Posted by snarley on February 12, 2004, at 18:48:12
In reply to Re: EFFEXOR for ADD? frustrated w/ my psychiatrist, posted by zeugma on February 12, 2004, at 17:25:14
>zeugma writes:
>
> Dr. Amen recommends Effexor for overfocused ADD.
>
i must have skipped over that part in the book my therapist gave me to read, choked the whole "change your brain, change your life" thing down in about 3 hours last nite, guess didnt catch everything hehe.
> High dosages (up to 300 mg/day and even higher) are not uncommon.
>
my major concern with that is that i've been grossly overmedicated by other psychiatrists in the past (which i guess is why i settled on this guy, he's fairly conservative medwise). It just sets off warning bells in my head when i see that the ultra high doses arent fda approved. I've been jerked around and put on lots of really wierd drug regimes in the past, one of which landed me with a dependency on ativan (was totally going with doc's prescription, not popping extra, he over time just upped the dosage a TON) that took me about 6 or 8 months to get over (was having panic attacks for months as i was getting off of it). So that's why i'm worried.
> I would think that Effexor plus a stimulant would be the best option, unless there is a specific reason for NOT trying stimulants. For example, I'm extremely underweight, and stimulants reliably worsen this to medically dangerous levels. So I take strattera to manage my severe inattentive ADD (a different subtype than yours). Strattera is a good antidepressant as well as an ADD med (so you see opinions vary).
>
It had never been a doubt in my mind that i wanted to stay on my 150mg/day of effexor, its working well for the depression, what i had thought going into this whole mess was that he'd leave the effexor as it was and put a stimulant or strattera on with it or something. But he wont budge on the upping the effexor thing (*sigh*)
> One last thing:Your doctor is not an ADD specialist. You might want to find one, if effexor doesn't work for your symptoms at the higher dosage.
>
>
I have a call in to my therapists (not the psychiatrists) voicemail (hopefully he will call back after he is done with his appts today by 5 or 6) to ask him what he thinks of the whole deal, and if maybe he could talk to the psychiatrist or what he thinks about maybe finding someone else who is more experienced with ADD.
zeugma: Thanks for the help/input, if anything it gave me a more structured and systematic way to think about and address the overwhelming problems of the day and i've calmed down a little bit (though still feeling that effexor increase, ick)Any other input from anyone on this stuff? ie how to cope with school in the meantime? i was actually having a semi-decent quarter for the first time in over a year, it will annoy me to no end if i manage to screw it up when (miraculously) i have been doing ok so far. I talked to the prof i was supposed to have a midterm with and got him to postpone it until tuesday next week. hopefully i will have some things straightened out by then. ugh.
Snarley
poster:snarley
thread:312542
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20040210/msgs/312568.html