Re: New to SSRI and worried
Hopefully someone else can pop by and share their experiences. Some of these questions you may want to pose to your doc as well.
I may have gotten really lucky with this med, but it's done wonders for me. I haven't had any major side effects - nothing sexual or anything like that - and even the start-up side effects were more annoying than traumatic.
My emotions haven't changed, I've just found I generally handle stress better.
I understand your fears as I was scared too. From time to time I still do have a scary thought. I think in general bad ideas are spread about mental health drugs and, being anxiety sufferers, we internalize them. But so far so good here.
I tell you - when I started these medications it was because I was taking accutane. I had had HA fears in the past and other bouts of anxiety, but this one was particularly bad. Why? Because I had googled something about THAT drug, which has a very bad rep floating around the internet, and was convinced I had done all kinds of terrible damage to myself. I was absolutely petrified.
And...a year after I stopped taking it and no bad side effects to speak of. I barely had any while I was taking it - slightly dry skin but nothing to cry over! It just worked and maybe I got lucky, but some "side effects" that people on the internet claim to have may be due to something else entirely, but they've attributed it to this drug or another.
I haven't had the chance yet to go off of lexapro and see how I do, but I imagine I'll be okay. I don't think the tapering will be that fun - you have to deal with side effects then too - but hopefully I'll be in a better headspace and can cope.
Best of luck to you!
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