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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be devastated and think I must be a failure

39 replies

fuckingpissedofftoday · 13/02/2016 12:01

I've been trying to come off antidepressants and on half a dose as agreed with my doctor. But for the last maybe 3 weeks things feel very hard again. I tried to jolly myself along but today I'm sitting here feeling so flat and empty. Cried all of last night, because it sounds stupid but I feel like I'm dying of something like ovarian cancer and I have nobody to give me a hug.

I feel like I can't cope with my life without antidepressants and I am so embarrassed by that. Everything overwhelms me really easily. I struggle with poor health and feel physically unwell a lot of the time, and when I'm on the AD's I can stay upbeat and manage a lot better. But other people manage without AD's.

I have no support and am totally alone. Other people have families and friends and partners, and if I give in and am depressed and ill then my chances of developing friendships or even finding a partner are nil.

What is wrong with me that I can't do it?

OP posts:

Lurkedforever1 · 13/02/2016 13:03

I don't know what you've been told, but you're reaction is very common. Even for the group that come of ad's and make a full recovery. You should really feel fully 'better' for 6 months at least before you try and come off medication. And someone should have told you even a full recovery isn't linear. You still get the lows, but over time the troughs become slightly smaller till they eventually level.

More importantly, it's entirely normal not to reach a stage where you've recovered fully without ads, there's no shame in it or question of being a failure. If you took a plaster cast off a broken limb, and realised its still not healed, you wouldn't attach personal failure to needing the cast back on. And if it turned out that your limb would never be pain free without support, you wouldn't blame yourself for needing medical help.

I know there's a lot of stigma attached to mental health, but that's only because the majority of people aren't visibly displaying physical signs. There will be 'happy' people you meet everyday that are either battling or have battled mental illness, and I'm sure if they identified themselves you wouldn't call them failures, which means you aren't either.

thebiscuitindustry · 13/02/2016 13:03

Your negative thoughts are part of the illness. There's nothing wrong in taking ADs to feel the same as non-depressed people. Have you considered asking the GP for some talking therapy?

ChineseDragonLady · 13/02/2016 13:04

The side effects of not taking them may well be worse though?

feebeecat · 13/02/2016 13:06

Beagle do you think you could tell that to your fellow GPs too?
I could have written OPs post, but GP told me it was up to me to just avoid the people who were making my life hard - all family, bit tricky - and just get on with it. Have been off ADs for a couple of years and most of that I just feel like I'm scraping by. I suppose he would argue that I am still functioning, but it's just about.
Lovely, lovely old GP sounds more like you Beagle and seemed to know that I needed some sort of low dose maintenance to keep me doing more than 'getting by'.
Hope you get it sorted soon OP

MerryMarigold · 13/02/2016 13:09

Sometimes it is hard on your own, and sometimes it is hard to be in unhappy marriage, or dealing with kids who have issues/ special needs, or feeling like you are messing other people up, because you are around people with your illness. Probably if life were absolutely perfect, we wouldn't need them (maybe, or maybe we'd need them less!). Just keep taking them, it's an illness like any other, and you need the medication to be 'normal'. I know I do.

KinkyDorito · 13/02/2016 13:11

I'm another daily user. I tried to wean and plummeted, decided to keep on with them. There's no talk of coming off. Citralopram, about 3 or 4 years - can't remember.

It is far better to take them and function .

roundaboutthetown · 13/02/2016 13:11

Side effects are worth worrying about if they are doing more harm than good. Seems to me, your ads are doing more good than harm, if without them you feel as bad about yourself as you clearly do. I would rather feel happy and able to cope than unhappy and unable to cope because I'm scared of not being able to cope with something that might never happen (like a side effect I can't cope with...).

In other words, it's better to make use of ways to help you cope now rather than worrying about the unforeseeable future to such an extent that you guarantee you are unhappy now and in the future.

Have you tried cognitive behavioural therapy, or mindfulness meditation, or relaxation techniques to see if they can help alongside the ads?

DamedifYouDo · 13/02/2016 13:16

You have an illness, you feel better with medication so take the medication to feel better. You are not a failure!

If a diabetic said they were a failure because they had to take insulin you would disagree. Your situation is no different to that.

Don't feel guilty.

roundaboutthetown · 13/02/2016 13:20

Ps how do you know who is coping without ads and who is coping with them? You are being very hard on yourself!

Lurkedforever1 · 13/02/2016 13:20

You're probably also guilty, for want of a better word, of the common symptom of not believing you are genuinely worthy of the right to support. Ime its not uncommon for people with depression to be very supportive and sympathetic of anyone else with depression, whilst subconsciously thinking that in their own case they aren't really worthy, and just need to get a grip/ pull their socks up/ man up etc. Hence other people are worthy, but deeming yourself a failure.

Obviously that's completely incorrect, but finding things to beat yourself up over is part and parcel of a very lonely illness.

Eliza22 · 13/02/2016 13:44

Please return to your GP and talk this through.

Lots of people take antidepressants on an ongoing basis. You haven't failed. Life IS hard and we all need support. Being alone is tremendously hard and you must seek help xx

thebiscuitindustry · 13/02/2016 13:49

I agree with round and Lurked. What would you say to someone who told you they needed ADs? Would you tell them they were weak and a failure? If not, what stops you from having the same compassion towards yourself?

witsender · 13/02/2016 13:53

I have accepted that I will prob be on mine for life...it is a chemical imbalance. Much like the thyroid problem I have which also needs daily medication but no-one blinks an eye at!

TowerRavenSeven · 13/02/2016 14:37

I have anxiety and after years of rejecting AD I finally decided to give them a try and I feel so much better mentally on them. I always rejected the idea because I insisted I had anxiety and was not depressed which I still hold as true but I'm so glad I tried them since they work for my anxiety!

My former psychiatrist from years back told me something so powerful: Don't compare yourself with anyone else! Everyone is different, different situations, and it doesn't really matter if someone else can cope with one thing and you find it difficult, you might find something easier than them.

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