Medication Forever?

[Yvonne]

For Cassie;

Ahh yes I remember it well "Seroxat Heaven"..... lol

[Cassie]

I agree with you Meggles. Its very 'hip' at the moment to be anti-medication. Not on here necessarily - my current GP has been quite sarcastic at times and one psychiatrist I saw said I was focusing too much on meds. You come away feeling weak and pathetic having been made to feel like a drug addict - well thats my view. Yet other doctors are totally supportive of meds.

I think its important to stick to your guns and follow your heart - despite taking a med every day to feel 'normal', I know at the moment thats what I have to do. In the future I'll consider coming off them but it has to be at the right time for me. Balls to the unsuportive doctors I say.

[dinkydoo]

I am too scared to take Meds, my Dad was addicted to tranquillisers for fifteen years, he was desperate to get off them, and in the midst of it all he was a horror to live with, aggressive, drinking too much, controlled by the chemicals within the drugs.... I know Meds are different these days, but I still do not want to take them. Each to their own of course, but I have friends who are in a similar position, drugged up every day to get through the day, and seeing no way of life without the drugs.
Whatever works for you is great, but I am much more into finding an alternative for things (although i have been struggling since childhood,lol) but who knows. LIke I said, each to their own, but I just see the drugs as a way of putting a sticky plaster on the wound, covering it up? Not dealing with the cause? Thats just my opinion. xxxxxxxxxx

[joannap]

this is a really interesting post. i was determined not to take meds and did without for out 7 years but really suffered! i then took lustral and like many others - felt i had got my life back and said i would never come off them BUT looking back now - the anxiety was still there - it just manifested through worries over other things in my life - i never learnt to deal with it - i also did not learn how to deal with stress effectively.

these tablets seemed to stop working for me and i came off them between march and october. i had been under a tremendous ammount of stress anyway and i basically had a mini breakdown on holiday when i was med free. my gp has put me in citalopram and it is working to some degree but not as much as before - at first i thought it was the meds being less effective BUT i now believe it is because i am much more aware and have more insight into my anxiety.

when i was on lustral for instance - i developed stomach pains that i had for 2 years - i worried myself 24/7 over these - i now realise that my anxiety had moved from panic attacks and obsessional thoughts into this health symptom. i also worried constantly over my grandmother who was ill (some worry is natural but i now realise i was obsessed!) and so the anxiety was still there.

now - i am glad in a way that the meds have increased my energy etc but that the rest is down to me. i still have my anxiety and intrusive thoughts but after 2 days of positive thinking and acceptance - they are calming already. this makes me believe that all anxiety/depression (apart from more biologically based conditions such as manic depression) continues because of the way we react to it - our thoughts about it and our fear of fear. the meds do make us feel better and i think anyone that they help should not feel guilty about being on them but they are like a sticking plaster in most cases and not a cure. i also worry about what if they do stop working like yvonne's experience.

i am determined to move forward and embrace my anxiety - to not run from it or be scared of it. i did come through 2 bad setbacks by doing this when i was weaning myself off lustral so it can be done by acceptance and changing thoughts - i am looking forward hopefully when i can live med free. x

[Yvonne]

Joanne

I have to agree with everything you have said in your post.

Looking back even when I was on Seroxat which was a medication that helped me greatly, I think after a few years of being on it the medication didn't work that well for actual panic attacks. I used to have bad anx when going to the hairdressers and stuff like that where you can't "escape" easily.

I also agree that the thoughts have so much to do with the illness. It is definitely our reaction to fear, our reaction to our thoughts, and our reaction to the little discomforts we get in our bodies.

However, getting ourselves to actually "react" differently to our own feelings and thoughts is the difficult one, especially when you have spent years being afraid of these things. The reactions come so readily to us and of course they are like a bad habit.

I think meds can be so good for people and can help so much - they do give you the first foot on the ladder to help yourself recover. Anyone suffering badly with this illness should not suffer and if meds can help them then I would be the first to say try them.

I am between a rock and a hard place at the moment. 5 weeks now off the Duloxetine. The panics are pretty bad and my emotions seem to be getting hold of me again. This time of year doesn't help of course. With me, I feel I must do this to satisfy myself what "I" am like without medication.

I have been on meds for a number of years and what I'm doing now is proving very hard. If it gets too hard and I feel I am not coping then I personally will definitely get myself back on medication and just pray that it works Thing is, in all of this you have to think of your family as well and you don't want to be a mopey, moany person around the people you love all the time.

Joanne, I think embracing the anxiety is definitely the cure with this illness. To actually welcome the panicky feelings without actually being afraid of them is the answer. It's a case of letting the anxiety out rather than holding it in. The holding it in is what causes the chronic tension we can feel. This demon has to be allowed to come out in whatever form it chooses. This is what Claire Weekes meant in her books - let the heart race - it won't kill you, if you are hyperventilating then just let it happen - you definitely won't stop breathing etc etc. It's about letting the monster escape, the keeping him in is what causes the knotted stomach and the heaviness on the chest. If we could all do this I know we could destroy the thing. But, actually it aint that easy lol.

Happy Christmas to everyonexxxx

[chloe555]

I have been on clomipramine for just over 2 years now and it has helped me even though i still have anxiety and depression,i think the medication takes the edge off.Personally i had no choice but to take it because i was so ill,i did have to go through hell finding the right tablets for me about 5 different ones.
Because the side effects were so bad.I used to say i would never take medication but as i said i got so ill i had no choice but everyone is different.

Take care

lots of love

chloe x

[Tabatha]

If it wasn't for my medication I wouldn't be able to work. OCD and severe anxiety attacks got so bad that I wouldn't leave the house without my husband.

However, I also hate my medication, Cipralex. It makes me feel like I've had an emotional labotomy and that my head is full of black cotton wool. GP said it was a side-effect but I've now been on it for one year and cant stand feeling like a different person or a zombie.

Will I take medications forever, in a word, NO?

[Bill]

Reading through some of these posts, I hope I don't come across as one of the meds bashers. I don't feel they're "evil" either.

When I reached a point where I felt so ill, I needed something to help me through that period so I tried meds. I found they lifted my mood but the effects never lasted. If they had, maybe I'd still be on them.

All the meds have side-effects which may or may not occur but meds do provide support when we need it and also provide a longer term alternative if we find taking them makes us feel happy and able to cope better.

I've also heard that Seroxat can be very beneficial for OCD but I've also heard some very bad stories about it.

I feel it comes down to personal choice and the persons choice should be respected. The bottom line is we want to get on with our lives and meds are just another alternative to other treatments to enable us to achieve that.

Personally I've found I've been able to cope without meds and I like to share my experiences in the hope of helping but I certainly wouldn't think any different of someone who finds they need meds and are happy on them, and nor would I try to push them into coping without. I just like to see people happy living their lives through their chosen method. We're all in the same boat.

[sarajane]

Excellent Thread:

I totally agree with what everyone else has said here.

Other people take meds for asthma, diabeties etc etc. I have been on and off meds for over 12yrs. I'm better on than off.
I found this web site: http://www.healthyplace.com/Communities/depression/causes.asp

Maybe it might answer some of your questions.

It is really a personal choice when it comes to meds. It took me all of the past 12yrs to finally find one that works for me (touch wood).

Good luck

(((((((HUGS))))))))))

SJ

[Southern_Belle]

I am for whatever works. Personally for me I do take medication for anxiety and OCD. I did try to go off and my OCD came back full force as well as the anxiety so I went back on my medication. For me now in the second half of my life I am now able to travel and really enjoy life as I never did in the first half. I do not care if it is because I take a pill because I have my life back.

I had anxiety as a child and was scared of my shadow. When I worked in my twenties and thirties I dove under my desk thinking planes would land on my building when I heard them fly overhead. I never traveled anywhere due to my fear of flying. I missed out on my children's lives and they missed out due to my worrying over them incessantly. I may have lost out on the first half of my life but refuse to do so on my second half. I owe that to myself and to my family.

Counseling has helped me tremendously but I know that for myself I must stay on medication. Perhaps it is because I have other health issues that also cause anxiety like thyroid problems. All I know is what I am doing works for me.

Laura xxx