Medication

[heatherd1986]

I know that medication will not cure my anxiety but in the past when I took it it did help well 2 of them did.
Ive tried propranolol and I am not sure if it was fast or slow release but it made me feel like my heart was going to stop it was horrible.
Fluoxetine worked for a little while and so did Citalopram,
I am due back to the dr tomorrow to see what medication I can try now. I need a medication that I can function on that doesn't have horrid side effects. Is there any such medication?????

[MyNameIsTerry]

Thats a very tricky question really considering how they affect us so individually when we start them. Side effects are well known to SSRI/SNRI's so perhaps you want to talk to people taking Mirtazapine, Pregabalin, etc as I've seen people say they suffer less on those but there are also threads where people are struggling on them too so there will always be a risk.

I'm thinking people like hanshan, SmilingAlbert, etc may be able to offer some advice as they seem to understand these and I've seem them promote their use over SSRI's due to less start up side effects.

[Emphyrio]

You could try a low dose of an SSRI, like say 5mg of fluoxetine (which you can get in a liquid). Mirtazapine (for me anyway) came with some fairly annoying side effects.

Ideally though I'd try and manage anxiety in other ways. Some gerval remedies and supplements can help, like rhodiola, ginseng and St john's wort. And inositol too.

[MyNameIsTerry]

You have to be careful with herbals as some can interact with antidepressants e.g. Gingko Biloba interasts with SSRI's. I know Emphyio is suggesting their use outside of meds but just wanted to add that just incase anyone tries an adjunct approach as we all tend to know about St. John's Wort but not some of the others.

Ginseng seems useful to me. I used to take Siberian and found it was helpful for energy levels, mental focus and illness in general. The only thing you have to watch is that it does have anxiety as a side effect so perhaps start small and build up?

Another interesting one is Ashwagandha. Like Inositol, there are studies of it to support it's use in anxiety disorders. NoPoet's inositol thread is a good read about it but please read my post on the end as there is a good source there which shows how the dosage can be lowered by 70% to achieve the same results without the GI side effects.

[Sunflower2]

You also should t forget that hundreds of people take SSRIs with no or very few side effects - these are the people that don't post about the side effects. Everyone I know that has taken or is taking SSRIs didn't really get any side effects. But reading on here would make it seem that everyone feels awful on them.