Many People Taking Antidepressants Discover They Cannot Quit

Anti depressants along with support from my family and therapist saved my life. Prior to taking anti depressants I would get into moods so depressed that I would have significant chest pain and headaches. The headaches were so severe that without any consideration I almost jumped from the roof of one my school buildings.

Within the first week of taking anti depressants (wellbutrin, I later switched to prozac) I would at random moments of the day begin to remember funny memories. I would be walking to my dorm from class and remember a funny gag from the simpsons and break into a stupid grin.

After two years on anti depressants I was able to stop taking them. I was able to do this by accepting and understanding that while I may have real reasons to be sad, the underlying reason that I was dwelling on these negative thoughts was my brain chemistry. Once I accepted this I was able to justify cheaper less harmful ways of medicating my depression. Whenever I began to feel depressed I would simply go to my tv and start watching episodes of `It's always sunny in philadelphia` or whatever comedy made me happy

I think the worst mistake people with depression make is reinforcing their sadness by listening to sad music, watching sad movies or reading sad books when in fact they should be doing the opposite. They also allow their depression to become part of their identity.

Much worse, something that can't be compared. Anyone would prefer a newborn which is an external person that you provide care and watch grow. Sure it will keep you up but it also provides emotions to help fuel you past those weak moments. When you are internally off where you can't sleep the affect is different.

>The drugs have helped millions of people ease depression and anxiety, and are widely regarded as milestones in psychiatric treatment.

History is littered with harmful, poorly-thought out "psychiatric treatments" that were widely regarded as milestones. Even if there are a tiny minority of people who's mental condition is so bad that scrambling their brain with drugs will lead to an "improvement", the widespread reliance on these drugs to treat the every-growing number of depressed and anxious people is not a good thing for individuals, or for society. This is especially true when it comes to young children, whose brains are being warped during the critical stages of development. Over a million children under 5 years old are being dosed with these mind-altering chemicals based on ridiculous ADHD or "defiance" disorders. Over ten million children under 17. Its very telling that the intelligentsia at the apex of society think that the answer to fixing our broken children is to drug them rather than to fix the broken society that they perpetuate.

https://www.cchrint.org/psychiatric-drugs/children-on-psychi...

I'm getting there one day at a time :)

Oh, hmm thats kind of you. I understand that reaction. That probably sounded rather sad, so I reflected whilst writing this response.

First and foremost I have one very good friend (my partner!), and a rather good relation with my mother (my father passed away, alas). I consider my mother like a friend, who given her age needs me more and more and this will increase. Same with my mother-in-law. That's both OK, but also a burden of stress.

It appears difficult to become friends as you grow older compared to being young. I burned ships with my old friends because the relations were no longer mutual; no longer developmental ("stuck" or "grown different paths") or downright parasitic. Ironically, my last major friendship was my best friend wanting to use mushrooms with me at my place while I was no longer interested in recreational drugs. I was an avid gamer, but no longer have time to play games so all friends who I had who were into gaming I no longer have that in common with. That's a big blow in my social network and friendship list.

The gist is, I find individuals inherently boring and basically I don't want [new] friends; they're a hassle and nuisance. Friends are a distraction, just like this very forum. At best, they're interesting, like this forum. At worst, its annoying to waste a Sunday on a birthday (with mindless chit-chat, annoying opinionated people, eating crap I could better buy/cook myself, and travel time/cost), just like you can waste an Sunday on this forum. Heck, like Facebook, rather. OTOH, you reap what you sow. I still got like 100 movies to watch if not more, 20 books to read, etc.

My family and partner's friends and our newborn is more than enough. I need to focus on improving those connections first and foremost since my autism does put those relations under pressure both generally as well as incidentally more so. That plus integrating my autism diagnosis with my career which isn't easy in mid 30s. You could argue I'm not ready for it yet but I didn't start taking SSRIs to become more social. I do want to meet more people with autism, but that's out of self-interest, and a long-term project since right now I still feel overburdened due to the above (mostly our newborn).