Bingo. Have you been reading my bio? When I came off my own med a year and a half ago, I got cortisol dysfunction that was occasionally crippling. I was over-sensitive to sound; had to use sunglasses when on the computer or watching TV; even reading more than a few pages in a book was too much for me. When the temperature outside rose past the mid-70s F, I would get sick. I worked for 6 weeks last autumn but had to quit because the cortisol made me a jittery wreck.

The good news is that through healing with diet and supplements, this improves over time. I'm getting better and I've been able to cope with working in a school 2-3 days a week. Strangely, what's harder on my cortisol is sitting still in a seminar for hours on end (which is also part of this return-to-teaching course I am on). Fortunately I use some herbs that help a lot with this.

I wish someone would investigate your ideas about how these meds affect adrenals, because I have no doubt you are on to something there. Problem is, no one ever seems to be all that interested in how meds do what they do, as long as they can point to them being "superior to placebo" in clinical trials. (Don't even get me started on that.)