 What is up everybody? This is Chris from the Rewired Soul where we talk about the problem but focus on the solution And if you're new to my channel, my channel is all about mental health So if you're somebody like me who is regularly trying to improve your mental and emotional well-being Make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell and we are about to go on a little journey I'm going to discuss my history with mental health medication specifically anti anxiety and antidepressant medications And I know I know that you check that disclaimer at the beginning of this video But just to reiterate do not do anything with your medications without talking to a doctor Okay, it is unsafe and you don't want to do that. All right. I will share a little bit about the one time I made that dumb mistake but anyways Before I get to why I am no longer taking my anti anxiety slash antidepressant medications Let me explain why I got them on them in the first place. So some of you know, I'm a recovering drug addict and alcoholic I got clean on June 23rd 2012. That was my 27th birthday And I didn't know anything about mental health or mental illness or anything like that But throughout my life. I just knew that my brain was Acting different than everybody else, right specifically when it came to anxiety That is like my primary Disorder I've struggled with depression as well But I started self-medicating with drugs and alcohol that was how I was getting through it But as many of you know substance abuse only makes things worse. So anyways when I got sober in 2012 I Was having a panic attack. All right, and I was telling my mom about it My mom is a psychologist and I was telling her like what was going on. I was confused I had no idea what was happening. It was in the early stages of my recovery and she's like It sounds like you're having a panic attack. She's like, you should go see your doctor and I was like, okay So I went down and I saw my primary care doctor and Yeah, after some appointments and everything like that. I was diagnosed with a generalized anxiety disorder as well as depression So she put me on the medication Lexa pro Lexa pro is an antidepressant But it also helps with anxiety because I am a recovering drug addict I can't take potentially addictive medications So I can't take things like Xanax or Valium those medications act a little bit quicker Right, they go straight to the amygdala in the brain where the fight-flight-of-freeze response is going off It helps calm that sucker down But as some of you know those medications can become addictive So I was put on Lexa pro and I stayed on that and it managed my anxiety for a very long time Um, I got to a point where this is something that I don't know if anybody else struggles with this who is a recovering pill addict but I was about a year or two into my recovery after being on the meds and I just I didn't want to be on any medications like my primary drug of choice was prescription painkillers and I didn't like How pills were holding holding me hostage like that's what my brain told me And I didn't want to be on any medication So one day I made the very dumb decision that once I run out of my medication. I'm just gonna I'm gonna stop Right and I I ran out I stopped taking them for a day or two It was fine And then I was at work and I started having a panic attack and I was freaking out and it was on a Friday and My doctor's office was closed So I couldn't get a refill and this is one of the many reasons why you don't do this And I couldn't get a refill until Monday. So it's like my dumb decision led to me having to deal with my anxiety All weekend long Until I was able to get that refill, but anyways getting off your medications without Supervision from a doctor. It's dangerous. Some of these medications have Very very terrible side effects like some of them Make you even more depressed some of them give you Ideation to take your own life and things like never ever ever ever get off your medications without a doctor's supervision so I got back on my medications and Eventually, I realized that my lexapro wasn't doing as much as it was before I got tolerant, right? So I went to my doctor. I got my dosage up. I think this was years ago. So don't quote me on this I think I was at 10 milligrams and she opted to 20 milligrams And about three months later. I got that tolerance again And I told her and she's like, well, I can't really do much like this is the Maximum dosage I can give you and that's actually when I found meditation Those of you who watched my interview with dr. Judson Brewer the other day talking about, you know I explained I got into meditation because my my medications were only working so much and Mindfulness meditation kind of filled that gap of what the medications were no longer doing for me, but later I Started, you know Recognizing the the side effects right like I had dealt with the side effects for a while. There's a wide range of them I won't go into all the details the most predominant one was like That that feeling of numbness like just not feeling any emotions. So I talked with my doctor I was like, hey, I would like to get off these medications I've been doing a lot of like self-care when it comes to meditation when it comes to 12-step meetings and journals and everything like that So she gradually helped me taper off and I stayed off for a while. I actually did this a couple times But eventually my anxiety would kick back in primarily because of life circumstances Like one of the times my anxiety came back Was when I started dating this this woman like way before my beautiful girlfriend Tristan And it was a toxic relationship and my anxiety flared up. So I got back on the meds But anyways, the side effects were there again. So I talked to her and she switched me to Prozac And this was about a year a year and a half ago. So I started taking Prozac and it was all good. I took it for a long time Not as many side effects. There were periods when I started feeling that numbness again, but it was More rare than it was on the Lexapro And Around Christmas time, I think it was December I I've discussed emotional regulation in recent videos that I've done on borderline personality disorder And dialectical behavioral therapy, but emotional regulation is something that I've struggled with most of my life I'm not diagnosed with bbd, but some people do struggle with emotional regulation And for a few years now my mom's recommended getting on a mood stabilizer So I went to my doctor and I was like, hey, what do you think about me getting off of my antidepressants? And me getting on a mood stabilizer lamik doll. That's the one my mom recommends. She she's been on it for a while now And my doctor was like, yeah, sure. Like, you know, we could try it, you know, so Yeah, in December I tapered off of the prozac. I started taking lamik doll and it's been It's been three months that I've been off my antidepressant anti anxiety medications So, yeah, like my experience my experience with it It's been it's been good like Um in the last three months even in the current state of you know, what's going on in the world Uh, my anxiety hasn't been bad. It hasn't been terrible. I've had a couple flare-ups in the last three months But I've been turning to the other tools That I have, right? I've been trying to meditate every single morning for at least five to ten minutes I have an awesome therapist who I try to talk to at least once a week Um, I use the better help online therapy app. There's an affiliate link down in the description if you want to check it out But I try to do like an appointment with her every week But if not, we do like little check-ins because you can like message on the app and everything But she gives me exercises and things like that too. I'm a huge fan of rational emotive behavioral therapy For me, that is one of the the best therapies for my type of anxiety. My anxiety is very irrational all right, I get into these these thought loops and ruminations and everything That are completely irrational. So rational emotive behavioral therapy Um, they have like the abc's right like the activating event event the belief the consequences and you kind of look at it And you start to retrain how your mind is thinking about these things, right? Um, I also do a little bit of cognitive behavioral therapy that is similar It's catching these certain thoughts or the behaviors that we have associated with those thoughts that aren't really helping us And oftentimes they're hurting us, you know So there's a lot of different therapies that I use to manage my anxiety When it comes to my depression I have a video coming out with uh, dr. Alex korb. It's actually a podcast episode two But anyways, I recently reread his book upward spiral. It's about the neuroscience behind depression And there's so many little things that you can do to start boosting your serotonin and endorphins and dopamine and oxytocin and All these other things. So I try to do those things if I start to feel Down and depressed one of the best things too. One of the best things is a gratitude list. All right Um, just five things five things that you're grateful for it helps your brain get out of this Tunnel vision on the negative and it forces you to look at the positive There's a lot of studies a lot of research around this. I don't always write it down. Sometimes I just go through a list in my head Aside from just like typical mindfulness meditation. I practice loving kindness meditation Like for me when I look at my mental health issues a lot of it is very self-centered, right? I'm thinking about me me me me me me me me loving kindness medication not medication loving kindness meditation is Send sending kind thoughts and well wishes to other people, right? um, I think I did a video Bringing people through that meditation a while back, but that's very helpful for me um, like I started out sending these thoughts and well wishes to the people closest to me and then I kind of brought in that that feeling of love and compassion to Others right, you know, it expands kind of like everybody, you know I hope that you're happy and healthy and loved, you know and all that kind of stuff. Um, but yeah it's been it's been good and like For me, it's just I want I want people to know that they are there are options um People don't like when I talk about it, but uh, but yeah We are we are kind of trained to believe that medications are the The end all be all like you take this pill it will fix you And from my experience as well as the experience of many others who I've spoken to over the years Like that's not the case medications are not a silver bullet and That's why I feel is so important for all of us to not only take our medications But we have to do other things as well Like something some of you might know of if you've been in a psychology class is the biopsychosocial model, right? They use this for mental illness. They use this for addiction, but Not only is it the biological factors, right? Like the chemical imbalances the the genetics, right? But also your thought patterns the psych the psychological part the social part Like what are things happening in your life, right? Like constantly being stressed about money or family or whatever it is like the situation We're all in right now where we have to quarantine These things can affect your mental health as well. So if we just focus on the biological aspect We're neglecting all these other things and a lot of us start to wonder Why am I not doing better yet? Why right? So regardless of what you took away from this video If you are on medications and you're still not feeling as good as you would like to Start thinking about that a little bit start thinking about what else you can do in your life to improve your mental health Like it's more than just taking a pill every single morning or at night or whatever it is Start looking at your thought patterns and you know different forms of therapy if you can't afford therapy like i'm telling you There are so many Worksheets online. There are so many books on different forms of therapy and everything like that There are so many things that you can do even if you cannot afford Therapies some of the smartest people in the world who created these therapies Have put that knowledge and that wisdom into books and you can educate yourself about them and start doing those practices I love therapy because It's like a check-in where they let you know like hey, are you still on the right path? But sometimes we have to work with what we have and if we don't have the money to afford therapy We got to do other things and meditation is totally free. My entire meditation practice started off with Free smartphone apps, you know what I mean? But anyways, I would love to hear from all of you about your experience with anti anxiety medications anti depressants Um How've they affected you? Have you ever come off of them? Just share your experience down in the comments below because i'm just one guy I'm just one guy and I like to hear about the experiences from others All right, anyways, that's all I got for this video If you like this video, please give it a thumbs up if you're new make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell And a huge huge. Thank you to everybody supporting the channel over on patreon As well as everybody who supports the channel by buying my mental health books at the rewiredsoul.com As well as the merch from the merch store. All right. Thanks again for watching I'll see you next time