Good Riddance Effexor — A Poem for Ed White.

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(EDITOR’S NOTE: SEE ED WHITE’S OBITUARY here)

Ed White and I were what I’d class as good friends, although very far from each other. We met through being Admins and Mods (Ed was an admin, I’m a mod) in an Effexor withdrawal group. We messaged often enough about not only withdrawal issues but personal things too. When one has been through withdrawal from psych drugs it’s not hard to find good people to share more than withdrawal issues with, Ed was one of those for me. I thought of Ed often and felt thought of when he’d message me. I thought often about the huge hug of mutual understanding I’d give him one day(I don’t know if he was the hugging type but he wasn’t going to escape mine), with tears of joy streaming down my face because we’d both made it and both knew. Ed was the one I wanted to meet the most out of all withdrawal people. I’m very saddened by his passing and feel I should’ve done more for him, like all he did for others.
I dedicate this “poem” to my friend Ed, it’s the best I have to offer for him as it comes from the deepest place in me. Pain and regret are where my best comes from. Ed was a much more gifted writer than me though, with his paper on the growth of facebook withdrawal groups, his RxISK article and in his thorough and thoughtful replies to those in the grips. He spoke very well on T.V. and in the SurvivingAntidepressants Medicating Normal panel, representing the unheard and giving us a voice. I was proud to know Ed when he was on T.V, the panel, when his paper came out etc. I knew that guy and look at him go. You helped so many in desperate times mate, you helped guide them to the light. I miss the thought of meeting you one day and wish you were still here. I’ll remember you and your kindness always.
 For Ed White, Loving husband/father, researcher, advocate, PhD and friend to many, who sadly succumbed to the perils of effexor withdrawal.
  RIP 07/08/1964-13/10/21.
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Good Riddance Effexor

Good Riddance Effexor, you rule me no more, you made me pay for, endless days and many more. I know why soldiers don’t speak about war, and I know others have suffered, much much more.

Truly devastating, unspeakable things. Things no one should endure, from stopping “medicines”. We don’t speak of it too much, to those who don’t know, it means digging too deep, in the hole we keep closed. In this terrible state, our eyes become truly open, now they’re open we realise, there aren’t many we can count on. The sleeping bear, he’s still there, we don’t want to wake him, it’s best to avoid things most stimulating.

The kindness from strangers, it can make us strong, giving us the will, to hide what’s going on, and find a way to carry on. Until the light starts to shine, it brings us back from that war, from that kindness of strangers, we start to grow claws. Like those buried deep, twisting our bones, sharp, like his who holds us there, but a different reason for. There’s no use trying to fight, the one who can’t be fought. For you my good friend, I wish I’d done more.

We slowly climb our way out, up those pitch blackened walls. Impossible to forget, the way it tore, through our brains and bodies, too often misdiagnosed, and never felt before. It burns everything, the hottest volcano in hell. I know I’ve never felt so unwell, but I’m ready for it now, if when I die I go to hell.

I know the pain you felt, because I felt it too, I managed to make it through, so I had faith in you. But I’m not you and you’re not me, why this did I fail to see? Your kindness would’ve surrounded you, but I just couldn’t see.

In times of pain, friends are meant to be there. Maybe you thought I didn’t care, and I bet you were so scared. You learnt much the first time round, now you were prepared. I know how strong his grip is though and should’ve shown more care. We get taken so far away where no one hears us pray, left there alone, to endure, until it slowly fades. To reach this point, no one can say, just how long it takes, prisoners in our bodies and brains until it slowly fades. If only I’d messaged mid week, so I really knew, just how much that desperate place, was affecting you.

You said I was very strong, to’ve made it through, why wasn’t that my cue, to reach out for you? When it rung I was still excited, to finally speak to you, but when it wasn’t you, i knew. I prayed for a minute, for it to be untrue, but deep down inside, i knew.

Desperately searching to be exempt from an injection, I failed to ask the Cat lady for an extension, of kindness for our struggling friend. You’d have found the strength, for your claws to grow, so in time you could show, yourself you could mend. Filled with fear from what they’d already said, the truth bullet had lodged, too deep in my head. For that outside help, I wish I had pled.

I know how it is for the red flower who lost her jem, we both now will never get, to meet with our dear friends. We told each other about it, I think we both told them, but now our chance on earth is gone, to meet with our dear friends.

It wasn’t meant to be this way, I wished for us to meet one day, now you’re in that blessed place, but it’s so far away. I wish I’d found the right words to say, we may still meet one day. I’ll think of you with your wings each day, (like those angels sent to help from above), flying free from all that pain.

It’s often said there’s an imbalance, but it’s never been proven, i wonder if you would ever use these drugs on your own children? There’d be no surprise if you did, you believe in them so much, if this happened to your own kids would you still have that trust? This thought fills me with disgust, wait a minute while I go throw up.

I’ll always protect my little light, from this incredible evil, an evil that even controls the minds of our medical people. An unstoppable need to keep you safe, from this most of evils, the one that’s peddled by all of our, blinded medical people. Are they blind or is it something else? About this I often wonder, to me you’re all just bitches of big pharma and all its dollars. And when the blind outweigh the unblind, by at least 20 to 1, most of us have no chance to welcome the light’s return from the sun.

I’m “brainwashed” by this painful truth, a truth i hope never happens to you. If it ever did you’d know it’s true and you’d be “brainwashed” too.

You’ve given me a purpose, that I never had before. Good Riddance Effexor, you rule me no more.

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MITUK’s mission is to serve as a catalyst for fundamentally re-thinking theory and practice in the field of mental health in the UK, and promoting positive change. We believe that the current diagnostically-based paradigm of care has comprehensively failed, and that the future lies in non-medical alternatives which explicitly acknowledge the causal role of social and relational conflicts, abuses, adversities and injustices.

3 COMMENTS

  1. This is a powerful tribute to Ed. Thank you.

    Ann Kelly is another longtime campaigner – an Effexor withdrawal sufferer/survivor… Some of you will know Ann. She also experienced The Beast. This is a piece that she wrote 2015, which she wants to share:

    The Beast
    Its 3 30 am and I’m lying here in a different reality to the one that I inhabit normally. For the most part, I’m enveloped by a beast… a beast that has large black slippery arms and legs. I am sitting inside the beast whose abdomen is a black place. It’s a place where in order to protect myself, I become infant, foetal, primal, instinctual, isolated, irrational and childlike. It is this emotional state that enables me to survive the experience…
    For the most part, this is the primal place that I operate out from. I’m astonished that you even present yourself in front of this beast, because you and everyone else are a cakewalk to him, because he controls biologically, physiologically, neurologically, mentally, spiritually and in every way, the ‘child’ that he owns…
    Like most captors, he’s powerful, and he knows it. He taunts anyone who dares to face up to him because he holds all the cards. When you dared to take on this beast, I know now that you had no idea of its power and my level of powerlessness. Had you known, I think you would have ran a mile from the get go.
    Every so often, the beast needs a sleep and so releases its grip for a while. When this happens I wake in the night with a clarity of mind and thinking so sharp that I believe I’m healed. Things feel calmer, clearer, together, grown up!!!.. Did I say ‘Grown up?’ It feels like a gift… a reminder of who I am, who I am capable of being. I think about what you have endured … what it must have been like to be outside of this and see the crazy making chaos. I’m grateful. This together with a whole host of ‘big grown up feelings’ that I find overwhelming and honestly don’t know what to do with, leaves me wanting to put things down on paper. A calmness comes from my stomach and spreads through my body to my extremities and this… well this is special time… time to reflect… time to write about my interlude in a foreign land!
    I’m also aware that no one can see this transition except me. Its the transition from one altered state of reality to another that the drugs were responsible for. I’m painfully aware that in a matter of hours, the beast will wake up and re assert its filthy occupation of my mind, body and spirit. I hope that it will tire of me and lose its grip before I lose mine…
    This short-lived reality makes me pray to God that one day I can feel this level of consciousness 24/7.
    In my mind’s eye, the child senses that the beast has fallen asleep, and she crawls tenderly out from its abdomen Its at that point that the adult inside me sees the child and wants to weep for her struggles, her nightmare, her tortured little soul…
    The adult is as adult and together as its possible to be. She reaches out for the child, pulls her towards her, brushes her hair away from her face. The child can’t speak… too traumatised, but the adult can!!!!! It’s at this point that the adult wants to represent the child’s case to the world and at this point I often I speak out loud in an empty room reprimanding naysayers, invalidators, cynics, judgementalists and anyone else who has spoken ill of little Ann and her struggle to cope inside the filthy organism that we know as drug dependency. The adult still sees the essence of her spirit is still intact and needs the world to acknowledge her plight.
    Faith is something known but not seen…We can’t see God, but we know something far bigger than ourselves exists. We can’t see electricity, but we wouldn’t knowingly stick our fingers in an electrical socket.
    As with this, family, friends and community need to have faith that the person displaying symptoms that are not understandable to them are just that …symptoms of something far bigger at work. They can’t see the beast, but they can see manifestations of its presence.
    People need to know that we are doing the very best we can at any given time…whether it be a window or a wave.

    Ann Kelly 23 September 2015