Success stories of getting off an SSRI?

[Seekingpeace]

Hi, I'm new to this forum and I'd really appreciate someone's insights into SSRIs. I've been suffering from anxiety for the past 3-4 years and it severely impaired my driving as I can no longer get on highways. I've just been prescribed Zoloft. I've read that various SSRIs have helped many people with reliving their anxiety symptoms. Many have been taking it for years if not decades. However, I have yet to encounter anyone who have been on the medication long term, were able to successfully get off the medication and be cured of their anxiety/phobia. If you have such success, could you please share? For those of you who have been on an SSRI long term, knowing what you know now, would you have taken it if you had the option to do it all over again? Any advice is much appreciated!!

[raggamuffin]

There's a lot of people on the forums here who have taken SSRI's long term. Medication is best paired with therapy to really tget to grips with and treat your anxiety. The medication is a band aid, the therapy will help you to address and overcome the issues that are causing you anxiety.

Ed

[gypsylee]

I've been on and off SSRIs for 20 years. The short answer is yes, I would still take them knowing what I know. Compared to some of the other things I've been on (benzos, anti-psychotics, you name it) the SSRIs haven't given me much grief and have helped me out of some very bad anxiety and depression.

[Seekingpeace]

Thank you so much, ragamuffin and gypsylee for your responses. gypslee, do you plan to ever come off of SSRIs?

[gypsylee]

Not in the foreseeable future. I came off them last year and then something happened which caused me to have a bit of a breakdown, so I had to go through the whole saga again of starting them. If I knew my life was going to be peaceful (like anyone does!) I would, but there's too many possible dramas that can send me into a frenzy at the moment. So I guess I stay on them as a precaution. They're not easy to come off but I wouldn't call them addictive because you don't get an immediate effect and you don't need more and more to get the same effect.

[JustaGal]

Not in the foreseeable future. I came off them last year and then something happened which caused me to have a bit of a breakdown, so I had to go through the whole saga again of starting them. If I knew my life was going to be peaceful (like anyone does!) I would, but there's too many possible dramas that can send me into a frenzy at the moment. So I guess I stay on them as a precaution. They're not easy to come off but I wouldn't call them addictive because you don't get an immediate effect and you don't need more and more to get the same effect.

Ditto.............

[Seekingpeace]

Thank you so much for all of your responses!