Posted by Bob (not Dr. ;^) on September 3, 1999, at 22:49:29
In reply to Re: over the counter antidepressants, posted by Cindy on September 3, 1999, at 21:45:00
I've got major depression and panic disorder to deal with. Prior to getting on psychopharms, I was going through a phase where my anxiety level was getting pretty crippling. My therapist (this was *very* early in my treatment with her, before it was apparent that I needed meds) she suggested Valerian to help me relax. Not only did it work really well, I started dreaming quite vividly (I rarely remember dreams, except for that period). The big problem was that after two-four weeks of taking it daily, it started giving me killer headaches.
In comes altmed#2. A friend who has MS and has been looking into all sorts of alternative meds, holistic treatments, and nutrition issues gave me some Melatonin. It didn't work as well as the Valerian, but it worked ... for about the same period of time, with the same end result.
I wound up taking either on an as-needed basis for a while until things calmed down for me.
Altmed#3 -- you HAVE to look into this one: SOD. Superoxide Dismutase. I got it from a alternative nutritionist who was big on enzymes. Most of the research I found on SOD at the time involved product extracted from animal sources (pigs' livers, I think). The one she had me on was a product called Prozyme, which is primarily SOD but has lots of other enzymes and other "good stuff" in it at miniscule levels. It's a product of Allergon AB (Pharmacia & Upjohn). There was some MD in California who was conducting a study taking people off of their anti-depressants and putting them on this stuff. The letter I received from him sounded more like a sales pitch for the stuff than a properly-controlled study. Well, I can't say that I noticed any difference while I was on the stuff. To make matters worse, the stuff cost something like 60-70 cents a pill! That was depressing in and of itself. 8^P
poster:Bob (not Dr. ;^)
thread:10931
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/19990829/msgs/10981.html