontinued the drug.



The difference now is it comes and goes, right?



I've never seen anyone go into a depressed state after stopping a drug unless it is stopped too quickly. This is a reaction of the biochemistry.



People have been sold a lie when they are told depression is genetic. It's not. Someone might say their mother was depressed and so is their sister. This is genetic only in as much as behavior is learned (children learn to mimic parents' reactions without knowing it so if mom is depressed children learn to be depressed). The other cause is poor diet. This makes all the difference in the world.



It is perfectly normal for people to experience a couple of periods of depression in a lifetime. An argument can be made for the use of this but that's a huge topic. Any doctor who has not been brainwashed by the drug companies who want you to believe the genetic lie so they can sell you drugs for life will tell you that depression is self-limiting. What prevents it from resolving in most people is nutritional and/or the unwillingness to meet life on life's terms (people who do this are usually people who believe that life is sometimes "unfair").



As I said, you'll feel many things at various times on this journey. Just ride it out. If it stays more than a couple weeks at most, check your diet and supplements. If this isn't it, increase the drug by one dose. This is sometimes necessary as you get into the lower doses. Don't stay long at the increased dose. A week or 10 days will be enough to get you unstuck. Then reduce again and you should be okay.



--C
 
and sure enough I do feel a lot better today, phew!

Blah...

OK well for the past week I have been feeling really quite "blah", like a low level depression, no not really depression, well maybe but very mild and just kind of flat. Hope this passes soon, can't help wondering if it's here to stay but that's negative thinking we all know what happens when you get into negative thinking spirals.

Wow I had that dream again!

Had a lovley day, beautiful weather, reconnected with a school friend, we met for lunch at an Italian restaurant and had a lovley time.
Then last night I had that dream again, it was the end of a two week holiday, and we'd had a great time, but there was a mind boggling amount of packing to do like moving house, not just a couple of suitcases, and a real feeling of sadness, what the heck does it mean?

2.60ml

2.60ml today, small drop this time or I think my head will go into cotton wool mode again.

Out of sorts

I have been feeling so out of sorts the past couple of days, I nearly came home from work early (sick) today, woke up with a splitting headache, my head is very fuzzy and cotton wool like and feel like I can't get a handle on things, I just know it's my head adjusting to a drop in prozac and I've got to ride it out, but I just feel so tired and drained :(

Cotton wool head and a bad dream

I've had a bit of a fuzzy cotton wool head this week, a bit like when I used to withdraw the old fashioned way. I can only assume it's because I'm getting lower down on the dose now so each drop is a bigger drop if that makes sense.
Had a bad dream last night, I was crying and crying and grieving, but not sure who or what for and I woke up in tears but then I was rapidly relieved that it was only a dream.

2.70mls

Nearly half way.

Following on from Jury Service

A friend at work found this article of the Guardian web site 10th January 2010

Call to lift ban on jury service for people with mental illnessBarristers join forces with mental health charity to urge rethink




Denis Campbell, health correspondent The Observer, Sunday 10 January 2010 Article historyMinisters are facing demands to scrap an "unfair and discriminatory" law that bans thousands from being jurors because they have suffered from mental ill-health.



Campaigners claim that many law-abiding citizens are wrongly excluded from jury service after being treated for conditions such as depression, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.



One in four Britons suffers mental illness at some point in their lives, and one in 10 is prescribed antidepressants, which would be enough to debar them.



Rethink, a mental health charity supported by barristers in England and Wales, will this week launch a campaign to have the rule rescinded. It agrees that some people's mental state makes them unfit to be jurors, but argues that many others are victims of an "archaic" ban.



More than 9,000 people a year in England are refused permission to serve on juries. The government promised in 2004 – and again in early 2008 – to review the situation, but has not done so.



The ban arises from the Juries Act 1974. A section on "mentally disordered persons" bars from jury service anyone "who suffers or has suffered from mental illness, psychopathic disorder, mental handicap or severe mental handicap, and on account of that condition either is resident in a hospital or other similar institution, or regularly attends for treatment by a medical practitioner". Rethink wants that replaced with a new definition of "capacity", based on the 2005 Mental Capacity Act, which would allow many of those currently banned to serve, while excluding those who are genuinely unfit.



Stephen Fry, the actor and comedian, who has suffered from bipolar disorder since childhood, is backing the campaign. "There are thousands of people with mental health problems who are willing and perfectly capable of serving on a jury, but who find themselves rejected solely because they see a doctor from time to time for support or medication," he said. "Exclusion purely on the grounds of treatment for a mental health problem is unfair and discriminatory."



Rethink cites Winston Churchill as someone who, owing to his depression, would be banned. Paul Corry, Rethink's director of public affairs, said that about 50,000 people with mental health problems had been excluded since the government's first pledge in 2004 to consult on the issue.



"People should be judged on their capacity, rather than being arbitrarily written off. It is high time the government carried out a consultation and considered outlawing this archaic and discriminatory practice, which prevents capable citizens from carrying out a basic civic duty."



The Criminal Bar Association, which represents barristers in England and Wales, also argues that the ban is wrong. "Trial by jury is a vital component of our criminal justice system and, in order to work at its best, juries should represent a cross-section of society," said Paul Mendelle, its chairman. "Figures suggest that one in four people will be affected by mental health problems, so it is inappropriate to impose a blanket ban that prevents anyone with a history of mental illness from sitting on a jury without assessment of their capacity."



But the Ministry of Justice ruled out any revision of the rule, and refused to say why the government had reneged on its pledges to consult. While ministers were committed to tackling the stigma and discrimination around mental ill-health, "any change would need to strengthen our jury system. There can be no question of changing the law to allow people to serve as jurors where their ability to do so is in doubt", said a spokesman.

2.90mls

Yup I have now broken the 3ml barrier and still going strong!

Jury Service

I had a letter several days ago asking me to do Jury Service, I was really excited, it's something I always wanted to do, so I filled in the form and sent it back, not really thinking much about it, the form asked some questions about health and the last question was about mental health, and weather you'd ever been sectioned under the mental health act, which I havn't, but I answered honestly about the past post natal depression and prozac use, almost by return of post I was rejected, and I know it was down to my answer about depression, it felt like a kick in the teeth and I was quite insulted, because I'm the most stable unstable person I know and I know one person far more unstable than me who has done jury service, still that's only my opinion and I suppose they have to have some guidelines/rules to follow.

Three followers!

I just noticed my blog has 3 followers, welcome to you whoever you are! LOL

Femail article on antidepressants

Long term effects of antidepressants

Femail web site was running an article on antidepressants today, it's good when the media report on things like this, sad though that so many people have such negative attitudes to mental illness though.