How I gave up Antidepressants!

I feel like I am free again. Or, maybe a better way to explain it would be, I feel my life is finally under-control.

I first admitted having problems last year.

There were many things happening in my life at that stage, mainly a legal issue that has now been resolved.

I really felt like I was drowning and my life was kinda out of control so that’s when I decided to take antidepressants.

It was the best thing I could have done at that particular time in my life.

However, I knew it was never going to be a permanent thing and I also knew it was a band-aid fix. I knew there were lots of things I needed to sort out.

Besides the main problem (the legal one) that was kind of out of my hands the other issues I think were mainly the pressure that I allowed The Imperfect Mum have on my life.

I really needed to put some boundaries up and I really needed to sort some things out. Besides those two issues, I believe one of my biggest problems was disorganization.

I was so overwhelmed with everything around me I didn’t really know where to start.

The clutter and the noise really took over. Since making some really small changes in regards to how I live my life and how I disciplined the kids i.e making sure they stuck to their routine. And making them responsible for certain things. Have really helped me and them.

It’s incredible how these little changes have had such a huge impact. So I have decided that over the next couple of months I will share some of those with you.

It’s nothing out of the box they are just simple little things you can implement straight away.

Besides the practical changes in my life I allowed myself plenty of time to slowly cut out the antidepressants and made sure there were no external stresses in my life.

I didn’t want to put myself or my family under undue stress and most importantly wanted to succeed in cutting them out of my life.

I ended up being on ‘them’ for 15 months so it was important to do it properly.

It took about a month of cutting the dosage down then spacing out the days so firstly I went from 100grams to 50 grams then once my body responded to that I then spaced out the days from every second to third to forth.

I am proud of myself for giving them away, however, I am extra proud of the fact that I made the right decision for myself and family and took the step in seeing a GP and decided that I needed them during that stressful period in my life.

It is very important that if you feel like you are suffering from some sort of mental illness that you act, don’t let the stigma that is attached to mental health rule your decisions or your actions.

It’s important that you act and do the right thing for not just you but your family also.

Have you ever experienced depression or anxiety?

Here are some links if you like:

http://www.headspace.org.au

http://www.beyondblue.org.au

All the best!

Kristy – The Imperfect mum xx