Stopping Zoloft After 2 Years - Anyone Have Major Issues When Doing So?

I’m thinking running across this forum might just be a God send.

I went on 100 mg of Zoloft after a major heart break in October of 2010. I read an Oprah piece that said being let down when having such high hopes for so long can actually change the structure of your brain so it made sense why I was having the depression I was. I could not quit crying. I’d waited for him for months and gotten a lot of promises only to learn they were all lies and this was from someone I considered a friend first.

Fast forward 2 years and at the end September of 2012 I started having issues again. I’d be out with friends and end the night crying on the drive home …..I guess out of loneliness and lost hope of anything more out of life. I didn’t see the point in even going out anymore and decided I was done. I had also noticed over the previous couple of months that I was no longer seeming to have any joy or excitement out of the simple things in life at all. I was pretty sure I didn’t need the Zoloft for my depression anymore but had kept on it because of how it really made me have no anxiety at all. At that point I planned on talking to my doctor at my next checkup because I missed that zest for like.

The next weekend though, in what I was going to make my last endeavor out for a while, I ended up meeting a guy who over the course of a month seemed to be the guy of my dreams. Mind you I’m a very successful, do it on my own, straight head on my shoulders, type of girl. I don’t believe or fall for BS, especially from a guy I just met but this guy was different. He put his feelings on the line like no one ever had with me before and did so on a consistent basis. To finally find someone I clicked with so well felt so great and I loved the feeling of comfort I had. My only issue was my butterflies weren’t there like his were and there is no reason they shouldn’t have been with me, except for Zoloft probably cancelling them out. I had no bad anxiety but no happy anxiety either.

I ended up going to the doctor before my checkup because of illness and told her my issue. She told me to start phasing out my Zoloft a bit at a time and also gave me Wellbutrin to help get my butterflies, sex drive and general zest for life back. I reduced my dosage of Zoloft at about a rate of 25 mg every 2 weeks and am no longer on it….pretty much stopping it in one month’s time in October. I’m now on Wellbutrin XL 300 mg a day.

In the midst of this, after really falling for my new guy through the month of October and making plans for the upcoming holidays, next summer and talking about the future of us, he completely vanished after a month of being in a relationship. Yes, this seems like a very short time but when you click with someone and they seem just as crazy about you, you start to think it might just finally be your turn. He stopped calling, texting and responding to any form of communication I tried. We talked on a daily basis since we’d met and he didn’t show when we had plans for Halloween ….yet he had even texted me the night before about letting me know when he’d be off work. Through a lot of worry, anxiety, tears, weight loss and every other emotion one could imagine I found out he probably tested positive for HIV and took the cowards way out by not even telling me, turning to drugs almost immediately. I got to see the shell he became due to the drugs when I confronted him again at the end of November, tired of waiting for him to come around. I have no fears about my safety because I was smart but that doesn’t help the heartache and what I’m going through now that I can’t seem to shake. I’m sad for me and still worry about him and how he has to be dealing with so much alone.

I sit here bawling as I type this and these cry fests creep up here and there all the time. My logic says it’s over and probably with good reason and I can accept that but my why can I not snap back to myself and stop crying? I go through the days just going through the motions. I have no hope or direction and feel like a total mess putting on an act just to get through work and interactions with others every single day. No guy should ever treat someone like he did me and I should be mad but again that doesn’t help the hurt and sadness over any part of the situation. My empathy for him is extreme. Others have said get your mind on something else but how can I when all I want to do is cry? The Wellbutrin isn’t doing a thing for me. I’m not suicidal by any means but with the recent shootings, as bad as it sounds I have thought to myself it would have been okay if I was one of them. I know this awful and not right but that is my state of mind. Over the past few weeks my doctor has said I went through something no one would easily get through and my sadness is normal but I’m not thinking it is to the extreme I’m feeling it.

I read on here that being on the Zoloft for the 2 years I was might have changed my brain structure? I’m curious as to how? I also wonder if what I’m going through now are considered the “severe” withdrawal symptoms from stopping the Zoloft in a month’s time. Should I try to get back on the Zoloft at a small dose and ween off of it more slowly? I know medical advice isn’t proper in a forum like this but any personal experiences or advice from one’s own experience would be much appreciated and sure would help. If some have taken up to a year to get off of it maybe this is the answer as to why I feel so hopeless and sad now I can only hope!

Thank you so much for having something like this. As I said this might just be a God send for me.