Sertraline Has Changed My Life for the Good

[loopylu]

I have used this forum & found it helpful when I was very desperate to get some help for my Anxiety, so I thought I would try & return the help. I had spent 25 years trying to deal with really acute anxiety & did not want to take any medication unless it was natural (which was never nearly strong enough) because I did not want to feel half asleep all of the time. This belief came from watching my Mum live on Valium & other stuff all her life. I spent years reading self-help books seeing Psychologists & having hypnosis etc., I always felt better for a while, but in the last 2 years my Anxiety got so bad I thought that if I could not get some sort of permanent help it was not worth carrying on with my life. I finally went to see my GP in tears & we had a long talk & he helped me make the decision to take Sertraline. I started off taking 25mg in the morning for the first 6 days & then went onto 50mg & finally after 8 weeks to 100mg. Initially the side effects were horrible but I had the belief that if I could ride these side effects out & stick with it for the first 6 weeks (which were the worst) I would be OK. I am so glad I did this. I put up with the nausea where I even bought up my food once, the sweating until I dripped, the teeth clenching, the shaky hands, the sleepless nights and worst of all the increased anxiety, I didn’t think it could get any worse. To help with the upset stomach my GP gave me a script for Metoclopramide HCL 10mg to be taken half hour before meals as I could not eat food, my appetite was gone partially due to the increased anxiety as well as the upset tummy. To help with sleepless nights I tried sleeping tablets which are addictive & for me fairly useless as they only helped me sleep for 2 or 3 hours then I was wide awake again so I found a product called Melatonin 2mg which I got another script for as the natural stuff from the health shop was not strong enough, I took up to 2 tablets 1 hour before bedtime & this worked for me & is not addictive.
To finish this with hopefully a helpful comment, when reading many of the comments on this & other forums, many people trying Sertraline get some of the side effects which are not pleasant, for me personally the Anxiety was ruining my life & I was willing to try anything to fix it even if I had to suffer more for a while to create a life worth living, it was short term suffering & after 6 weeks life improved drastically. I increased my dose to 100mg & other than a couple of sleepless nights & mild sweating I had no other side effects & again after a couple of weeks all was fantastic. Now after 14 weeks I am so very happy & mentally relaxed. This is my personal experience & I always did everything with my GP’s OK & my wonderful husband who was so supportive, god knows how he put up with me :yesyes:

[venusbluejeans]

Hiya loopylu and welcome to NMP :welcome:

Why not take a look at our articles on our home page, they contain a wealth of information and are a great starting place for your time on the forum.

I hope you find the as site helpful and informative as I have and that you get the help and support you need here and hope that you meet a few friends along the way :yesyes:

[loopylu]

Hi Venusbluejeans

Thanks for your reply. I only posted on here because when I was going through all of my horrible terrifying times I used to read the forum & the people who posted on there helped me feel that I was not the only one & that I was not going mad.
I am now better because I take Sertraline, I should have done this ages ago. For me the new modern SRI's are great, I feel wide awake all day & happy & not afraid of every thought or physical feeling anymore because I no longer seem to have them......for example if I got a pain in my leg I used to be terrified I had some awful sickness that would kill me, my mind was out of control. I used to spend so much time internet searching every pain I had, or every weird thought I had to see if I was normal - which for all of you who have done this know that you will always find terrifying info. somewhere that matches exactly your symptoms. Now if I get a pain in my leg, I just dont worry about it, it seems to just not get to me anymore & I now have my life back.:yahoo:
I hope I might be able to help anyone who is trying out the Sertraline as for some of us the initial side affects are awful & I have noticed on various forums that many people don't seem to understand that these side effects are usually temporary, so they stop taking it or increase the dosage to early because they think its not working as its made them feel worse. I also have the personal opinion when reading some of the things people have written about taking Sertraline (This is only my personal opinion as I am not a doctor) that some of the GP's are too ready to increase dosages to quickly where as my doctor would not do that, he insisted that I wait for 4 to 6 weeks on the 50mg. After 6 weeks I did go to the 100mg & that is the right strength for me.