Withdrawal

The Sutras and the Gita talk about withdrawal of the senses from their sense objects as part of the process of yoga and meditation. In Elemental Yoga, we spend a few minutes at the beginning of every class closing our eyes and turning our outer gaze inward and turning our outer hearing into a deep, internal listening. This is a great way to begin a class, to "drop in" to oneself and to have a truly meditative practice.

These days I'm thinking about a different kind of withdrawal, as I've tapered down to a minuscule fraction of a fraction of my anxiety meds. This last round of withdrawal was nothing like what I went through last spring when I came off of Zoloft and Xanax - a potent cocktail a terrible drug-pushing psychiatrist had put me on. It was so bad that I went cold-turkey and went through the "zaps" of withdrawing from Zoloft and the increased anxiety of being off the Xanax. Ironically, when you go off your anxiety meds, anxiety is one of the withdrawal symptoms.

Now I'm coming off the of the benzodiazepine that my new, not so drug-pushing psychiatrist put me on when she found out I went cold turkey off of the others. This is a replacement drug that is easier to titrate down off of, so I was cutting pills in half, then in half again, until I basically was swallowing some pill dust each night before bed. I did have increased anxiety, again, with each titration, but it was nothing like the cold turkey craziness of the Zoloft/Xanax.

I have found that restorative yoga takes the place of these meds. If I take one hour of restorative everyday, it has the same effects as popping a benzodiazepine. Of course, it's much easier to find the time to pop a pill than it is to find an hour to lie on a bolster and a couple of blankets with an eye pillow on my forehead (restorative has been shown to be much more relaxing for people with the addition of weight on the forehead in the postures). But then restorative doesn't have any negative side effects. Though I think it can be addictive.

The last stage of this withdrawal from the meds seems to be a general foggy mind. I forgot my son's backpack this morning - had to drop him off then run back home to pick it up and take it back to school. I got our schedule mixed up and showed up to a Tae Kwon Do class 45 minutes early. I can't seem to find the energy to cook supper beyond heating up frozen vegetarian chicken nuggets. But this will pass, and I'll be myself again. A self without psychotropic medicine, a self that still has panic attacks at times, and still has anxiety, but who is capable of viewing those things as passing emotional and nervous system states that can be watched with a compassionate, meditative eye, knowing that they will pass within ten minutes (usually) or faster if I'm in a place where I can watch my breathing, do a restorative pose, or practice some other intervention (engaging uddiyana bandha works wonders here, too).