The Gaslit Truth

Your Complete Guide to Medication Tapering: The Final Stage Pt 3.

• Dr. Teralyn & Therapist Jenn • Season 2 • Episode 69

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You've been gaslit into believing medication tapering means cutting pills in half and taking them every other day until you're done. The reality? Your brain requires a much more sophisticated approach.

In this final installment of our medication tapering series, we reveal the neurological science behind why standard tapering methods fail so many patients. Discover what's actually happening as your brain's receptors adjust when medication levels change, and why those challenging symptoms aren't a "return of your condition" but genuine withdrawal effects your prescriber may never have warned you about.

We dive deep into the hyperbolic tapering method, explaining why initial reductions often feel deceptively easy while those final milligrams can be the most challenging. Learn to identify withdrawal symptoms beyond the obvious brain zaps—from headaches and vivid dreams to digestive issues—that signal when your taper is moving too quickly for your unique neural adaptation.

The most crucial factor in successful tapering? Individualization. Your withdrawal timeline might look nothing like someone else's, even on the same medication. Some experience effects within days, while others don't notice symptoms until weeks after a reduction. Understanding your personal pattern becomes your most powerful tool.

Whether you're contemplating a medication reduction or currently struggling through withdrawal, this episode provides both scientific understanding and practical guidance to navigate the journey with greater confidence and fewer setbacks. Connect with us directly if you're ready to create your personalized tapering plan with evidence-based support.

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Dr. Teralyn:

Therapist Jenn:





Therapist Jenn:

Well, hey, everyone, you have been gaslit into believing that you are going to be on these antidepressants forever. This is now a three-part episode. It was supposed to be two, but gaslit.

Dr. Teralyn:

You're gaslit into believing it was only two parts, when it's really going to be three. We lied.

Therapist Jenn:

So now it's a three-part episode and we're going to talk to you about how to taper your medications. We are your whistleblowing shrinks Dr Teralyn , and therapist Jen. And hey, you found us on the Gaslit Truth Podcast.

Dr. Teralyn:

Woohoo. So, if you haven't already, go back and listen to episode one, or, I'm sorry, not episode one, but part one and part two of the Medication Taper. We were only going to do two parts, but Jen and I get a little geeked up and we end up talking a little too much, and so this turns into three episodes for the same thing, which I although it's important because I think people need to understand, also not to dissuade you into doing this, but to understand, like, the detail of what it means to taper, because so many people come in and like what supplements can I take to help me feel better, tapering, and how do I taper? And I don't have a two sentence answer to that. Um, because everyone is so bio-individual how long you've been on a medication matters immensely.

Dr. Teralyn:

What medication you've been on matters, um, all these things. Your nutrient depletions matter. How you take care of your body matters, it matters, it all matters, yep. So it's not easy, in the sense that it's a little bit more complicated than you probably thought, but I like to believe that Jen and I make it less complicated and we offer you some real solutions that will help make you feel better faster. So this episode we're going to talk about the actual taper part. So I'm going to say again don't just listen to this episode and start your taper. Go back and listen to part one and part two. Okay, cannot stress that enough.

Therapist Jenn:

We'll put them all in order for you guys.

Dr. Teralyn:

We'll make it real easy you just flow from the first one to the second one to now the meat of the third one.

Therapist Jenn:

So let's start talking about this taper. Something that Terry and I do is called a hyperbolic taper.

Dr. Teralyn:

I'm going to put hyperbolic taper-ish.

Therapist Jenn:

Ish, okay, this would be an ish. And before we, before we go farther with that, we have to give a shout out to Mark Horowitz.

Dr. Teralyn:

Mark.

Therapist Jenn:

Horowitz is the gentleman that wrote the Moudsley deprescribing guidelines. Um, he is going to be coming on the show.

Dr. Teralyn:

He's coming on guys, we've got him scheduled, but he is in.

Therapist Jenn:

France right now and he's fucking busy, okay, right now, and he's fucking busy, okay. So we all just have to be patient, okay, and so we can get him on the show in a few months, but he's coming, guys, so it's going to be super cool to talk to the man that I don't know. Change the entire, my entire practice, like it made me like, actually change how I see all of the world within deprescribing Um, so he, um, he wrote a, a guy, a deprescribing guideline that's about getting off antidepressants and benzos, z drugs, things like that. So Terry and I use this as a guide when we are working with our clients and doing consulting, but I can speak for both of us when I say this is just really truly nothing but a guide, because this process is so individual. I am walking proof of this process being extremely individualized and I'll give a few little things along the way, as Terry and I talked today about how this had to shape and change, and it does for many of our clients too.

Dr. Teralyn:

Well, this is why this conversation is important, because this is also why there isn't a standardized evidence-based practice for deprescribing, because of the individuality and bio-individuality that is required within it. So if you only had you do this, this and this, that would be great if everybody responded that way, which is why a lot of prescribers who are trying to deprescribe people don't take in the individual nature. They're like cut it in half and then do every other day and it's just. It's not an individual process enough to account for all the withdrawals that people go through and the debilitation and all those things. So this Mousley deprescribing guideline is like the next best thing to that, but we also have to make sure that we account for bio individuality within that.

Therapist Jenn:

So the real layman's easiest way to talk about the idea of hyperbolic tapering is we are not most. We're going to talk a lot about antidepressants today Not that there aren't other drugs that we help deprescribe individuals off. But when we're talking about a hyperbolic fashion, it's about looking at how it is that the drug actually interacts with the brain and these receptors of the brain as you slowly start to deplete this drug out of the body. These drugs use a hyperbolic fashion. The law of mass action comes into play with this. So we're really looking at neurologically how our brains have adapted from being on these drugs and what we have to do, in a very low and slow fashion, to take them out of the body.

Dr. Teralyn:

Okay, so that they can readapt to that. It's that exercise and kind of homeostasis that we're talking about.

Therapist Jenn:

It is so so to give you just just a little bit of like the nerd part of me that I like to explain to my clients which, for some people, this is too much information. For others, they take this and run and they're people, this is too much information For others, they take this and run and they're like this is so fucking fascinating and I'm like, yeah, thank you, mr Mark Horowitz, and other people too. There are people out there, dr Yosef, they put some really great videos out guys, which I'm like at some point I need to do one of these Melissa Pistillo has one out there too where they draw the graphs for you and they explain what's actually happening. The part I'm going to explain now without a graph for you guys, okay, but it's about neuroadaption to antidepressants and what happens when you reduce the antidepressants or you stop them. So in the brain, serotonin is released from neurons, essentially right these presynaptic neurons, and it gets released into the synapse and it activates the receptors right On the postsynaptic neurons. So they go from one to the next right the serotonin. There's something called a serotonin transporter, okay, and it re-uptakes your serotonin right, and it gives you basically some level of equilibrium. That's what's happening before a medication. Okay, that's your healthy brain neuron action, yay, okay.

Therapist Jenn:

Then we introduce a medication into the brain, okay, and fuck it all up and we God damn it we create. I know you don't want to hear this, but for those of you who are already met, harmed and are listening to us because you're like, I'm ready to start deprescribing. You have a synthetic brain injury and here's the start of the synthetic brain injury, guys, okay, so we introduce like an antidepressant, and that antidepressant blocks like 60, 70, 80, 90% of the serotonin activity, this transporting activity. That happens. So what happens is there's less reuptake of that serotonin that's going into that presynaptic space. There's less of it, okay, essentially.

Therapist Jenn:

So then what does this do? It leads to an increase in our levels of serotonin, which increases the activation of the post-receptor, the thing where it's supposed to receive it, right. So this is once this drug is going in there, so we're actually increasing it. Here we go Then, when drugs are in the body long term and they're in the brain long term due to homeostasis, which is what Terry just said before, basically our body space of like, we have to even it out. We got to just feel, got to feel good because something's changing right Due to that, the excess activation that's happening in the post. I got to make sure I get this right now. The post synaptic receptor it leads to down-regulating of these receptors.

Dr. Teralyn:

Okay, and it actually there's too much going in.

Therapist Jenn:

So you have only so many receptors for the serotonin molecules, and so it's too much Down-regulates down-regulates, right, and we know this because there's imaging that has been done of the brain to see that this is happening. This is how we know. Okay, so this can happen for quite a long period of time. So then we move to the very last part of this, which is when we decide that we're going to stop the medication. Okay, so when the antidepressant gets removed, or even reduced okay, after a long-term use, that serotonin transporter starts to be unblocked and now the serotonin becomes removed from the synaptic area and it tries to return to these basic physiological levels. It's trying to get back there, that down regulation right.

Dr. Teralyn:

The sleepy receptor.

Therapist Jenn:

The receptors are sleepy, they are sleepy, yes you always say that that's a good way to say it. I got to use that more because I'm just too like in the stupid words I need to use simple words Sleepier.

Dr. Teralyn:

It's a sleep. We need to wake it up.

Therapist Jenn:

Sleepy night night. So they're all sleepy night nighting here. That down regulation of that receptor goes on for some time, even after the antidepressant guys is starting to be removed, and then the system starts to register these physiological levels of the serotonin and it's like what the fuck is going on? And that is what leads to withdrawal guys. That is then when we start to experience withdrawal and these symptoms. They're going to keep happening, guys, until the body and the brain gets back to a space that was like, as mark horowitz puts it in his book he calls it pre-drug configuration, meaning where we were before we synthetically injured our brains.

Dr. Teralyn:

so there's your five minutes of like.

Therapist Jenn:

No, that was channel 10. Yes, I liked it, ross, he can paint and I'm just going to be there talking about the brain.

Dr. Teralyn:

Well done, jen, well done, thank you. There's two parts in here that I want to talk about just briefly. The one is in the withdrawal, so when your receptors are sleepy, and that's when you're going to experience the withdrawal. And that's when most people say I must need the medication because I'm experiencing this heightened state of anxiety or depression, whatever it is, and there's a truth in that. Yeah, you do need that medication to keep the previous homeostasis in place.

Dr. Teralyn:

You're right, but that is not a return of symptoms, and this is what we've been taught to say that, yep, that's a return of your symptoms. There's one way to understand how it's not a return of symptoms by a simple question the symptomology that you have right now, was it exactly the same as the symptomology you had 25 years ago when you started? And 100% of the time, I can guarantee you the answer is no. It's way worse, it's way different. Or maybe I started as a depressed patient and now I have got this immense anxiety, so it's different. So that's how you know that it's not a return of symptoms.

Dr. Teralyn:

I also want to address the very beginning stage of when you start taking a medication. Address the very beginning stage of when you start taking a medication. As you said, it blocks the reuptake of serotonin, leaving more serotonin out there playing around building up, right? So when I say the chemical imbalance hypothesis has been long disputed and debunked and all the things and so I'll get this pushback of, then why does it work? I'm like, well, because your neurons now are flooded, in the beginning, with serotonin. What does that feel like? Anytime you have flooded your system with a neurochemical, it feels different, right, like yes, you're going to get sometimes a manic response to that which feels good, like it does feel better than some depression.

Therapist Jenn:

Yeah, you were so damn low. Yes, that's like when people are like a stimulant really helped. Well, fuck, yeah, yes.

Dr. Teralyn:

I would probably enjoy a stimulant too much.

Therapist Jenn:

I'll just love that for a hot second. Yeah, not for more than a little bit.

Dr. Teralyn:

Right, because then, the longer you go, the more downregulated those receptors are, and that's the place where you end up getting more medication, because you start feeling low, or an additional medication on top, or a new diagnosis. All these things start happening. So I've never said that an antidepressant doesn't quote unquote work in the beginning, because it does, because it floods you with all those happy chemicals. Right, it works until it doesn't. It works until it turns on you, and those are the people that we're hoping to catch here, because that's when you know your mental status is going downhill. So, anyway, those are the two important pieces, parts of this process that I think most people have experienced.

Therapist Jenn:

Yeah. So, knowing that these, like we were giving a very specific example and what I was going through is talking a lot about serotonin, okay, antidepressants, they show this hyperbolic pattern between, like the dose and the clinical like symptoms, that's happening, okay. So here's how we get to withdrawal. So the next part I'm from the brain right, which is what Terry and I were talking about here. So then the next part of this is what actually is withdrawal. I think we should touch on that, because people's perceptions of withdrawal at least for a lot of my clients that I've worked with, some of them, it's like a split. Some of them know what it is because they've been trying this two ways from.

Therapist Jenn:

Sunday and have tried so many times to get off of their medication and they know the obvious withdrawal symptoms they know really well.

Dr. Teralyn:

Like the dizziness, the brain zaps. The dyscalibrium, the akathisia. Anybody who has ever went off of?

Therapist Jenn:

a medication and had akathisia, which is essentially there is just this restlessness in your body. It's like. For me it was like there was like bugs crawling all the way through me, had to move, had to move, had to move, had to move. Ok, impending doom often comes with akathisia bugs crawling all the way through me, had to move, had to move, had to move, had to move.

Dr. Teralyn:

Okay. Impending doom often comes with akathisia. I still think, jen, that sometimes akathisia is looked at it like a return of symptoms. That stuff is the anxiety and the akathisia, with the low mood and the wanting to off yourself. That's a return of depression mood and the wanting to off yourself, that's a return of depression.

Therapist Jenn:

But the obvious ones are I know I'm in withdrawal because I'm dizzy or I have a bobblehead or I have brain zaps. Those are obvious. Those are obvious, but there are. When I say a lot of clients, I have already been through those. But something that I find very interesting is that there were many other. As they learn about withdrawal. There are many other symptoms of withdrawal that they had prior to those that they didn't know were withdrawal.

Dr. Teralyn:

Right, yeah, so, in the vein of us helping you with your hyperbolic taper, we track symptoms with people Like. Symptom tracking is a huge thing, data collection is a giant thing, and the reason we do that is especially, I think, about the first time. Like, let's say, you're going to come in and you're going to do your first reduction, right, okay, I will say, we're going to do your first reduction. The first one is going to take the longest, because I want to make sure that you're not experiencing any withdrawal symptoms at all for weeks before we go again. In order to do that, though, we need to collect data for a little bit of time. Okay, on this first one, and so I want to give. I'm going to throw Jen under the bus here, because I think it was one of your first tapers, and then it was going well for a few weeks, and then, suddenly, you were complaining to me that you had a headache, and I said you need to track that as a thing, and you were kind of like it's been a few weeks, so whatever.

Therapist Jenn:

And here's where it comes from, and I know a lot of people listening right now are going to go through this. Well, the first couple of reductions, I was fine. And here's the deal, guys. Yes, if you're on 20 milligrams of of, say, lexapro, right For most, tapering like guides okay, you actually go down like five milligrams right away or down to 10 milligrams. That's very common and that's where that's where this is important to know.

Dr. Teralyn:

It's a false sense of security.

Therapist Jenn:

And there's a little science to back it right. Again, guys, there's this hyperbolic fashion that's happening and in that, this curve that's occurring the farther you get in the taper, the more difficult it gets because of all of that obnoxious PBS special I just gave you about the brain. Okay, about 10 minutes ago. That's the why. So typically for most tapers we're looking at the occupancy of serotonin on these receptors. Over time that changes, so what it looks like when you go in the beginning is very markedly different from the middle versus the end, which is why in the beginning you can take a five or even a 10 milligram cut and you're like oh, I'm fucking fine.

Dr. Teralyn:

Or I want to say people that are on like Zoloft and they're at 200 milligrams and they don't feel anything in their taper for a long time. When I say a long time, like 150, 100, and then suddenly you hit that cert occupancy point and it goes. Oh my God.

Therapist Jenn:

And that's where there's some brain mind fuckery that happens with this and I will be yes, you can call me out all day long in this episode because I did it multiple times because I wasn't paying attention to withdrawal symptoms that I didn't. I knew they were withdrawal because you know I've read about them, I was educated on them, right Like Joseph Glenn Mullen wrote this great book called the Antidepressant Solution, and in there there's these charts that I still give to my clients as a reference right and I use myself.

Dr. Teralyn:

There's like a hundred, there's around like a hundred symptoms or something.

Therapist Jenn:

Well, the one he put out has about 60. It's got about 60 different withdrawal symptoms in it. And some of these are ones we would never chalk up to withdrawal guys, which is why we start to. This is like my Bible these sheets I have. They are laminated and they're in my bathroom cabinet. I look at them every day Great idea.

Dr. Teralyn:

It's a great idea, I do.

Therapist Jenn:

Because here's the deal. Did you know that slight headaches are a symptom of withdrawal? Stomach bloating and abdominal cramps diarrhea, okay are symptoms of withdrawal. Let's say you got a cold and there are symptoms that are mimicking like flu-like symptoms, right, Like you've got aches or pains, or my nose keeps running, Okay.

Dr. Teralyn:

Yep Runny nose is on the list. Oh my God.

Therapist Jenn:

Nightmares, guys. All of a sudden I'm not sleeping as good. I'm having these kind of crazy, like intense dreams maybe not super nightmares, but all of a sudden my dreams are vivid and they're really intense. Okay, intense dreams maybe not super nightmares, but all of a sudden my dreams are vivid and they're really intense. Okay, these, these are symptoms of withdrawal. Now most people are like my brain's not zapping.

Dr. Teralyn:

I'm not.

Therapist Jenn:

I don't have suicidal thoughts.

Dr. Teralyn:

Okay, guys, these are the things.

Therapist Jenn:

Yeah, you're not going to hurt myself or others. These are the things that your prescribers will say to you to pay attention to, but they are missing the other hundred symptoms that people go through. Well, you have trouble sleeping. What's that about? That's actually a symptom of withdrawal.

Dr. Teralyn:

This is the exercise in curiosity and not dismissing anything. So if you have it, you check it off because it might be really important for your next one. It might have an established pattern of when it emerges. Yeah, because here's the thing, and this is where the deprescribing guideline is very important, because it maps it out. But this is the individuality piece. So if you know that on week three you get a headache, Week three after your taper, you're definitely not going to want to be tapering in week four or even in week three.

Therapist Jenn:

So that's what we do, guys, is we look at the symptoms you have and you have to be very honest with yourself on this. I was not many times, which led me to some pretty extreme akathisia and spaces of like. I could have been inpatient, no doubt in my mind. Okay. So I laugh about these things, but it's part of my story and that's just kind of how I am sometimes. But I didn't pay attention, right, and so here I was, going from headaches to so much akathisia that I couldn't walk around my kitchen and be around knives. Okay, that's reality for me, all right.

Therapist Jenn:

Now what we do and we look at is when you have these symptoms even if it's diarrhea, even if it's like the headaches or my nose won't stop running or my sleep is changing then what we do is when you have those symptoms of withdrawal, you note them and we do not look at tapering you down until you've went at least a couple of weeks without those symptoms. Everyone's different. For me, it takes about 21 to 25 days between each dose reduction for me to have a withdrawal symptom. I don't go down a dose and feel it within four or five days. I'm about two to three weeks later and then I get it.

Dr. Teralyn:

So for me, I got to wait like a month between every single dose reduction. Right, because so many people will miss a dose, like when I was on Zoloft. I know I would miss a dose Right, and then the next day I'd be like you know. So that's what I'm. Most people are looking for, those immediate responses to withdrawal, and they might not exist. Okay, well, and that's.

Therapist Jenn:

I don't mean to interrupt you here, terry, but I and I didn't want to. I'm not going to go far into this, but it's one of the reasons that we educate our clients also on, like, the half-life of a medication. Okay, yeah, and I was like, before we prepped here, I was like we could talk about half-life, just really. Oh, yes, flexatine, it's really long, okay, and so, as compared to some other drugs, right, it's longer. Right, versus a benzodiazepine, your half-life is a matter of hours for some of them. Okay, so your prescribers are going to tell you that's how long it takes for you to the drugs out of your body. If you haven't experienced withdrawal within that half-life period, you're good to go Right, but we already did the PBS special and I talked to you all about how this actually works in the brain, so it's a misnomer.

Therapist Jenn:

Your half-life is important to know, though, because you might notice some of those withdrawal effects that can happen right around that, which is why, like for me, okay, I can't go more, I can go a day and miss my Lexapro, I'm okay. It has a little bit longer of a half-life, and that's me. Personally, I don't experience that Right, and I can miss a dose and I'm okay and I'll just take the dose the next day. But so half-life does matter for that reason. Okay, so it's something to know for the drug that you're taking. But where half-life doesn't matter is what's told to you by your prescribers, which is, hey, you've made it, the half-life's done, you don't have withdrawal.

Dr. Teralyn:

It's out of your body. You're good to go.

Therapist Jenn:

You're good to go. When in reality, that just means the drug has been expelled from the body, but now we wait for the brain to do its thing.

Dr. Teralyn:

Yes, so getting the drug out of your body is only a smidgen of the battle. The recuperation of your brain is the biggest piece that you're going to be dealing with.

Therapist Jenn:

My example I give people is alcohol.

Dr. Teralyn:

Yes, huge example Use alcohol as an example.

Therapist Jenn:

You can go ahead and you can drink too much, right, and within how many hours you know that the alcohol itself is out of the body. But what happens for the next couple of days? You're a piece of shit because you're hungover, right.

Therapist Jenn:

The brain, right, the half-life, it's out of the body. But now the brain and the body have to do the work from the damage that was done. It's the same thing as these guys. So half-life matters, but it doesn't matter in the way that I think it's been educated to us, sometimes by prescribers, because we're like Same thing, yep, and also when we were talking about that cert occupant, we should have put up that little graph on the screen.

Dr. Teralyn:

Too bad, anyway, sorry guys, we didn't do it. Yeah, that graph part of the screen is, I think, one of the most important. I might have it here. Hang on, oh, she might be able to pull it up here. I mean, I have the book here so I can just grab it. Oh, you could. Yeah, you can just throw it up there.

Therapist Jenn:

Okay, hang on, I'm going to try to make this work, guys.

Dr. Teralyn:

Oh, there it is. Yep, there it is. You can see it Like there's like this plateau across the top and then the occupancy level starts decreasing and decreasing and decreasing. Once you hit that curve, okay, going down. Okay, good, you're good. Yep, there you go, yeah, which is why, in the hyperbolic taper, we go slower and slower and slower toward the end. So the ending. Here's the caveat for everybody the ending is the hardest part. So those last little, what is it like? 10% or something is the hardest.

Therapist Jenn:

Man.

Dr. Teralyn:

Yeah, maybe I would have that. But this is like you know you get down to Jen's on four milligrams or something.

Dr. Teralyn:

I'm four, four milligrams or something, and she's just chomping at the bit to be done, Like I can I just be done. And it is so for some people not all, obviously but the last little bit is the hardest part and you're just aching to get off of this entirely. But know that you're going to probably go slower in the end than you did in the beginning. Like I said, that beginning drop, like when you saw the curve was pretty well plateaued. So really anything over, like, let's just say, your sort of occupancy, is 100 milligrams, meaning if you're below 100, you start experiencing withdrawal.

Dr. Teralyn:

If you're 100 to 200, you don't experience anything. That just means that that's just extra shit rolling around in your brain. That extra stuff didn't really even do much for you, right, it's just all the extra stuff. And then when you start going down, that's when you know that was your most impactful milligram, really up to like I'm just making numbers up 100, right. So it gives you that false sense of security off the beginning. But it also gives you a really large sense of hope, right, Like oh, but sometimes the hope is this was really easy, right. And then you start going okay, this is okay. Whoa, that hit me hard, I got to pull back a little bit. Then you get to that little bit and you're like oh man, this is so psychologically hard to keep going.

Therapist Jenn:

Part of what we work with people on our consulting is the psychological piece behind this.

Dr. Teralyn:

That is a very- and to not lose motivation, because I do. There's some people that I've worked with and they get down to that last little bit and they're like maybe I'll just stay on this little bit because it's so hard, and it's like, okay, we got to get going again. Or you know, I do tell people like sometimes the working with me isn't about a full taper Again. I want to make sure that my clients have that own personal agency again where they can say I'm just going to hold here for a while and I'll contact you in the future when I'm ready to finish it off, and that's fine. So, even like, just a reduction in medication for some people, that's enough, right For some people. I can't push my agenda on you, but I want them to know that it's either you know, less is more, or we're going to do the full thing, or we're going to take you off of you know one or two medications and leave you on the other. You know, whatever you want to do, I'm there for it, you know so.

Therapist Jenn:

I think that's important too, because people will like consult with me and they will. They'll do a you know, a quick consultation and they well, I heard you on on your social media, right, I've listened to you on the gas literature and, like I know you're over a year and a half into doing this and it's not feasible for me to sit and see you once or twice a month, right, for a year and a half. Like that's like cost-wise right, Like that is not a thing I can do, right, and so I think it's important. That's one of the first things I tell people is well, first of all, this is my journey, not yours, so everybody is going to be really different than this. And second, we're going to build you up.

Therapist Jenn:

At least I tell people this I'm going to resource the shit out of you, give you everything you need. I'm going to teach you how to listen to yourself and as you start to go through this taper, you're going to know and learn and have that agency. You're going to know what to do. You don't have to stay with me forever. I've got people that come back three, four months later and do a check-in and tell me where things are at and ask a couple questions.

Therapist Jenn:

And that's it. You do not need to. Once we get you built and resourced, you'll have the things that you need. To keep moving forward in this, you learn. I've got life events going on right now. For me, that was a big one. I went three months and I didn't touch anything. I didn't even touch the taper and I knew what I wasn't going to because I had so many things going on in my life that I knew weren't going to be optimal. It was the middle of winter. In this godforsaken state we live in, I don't know why I'm still here. That doesn't help. So I paused, and you learn when to pause, when to go. You learn if you went too fast and if you have to reinstate, which is going back up to where you were. We try hard, not to do that.

Therapist Jenn:

We try not to do that. There's this thing called the kindling effect you can look that up, guys which can be a dangerous space. However, for some people, I've had to do it a couple of times because the withdrawal was so bad and it was two solid weeks of it and it was too much for me, so I went back up. Of course, I got better within like 24 hours.

Dr. Teralyn:

That's another way. You know it's withdrawal. You instantly get better and you're like oh, Within like a day or two, you're back, but it's very individualized.

Therapist Jenn:

So we teach you how to get to that space, because I don't know about you, terri, but I'm not in the business of creating forever consumers. That's just not my shit, could we be Hell yeah, you want to stay with me for three years and see me every two, three weeks and pay out of pocket for that and do that. Fine, but guess what I find?

Therapist Jenn:

maybe some people do, but for most of us I don't want that. We want to teach people how to really listen to yourself and do this yourself. We'll get you there and you just check in.

Dr. Teralyn:

Yeah, and I like to tell people too. When I'm working with you, I like to keep communication open, because if I'm not seeing you for four more weeks or even longer, because, like Jen, she held for three months or whatever, I'm not going to see you while you're holding, let's set that appointment for April then. But if you're doing something and you have a question that's small, just ask it. Do not wait for April to roll around to ask should I take this B complex, like what the fuck? Just ask me the question, you know. Um, so I I like to be able to have that type of touch point, support as needed. Uh, and I will tell you that you know there's people like, oh, you shouldn't do that, whatever, and I'm like I have yet to have somebody abuse that with me, um, cause I think most people are conditioned to not unless it's really important. So I'm not really worried about that stuff because I want to know that you're also being very supported by me.

Therapist Jenn:

And most people don't. They're not right and left like going through things, asking crazy questions. They're not. It's usually like legitimate things that they just want to know something about. I get a lot of people who communicate just to go hey, I just found this article you might want to read this Like. I get more of that. I get memes sent to me constantly. I know I'm constantly getting more of that kind of stuff. Like hey, I was on JAMA and I read this article have you seen this? And I'm like, oh my God.

Dr. Teralyn:

And then I'll take that and give it to other clients.

Therapist Jenn:

It's so fantastic because it's this community of sharing resources which ends up happening too, which is pretty damn cool.

Dr. Teralyn:

And I will tell you that I think, Jen and I, every time we work with someone we learn something new, because no one person is the same. And also I've had an influx of people coming in very complicated psychiatric medication stacking and stuff like that.

Therapist Jenn:

A lot of polypharmacy.

Dr. Teralyn:

Polypharmacy is a huge thing and a lot of health-related concerns on top of it. So I'm learning, sometimes at the same pace as my clients are, and I'm constantly having to relearn what I thought I knew already, because it's never the same thing twice. So people will have questions like, well, is this normal? Is that normal? I'm like, well, if it's happening to you, then it's normal for you. Yep, I'm like I don't know, not everybody's going to experience that, but if you are, yep, I'm like I don't know, not everybody's going to experience that, but if you are, that is your normal. So that's where we're at and that's that individual piece of all of this that I think can be missing, and it is kind of missing in the book. There's no way you can account in this book for bio-individuality and just life experiences and things like that. So this book is a great guide. Like Jen said in the beginning, it's a tool, it's a guide, it's great education to give to your prescriber.

Therapist Jenn:

They love it when you bring it to the appointment and you tap on the book and you show them the charts.

Dr. Teralyn:

And then they ignore it.

Therapist Jenn:

They love that, I know I'll tell Mark all about that when he comes on the show. I'm just like you have no idea. I brought that book right in there with all my tabs and all my notes and everything, 100%.

Dr. Teralyn:

Jen has exchanged her DSM for the Mouselini prescribing guidelines.

Therapist Jenn:

I know Well, but if you guys have stayed this far with us, this was the end of what was supposed to be a two but a three-part series.

Therapist Jenn:

I swear to God, we're not going to do part four, I mean unless we get a bunch of people that like if we get feedback that like, because anytime you guys give us feedback of like topics that you're interested in us doing or talking more about, we take that into account and so if it makes sense for us, well, we'll add it in and we can resource and add it in. But this I think, I think we can say this is three parts.

Dr. Teralyn:

We are done. Here's the end of our three-part series. If you need more, just work with us individually and we'll give you all the things you could shoot us an email.

Therapist Jenn:

I'm looking to deprescribe and, yes, we will work with you and help you through this. But this is the end of a three-part series. If you haven't catch the whole thing as we wrap, we wrap up our first. The first piece of deep prescribing is that 90 day warmup eat, sleep, move, meditate, get your fricking lifestyle dialed in before we get going. Then you actually move into the second part of deep prescribing, which is you've got your taper team, you're you're maybe doing some functional lab work. We're looking at nutrient depletions. Maybe there's some amino acids or supplements that we need to bring into the game. Okay. And then we move our way to the actual part of looking at what could we do for deprescribing. How could it look? What types of guides can we use? What could your actual hyperbolic taper look like? And that's our hustle.

Dr. Teralyn:

It's what we do, yeah, and so the next part would be setting your free consultation. So there you go Shameless self-promotion.

Therapist Jenn:

You know what? You could send us your Gaslit Truth stories. Or you can email us and just say hey, I want to deep prescribe with you. At thegaslittruthpodcasts at gmailcom, you can find Terri and I anywhere that you go at any of our socials. We're there. You can listen to this podcast anywhere that you listen to your podcasts and give us five stars because you know what we're trying to save the world.

Dr. Teralyn:

We deserve every star.

Therapist Jenn:

Yes, Damn yeah. So thank you everybody for staying with us and listening to three-part series and stay curious How's that?

Dr. Teralyn:

All right, have a good one.

People on this episode

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Dr. Teralyn

Co-host
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Jennifer Schmitz

Co-host
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Dr. Teralyn

Guest
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Jennifer Schmitz

Guest