Feeling Lightheaded A Lot

[MarkyMark88]

Hi everyone,

I'm brand new here and have had a lot of success in dealing with my health anxiety by visiting this site. I thought I'd give it a go and try to join the community.

Ever since my first panic attack back in August it seems like I can't go a day without feeling some sort of lightheadedness. I've been on alprazolam for a couple of months and switched to clonazepam a few weeks ago for quick reaction use and recently switched to buspirone from zoloft a week ago for long term use. I was on zoloft for about 3 weeks and hated it.

Could the feeling of being lightheaded be a side effect of the buspar and my body trying to get used to the new medication, and or when the clonazepam starts to wear off each day? I notice that the lightheaded feeling subsides when I take my clonazepam. My PCP said that when those kinds of meds wear off anxiety symptoms can hit pretty hard, and I'm sure dwelling on the feeling is only intensifying it. I feel as though I need to take the clonazepam everyday just to keep my mind at bay but I am afraid by doing that I am slowly going to become addicted to the medication, which is the last thing I want.

I know if I google lightheadedness I will be going down a dark and deep rabbit hole and I'm not even going to think of doing that.

Any insight would be welcome! :)

[cattia]

I have this a lot, every day in fact at the moment. I think it is a form of depersonalisaton. It's really, really horrible, I often feel like I am going to pass out on the spot.

[MarkyMark88]

With it being that bad for you how have you been dealing with it to get by during the day?

[cattia]

I'm barely getting by day to day and I'm afraid if I don't feel better soon I will need to go off sick from work. I feel worse as the day goes on, then somewhat better late afternoon / evening. I feel totally exhausted along with it. Sometimes getting out and walking helps and when it gets really bad at work I lock myself in the toilet and listen to a five minute meditation on my phone with headphones. It helps ground me which makes it slightly better for a short time. How are you coping yourself?

[poppy77]

Why are you switching and swapping your anxiety meds so much? This is probably affecting your body's reactions to the meds. I bet you light headedness is an initial side effect of at least one of them. In fact when I started on Sertraline (Zoloft) I did get light headedness and loads of other weird things too, such as really bad sweats (including bad night sweats, which, as I'm sure you can imagine, really amped up my health anxiety), complete insomnia, increased anxiety. This lasted for a few weeks and I was almost ready to quit them but the Dr encouraged me to hang in there. After a few weeks all the side effects started to go away.

Hang in there, it will get better. Also, talk to the doctor about a definite plan for your medication and stick with it rather than chopping and changing.

Best of luck

[cattia]

I've also just come off Sertraline after being on it five weeks. It did help my anxiety a bit (after two weeks of panic attacks with start up effects) but it made me feel so incredibly lethargic and depressed. Although I was only on it five weeks, I wonder if some of what I'm experiencing could be Sertraline withdrawal. I tapered down from 50mg over a week because I'd been on it for a short time, six weeks in total but perhaps that is enough to get withdrawals.

[Panicless]

I have had that a bit. It seems to come and go. I got the doctor to check it out, had blood tests etc. But she couldnt find anything and decided that it is just an anxiety thing.

[MarkyMark88]

How are you coping yourself?

By coming to this site mostly lol. Getting great insights from other people that have the same symptoms that I'm going through. That tells me everything has to be in my head or from my body getting used to medications. I'm going to try therapy come the first of the year.

[Ethansmom]

I am getting the same thing. I think mine could be medicine related as well, as well as the continuous worrying about the symptom :(