Honey Badger Don't Care

A few week ago, my physcician and I decided that it would be prudent to change my antidepressants after 9 years to see if it would help me control my impulses that lead to weight gain. I think the new medicine is working slowly but here's the scratch: the old medicine was highly addictive and I have been in the throes of withdrawal ever since I began tapering off. For the curious, here are the list of withdrawal symptoms. Only those in bold are effecting me, so it could be much worse.


intense insomnia
extraordinarily vivid dreams
extreme confusion during waking hours
intense fear of losing your sanity
steady feeling of existing outside of reality as you know it (referred to
as depersonalization at times)
memory and concentration problems
Panic Attacks (even if you never had one before)
severe mood swings, esp. heightened irritability / anger
suicidal thoughts (in extreme cases)
an unconventional dizziness/ vertigo
the feeling of shocks, similar to mild electric one, running the length of your body
an unsteady gait
slurred speech
headaches
profuse sweating, esp. at night
muscle cramps
blurred vision
breaking out in tears.
hypersensitivity to motion, sounds, smells.
decreased appetite
nausea
abdominal cramping, diarrhea
loss of appetite
chills/ hot flashes
fainting
"scratching sound" inside one's head
constant white noise in the ears
tingling sensation in cheeks, lips, tongue and surrounding areas.
heart palpitations/ chest pain
swollen and sore eyes
fatigue
extremely localized, bursting headaches
lump in throat
rash / dry, flaky and irritated skin
grinding of teeth
difficulty swallowing
itchiness

I would also add intense loneliness and sudden inability to cope with people acting like assholes, although that may already have been covered under the mention of irritibaility and mood swings.

I must say that finding the list on quitpaxil.com actually was a huge relief. How pleasant to know that I'm not necessarily on the verge of some horrible seizure. I'm not longer convinced that my 10 year old will find me in a puddle of my own waste gnawing my tongue off and twitching, but I suppose there is still a slight possibility.

The scratching sound /white noise, while still not acceptable or pleasant, aren't as scary now that I know it's fairly typical AND temporary. I am convinced that "honeybadger" is inside my skull and wants to get out through the back. It would be really convenient if Dr. Hfuhruhurr could perform his cranial screw top method to give me relief. It would be really convenient, too, if Youtube actually had a video of the surgery itself. But that ain't gonna happen. I think Steve Martin's probably afraid of honey badgers anyhow. He should be.

If you haven't seen the viral youtube video about the honey badger narrated by Randall, you won't even begin to "get it." The video is NSFW and NSFK as it has strong language in it, but honey badger don' care.