Coping with Early Stages of Citalopram

[phil6]

Sparkle,
That's brilliant news... I am back on 20mg and now looking forward to my 10 th week thanks.
It's lovely in Ibiza... Nice and cool, to get away from the heat...lol.
Phil

[Spot-the-frog]

The parcel didn't turn up and i didn't go to my daughters, in fact I felt really anxious and ended up going to lay on my bed with the fan on about 5pm. I stayed there until I went to sleep at 10pm, just trying to read and watch tv. I have woken up this morning and feel anxious and have no idea why. Feeling really down as I was doing ok and had a glimmer of hope, only for it to be snatched away again. I hate my life!

[lisa2512]

hey spot im having the same problem, i had 2 amazing weeks of feeling really good then wham i got gastritis, that has now passed im just left with the odd bout of indigestion after eating and a little nausea, but every morning im waking up anxious, im restless and really tired all the time, im getting anxious when my husband goes to work, im getting anxious when i have to collect kids from school, im getting anxious when having to do anything i feel so drained, im flat and miserable, got no motivation, i just wanna go to bed and stay there, im not taking pleasure in anything and i cant settle. im on week 8-9 of cit, im just not sure if its right for me this time round, i thought it had settled but now its back to how i was on week 4. not really sure which direction to go, weather to come of cit and try a diff ssri or weather to stick with it another 2 weeks, i hate the thought of coming of cit as i know what a bugger it is, and i hate the thought of the start up of another ssri. in a crap place at the minute

[phil6]

Lisa, Karen,
Having just gone through a similar blip, I am now feeling good again. I only say this to encourage you to believe that these downs do pass. The length of time they last are definitely proportional to how we think when we go through them. I think mine only lasted a few days this time as I made a conscious decision not to count the days or yearn to feel good, I just tried to do one day at a time and not be too discouraged. Now I know how desperate these days can feel, but they do pass.... Always.
We also fall into the trap of believing that an answer lies in a different drug etc etc... I learnt that the hard way recently chopping and changing, and here I am back on the Cit and feeling good again.
The answer lies in, and always has, changing our attitude to the way we feel on any day. Think of it this way, when you feel good, do you try to feel bad? You couldnt do that or want to....So why when we feel bad to we try to feel good? Stop trying, accept that you are having a bad day... Forget yesterday, and don't think about tomorrow. Yesterday is gone and we cannot predict the future.
I saw an excellent statement recently, I can't remember where,,, " if you have one foot in yesterday and one foot in tomorrow then all you can do is piss on today"
Now I know your reaction to this will be similar to mine.... I can't do this, I don't feel I am strong enough to do this, I have no motivation etc... As this is the way I think when in a bad spell... But actually we can do it, even if it takes a lot of practice and a lot of failures. But please remember how you will feel when the practice pays off.
Hope you both feel better soon. X
Phil

[cheshirecatqee]

Lisa and Karen, Phil is so right, i had a blip about a couple of weeks ago but it does pass and no matter what med you are on there will be blips.

Please try and be strong, just keep reminding yourself you got better before and you will again.

[lisa2512]

thanks guys, with me i think the fatigue maybe post viral, it just gets you down, thanks for the support

[Spot-the-frog]

Thanks from me too

I am still struggling today, maybe it is because subconsciously I am thinking about going back to work, I have a doctors review tomorrow. Whatever it is it is tiring and I feel so rubbish. I have been trying to keep myself distracted by doing housework and then baking a cake but now I am really hot and tired, AND I am still waiting for my delivery - funny enough it is a fan on a stand - could really do with it today!

[Spot-the-frog]

Had my GP appointment this morning, and have decided that after 3 months on citalopram to change over to Escitalopram. My GP thinks that I have given the cit a fair crack of the whip and that even though there has been some improvement he hoped it would be more. We talked about two ADs - Escitalopram V Sertraline and he thinks the Escit will be the better option as it is very similar to Cit. I have to cut my dose of cit in half for a couple of days and then start at 10mg of Escit building up to 20mg - so watch this space.

[keithwms]

Had my GP appointment this morning, and have decided that after 3 months on citalopram to change over to Escitalopram. My GP thinks that I have given the cit a fair crack of the whip and that even though there has been some improvement he hoped it would be more. We talked about two ADs - Escitalopram V Sertraline and he thinks the Escit will be the better option as it is very similar to Cit. I have to cut my dose of cit in half for a couple of days and then start at 10mg of Escit building up to 20mg - so watch this space.

This sounds like a reasonable approach. Good luck with it! I am very curious what differences you find. I hope you'll still hang out with us

Sorry that cit didn't work but... we all know the statistics: a lot of people need to try two meds before finding the right one for them. I hope escit works for you and that the taper off cit goes smoothly.



~~~

I am ~1 week in on the buspar, which my doc added to the cit. Coming up to speed on buspar has been fairly easy. Well... much easier than cit. I had the poor sleep, excess nervous energy, and I think I have some mild dizziness an hour or two after taking it. I also seem to perspire rather profusely when nervous, but that is probably temporary- I hope.

At this point I am just trying not to ask myself how I feel, because the answer is a mix. I definitely do not feel like myself yet, which is annoying. But I probably need to try not to think about it for another week or so, and just give my new combo a chance to settle. Patience, you know! If the buspar does what it's supposed to do then I may have found my solution for the longer haul.

My question is, will I be able to dial down the cit after a while? I think that'd be nice, as it does still seem to give me too much nervous energy. But it is all manageable.

I hope everyone feels some sunshine today!

[phil6]

Karen,
Good kick with the change.... I think you are right to give something else a try after 12 weeks.
Hi Keith, sounds like you are feeling a bit better. When you say that you will try not to think about the way you feel for a week or two, you might want to tell us all how you do that! I honestly think if I could do that then I would recover quite quickly.
I have had a couple of good days, feeling back to my old self, then this morning, although still feeling ok, I felt a little shaky an dizzy. This might be due to going back up to 20mg of cit but I certainly immediately start to question how I feel. Not to say I didn't carry on with what I was doing, ( buying a new microwave oven ) but I did dip into my old anxious thinking for a half an hour.
Phil