Depression Confessions exists to help facilitate an open and honest about how depression impacts my life. Depression is different for everyone but there are still many common threads and we shouldn’t be afraid to talk about it.

I’ve been talking about my ongoing war with depression for many years now and it’s a liberating experience. I encourage everyone to be open and honest with the people in your lives about how depression is impacting you. Silence and shame are two of depressions greatest allies.

I’m writing today to update you on how my journey to withdrawal from antidepressants is going.

I’ve been on Paxil and Wellbutrin for many, many years now but it was time to come off the meds and see where I’m at. This was a big decision and involved months of internal debate. I talked it over with my wife, my doctor and my therapist before making a final decision.

I’m now two weeks into a medically supervised withdrawal from Paxil. The first week was awful. I felt like I was dealing with the worst case of flu I’ve ever experienced. Cold sweats, body aches, headaches, nausea and weird feelings in my brain. Thankfully, that all ended after the first week but that’s when the insomnia kicked in. That also seems to be better and I’m grateful.

As I’m entering into the third week of withdrawal from Paxil, I feel amazing.

I’ve got a great deal of time left on this journey to completely withdrawl from the antidepressants. There will be more misery and unpleasantness but I’ll push through and continue moving forward.

I’m very optimistic about this whole thing and I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings.