Losing It (Day 100)
Friday, December 15th, 2000 (45th day off Paxil).
Dave wrote:
My emotions are all over the place. I keep bursting into tears very suddenly and out of the blue. Also, in the evenings/nights the last few days I have had really frightening feelings that I’m going to suddenly do something really awful and will just lose control. I feel like something inside me that usually inhibits these actions has come undone and is in danger of activating. It’s really scary.
Has anyone else felt this? It’s not a feeling of wanting it all to end — it’s a feeling that it just suddenly will with some rash action. This is very hard to write — probably to read to. Please reply if you’ve felt the same. I just want to hear there are others going through the same thing — please don’t write and tell how SSRIs are thought to induce suicide — I can’t handle that.
My response:
I know the feeling. You don’t have to describe it to me, and I don’t feel like elaborating on it. I know it too well to want to think about it too much. Since my first attempt at cold turkey withdrawal, I have experienced what you’re describing more than once (the last time I experienced it was about five days ago). I’ve experienced it at various times during my withdrawal and in many variations, but it’s all basically the same thing. It’s extremely difficult and scary to describe, but it’s like a knowledge that I could die now; a human being can only take so much, then something’s gotta give. But that doesn’t even come close to it.
Anyhow, I have lived through it, and continue to do so, because I’m able to avoid things that could set me off.
How I’ve managed to live through these moments, I don’t know. Recently, I even wrote a suicide note. Then I spent an hour or so polishing it up. And so I wrote a note instead of jumping off a bridge. By the time I finished polishing up the note, I’d managed to live through it, and although I wasn’t feeling too hot, I was no longer in danger. It’s the scariest thing I’ve ever had to face. And maybe I survived it by not facing it, by doing something else. Or maybe by actually facing it through writing and saying, “You won’t get me, you motherf**ker!” I don’t really know, and I’m not sure I can talk about it because it’s still very fresh in my mind.
But I’ve survived it and done most of it alone. There are times when I don’t want to talk to anyone, and don’t. I know when I have to be careful. That’s probably what got me through it, a knowledge that, “I have to be careful now.” And I run from everything — probably not the best thing to do (social isolation is usually not a good thing), but when even the slightest thing can set me off, can push my buttons in the wrong way, I make sure not to bump into anything or anyone who could push me more over the line.
Don’t push yourself. Know that now may be a time to be careful. Very careful.
None of this is probably any comfort to you, but what I can I tell you? I’ve been feeling extremely worn down lately and I don’t have as much to give as I used to. But I’m still alive.
Fall head-first into the agony of it. Live through it. Whatever it takes. Maybe that’s what I did. Maybe you can do it too. The main thing is don’t kill yourself. It isn’t you, remember; it’s the damn Paxil withdrawal.