Hi Elias,
You have done just as I would recommend anyone to ease off prescription medication. You have the desire to stop having your emotions controlled by a drug and are seeking natural health instead.
If you are in middle age, numbness in the feet and digestive disorders are more a natural aging deterioration at that time of life. Numbness in the feet is a precursor to Diabetes Type II and the neuropathy that comes with that condition...meaning a person's nerves are atrophying at the tips of the extremities. Toes and feet, or fingers and hands, can lose circulation and feeling overnight, especially while sleeping. As this condition gets worse, arms and legs can lose more and more circulation. Again, the predominance of whole grains in the Macrobiotic Diet can arrest this downward trend and restore a person to good health and good circulation. Again, walking 30 minutes a day is highly recommended for whole body circulation and enhanced functioning of the internal organs.
Diabetes Type II and also digestive disorders (common symptom is acid reflux...used to be called indigestion) are from eating a diet too yin...meaning too acid...with too many simple sugars, fruit and fruit juices, raw foods, dairy foods, and acidic vegetables such as potatoes, tomatoes, green peppers, etc. (what is known as Nightshade Vegetables). Eating too much food, more than the body needs for daily fuel, eating too close to bedtime, especially of foods high in carbohydrates are some reasons for numbness in the extremities at night. The body literally cannot handle the overconsumption of carbs, fuel that it doesn't know what to do with. It is stored as fat while sleeping or if consuming toxic additives, etc. ...the body can begin to pocket it in various sites.
Since you say you noticed the numbness after eating lots of fruits...I think the above advice fits. Macrobiotics can be a life saver for those who haven't known any better until now, who have been eating too yin...too acid...too many simple sugars. Macrobiotics balances your diet towards the middle and a safer, body helpful, way of eating. The middle is a variety of whole grains and vegetables, especially root vegetables and round vegetables, like onions, cabbage, squash, carrots, turnips, parsnips, radishes, etc.
Developing a confident relationship with the Creator can do wonders to ease worries and anxiety. In macrobiotics, one develops more and more respect for the wonder of our bodies, how intricate, and what marvelous mechanisms they are. There is a great intelligence, more than our minds can conceive of, behind everything.
As you become more and more familiar with macrobiotics, and yin and yang, you will begin to be able to utilize these tools, y/y, to manage your emotions. You will be able to wake up in the morning, access your health condition at that moment, including mental, and choose foods that will balance your daily condition. The need for a pill to do it becomes moot, as you can do it with natural, delicious, good-for-you, food.
The anti-depressants and Paxil (which was created for social anxiety) are sedating and soothing to a worried mind at the front...and create aggressiveness and anger at the back. Everything that has a front has a back. One doesn't get away scott free without having to deal with the back also. There is also dependency and addiction at the back.
You monitored your own usage of the pill, cut back yourself, gradually, and weaned yourself off of it. A doctor is not going to do that for you, or encourage you to do it. Your dependency on them and the appointments you make are their paycheck.
When feeling weakness in the nerves load up on whole grains, beans, and use more salt.
The whole grains and beans add B Vitamins and complex carbohydrates, important for mental health and long sustained energy. The protein in beans will prevent depression and keep sexual energy strong, especially Black Beans. Salt will naturally make you more active and confident. The Macrobiotic Diet provides salt in soups with good quality sea salt to season, miso, good quality shoyu (soy sauce), pressed salads (pressed with salt), condiments such as gomashio (crushed sesame seeds and sea salt -- to sprinkle on grains and vegetables), and sea vegetables (seaweeds -- which are an incredible source of minerals). Too yin, and one is lethargic, without gumption, and lacking seriousness...Too yang, and one can become too powerful, aggressive, and angry. Monitor these subtle changes and try to strike a balance in the middle.
You will have some weakness that comes and goes until you are really out of the woods. Just monitor yourself, and adjust accordingly. Listen to your body, and you will begin to know it well. Keep reading...recommended is:
The Macrobiotic Way by Michio Kushi and
The Self Healing Cookbook by Kristina Turner has a lot of wonderful information all the way through, on food and moods.
Self Healing is where it's at!!!
Nancy