Published on 12, July, 2020
hi, my doctor wants to start me on 50mg of sertraline for a few months for depression and anxiety. I've done some research into it and the side effects, however most ND people seem to have had negative effects. are there any autistic people on here that it has actually been helpful and worked for?
My experience of these antidepressants is that they work for a little while, but then don't work and when you try to get off them you get 3 month withdrawal with brain zaps which are really intense and dangerous, so after a while you are only taking them so you don't get withdrawal, much like narcotics. I say dangerous because I would get brain zaps (reward yourself with serotonin that's not there) when crossing the road and my vision would go blurred and I would feel dizzy.
Doctors try to put me on them now (off them 10 years) and I tell them that I would take heroin over them because I know the withdrawal wouldn't be as bad. Never taken heroin but had opiate addiction before, withdrawal was a week in bed with imodium and 2 weeks of being so bored you want to kill yourself, which was better than 3 months of brain zaps.
If any doctor ever says "discontinuation syndrome" just tell them that's a marketing ploy to not call it withdrawal. If only tobacco companies thought of it, then we'd have "nicotine discontinuation syndrome" instead of withdrawal...