Depression, anxiety and more

I've had generalized anxiety disorder since childhood. I mostly cope with self-care techniques, but it's always a battle to fight the anxiety in everyday situations and when it builds up due to long-term stress.

I hope you have the opportunity to try some form of talk therapy (if you haven't begun already), because that's really helped me a lot. If one therapist isn't a good fit do not be ashamed to try another one.

I truly wish you the best. You sound very self-aware & motivated to change your life.

A few years ago I got put on 3 pills for anxiety, depression and pain.
I was a walking zombie.
I was also(and still a bit to this day) a heavy drinker.... this was a horrible cocktail and proved to make things worse.
I understand the everyday struggle between depression and anxiety .... your depression will keep you in bed but your anxiety will make you worry that your friends hate you know because you bailed.
It is a never ending battle in your head.

I took myself off my antidepressants which threw me into a massive battle with my anxiety to the extent I lost so much weight from vomiting I would get so worked up about things I would vomit vomit.

Two-Three years ago I got taken off/denied my anxiety meds as I started to abuse them. I was doing horrible things with my ativan. After that I had to learn and quick how to cope when an attack came on. That was the biggest struggle. I would faint, vomit. This is also -from what ive heard- is the withdrawal symptoms of ativan as it is an "opiate"?

Now current day I am no longer on any meds and can handle my own attacks (it aint fun) I still vomit some days and get dissy but I am in such a better state of mind...

What I do to get over my anxiety is I literally have to take it second by second/ min by min.... tell myself that everything is ok and I can get through this next min. I have a mental list of things I need to get done and I just everyday have to work to get closer to that list being empty (it never will) but it feels good to complete things and thats what gets me through my attacks I confirm that I have completed this item and this item yes it can wait a day as today I need to slow things done and that brings done my heart from exploding

It is a long battle and hard one

but there is light at the end of the tunnel.. Trust me

Last April I started fighting with suicidal depression (I've fought with depression my whole life but it turned suicidal last year). My doctor changed my medicine and things got much worse. I never had anxiety until I was on depression medicine but the anxiety was so bad that I couldn't drive five miles down the road to see a doctor. My wife had to take off of work and come get me to take me to my appointments. The doctor changed me to Prozac and I slept all day long. I could barely manage to get up and go to work (I work from home) then I'd fall back into bed until the next time to go to work.

Things got so bad that I told my wife who to contact when I died in order to collect the life insurance policy. Then I started making plans to kill myself.

Fortunately, my doctor was wise enough to realize there could be something else going on and had me do a testosterone blood test. Turns out my testosterone was terribly low. It took about four months of working with a urologist to get my testosterone in the correct range. Six months after that the depression is nearly non-existant. The suicidal thoughts and ideations are completely gone. The only time I think of suicide now is when I (literally) thank God for letting this testosterone treatment deliver me from the suicidal depression.

Please, get your testosterone levels checked. It might literally save your life. If it isn't testosterone, your doctor can continue to try medicines until you find the one that works for you. There is hope. I went from hopeless (I told my wife that she had to hope for both us because I just didn't have any hope left) to feeling that life is worth living.

I'm sure there is an equivalent hormone for women (estrogen maybe) but I'm not sure what it is. Any woman suffering from depression might want to ask her doctor if there is a hormone deficiency that might be causing her symptoms.

JakedOnGreenBeers wrote: »

I'm sorry for what you've gone through since such a young age.

If I may ask you a personal question, because I relate a lot to this, do you tell your psych when you plan to cut back on the medication or do they plan that for you? I feel a lot better after I run most days lately and I don't want to take meds forever but my psych has made no mention of adjusting the dosage or frequency or anything.

Thankfully I have an amazing doctor, when I feel like my medication needs adjusting we have a talk about it. He knows that I know my body, so if I feel like I need more or less or whatever, he will typically listen. At the same time he will also bring up medication adjustments, typically he will bring it up if he thinks I need to up my dosage, mostly because if my symptoms are so bad that he can see them and I haven't asked for any adjustments then I'm probably not in a good place to be making that kind of decision anyway.

At this point in life I go through periods where my depression gets worse, and there are times where it gets better. For me the seasons play a big part, to tell you the truth I'm not sure why I haven't been diagnosed with SAD as well. In mid fall I will probably need a higher dose, because my depression is really bad in the winter. I have an appointment in a week to see about lowering my dose, because my depression is better in the summer.

But regardless every time I see him he will ask me how he thinks I am doing, and how I think my meds are working. That's the thing with medication like this, there is so much trial and error, but if you find something that works really well for you then life is great. Its really hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that my "good" days, where I have some motivation, and can actually do a lot of things are the normal day for others.

When I was in my teens I had goals to be off of medication, because I didn't want to be dependent on it. But the way I figure is that everyone is dependent on the neurotransmitters, I just don't have the same amount as everyone else naturally, so I have to get it from another source. Whether that is scientifically what is going on in my brain I couldn't tell you, but I have been off and on meds long enough to know that being off of them right now is not good for me