Anxiety Forum

[nevergiveup]

Hello all,
This is my first post here so please forgive me if it's a bit lengthy...

I'm in my mid thirties and i've been battling anxiety for a long time before getting on formal medication. My informal medication was alcohol and I started zoloft in the year 2000. Besides some of the standard, milder side effects, zoloft worked wonderfully for me. It changed my life. Unfortunately, its effectiveness wore off after 6.5 years or about a year and a half ago. My doctor and I decided to try Cymbalta and I was on that longer than I should have been. It seemed to put me in a fog and I had some severe anxiety episodes. At the time I was busy with work and missed regular med checks. After a particular bad episode and running out of my prescription, I decided to stop taking the medication. This was the Spring of 07. The withdrawal was brutal. I will definitely be tapering off the next time. I was feeling better though and my summer was fairly good without medication. This was good to see what life was like again without it. Everything was great but the stress in my life kicked up significantly and my anxiety came back with a vengeance. I decided to go back to medication again in November, 2007 and my primary care dr. prescribed 20mg of Celexa (actually lexapro, but the insurer wants to try celexa first). It was great the first two weeks and then I had a severe anxiety attack, the worst i've ever experienced. I think it was the medication, but the dr. did not. I dropped the dosage from 20 mg to 10 mg with the intent of getting on a different medicine. My attacks went away for a few weeks but they seem to be coming back again. I reupped my dosage to 20 mg today, which was a rough day and plan to get to a Psych this week (not my primary care dr. ) to get a new plan in place.

I'd be interested to hear if anyone thinks I should stick with Celexa or should change to a new med.

May God bless you all
_________________
May the road rise to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face.
And rains fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the hollow of His hand.

[nevergiveup]

Update... I ended up tapering off of Celexa. It was bad for me in the high dosage (20mg) and didn't do anything other than give me side effects at the low dosage (10mg)...

I've been doing somewhat better thanks to other posters in the forum that promoted the book "Been there, done that? do this!" by sam obitz.

I read his book, which is a great starter and the exercises he communicates are very helpful. I also bought the book "Feeling Good" by Dr. David Burns, that was listed in Sam Obitz bibliography. And some Anxiety Workbook thing that is rated highly on Amazon (haven't spent as much time with it, although it seems good).

the self help has been great and i've had times where i've tasted anxiety, depression free happiness, which is something I haven't tasted in a LONG TIME...

i am beginning to struggle again and, while I think the books are great with or without medicine, I am thinking about getting back on medicine...
_________________
May the road rise to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face.
And rains fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the hollow of His hand.

[nevergiveup]

i decided to get back on meds and my dr. prescribed luvox (fluvoxamine). I've been on it for 5 weeks now and i'm having a tough time with the "side" effects including: nausea, reflux, headaches, feeling hot/sweating, muscle tension and one or two others i can't think of at the moment...

the good news is that i am feeling less anxious or at least my mind doesn't seem to be racing as much. the bad news is that i feel like crap physically and i'm worried about that...

job stress/burnout isn't helping things, but i didn't have the above mentioned issues previously...

p.s. anyone out there looking for an experienced professional i ready for a change. also, any lotto winners out there that would like to help a guy retire early?
_________________
May the road rise to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face.
And rains fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the hollow of His hand.