Punk trying to come off Prozac

I am best known as that oh so irritatingly happy happy Cbeebies presenter on Tikkabilla, Higgledy House & Mighty mites. In reality I’m just another 30 something with many skeletons in my closet…. And the biggest skeleton is that I am actually a Punk On Prozac.

“Aha”, I hear you say! “She is one of the, ‘Shiny, happy, people’ we read about, a fraud in happiness, the smile is there but the light in the eyes burned out long ago…… We just knew no one could be that happy!”

Well let me dispel right now the – they’re always happy myth, about us Prozac zombies, we are just that….. Zombies, often misdiagnosed and in a fluoxetine fog trying to fathom out if on this drug we will ever fit in to a society in which we have to hide our filthy addiction, because deep down you will all judge us, even our close friends and family judge us and use it against us. On Prozac we are neither able to reach a state of blissful happiness or can we delve indulgently in to the depths of despair, we are numb, controlled and indeed the effects of taking prozac have even been described by, Joseph Glenmullen in his book, Prozac Backlash, as a “chemical lobotomy”…

I’ve been taking prozac for 15 years and I’d be inclined to agree with Joseph Glenmullen M.D. My soul is slowly dying and that’s the reason I am writing this blog – to log my experiences of my adulthood addiction to ‘chemical happiness’. I’ll explain why I started taking it and how I’ve come to stay on it for long.

But for now here’s a poem I wrote about it I hope it explains the experience of being a Punk On Prozac

And there I am by night and day
A drugged up web trapped in play
And I can hear my whispers say
A curse be on me if I stay
Inside a Prozac nation

I don’t know what this curse will be
And yet It takes me steadily
And little others care for me
Inside my Prozac nation

Hear the system mournful holy
Chanted loudly chanted lowly
Til my blood is frozen slowly
And my eyes are darkened wholely
Bathed in medication
Eyes widen, muscles quiver
Nervous system caught in shiver
Through the high that runs forever
A spinning Prozac nation

Moving through the mirror clear
That hangs before me every year
Shadows of my past appear
The shapes of my creation
But in the web I still delight
The drug that weaves the crazy sights
To find the switch that brings the light
That is my prozac nation

Of course if you are taking prozac I’m not a doctor, I just want tell my story to whoever wants to listen – I’m just spring cleaning those skeletons.

I’ll keep you updated about my next instalment of ‘Punk On Prozac’ on my twitter feed @sjhoneywell – I look forward to hearing your comments about my blog. Thank you for reading

SJ x