Hi everyone.

I was put on antidepressant (Citalopram) 10 years ago, when I was 18, shortly after coming home from rehab. At the time, I was suicidal - recovering addict, just got out of an abusive relationship - so I just took the meds, along with the benzodiazepines I had been given at the rehab facility (I quit those after a few months). For the next few years, I was just prescribed the same medication over and over, no doctors bothering to ask me about whether I was receiving additional treatment or telling me that maybe taking SSRI's indefinitely wasn't the best idea... Then I got pregnant at 21, my doctor helped me to try and stop the medication, but I couldn't do it and so continued with a smaller dose. After my second pregnancy, I had postpartum depression and had to increase the dose again, then went back to the smaller dose when I started feeling better. About 3 years ago, when my youngest daughter was 1, the health anxiety began. I also felt the medication didn't work anymore and read a lot of articles online about why antidepressants shouldn't be taken long term and I got so scared, I decided to quit the medication. I talked to my doctor and a psychiatrist about it, of course, and tapered off slowly. After the intial withdrawal symptoms, I felt fine for a month or so, then I started feeling worse and worse, but I was determined not to get back on antidepressants, I had become so scared of taking them because of all the shit I had read... So I kept going, until finally, after maybe 7 months, I ended up at a psychiatric hospital. At this point my doctor had been begging me to get back on medication for a few months. After coming back home, I started the medication again, this time Escitalopram and I have been on it ever since. I just can't seem to function at all without it. So that's 10 years I have been on it now. I am so scared I have done permanent damage to my body, especially my brain. Has anyone else been on antidepressants this long? I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to live a life without medication and it scares me. Am I doing myself more harm than good? Please, if anyone can offer any words of reassurance, it would be much appreciated... Thank you!