Posted by Crazy Horse on November 30, 2006, at 19:43:27
In reply to Let's Talk Lithium!, posted by becksA on November 30, 2006, at 14:26:14
> Long, please read!
>
> Wow where do I start. I have been on so many drugs I should probably say what I have NOT been on, to be more brief. Anyway I have SEVERE social anxiety...and moderate depression. I tried Xanax to a ridiculously high dosage and it did NOTHING for me. I finally found Klonopin at another RIDICULOUSLY high dose (14mg daily!) to finally quell that anxiety. I have no side effects from it but I'm beginning to realize that it for obvious reasons is making me do stupid things, staying out way too late, wasting money, etc.
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> Finally took a step back (with talks with my doc), and decided we better try a different approach before I do something REALLY stupid that might even get me into some real trouble. He thinks we may be treating this "anxiety" from the wrong direction. I seem to have a different type of anxiety.
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> I'm not always scared about things, it's not generalized. It is almost a physical anxiety. The biggest thing I notice is that in new social settings, meeting new people, if it's strictly business, no smiling, serious matters, I'm OK. If it's a party, jokes, people laughing, my face literally freezes up, and I cannot smile! I cannot even force a smile, and when I do I know how obvious it is that I'm coming across as extremely anxious, I think about this, and that only makes things worse. I begin to panic, try harder and harder to smile, appear relaxed, and of course the opposite happens, it gets worse. I become so obsessed with trying to appear natural that I appear SUPER anxious, and sometimes miss half the conversation because I'm so focused on myself that I cannot even hear what they are saying.
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> With those symptoms, we are thinking it's more a combination of depression and anxiety (in the past I've always said depression really isn't an issue). And it never has been a HUGE one to the point of suicidal or crying my eyes out all the time, but I've been pretty blah and down for quite some time. I also seem to have a HUGE lack of motivation which I always blamed on my ADD but I now am sure the depression is playing a huge role in this. So now we have been trying some mood stabilizers.
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> Lamictal did nothing but raise my anxiety further. Depakote seemed to make me more depressed, if anything. 2 days ago I started on Lithium, and for some reason I'm more excited about this one. I've read a lot of good success stories on it, and I would LOVE to come down on the klonopin for many obvious reasons.
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> I've only taken my first two doses of 300mg at night the past 2 nights so I'm not expecting to feel anything. How long does it normally take? What can I expect? How's the success rate? Any kind of input or past experience would be greatly appreciated.
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> Thanks a lot.Scroll up to: 'Maybe all drugs are like this'
I hope this helps.-MJ
poster:Crazy Horse
thread:709080
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20061129/msgs/709150.html