More brains!
Straight to the cut this time.
After a week on half the previous dose, it was still kicking my arse with hours upon hours of extra anxiety, so starting yesterday, I'm down to 12.5 mg, the smallest dose I have ever taken, and a quarter of what I was on less than two weeks ago.
I may have done myself a disservice by reading up on withdrawal, which is pretty terrifying stuff, but I need to remember that the horror stories I'm hearing are generally going to be the worst of the worst experiences (people who have easy titrations don't tend to go onto support message boards and post how great they feel, I imagine -- like the sylph said to me last night, they're going to be too busy leading their lives).
Two days in, I'm still feeling a kick from the medicine, but again, it's a smaller one. I have managed to get some time off work in the form of seven afternoons -- leaving at 2 pm rather than 5 pm, so I can continue going to the office (anytime I take actual time off due to stress, it makes coming back to work an anxiety party, so hopefully this modified schedule will help that) and yet still have some more family and recovery time during the latest Adjustment Period.
Meanwhile, I need to stop researching. I need to stop reading. I need to stop trying to figure this out any further than I have. I think I've found all that I'm going to find, and while I've finally figured some things out, I don't think I get to know everything. After hours of searching, I cannot find any stories of people with circumstances similar to this, where a simple lifestyle change made such a difference to their medication tolerance (and perhaps necessity). I don't know if the extra water has flushed me clean to the point that every dose feels like my first. I don't know if the extra water has raised my inherent brain chemistry to the point that the medication feels like an unneeded intrusion.
What I do know is that I need to give it time now. I've already dosed down way faster than recommended. Now I just need to tough it out, deal with the jitters and whatever else may be coming (no brain zaps, thankfully), and let things settle. I need to stop reading support boards and start playing video games and watching anime and enjoying my family, not necessarily in that order.
As I said before, the waiting part? Still sucks. But time has always healed this in the past, and time will be needed to do it again. Along with some better life choices, of course.
After a week on half the previous dose, it was still kicking my arse with hours upon hours of extra anxiety, so starting yesterday, I'm down to 12.5 mg, the smallest dose I have ever taken, and a quarter of what I was on less than two weeks ago.
I may have done myself a disservice by reading up on withdrawal, which is pretty terrifying stuff, but I need to remember that the horror stories I'm hearing are generally going to be the worst of the worst experiences (people who have easy titrations don't tend to go onto support message boards and post how great they feel, I imagine -- like the sylph said to me last night, they're going to be too busy leading their lives).
Two days in, I'm still feeling a kick from the medicine, but again, it's a smaller one. I have managed to get some time off work in the form of seven afternoons -- leaving at 2 pm rather than 5 pm, so I can continue going to the office (anytime I take actual time off due to stress, it makes coming back to work an anxiety party, so hopefully this modified schedule will help that) and yet still have some more family and recovery time during the latest Adjustment Period.
Meanwhile, I need to stop researching. I need to stop reading. I need to stop trying to figure this out any further than I have. I think I've found all that I'm going to find, and while I've finally figured some things out, I don't think I get to know everything. After hours of searching, I cannot find any stories of people with circumstances similar to this, where a simple lifestyle change made such a difference to their medication tolerance (and perhaps necessity). I don't know if the extra water has flushed me clean to the point that every dose feels like my first. I don't know if the extra water has raised my inherent brain chemistry to the point that the medication feels like an unneeded intrusion.
What I do know is that I need to give it time now. I've already dosed down way faster than recommended. Now I just need to tough it out, deal with the jitters and whatever else may be coming (no brain zaps, thankfully), and let things settle. I need to stop reading support boards and start playing video games and watching anime and enjoying my family, not necessarily in that order.
As I said before, the waiting part? Still sucks. But time has always healed this in the past, and time will be needed to do it again. Along with some better life choices, of course.