Bereavement, Trauma and antidepressants - Life Happens

Claire Wortley
9 hours ago
7 min read

Bye Mum

It has been a almost a year since I have had the energy and inspriation to sit down to write a blog and that has been for several reasons.

Earlier this year, my darling mum passed away peacefully. Although I knew it would be a blessed release for her, I have found I miss her more and more as time goes by. My first birthday without her and now our first Christmas without her is just around the corner.

If you have read my previous blogs you will know that I was adopted as a baby. I was blessed to have been taken in by a lovely family who have supported and loved me through so much. I made many big mistakes and then battled with my mental health for many years which took its toll on them at times.

One thing that puzzled me after losing Mum was why I didn't fall apart? I had expected to be an absolute mess when the grief hit and yet I wasn't. Sure, I cried and felt sad but the utter devastation I was expecting never happened. So why was this so?

It turned out that the new pain and loss I was expecting wasn't like being hit by runaway train, it was actually familiar. It wasn't like getting to know a complete stranger, it was like bumping into someone I already knew really well.

In fact it felt almost comforting because it was familiar. Here I was expecting a complete breakdown and to be an utter disappointment to my family but instead there was no drama and no panic.

A familiar friend in trauma

As an introspective person I have spent most of my life asking questions about my reactions/triggers and behaviours including 'why am I so sensitive? Why do I seem to sense more about others then most people? Am I damaged? Am I soft and weak? Am I just a misfit who has no real place anywhere? Why have I had so many mental health issues? Am I just being a 'drama queen?'

So when my reactions to losing mum weren't the exagerated explosion I was expecting I wanted to understand why. Maybe I was in denial? Maybe I was dissociating from my reality as a way to survive?

Dissociation is a mental process where a person disconnects from their thoughts, feelings, memories or sense of identity. (Better Health Channel)

Adoption trauma cos life happens

As is the norm for me I became my own mental health detective and started to research bereavement, loss of adoptive parent and so on. I found many interesting websites and books and came to understand a lot more about the grief around adoption. The loss was not just experienced by the adoptee but there could be grief for the birth parents who have made the difficult decision to give their child away. Grief for the adoptive parents who may have to grieve the fact they will never have their own biological child which may have been a huge part of how they saw their future together.

It was during this time that I stumbled across videos on YouTube by Paul Sunderland about Adoption and Addiction. Paul speaks about how adoption can be seen as traumatic, Adoption Trauma, possibly a form of CPTSD, Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Even now my inner critic, Judge Mental, looks at that terminology and whispers to me ' is that a big enough label to make you feel special and not so pathetic?'

Thanks JM but this is a huge step forward for me!

As I read and watched more I began to understand that the reason I wasn't floored by grief was becasue I had know it all my life. I had experienced loss just a week after being born. I didn't have the cognitive ability to understand what had happened but my tiny baby body recognised that the person I knew and felt safe with was no longer there. Ok I was getting cuddles elsewhere but the person I cried for never came back and this caused stress, stress that my mind doesn't remember but everywhere else does.

This was a huge breakthrough for me! Not only could I identify with what I was learning but I could finally give myself permission to feel those feelings of loss. I understood why I was so hugely moved by connections and kindness and why the fear of abandonment was visceral rather than psychological.

Moving forward

During my research I discovered that there is now such a thing as adoption informed and adoption focused therapy. WOW! Where was this during all my years of therapy over a decade ago?

During 8 plus years of therapy being adopted was never really spoken about. I would rationalise and intellectullise it which kinda let the therapist off. Maybe I wasn't ready to accept that there was pain around the issue. You see society paints adoption as a beautiful thing, and,to some degree it is, but that doesnt mean the pain and loss around it should be ignored because it's less uncomfortable to talk about.

Maureen always has an opinion on everything.

I soon made the decision to look up an adoption informed therapist to see if we could do some work on some very deep triggers that have been bothered me.

So far I have had several sessions which have already opened my eyes and given me a sense of freedom.

In one partiucular session I was sharing about how it can be difficult to talk about being an adoptee because you don't want to be heard blaming anyone or seem ungrateful.

My therapist asked how it felt for me and I replied ' it hurts that there is a part of me that I must make more comfortable for others to be around and that I can't say my truth. My truth is that I often feel lost, not good enough and wonder if perhaps this is all my fault?

My therapist replied 'that is sad, I'm sorry.' This response opened the flood gates and as much as I tried to hold back the tears she encouraged me to let it out and let it go.

Once this had passed I told my therapist that holding that space for me and my pain was the most amazing gift I had ever received. I felt seen, heard and validated as a whole and not just the bits deemed socially acceptable.

Sun shining through hands making a heart shape — Feeling accepted and safe

Coming off antidepressants

I was first prescribed antidepressants when I was in a Mother and Baby Unit in London, 30 years ago. I was struggling to cope with being a mother and lived in a constant state of anxiety almost since the moment my baby was born. During my stay at the unit I tried several medications and was eventually settled on Sertaline/Zoloft.

Over the years the dose went up and down and eventually stayed at the highest prescribed dose.

It was in my early 40s that I began to experience panic attacks and anxiety that took away my appetite, sleep and confidence. My GP at the time suggested I tried another antidepressant called Mirtazapine/Remeron.

It must be around 13 years that I have been on Mirtazapine and at times it was at the highest dose of 45mg. Even this dose didn't help when I hit crisis so I started intense, one to one therapy and it was this that gave me the tools to make lifestyle changes that got me to the point of recovery.

Since this time I also learned about perimenopause and am on HRT which has helped me hugely with general mental and physical health. This lead to me making the decision that I am ready to taper off Mirtazapine completely.

I sopke with my GP who advised me to taper the way Pharmaceutical compaines say to, drop from the lowest dose of 15mg, in the UK, over a matter af a few weeks and all should be good.

Now I didn't feel confident about this and so decided to do some more research. It turn out you can get lower doses in the USA but not here. I was very confused about how I could safely come off a drug that I had been on for so long and that effects the chemical make up of my brain?

I called the local pharmacist to talk through my options and she was great. She discovered that there is a liquid form of Miratazapine that means you can make smaller decreases in dosage. One massive draw back is that it is hugely expensive.

Hyperbolic Tapering

Basically hyperbolic tapering is a way of tapering off psychotropic drugs, like antidepressants, in a way that decreases the likelyhood of severe withdrawal effects. Instead of decreaseing by available doses, the drops are done by percentage of each previous dose and over a much longer period of time. No stopping within a few weeks!

Go to https://www.outro.com/blog/stopping-antidepressants-what-is-hyperbolic-tapering to learn more about this way of tapering.

Learning about this stye of tapering hasn't taken away from the fact I would have to be very very wealthy to afford years worth of the liquid Mirtazapine. What was I going to do about it now? Should I carry on trying to get off this dry??

The answer to that question was YES.

In learning more about long term antidepressant use I discovered a couple of valuable points. The first was that antidepressant's eficacy, meaning the ability to produce a specific outcome, is not studied over more than a few months, so do they really remain useful over years maybe decades?

The second is that taking antidepressants into old age may have some detrimental effects on your physical health.

With the support of others in a similar situation I have found a way to make this tapering happen. Cutting pills or making a liquid suspension is possible but done purely at my own risk.

Today

Oh there is one other thing, because I believe this is more than enough to be dealing with I took the decision to temporarily close Claire's Chair, my mental health support business. I felt that as much as I was passionate about helping others with their mental health, I needed to give that same safe space and time to myself during this time of change and adjustment.

Claire's chair is still in use but now it is me sitting in that chair.