The Weaning Begins (Day 4)
Saturday, September 9th, 2000.
Today is my 4th day of weaning myself off Paxil, but this time I’m doing it slowly. The first time I stopped was cold turkey because my doctor said it was okay to do that. That was a few months ago, and I haven’t been the same since.
It took me this long to get my courage back up to give it another try. Outwardly, I appear pleasant and calm, but inside I’m scared and have been at least for the past month anticipating getting off the Paxil again. As well informed as I’ve become since the hell of my initial withdrawal experience, I’m still scared. Everything I went through during my withdrawal has definitely left an impression on me, and one that I’d much rather have done without.
But I’m beginning to feel some relief now that I’ve gone four days without any withdrawal symptoms. I say this realizing how early it is the weaning process, but so far nothing has happened — and that’s better than what I was anticipating. Maybe now I can begin to relax. With this stuff on my mind, I have not been myself; I haven’t been able to enjoy my life.
I’m on 20mg of Paxil, and I’m alternating between 20mg and 15mg. I’m going to do this until I’m ready to lower it again. Then I’ll be alternate between 15mg and 10mg until I’m ready to go lower, and so on.
I’ve been taking multivitamins to help boost my immune system, and I think they’re helping (I began taking them about two weeks before I began the weaning). I don’t exercise much, but I go for a long walk at least once a day, and that’s about as energetic as I get.
I haven’t been sleeping well, but that’s probably more to do with my own self-induced anxiety. (And who the hell wouldn’t feel a little wary if they experienced electrical surges in their brain the last time they tried to get off the damn Paxil?) This is a very preliminary report, but so far so good. For the first time since my first withdrawal experience, I find myself with some vision for the future again. Overall, or generally, I still feel somewhat apathetic, like I’m not really living for anything, but I’m not feeling as apathetic as I was. And that’s something.
My new doctor “didn’t see the point” in alternating the dosages like I am, but he didn’t say I couldn’t either. He’s allowing me control of my treatment (besides, if he objected, I’d just go to someone else). His attitude is that as long as it doesn’t hurt me, I can do what I like. He’d rather I dropped by 10mg straight off the bat (ha, ha, ha), but he’s not objecting to my methods.
We’ll see how it goes…
P.S., Thanks again to everyone at paxilprogress.org who helped me through the hell of my initial withdrawal experience a couple months ago.
P.S. (Sept. 2006): I’ve been adding categories as I contine to repost Paxil Free. From this post, I could add the category “Scared.” I could probably add “Apathy” and “Depersonalization” too. But all of these categories would apply to just about every post on this blog. So if you notice any categories that seem to be missing, that’s why.