What It Feels Like to Come Off Antidepressants After 20 Years
“And Why So Many Women Are Silencing Their Souls”
For 20 years, I lived with a quiet ache—a sense that something inside me had gone silent. Antidepressants helped me survive some of the darkest chapters of my life. They gave me a kind of stability when I felt like I was unraveling, and for that, I hold no shame. But even on the meds, I was still depressed. I was functioning, but I was disconnected. Apathy became my norm. I didn’t feel deep sorrow anymore, but I didn’t feel real joy either. I felt like I was living a life that wasn’t my own.
And in the silence of my emotional world, my mind stayed loud—full of regrets, looping thoughts, and constant overanalysis. I longed for happiness, but it felt out of reach, like a faraway memory.I had moments of joy and pleasure, only to come back to my dulled reality.
What led me to medication wasn’t depression at first. It was rage. My anger was a force—raw, overwhelming, and full of shame. I would always stuff it down. I was mostly parenting alone, and I didn’t want to hurt my daughter with that rage. So I went to the doctor. I asked for help in the only way I knew how: I was prescribed medication so I didn’t feel so angry.
This is the Story of So Many Women
Why are so many women prescribed antidepressants? Let’s talk about this.
So many women are taught to be poised. To be classy. To smile. To hold things together for everyone else. We’re told we’re too much—too sensitive, too emotional, too needy—when we express emotion or not enough—when we hold it in. We’re raised to people-please. So we twist ourselves into shapes we were never meant to hold. And slowly, we lose the ability to recognize ourselves. When the emotional weight becomes unbearable, we’re offered pills instead of permission to feel.
In my case, antidepressants were part of that emotional silencing. They made me more tolerable to others and less reactive to life—but they also dulled my connection to myself.
My Healing Journey with Cannabis, Mindfulness, and Feeling Again
When I began to wean off antidepressants, it wasn’t graceful. Emotions returned like a tidal wave: raw, disorienting, unrelenting. It felt like I had cracked open. But this time, I didn’t run. I met myself—slowly, gently, and with radical honesty.
Cannabis became my ally in this process. Not as an escape, but as a plant teacher that helped me witness my thoughts without spiraling into shame. It allowed me to pause the relentless rumination—especially the ones steeped in trauma and self-blame. It helped me shift out of the victim mindset that whispered, “You’re not good enough,” and into a new space that asked, “What if you’re safe now?”
I found great guidance in The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. “Don’t take anything personally” became a mantra that helped me stop assigning negative intent to every interaction. “Be impeccable with your word” helped me speak more kindly to myself. These teachings, alongside my training in mindfulness meditation, began to reshape my mind from the inside out.
I began to see that my physical pain wasn’t separate from my emotional pain-it was a map. Every ache, every tension, every chronic issue had something to say. Louise Hay’s book You Can Heal Your Life became a guide to understanding the connection between my suppressed feelings and my body’s cries for attention.
And slowly, I started to come back to myself.
As I peeled back the layers of medication and numbness, I began paying attention to myself in a new way. And with that awareness came another unexpected discovery: I had ADHD. Learning about neurodiversity changed everything. It was like finding a missing chapter of my story. Suddenly, so many parts of me that I had judged and shamed made sense. Understanding my energy patterns helped me stop fighting myself. I started honouring the days when I needed to rest, move slowly, visit friends, or just lie in the grass and breathe. I realized that no one-especially a woman healing from years of emotional suppression-can give endlessly without a break.
Those quiet days weren’t failures. They were medicine.
What No One Tells You About Coming Off Antidepressants
Let’s be clear: coming off antidepressants is not something to take lightly.
You need support. You need your people—your family, your friends, your practitioner, maybe even someone like me—someone who’s walked this path and knows how messy, scary, and beautiful it can be. You need time and space to fall apart a little, because when those emotions come back, they don’t knock—they kick the damn door in.
And it will be tempting to run back to what numbed you.
But please hear this: the healing is in the feeling.
It’s in crying in the shower when you finally grieve that old wound. It’s in forgiving yourself for surviving the only way you knew how. It’s in resting—deep, uninterrupted rest—while your nervous system recalibrates.
For many, this healing journey includes what mystics and spiritual seekers call the dark night of the soul—a deep, disorienting passage where everything you thought you knew about yourself dissolves. It feels like everything is falling apart, but in truth, what’s collapsing are the illusions, the masks, the survival patterns. And what emerges on the other side is something more real, more whole, and more you than ever before.
An Invitation to the Women Who Are Feeling Numb
If you’re reading this and wondering if your spark is still in there somewhere, I promise—it is. If you feel muted, disconnected, or lost in your own life, you’re not broken. You’re not too much. You’re not not enough.
You are a woman waking up.
And if you’re ready to start exploring what you’ve been suppressing, do it gently. Start with breath. A journal. A long walk. A safe conversation. A plant ally. A quiet morning with your hand on your heart.
It’s okay to have emotions. It’s okay to be wild and tender, fierce and soft, joyful and grieving—all in the same breath.
You don’t need to go back to the woman you were. You’re becoming someone even more whole.
If you're ready to gently explore what's been buried beneath the surface, I invite you to join CannaSoul Connection—a sacred circle where we use mindful cannabis practices, meditation, and community to come back home to ourselves.
And if you feel called to deeper, personalized support, I offer 1:1 cannabis health coaching for women navigating emotional healing, burnout, or coming off antidepressants. You don’t have to do this alone.
Let’s reconnect you to your body, your truth, and your soul. Reach out to begin your journey.
