Over the years, I've accumulated a few too many prescriptions. Anti-depressants, anxyolitics, anti-seizure meds, sleep aids, and more. When I moved to the Seattle area and it was time to pick up a new shrink, I just happened to get one of the west coast's best addiction specialists. With a couple mistakes in life, I've never considered myself to be an "addict," but he thinks otherwise.

This guy keeps his dog in the office all day. It's this big black poodle-y thing with a penchant for sharing its bodily fluids. That animal's day just isn't complete unless it has marked every patient as its private property. I think my shrink decided I was on too many meds when the dog passed out the first time it licked me.

It's amazing how easy it is to become human blotter paper for psychiatric drugs if you let people tell you what you "need." I'm not saying I'm not totally insane and in need of help. That's a given, as anyone who has read, say, at least three of my posts could tell you.

But even I won't deny that two anti-depressants, several different benzodiazepines, and various other pills might be excessive.

Since I started with this guy, I've managed to drop the sleeping pills, the benzos, and am working on one of the anti-depressants. It has made me a little moody, but I'm starting to feel the benefits.

I think I wound up on all these things because I was seeing more than one doctor down in Portland. I knew I needed some kind of help, but wasn't skeptical enough about various doctors' assessments, instead believing that everything thrown at my brain would ultimately help. It was all very THX-1138 (or The Electric Acid Kool-Aid Test, depending on which pop-culture reference resonates more with you).

Zoloft, Wellbutrin, Klonopin, Ativan, Xanax, Valium, Lunesta, Cardene, Nadolol, Verapamil, Neurontin... these are just a few meds I've been given over the past two years. I've forgotten what all the others were. Probably because I was on Zoloft, Wellbutrin, Klonopin, Ativan, Xanax, Valium, Lunesta, Cardene, Nadolol, Verapamil, Neurontin...

Right now, the only meds I'm on are Zoloft and Wellbutrin, and I'm about halfway through dropping the Zoloft.

It's amazing what a difference it makes not to be on all this stuff. I don't think there's anything wrong with head drugs, as it seems many people do, but when you're on as many as I was, and unless you have a serious mental illness, the meds themselves will eventually drive you mad - long before your own brain does.

Because this shrink knows what he's doing, it's been surprisingly painless. I had been taking various benzos for years (Klonopin, Ativan, Xanax, and Valium are all benzos - medications for treating acute episodes of anxiety). Never having stopped long enough to notice how they were affecting me, I let my head sit in this drug-induced fog for the entire time I was on them. They hurt your ability to concentrate, your short-term memory (and, consequently, the formation of permanent memories as well), can wreck your libido (probably a good thing in my case), and you'll become physically dependent on them if they aren't used correctly.

I didn't use them correctly.

Every day since quitting them, I've felt clearer and clearer. It's fantastic. I had tried to ditch them on my own in the past, but couldn't. When this new shrink took me on, I was on very high doses of these things. Not only was I on high doses, but I took them everyday. That's a bad thing for a class of medications meant to be given in stints no longer than two weeks, and only for treatment of symptoms - not prophylaxis.

The only drug that has been giving me any problems is Zoloft - an SSRI anti-depressant (in the same class as Prozac). Most doctors will never tell you this, but starting and stopping SSRIs can be extremely difficult. When starting you go through a confusing ramping-up period. When stopping, it's not uncommon to go into withdrawals.

I'm right smack in the middle of those withdrawals.

Not that I'm complaining. I've been through worse, and actually feel quite good right now despite the nausea, headaches, sweating, occasional confusion, and the seemingly paradoxical combination of fatigue and insomnia.

Finally managed to sleep last night, and had some uber effed up dreams. If you've ever had "fever dreams," then you kind of know what it's like to dream while coming off of an SSRI.

One dream in particular stood out in my mind when waking up.

I dreamt that I was going to a plastic surgeon to have my nose done. I won't lie - with a nascular appendage like mine, it's hard not to wonder what it would be like to have it smallened and shaped into something less prone to swaying in a strong wind. I'd never actually do it, but there's always that Michael Jacksonian curiosity in the back of the head.

When I arrived at the plastic surgeon's office, they didn't waste time. I was given some pain-killers, and then one of the surgeon's assistants chopped my nose right off my face (not that they would have chopped it from any other surface of my body - had that been the case, cosmetic surgery would have been the least of my worries).

I was left with a gaping face-crater where my nasal innards were exposed. There was blood all over the place, and I felt a slight tingling in the area my nose should have been.

Another assistant walked up and covered the face-crater with a sheet of wax paper. Because of all the blood, it stuck in place without any adhesive.

Started to have second thoughts at this point. I was under the impression that the doctor might have knocked me out before shaving my nose off. I didn't like this business of remaining conscious while having body parts removed. Even worse, I realized that I didn't know what kind of nose I wanted - I hadn't bothered to look through a catalog to select a new model with which to replace my old proboscis. Worse still, I was told that my old nose had been thrown away and that I couldn't have it back.

Screwed.

And, speaking of screwing, for reasons I don't understand, I was told I'd also have to have my private parts removed.

All of them.

Maybe it was in the fine-print and I had missed it, but this was an even worse surprise than the we're-going-to-chop-your-nose-off-while-you're-awake thing.

Satisfied with the wax paper bandage covering my face-hole, the assistants went to work "down there." I watched as they hacked and cut around the organ, eventually removing it.

As though a dream like this possibly could have continued without further horrors...

I could feel that something was wrong (I mean, in addition to having things cut off my body). Didn't know what, but one of the assistants was happy to tell me all about it.

There was a powder I was supposed to place around my reproductive bits the night before to prepare for the procedure. I didn't do it. Because of this, there was a complication during the wiener-removal phase: My testicles were supposed to be cut off, too, but due to my absent-mindedness and not having put the special powder on the night before, they didn't come off properly. Instead, both testicles were cut right in half, not at all what was supposed to happen.

In short, they weren't going to be able to restore my reproductive organs following my plastic surgery. I was stuck that way.

When the dream ended, I was naked, had no penis, had two half-testicles attached to me (which, together, formed one whole, but useless, testicle), and was wearing a bloody piece of wax paper over the hole in my face where my nose had been.

I really hope this is the last time I ever have to quit an SSRI...