Posted 2/17/2017 12:28 AM (GMT 0)
KC:
Thank you for your replies.
I'm seeing some of the things your wrote differently.
You say:
"I'm not sure...I really feel it was medication induced b/c before taking the med, I was fine....I just had a panic attack...placed on Klonopin which was okay for awhile until I realized it was a benzo; returned to doc...rx'd Lexapro...began torrential crying episodes...told to stop it; did then tried to take self down from Klonopin too fast-wound up in depersonalization/derealization...no sleep for days...returned to pcp; placed back on Lexapro-continued crying/spaciness...no better...thank you...I appreciate your willingness to help me"
Again, you say,
"I really feel it was medication induced b/c before taking the med, I was fine....
One way that could be looked at is, you weren't fine before you took the medicine, bcause, "I just had a panic attack"
So, we'll say the doctor was trying to stop the panic attack.
That's a mental condition, so you weren't 100% fine. But you weren’t having some of the situations, you’re having now, so in a way, you were fine, except for the panic attacks. So, that can be looked at either way.
Then, "Klonopin which was okay for awhile until I realized it was a benzo; returned to doc...rx'd Lexapro...began torrential crying episodes."
(Your first med, Klonopin the net says is a “long-acting benzodiazepine” so it’s long acting Ativan, which is also a benzo and is used for short term anxiety.
Net also says, “It (Klonopin) has been proven effective as a treatment for panic disorder and shows promise for treating social anxiety disorder.”) So, you were getting the right med for panic attacks, it could be said.
You second med, Lexapro, is “an antidepressant that is designed to treat both anxiety and depression.”
So that seems to be OK.
But you don't like benzos, because…I don’t know.
So he took you off Klonopin and put you on Lexapro. And, you began crying episodes.
You were told to "stop it."
And, "did then tried to take self down from Klonopin too fast-wound up in depersonalization/derealization"
Did the doctor put you on Lexapro (your 2nd med) before you had gotten off of Klonopin (your new or 2nd med)?
What was that all about. Why were you taking yourself off of Klonopin?
Net says, “Depersonalization-derealization disorder occurs when you persistently or repeatedly have the feeling that you're observing yourself from outside your body or you have a sense that things around you aren't real, or both.”
You say, “I'm searching for help outside these resources” meaning doctors and meds, I’m thinking.
I now realize I have had a similar situation to yours. I didn’t fully understand what you were going through. It was a lot of information in a short amount of time. I see now that the answer is not necessarily, at first, psychiatry and medicine, that that is what you’re going away from.
But then when you look at some of the ways you describe your situation, your mind going in circles, you know, you get the feeling you could use some help from some of these same medicines.
I, also, have been in this situation.
I used to think that medicine was my friend, better than an operation, a way to calm down from my manic-depression, in which my mind would race 100 mph, and I could not get anything accomplished.
Then one day, all of that changed.
The way it started was, I got a female psychiatrist who hated men.
My first appointment was on a Friday, and she started changing my meds, on a Friday. And she had no answering service for weekend help.
I actually started it when I asked her if I could get off Ativan.
She said, yeah, and I said how, and she said, just quit taking it.
And it was also her cold tone of voice, as opposed to a doctor who might be concerned about her patients. So, I quit taking the Ativan that night.
The next morning, the stopping of that med helped an ear condition that I had, and I thought I was in Heaven.
That night, I thought I’d quit taking another med to help my ears, and the next day, I had a panic attack from going off too much med too soon.
To stop the panic attack, I started taking those 2 or 3 meds again, too fast, and my ears popped from that, and have been in that deteroriated condition since.
So, now I was afraid of medicine. No more for me, thank you, for I related all meds to attacking my ears, so I wouldn't take any more meds. People would almost beg. No way.
I went for several weeks or more without any of my meds, anti-depresant, Lithoum, Ativan. My mind was probably slowly going away. But I wouldn't take it.
I don’t know what started me taking it again, maybe so depressed, anxiety attacks, I don’t know. But one day I did take one of my meds. And I saw it wouldn’t hurt my ears, because I had only taken one pill, not 2 or 3 all of a sudden.
Then the next day I took another pill, and not too long later I was back on my regimen.
Many years later I realized what I could have done. I could have taken 1/4th of one pill. To see if it was going to kill me. If hours later, it had not killed me, maybe I could have gotten over that fear of medicine.
Then if I wanted to take another 1/4th of that pill hours after the first 1/4th, I could. I could then, hours later, or the next day if my condition warranted, take the other ½.
You might try something like that. You might try finding a good doctor.
If you get a doctor in Houston, you might see if that doctor, after the first few visits, would agree to telephone appointments because of the distance.