PDA

View Full Version : Terrified and want it to stop



Tufty
13-03-12, 12:12
Never 'posted' or spoken to anyone outside family and friends about these sensations but I'm hoping someone may be able to give me some reassurance and encouragement that there is light at the end of the awful place I'm in.
A brief history, I first had a panic attack at the age of 26 when suffering from post natal depression, tried some tricyclic antidepressants but they made me too sleepy to care for my beautiful baby (now a beautiful 15 year old) and so I stopped quite quickly, the panic and depression lasted a few months but I coped. Aged 30 I had some panic attacks and general anxiety again after moving house and had two young children but slowed down, took time off work and it went. Aged 33 I had a 'major episode' (don't know what else to call it), don't know what the exacerbating factors were but for 10 months I went to hell - but I came back!! Had severe, crippling anxiety disorder, became agrophobic for a while, this lead to depression and eventually hospitalisation - which was of little help. Back then (this was 2003) I had CBT, psychoanalysis, art therapy!!, tried citalopram, venlafexine? and imipramine. The SSRI's gave me intolerable anxiety - electric current running through my body, the shakes, basically a fear of living, the imipramine made me sleepy but didn't help much. I started Prozac at very low dose (2mg liquid increasing daily) at the start of 2004, increasing the doseage to 40mg daily and I went back to being me. Life for 8 years had been really good, taking between 20-80mg Prozac weekly, I'm crap with meds and forget to take them. If I left too long between doses I get a bit irritable and it reminded me to take it.
Then, sorry I'm trying to be brief, since the start of the year I've taken it less - just forgot. So for the last week I've been 'thrown' back into to the pit of panic. I increased the Prozac but I'm getting all the side effects I had when initially starting - electric shocks, sweating, irrational fear, shaking, diarrhoea, clenched jaw - I'm terrified. Taking 2mg Diazepam 2 - 3 times a day but it only works for about 3 hours - can anyone help???

diane07
13-03-12, 12:17
Hi samhar70

A huge warm welcome to nmp.

You'll get loads of advice and support here and make some lovely friends along the way.

Best wishes

Stormsky
13-03-12, 12:26
hi
if the prozac has worked for you in the past, then hopefully the effects will kick in soon, youll just have to persevere for a few wks, like when you first started them initially.... but also you may find they dont work as well this time, as i know alot of people whom a drug worked well , after a break from it, the same drug didnt work so well...its going to be a case of waiting to see...
Im no fan of meds, they dont cure you, and only mask symptons... you will have to eventually deal with the anxeity at some point, or are you planning to stay on meds indefinately?
the thing i found , i was on meds 9yrs, is that when i came off the anxiety was worse than before i started meds... which can happen with all the years its been suppressed by drugs... ive been meds free for 7 months and have a grip on my health now, but its taken time! exercise and vit b are all i do, and trying reflexology this week too, which is supposed to be good for mood .....
you need to look at what is still causing your anx/panic/depression really....