Confused

Confused
O

onlyakid

Right now I'm confused. I don't know if I have ADD, PTSD from the sexual abuse or PTSD from other traumas. I could have one, two, all, or hell maybe even none of them.

What got me confused recently is that I just moved from one apartment to another in the building next door. It was very tiring and I wasn't very orginized, so I ended up throwing things in boxes including my meds. My lanlord didn't warn me he was going to shut off the electricity as of Tuesday at my new apartment. Consquently, I had to stay at a hotel for the past 2 days. Bottom line is I couldn't find where I had put my paxil which I take for Anxiety/PTSD. So I haven't taken it in 2 days, all I've taken is my Adderall for my ADHD. These past 2 days have been remarkably better than the days that I did take my paxil. I've also had good days on other days I've forgotten to take my paxil at night (if I take it during the day, I get exhusted). Anyway, I'm thinking that its possible that I don't need the paxil (Yes, I will talk to my pdoc about this before I stop).

So now I don't know, I'm thinking that all I've taken is my adhd meds. Maybe all this problem has been due to my ADHD which I was diagnosed with before the sexual abuse. However my father got sick when I was a kid and there were fights in my parents relationship before they finally divorced. Is that the trauma that caused me to get PTSD? Do I have PTSD? Is it a combination of the ADD and PTSD, or is it one thing?

I could go on and on and on. But I won't because maybe this is something I need to discuss with my therapist but I just needed to see if anyone has any idea about all this confusion.

Jason
 
Jason I know for a fact that Pxil did a real number on me and I am glad I am off it. Now I have adhd also and take nothing for it. All I take is 150mg of effexor and 150mg of welbutrin. When I took stuff for the adhd I truly went bananas. Maybe it is the ape in me. :D

Talking to your pdoc is a good idea.
 
I had an emotional breakdown last august. I went on a total of 3 different antidepressants (effexor, zoloft, and paxil) until last december. effexor- i liked what it did to help me relax, but it made me sweat profusely all day long. Nix that. Zoloft, I seemed fine on it for the first 3-4 weeks. Then I was GREAT! I was just awesome! Talk about higher than a kite, I couldn't sleep. I almost went 4 full days with only 1-2 hours sleep each 24 hour cycle. I was wired for sound, and was NOT tired even after the 4th day of no sleep. I realized then something was way wrong and called the doctor.

Then they put me on paxil....I bawled my eyes out. Everytime I started and stopped one of these meds, I cried like a baby. I think some of it might have been good, to just let the pain out. Some of it was not good. It was uncontrollable. then the paxil gave me extreme constipation;tore my bowels up good. Then I started sweating profusely again. Enough of that. My doctor wanted me to go see a psychiatrist, but she couldn't see me for 3 more months. I just threw my hands up in despair and said "enough!" I quit taking my antidepressant (weaned off slowly) and didn't feel that good for about a month. Since the beginning of 2005, I've felt better and better.

I do admit that I've been eating according to the South Beach Diet (nothing like the Atkins, trust me) and I feel better physically. I think the combination of continued counseling, attending support groups, continuing my spiritual pursuits, talking openly with my wife, and getting off the antidepressants have been the best things for me.

however, I'm not stating you should. I'm just telling you how i felt. I have done so much better without them. I will admit to some REALLY low days, days where my soul is crying out unmercifully. But I've come to the conclusion for me that I shouldn't be medicating with anything right now. I'm even weaning off of caffiene. Getting off all this stuff is really helping me to feel better.

just a few thoughts that I hope can help.

Rob
 
**POSSIBLE TRIGGER**

Paxil too gave me constipation, I had blood in my stool (enough to give the water a red tint) on a good number of times a month for awhile. As a matter of fact, It gave me a scare since my grandmother died of colon cancer. Anyway, talked to my pdoc about it, he gave me Paxil CR which seems to have helped the situation alot, still ocassionally have small amounts of blood but nothing close to what it was.

I had gone to my pdoc on Friday and complained about fatigue in the afternoon, and he is changing me to Zoloft. He described it as "energizing". Hmm..my Adderall which is energizing and Zoloft which made you higher than a kite, this maybe interesting :D

As for you being on the South Beach Diet. I do have about 50 pounds to lose thanks to my depression and my coping mechinisim of overeating. And the gym probably wouldn't hurt me either. I need to eat healthier too. Living alone in apartment means Pizza, frozen dinners, fast food, etc. I may look into the South Beach Diet, as it looks pretty decent from what I can see on the web.

Jason
 
Jason,

The only med that Ive taken that really helped me with my depression was Prozac. And that made me so physically ill that depression was a positive choice. When taking Paxil I became actively suicidal. Just barely survived that one. Nothing else has done much of anything. So I just do without. Anyway, after the Paxil incident, Im kind of scared to try any more mood altering drugs.

Aden
 
Jason, I sympathize with you about the meds. I just changed insurance companies and they denied all of mine. Didn't expect that. Had to have pre-authorizations for them. The interesting thing is that I had to cut this one and that one to try to last until I got the auths. I take a lot of medicine. I cut back on my provigil (which is a drug for narcolepsy, go figure) and I cried all day for no reason. Now I am taking a former form of wellbutrin that I abandoned when I got my new form of wellbutrin. It seems to be making me higher than a kite (I'm bi-polar, too. God was way too generous when he was passing out the brain disorders. Could I see the menu again, please?) I always think that if I could just cut out maybe eleven or twelve pills a day, I might be this normal every day guy...but that's supposed to be the bi-polar guy's downfall. You get feeling better and think, "Hell, I don't need those drugs." But you do. My nephew is bi-polar and goes off his meds periodically. Every time he does, he ends up in the hospital until he gets back on them again. I went to my T today. She said the wellbutrin wasn't what was making me manic. She said it was my manic time of year and if anything I should cut back on it. It is so confusing. I wish there was this little pill dispenser in the bathroom ceiling and that every morning I could just push this little button and open my mouth and the right number of the correct pills would just automatically fall down into my mouth, followed by a big gulp of a pleasant tasting liquid...not gonna happen.
I will tell you like many others here that Paxel nearly killed me. I was on it for about three days and called my T and said you gotta get me off this stuff. I can't take it. It sent me right through the stratosphere. Constipation was not a problem. I didn't ever land long enough to ______!
 
I've had three experiences with anti-depressants : a baaaad one, an annoying one and a pretty good one.

Prozac gave me nightmares - intensely vivid brutally violent nightmares, then I'd wake up in the morning and have to spend 15 minutes doing deep breathing & meditative prayer to get calmed down. Shrink said they would go away very quickly as I adjusted. Liar - they got worse, until the morning of the 5th day when I woke up and the nightmare kept running in my head. I was *fully* awake and yet this horrible nightmare was superimposed over everything. I immediately flushed the rest of the Rx down the toilet & told the doc I'd live without.

Tofranil (one of the tricyclics) made me impotent. Nope, no way, not gonna take *that* ! :D

After my partner died from cancer in 2001, I went on Paxil to prevent a slide into serious depression. Paxil worked - *too* well - I did not feel *anything* even though it was appropriate to be in grief / mourning. So, I decided to trust my body to tell me what was enough to keep the depression at bay but not so much as to prevent me from healthy grieving. That turned out to be 1/2 (5 mg) of the lowest dose they make of Paxil (10 mg). My (new) shrink insisted that was a sub-clinical dose, that it could not possibly be working - but I *knew* it was - fired him, too.

A very good friend of mine tried Effexor and he had a terrible time with drowsiness, so I suggested that he try a half or quater of his prescribed dose. He, too, found relief in a "sub-clinical" dose. Shows you what idiots MDs can be sometimes.

Trust your body, guys. Anti-depressants are wildly powerful meds but the right one in the right dose can really help.

IMPORTANT NOTE, PLEASE READ !!!
I am NOT an MD nor am I qualified to tell you how to take your meds, just sharing my own experience. And whatever you do, NEVER stop ANY prescribed mood altering medication cold-turkey - that can indeed kill you.
 
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