A Tiny Little Pill

Some of you may know, some of you may not - but I am on anti-depressants.
After feeling well and happy for quite some time now I made the decision that it was time to come off them and start myself on the next step in life - creating my own internal happy drug.

However I am having extreme issues in dealing with the "withdrawal" that I'm sure my doctor didnt plan on - as the schedule she gave me has yet to be followed.
I havent even managed to make it to the second step.

The Plan:

Week One and Two - stop taking ONE pill on a Saturday (resulting in nausea, dizziness and what is fondly referred to as "brain shivers" on Sunday)
Week Three and Four - stop taking TWO pills on Friday and Saturday.

I just cant do it. And there are still several other weeks and months AFTER this step to go.

The last two Saturdays I have broken down crying (oh yes...uncontrollable crying is another side effect) because I felt so terrible.
I can honestly say that I have never felt this bad in my entire life.
Broken finger? No problem.
Serious Flu? Piece of cake.
Mysterious virus that robbed me of my appetite for 3 weeks? Easy Peasy!

This is beyond anything I have ever felt or experienced before.

I have vertigo so I cant really walk anywhere without feeling like I'm going to lose my balance. I also find I can walk into walls very easily.
Dizzyness and "brain shivers" cause even further crashes into walls, or the inability to co-ordinate my limbs.
Nausea - I have yet to throw up and I am not looking forward to the moment I actually do accomplish this feat. I havent thrown up since I was a teenager (a fact I'm very proud of) and I dont particularly want to break this record, but every week I try this it is looking more and more likely.

And this is on top of the normal, every day side effects I get which include: rapid heart beat, hot flushes/night sweats and itchiness.

So basically I feel like absolute shite. I haven't managed two days off the medication because I feel so disgusting I give in and take a damn pill - and then after taking the damn pill I then get the side effects resulting from TAKING the damn pill (damn pill, damn pill, damn pill - okay it's out of my system now). So I've had to resort to sleeping through any dosage.

Pretty much my weekends have not been fantastic. I lie everytime anyone asks me if I had a good weekend - "oh yes it was fine."

I dont know how I'm going to do this. And I'm not sure how much longer Vladdy can keep mopping me up off the floor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venlafaxine