Posted by psychlover on May 31, 2013, at 13:16:17
Hi, I have not posted on here for a number of years, mostly because I have not been depressed in about 5 years, but a few months ago, I realized I was sliding into a major depression and I knew I needed meds.
I went to see a very expensive psychiatrist who would prescribe me an MAOI, because I knew I had atypical depression and that EMSAM had worked for a while 5 years ago. He put me on Parnate. The side effects were intolerable -- insomnia, fatigue, constipation, inability to urinate, dry mouth -- and I didn't feel any better. After about 6 weeks I quit.
6 weeks later I asked for Emsam. Within 1 day I was feeling better. I had energy and much more importantly I was calm, happy, and not critical or angry at my wife, which is my default mode with her and has driven our marriage to the brink of collapse.
But right away I started having food interactions, despite the fact that the 6mg dosage of Emsam does not carry any dietary restrictions. A tablespoon of tamari (soy sauce) with my brown rice was the first thing to give me chest pain and send my blood pressure spiking. Then 2 days later after eating some edamame for dinner, my BP climbed to 179/96. The next day I was careful not to eat anything with even small amounts of tyramine, so I ate the food I made at our barbecue: ribs, steak, hamburgers, hot dogs. Shortly afterwards my BP zoomed up again, with my diastolic peaking at 99. Again on Wednesday I ate some salmon and my BP skyrocketed. I called the paramedics because of my chest pain, they said the EKG was fine and that I didn't need to go to the hospital, which I was happy to hear. And then this morning, I had a smoothie with kefir (I usually use soy milk, but I forgot kefir was fermented), and my BP shot up, no chest pain this time, but a splitting headache.
Why am I so sensitive to tyramine when I am taking a medication that at this dosage officially has no dietary restrictions and theoretically avoids any MAOI interactions in the gut? I do sometimes get panic attacks, but I don't think this is just about panic attacks. This seems to be definitely related to what I eat.
Any thoughts?
Thanks,
psychlover
poster:psychlover
thread:1044570
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20130527/msgs/1044570.html