Friday, April 20, 2012

What did you say?

After some back and forth with the doctor's office, I have been given the official "OK" to stop Paxil. This is good, although honestly I'd have stopped it without that approval. "It's my body," and all that.

What's not so terribly great is that my doctor says there's really no "one best way" to stop the drug, and that most people experience withdrawals from Paxil to some extent. So, I should just start weaning myself off it by reducing the dosage as fast or slow as seems to work for me. No recommendations. Just, "Call if you have problems or questions."

I like my nurse practitioner a lot more than I like my doctor.

Now, a bit of research on potential withdrawal symptoms has me a little ... worried. Yeah. I know. I'm supposed to be trying not to worry so much, and I am trying. But, well ... I don't really want to experience loss of balance, sleep disturbances, "brain swooshes" (not my term but apparently an accurate one), and oh yeah — auditory hallucinations.

I could probably handle everything but that last bit. I don't want to hear things that aren't there, just like I don't want to see things that aren't there. There is a good reason I never took up the junkie/tweaker lifestyle. My imagination is flamboyant enough on it's own; I think I'd pee myself if I actually saw or heard some of the beasties I think up and draw.

Six-Year-Old-Me remembers some of her wilder imaginings and agrees. I've always been on the slightly morbid side of things. Not that I don't like nice things like unicorns and bunnies and teddy bears and such. I just prefer my unicorns to be the black Night Mares, or my own version of the Corrupted Night Mares (see below). And OK, yeah, bunnies and teddy bears are pushing it. Point: I like dark things. I like light things too, so long as there's some sort of dark twist to them.

And really, I don't want to see or hear this, ever:

    "Night Mare Carnivale" © C. Vandever, 2006

... or this:
    "Night Mare Quick Sketch" © C. Vandever, 2011

Yes, I drew both of those, and yes, Six-Year-Old-Me approves (I used to be enthralled by the covers on horror movies at the movie store, even with the latest beloved Benji movie tucked under one arm). See what I mean? Can you just imagine the slobbery, wheezy, scratchy, hyperventilating breathing of one of those lovies sneaking up behind you, all horsey and brimstone-y and undead?

I can. I don't want to hear that. I think that would freaking paralyze me.

Now, what I don't know is if these auditory hallucinations are that type of sound, or voices, or if it's just weird buzzing/tones. Either way, I'm not interested. Voices would be freaky, too, and weird buzzing and tones that are random and the source of which eludes me drives me batshit. So, paranoid or merely annoyed, I'd still be unhappy.

But that's a possibility I have to accept. My own doctor claims nearly everyone getting off Paxil experiences some form of withdrawal. But in my research some other "medical expert" claimed that only about 20% of people experience withdrawals. Being ever the realist, I'll hope the latter is correct, but prepare for the former.

With no actual guide for getting off this stuff, I just have to figure it out on my own. I am tempted to make a darkly sarcastic remark about the medical system and usefulness, but I'll refrain. So, how do I do this? I have an idea ...

When I started the drug, I was instructed to begin at 10 mg for the first week, then alternate between 20 and 10 mg for the second week, and then just go right on to 20 mg, my current daily dose. Since the drug had to build up in my system before "kicking in," I'm guessing it won't be as simple as just reversing that to get off it. Here's my five-week plan for dosing down:

Week One (starting tonight): Alternate 20/10 mg
Week Two: 10 mg
Week Three: Alternate 10/5 mg
Week Four: 5 mg
Week Five: Alternate 5/0 mg

Week Six, toward the end of May, should be when I'm done ... if all goes well. If it doesn't, I'll stick with the same dosage steps, but double the time for each to two weeks. So I am (perhaps naively) hoping to be Paxil-free by the end of June at the latest.

Six-Year-Old-Me thinks it's a good plan. 30-Year-Old-Me tries not to think too hard about six-year-olds not being optimal at medical advice. 30-Year-Old-Me remembers just how often I fell and got scraped up, and felt no need for cleaning up the blood and dirt. And band-aids? Pshaw. They're for sissies.

So tonight I'm cutting my dose in half. Wish me luck. Heck, at this point I'd settle for non-audible strange dreams, so wish me those, too. And yes, I promise to blog updates on my progress, especially with any drawings of invisible things that creep up and say "Hello."

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