No meds

[sagey]

I've read on here about some people coming off meds deliberately and going it alone with the support of CBT and other therapies. I'm just wondering if anyone can say how they came to the decision to cease meds and how they cope now with looking back on their meds. I'm on flupentixol and don't feel it is doing anything and I'd be as well to concentrate in my own head without drugs. I'm also curious to see the old me back without the perpetual tiredness.

[Yvonne]

Sagey

I'm just going down the "no meds" road right now.

Following disgusting withdrawal from Seroxat three years ago (which I don't think I have ever recovered from!) - having tried Citalapram, Nortriptylene, Sertraline and last of all Duloxetine have had little respite from my illness.

Had so many bad side effects from all the above and no real therapeutic effect. None of them helped my panics, the Duloxetine seemed to lift me out of the awful post Seroxat depression to a degree.

I have been on Duloxetine for a year and the tiredness and lethargy during the day and the insomnia at night was really getting me down. I just decided enough was enough because the medication itself was not helping my panic attacks and I still didn't feel my old self. I did protest to the shrink during the time I have been on Duloxetine but my rants fell on deaf ears and I got told that at least I was better than I was blah blah - NOT GOOD ENOUGH I'm afraid - if a medication does not do what it says on the can then why take it.

I reduced down from 60 to 30 over a few weeks and was okay. I am now down to 20mg and doing day on day off this week and I am in bad withdrawal. I am getting head shocks, body jolts, swimmy head - like off balance feeling, diziness, bad headaches and feel veeeery low.I feel very drowsy and sleepy but I can't sleep, I have no appetite. I am getting palpitations etc etc ----- Arghh!!!

I am actually determined to get off this medication - it is going to be hard I have no doubt about that. I just want anti depressants out of my damned system - if it takes a while to feel somewhere near normal I have a feeling it may be worth it.

I have a prescription in the cupboard from the shrink for a med he wants me to try - an MAOI. I don't want to take it and I hope I can be strong enough to get through this without trying the new med.

Logically - a med takes 4 to 6 weeks to get into the symstem and that is normally not a nice experience what with the side effects you suffer when starting a new med. So, I have told myself that 4 to 6 weeks of feeling rough might be the way it's going to be before I clear myself of this drug. How I will be after that I don't know.

I haven't heard of the med you are on. Is it an ssri? If it is it's one I don't know. I understand completely where you're coming from with the tiredness thing - that makes you feel awful in itself - my own cpn said that a med which is sedating can only add to depression.

These anti depressants are dreadful medications as far as I'm concerned - I am bitter at the moment of course because I have been through so much crap over the last three years.

With me none of the medications I tried after Seroxat worked. It was a case of going on a med waiting weeks and weeks for it to kick in and praying that it would work - then little in the way of good effects. I feel that at the moment I have no choice but to try the "no meds" approach.

What I have also found over the last three years is that all the tried and tested techniques of CBT, mindfulness, relaxation, exposure to feared places just has not helped me. Time and time again I put myself in panic inducing situations and suffer hell basically - but the panics just don't go away. I seem to be okay when I'm with a family member but when I am on my own and having to go somewhere alone I get mega panicky and just want to burst into tears....... extremely embarrassing because people notice.

So all my efforts at trying to face the fear and do it anyway have not helped and neither has anything else I have tried and I just cannot understand it. No wonder I'm flippin' depressed!!!!!!

Sagey, please let me know what you decide to do and maybe you and I can log our progress together on here.

Take care all. x

Yvonne
from Rainy grey Colchester

[sagey]

Thanks for your reply Yvonne. The flupentixol is for depression and anxiety, though I've not had depression. I'll look up what group of drug they are cos I'm not sure, I think they are supposed to inhibit the fear feelings. I've been taking them about 4 months but as I don't believe they are reducing the fears, instead of getting another prescription, I'm taking the doses further apart until they are gone. Then I will see if I wake up and find motivation for life and concentrate better. Keep in touch.

[nomorepanic]

Sagey

I found meds never helped me so stopped them 9 years ago and went it alone.

I was also worried that they would change me and my personality and I wouldn't be the person I really was and I didn't want that.

Meds are not the cure - I am sure you know that anyway - they are a crutch to help you get back on track and make the lifestyle changes that make the difference.

[kate]

So many people, myself included, have not found any relief for anxiety whilst on med's.

Anti d's, were originally formulated for depression. End of. While patients were taking these, and their depression lifted, so did their anxiety. Which leads me to believe that their anxiety was merely due to their being depressed.

However, the medicial profession seeing these results, came to the conclusion that anti d's would also be the way forward in the treatment of anxiety alone.

From reading a lot of posts on here, it would not appear to be the case. The side effects are mostly a major reason why people do not get past even 1 week on the drug they have been prescribed.

When I took anti d's for actual depression I had no side effects when either starting the drugs or indeed coming off them. Could it be that the drugs only work/have little or no side effects when used for treating their original illness that they were designed for?

I too have gone down the no drugs route, not through choice, but because I haven't yet found one that I can get onto without awful side effects. Yes, I still feel very anxious BUT this is something that I have just learnt to live with.

Good Luck.

Kate

[Yvonne]

Kate

I found your post very interesting. I think you are so right about the fact that the meds don't cause bad side effects or such bad withdrawal for actual depression - the illness the meds were intended for.

I am not what you could call clinically depressed - no way. My low mood is down to the fact that I cannot live my life the way I want to because I am too shit scared to do things that I want to do.

All this reuptake of seratonim with the ssris's - I am sure my seratonim levels are fine and I don't need these meds doing what they do. Not only that these meds affect other receptors in the brain which can't make you feel good. I do think that for someone who is clinically depressed the meds are a godsend but not for most anxiety sufferers whose depression is caused by the anxiety.

I personally think that shrinks and gp's don't really have any idea how to treat anxiety that well. With the medication I think it's a lot of trial and error. Also regarding the meds - the ssris can cause bad anxiety and I honestly think that the Duloxetine was making my panics worse. Prozac is another medication which definitely makes anxiety worse.

I am going it alone and I am hoping I can cope.

Yvonne

[kate]

Hi Yvonne,

I too am definately not depressed but,like yourself, I'm very low. I know this is due to the constant anxiety NOT to clinical depression.

I have only suffered with what I class as "proper" depression on 2 occasions. Both times I was prescribed anti d's ) Prothiaden, one of the older drugs. Niether time did I suffer any problems on it and it did what it said on the tin and brought me out of the depression.

I so agree with you that most GP's haven't got a clue when treating anxiety. I reckon that 99% of the time they prescribe anti d's. But, if this is what they are being taught to do in medical school, I suppose this is all they know! GP's unfortunately, have to know a little about every ailment whether it is physical or of the mind. They are no way experts in the mental health field, more's the pity.

There needs to be, in my opinion, many more experts in the field, more specialists to who we can be referred. If we were suffering with a physical problem, and the GP wasn't 100% sure on the course of treatment, then we would be referred to an expert in that particular field. This just isn't going to happen with problems of the mind.

Anyway, good luck Yvonne, hope it all works out well for you

Kate

[sagey]

I've seemed to have lost my appetite since I started meds. I've lost a stone ove the last ten months and wonder if anyone else finds that meds are perhaps to blame for loss of appetite? I'm going to finish the pills I've got left and then see how I manage without. It's interesting to know that others discarded their meds to go it alone and are surviving. That helps to boost my motivation. Thanks.

[Alennx]

Um, I'm confused... ***First Post*** ... Why is everyone taking pills that make them feel worse?

I started getting panic attacks in 1994, never went to the doctor, they got gradually worse but I dealt with it. Then in 2004, I went to the doctor and was prescribed Alprazolam or "Xanax." It worked immediately! I stopped having panic attacks that day. I take 3 x 0.5mg a day and have done for two years. In that time I've had four, one week breaks from the pill. Horrible, but not unbearable. I know I'm getting resistant to the pill and I get the creeping horrors sensation occasionally but after dealing with it for ten years, that no problem.

I tried Cyraquil or something spelled like that... much worse attacks, I tried Zoloft... great for 3 days until I had an allergic reaction that sent me to hospital , I tried Clonozepam or something spelled like that... didn't help and made me aggressive.

Xanax. Done deal.

You can't 'deal' with a chemical condition, only a psychological condition. My panic attacks aren't psychological since I operate normally otherwise. It is a chemical issue that must be chemically managed. No Raki here

[Yvonne]

[can't 'deal' with a chemical condition, only a psychological condition. My panic attacks aren't psychological since I operate normally otherwise. It is a chemical issue that must be chemically managed. No Raki here [/quote]

Hi Allenx

I agree that you can't deal with a chemical condition - if you have a hormone imbalance then a hormone is given to correct the imbalance.

You seem to be saying that your panic attacks aren't psychological - well that would be unusual I have to say. No doctor would believe that panic attacks/anxiety are a chemical condition - this is why they focus so much on therapies like CBT and mindfulness.

Anti depressants are used to "help" anxiety conditions (I believe, and to the best of my knowledge) - because of their sedative properties, also the thinking behind using an anti depressant is that once the depression lifts then so will the anxiety. I am no expert and please don't quote me - this is just what I have picked up from books and my own experiences.

I do believe that some anxiety conditions can be caused/worsened by certain medications as I said in an earlier post. For example, Prozac is renowned for its ability to make anxiety worse - hence it isn't used so much for anxiety - other meds like Seroxat and Sertraline are used which are more tranquilising meds.

Medications like Propranalol are used for to slow down the production of adreneline in panic attack sufferers - however for the adreneline to be produced in the first place you have to be scared, feeling fear in order to produce it in your body. Anxiety certainly causes chemical changes in the body but this is the fear response.

May I ask when you have y our panics? Do they come out of the blue - or are they connected with something specific like waiting in queues - the usual panic inducing stuff? The medical professionals believe firmly that it is the thought which induces the panic - if you have the thought that you will be panicky in the supermarket queue then you will be. This is why so many therapists psychiatrists use CBT along with medication. I personally think with people like myself that the anxiety works on a subconscious level and has now become habit and even if I am not thinking scary/negative thoughts the panic still kicks in.

Xanax is not used much in this country, our gp's psychiatrists don't like the stuff as far as I know. It sounds like it is a marvellous med for you and I am so glad that you have something to alleviate awful panic attacks. It's a benzo of course and the medical profession here, in general, do not like to prescribe them to patients for long periods. They are very addictive and the body becomes immune to dosages so it becomes necessary for dosages to be upped. Personally, I think that if you are suffering so badly with anxiety and it is completely ruining your life that taking a benzo may be the only answer. Sometimes you just cannot suffer the awful sensations of panic and I believe that the body should be calmed down.

Anyway, as I say - I am no expert and I don't want anyone taking what I say on board as gospel. I am speaking from someone who has a lot of experience with ths dreadful illness and I am only speaking from my own experiences with medication etc.

Take care all.

Yvonne