Xanax is great for occasional stress but it's not intended to be an every day medicine because it can cause "rebound anxiety." If you really need daily medicine, you should be on a maintenance antianxiety like paxil, buspar, wellbutrin; there are a zillion daily medicines that work better for daily needs because they aren't as likely to cause you to develop a tolerance, or rebound anxiety. An heart/blood pressure medicine, propanol, can also be used.

Also, if you need daily meds, you should look up doctor-led meditation classes in your area. I'm not talking about earthy-crunch-granola-new wave- spa stuff with candles and goofy talk. I'm talking about classes led by M.D.'s where they teach relaxation. The classes are expensive, they're usually at hospitals, they're full of professional people like other doctors, lawyers, airline pilots, etc., and they usually work. Meditation is ultimately the state of the art way to get the damn brain to stop cycling so fast and the heart to stop pounding and telling you incorrectly that you're about to die.

I've never had Xanax before... I was prescribed Zoloft and Lorazipam "Basically Ativan." which seemed to work, although I had that nice drunk feeling when I had to take the lorazipam. I had never known Xanax was a rebound anxiety drug, but I do now, so I know not to take it. I have had so many trips to the E.R. due to anxiety. The heart attack like symptoms are as normal as breathing air. In fact, they are so similar in comparison, it scares me to think if I really had a heart attack and didn't know.

clonazepam, Klonopin was my best alternative to Xanax its longer lasted and provided me with the small immediate relief but stayed in my system longer. i did alot of research on it & its a really safe and popular drug that has great success rate to help people dealing with anxiety issues.


hope this helps doesnt hurt to try

my doctor took me off xanax and put me on clonazepam, Klonopin, she referred to it as a longer lasting xanax & im doing pretty well on it.

A blood pressure medicine could help. I'vve been given the propanol, even though my blood pressure is fabulously low. I've been given the lowest dosege tablet to take "to take the edge off." It helps and seems to have no side effects for me.

The funny thing about my anxiety: after I lost 80 lbs in 2001, and I started drinking coffee, I had my first panic attacks (after 9/11), and months later I realized that when I was fat, I had been self-medicating - with carbs! Literally, a diet high in ice cream, potato chips and white bread had kept my anxiety to a low rumble, and when I took that away and added some caffine, I developed panic attacks. And I think that might be the case for a lot of people here in MFP (maybe not you, but any of us here who love carbs.)

I forget if you mentioned caffine - but it helps to cut caffine out completely. Switch to decaf coffee and decaf or herbal tea is you drink those. I know a lot of people who have trouble sleeping at night and are drinking a big iced tea at dinner and insist that these two things are not related. And of course they are.