“Every morning, I take a 5ml spoonful of mint liquid Prozac, and every day I gulp down that liquid I wonder if I really need to continue.”
I wrote that paragraph 19 years ago for a Vogue article that I decided not to publish. At that time, I had been on drugs for six years. I’m still taking it. That means I’ve been on Prozac for 25 years.
Not much has changed, except for the fact that in 2005 I was in a much smaller minority. Around nine million people in the UK, or more than one in 10, are currently prescribed antidepressants.
And being in the minority meant there was still a stigma against the idea of needing to take antidepressants. I was editor-in-chief of Vogue magazine, and one of my staff members read the article and advised me not to publish it. Now that I think about it, I should have done that.
I didn’t start Prozac because I thought I was depressed. Unhappy for sure, and anxious for sure. I was suffering from physical symptoms that were completely interfering with my life, but I didn’t think I was depressed.
I started taking Prozac one day in 1999, after months of increasingly unwell health, while having lunch with Manolo Blahnik at Wilton’s in St James’s, London. Because it started to get blurry.
The fact that antidepressant prescriptions are so common means they are often not monitored at all, says Alexandra Shulman
The shoe designer regularly took me out to lunch and I would order fish pie. I don’t know why I remember that it was a fish pie, but the area around my gaze was shaking and the weight of my head like a 12 kg dumbbell was about to slam me into it, so the fish pie was also Manolo. I couldn’t see clearly either. fish pie.
When I returned to the Vogue office, I couldn’t walk down the hallway without reaching for support on the wall. Vertigo just hit me. I called a private cognitive psychologist I knew and begged him to come see me right away. She recommended prescribed medication. It wasn’t difficult to understand why this happened. Two months ago, my husband and I ended our marriage after a difficult period of trying and failing to save it.
The burden of misery and guilt was terrible for both of us, especially knowing that our young son would be deprived of the family life we expected.
I was editing the most important magazine in the country and had to try to maintain a normal family life for my stepdaughters, ages 3 and 15, in their father’s absence.
I really wanted my stepdaughter to continue living with us, as she has done for the past three years. I loved having her there and was an important factor in making my son feel like nothing had changed. Shortly after we broke up, even handing over weekends was a pain.
I’ve been prone to panic attacks since I gave birth to my first child at age 20, but previous episodes were associated with situations where I felt trapped, contrary to how I felt about my husband and our separation. It was happening in parallel.
In fact, I felt like I was liberated from living in an unhappy house. So this was different. It was a panic caused by paralyzing dizziness and fear of dizziness that gripped me.
I felt anxious about waking up in the morning. When I opened my eyes, I found that my bedroom was no longer a haven, but a dangerous place, spinning around as if in the throes of the most nightmarish episode of alcohol abuse. It felt like my brain was in a dryer.
Then, when I woke up at 3am, white-hot fear (which I now recognize as an adrenaline rush) filled my body and mind, and I feared I would pass out or even die. – especially since he was the only adult in a house with two children.
Free-floating anxiety is exactly what it sounds like, but it sounds a lot more fun than it actually is.
One time, I was flying to New York for a fashion show, and when I woke up at dawn to take an early flight back to London, my brain switched into the now familiar horror mode. .
Alexandra and her son Sam at Vogue magazine’s 90th anniversary party in 2006
The room spun. I crawled out of the room and managed to get out of the hotel and into a car for JFK Airport. But because I couldn’t stand up straight, British Airways wouldn’t let me on the plane, even though I needed to take care of my son in London that weekend.
A common reaction to mental instability is to deny it’s happening and put off doing anything about it. Although I knew that the dizziness attacks were a kind of psychological manifestation of the anxiety I felt on a daily basis, it was still difficult for me to take the step to seek professional help. It was my lunch with Manolo Blahnik that pushed me over the edge. I took Prozac, an SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor) that regulates mood by controlling the flow of the chemical messenger serotonin in the brain.
This is a type of antidepressant that Thomas Kingston, husband of Prince Michael of Kent and Princess Michael of Kent, and husband of Lady Gabriella, was taking before he tragically committed suicide earlier this year. It is.
An inquest heard last week that 45-year-old Kingston, who had complained of trouble sleeping due to stress at work, was initially given the depression drug sertraline and the sleeping pill zopiclone by her GP. At the Royal Mews Surgery, based at Buckingham Palace and used by members of the royal family.
When he said he wasn’t feeling any better despite the medication, he transitioned to another antidepressant, citalopram. He appeared to be suffering from side effects and stopped taking the medication shortly before his death. Mrs Gabriela said his suicide was “impulsive” and said: “People taking drugs like this need to be more aware of the side effects to prevent future deaths.”
However, the fact that such prescriptions are so common means that in many cases there is no monitoring at all, as in reality there was no monitoring for me. I can’t remember the last time my prescription was reviewed or there was a discussion about whether I should still take this drug or switch to another drug.
Unlike me, Kingston only took SSRIs for a short period of time. He found the side effects intolerable and decided to discontinue them. This is not the first time we have heard of someone committing suicide after withdrawing from this group of drugs. There are thousands of stories of horrific side effects both on and off the drug.
While some people experience side effects quickly after being prescribed an SSRI, such as decreased libido, sleep disturbances, excessive sweating, and nausea, I am fortunate to emphasize the importance of gradually acclimating the drug to the body. I was blessed to have an excellent family doctor who helped me.
He prescribed me a liquid form of Prozac rather than a regular pill, so I was able to easily increase my dose to 5ml (1 teaspoon) daily over a few weeks.
At first, it felt like I was living behind frosted glass, cut off from the outside world, but that was fine with me.
I didn’t want to experience the real world more vividly than necessary, such as the sadness over my marriage and the stress of trying to handle work while my family life was falling apart.
Some separation was fine by me. That glass screen protected me and felt safe. Some people find it alienating.
Over the years, I continued to find Prozac helpful and calculated that the positives of the drug more than outweighed the potential negatives of discontinuing it.
At one point after being on it for about 4 years, I asked my doctor if I should continue taking it. He said people are perfectly happy taking drugs that solve problems in most parts of the body, but become concerned when it comes to things above the neck. Interfering with the workings of the brain bothers them.
He gave me what seemed like a reasonable explanation for what Prozac was doing… making me feel more emotionally stable and calm in my body. There’s too little serotonin, the body’s natural “feel good” chemical that helps with this, but Prozac overrides this.
However, there were times when I thought about quitting. After all, who wants to be more dependent on drugs than necessary? So, on very rare occasions, I tried to stop taking the small amount of Prozac that I currently take two or three times a week. And each time I came back to that bottle.
One day in January a few years ago, after weeks of tapering off my medication, I realized that if I was going to quit my antidepressants, I should do it in the bright summer, not in the dark days of winter. I know), I was in Paris. At a haute couture show, I suddenly couldn’t stand straight.
I was outside the Center Pompidou, terrified that I was going to collapse in the large courtyard.
When I got back to the hotel, I didn’t know how to get to the fashion show that night and was worried I was going to pass out. But I got there. Because you do. Right?
Another time, I decided to stop taking it, but then changed my mind. My life was going well, my son was happy, and I was considering buying a bigger house. Since it was spring, it seemed like the perfect time. And then my father became seriously ill and I wasn’t going to risk reducing my ability. To cope. There’s always something that puts you off stopping. You might call it life. Naturally, the question arises whether these symptoms always occur if the drug is not taken, or whether withdrawal symptoms are the cause. I’m not determined enough to know that yet.
At one point, after about four years of taking it, I asked my doctor if I should continue taking the drug, Alexandra writes.
However, lately I’ve been experiencing more of the old vertigo, so I’m reconsidering my relationship with Prozac.
It may be a traumatic aftereffect of cancer surgery and pulmonary embolism that he suffered in the summer. It could be vestibular migraine which I have been told I might have. Or maybe the Prozac I’ve relied on for years to prevent dizziness isn’t working anymore.
I realize I haven’t consulted a doctor in years about whether or not I should continue the prescription, but I’m wondering if I should make an appointment.
Antidepressants have changed since they were first administered 25 years ago. There’s something new on the market, and Prozac is the grandma in town.
Perhaps there is something better for me, but perhaps it comes with some very unpleasant side effects that I was lucky to avoid by changing the dose or changing the medication.
Our relationship with medicine is as complex as our relationship with other people. Sometimes it’s easiest to follow the devil you know.
If you’re struggling and would like to talk, Samaritans operates a free 24/7 helpline (116 123). You can also find your local branch by emailing [email protected] or visiting the Samaritans site.
