I woke up after fifteen years of unnecessary medication to find I am sixty years old. Divorced, estranged from my children, broke, on disability, have two fractured vertebrae, three herniated disc and spinal stenosis all brought on by a weight lifting accident in prison (yes prison) during a short visit from a medication initiated manic episode, to find out I was miss-diagnosed and I don’t need any of the medication I’ve been taking for fifteen years, the withdrawal is difficult and time consuming.

To top it off I’m an inch and a half shorter and still forty pounds over weight and I think I’m forty five. Oh and I don’t sleep.

What helps is diet and vigorous exercise. I’ve lost twenty five pounds and I am the strongest I have ever been and I played ice hockey for thirty years. I got with my doctor, found out what I should and should not eat (hint sugar had to go) and what exercises I could do. For me I lift weights and walk or ride a bike.

I figure to borrow from Red “it was time to get busy living or get busy dying”

Good luck! I know it’s hard.