Navigating PTSD Diagnosis, and Medication Use, and Looking For Better Coping Mechanisms

[JAC1507]

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to touch bases on my current situation and status, I first posted about 6 weeks ago regarding my experience and diagnosis. I
went to a psychiatrist last Friday and had a great session with my doctor who after a 90 minutes initial session was able to tell me that I have
PTSD, Alcohol use disorder, Anxiety and Depression. While this was overwhelming, based on my previous reading this all fell in line with what my
previous thoughts were. I have been attending sessions with with a clinical social worker whose role is supposed to be that of a therapist and I
have found that talking about my past trauma has helped immensely. I was initially against the idea of a psychiatrist as I wanted to see if I could
work on dealing with my ptsd without any medication, but having recently decided to go cold turkey has made it very difficult. I decided to try the
prescribed meds and wanted to ask those in the forum about your general experiences these two for those who may have had the experiences:
lexapro (Escitalopram) and Naltrexone (Revia). My first day trying these medications was today and I've had some interesting effects: sleepiness,
a weird head feeling, and a stomach ache. Please let me know how either of these felt on your ends, thank you.

 

[JAC1507]

My mistake everyone, I realized that I have a few typos above as I was doing a few things while drafting this post. I stated above that I wanted to work on dealing with my ptsd without any medication, but I went cold turkey on my alcohol use and have been slowly improving in that effort. I originally was drinking 5-7x a week, 5-6+ beers a day for the better part of 15 years, as I started to work on dealing with my trauma I have decreased to drinking 1-2x/week with the usual amount being 2-4 beers/occasion but after having realized that this is a slippery slope I've decided to go cold turkey. I'm now 8+ days without touching alcohol and am very proud of myself!! One thing I know I have to really work on are my coping mechanism so that I can learn to mitigate my drinking, any suggestions for how any of you do this would also be greatly appreciated, thanks.

 

[Freddyt]

Good for you. Best thing I ever found to help with coping is in the Articles section here (Big Blue bar at the top of the page.) I would also recommend that you go through that stuff. There's a lot of help there.

But start here.....

The ptsd cup explanation

Nearly a decade ago (2006) I wrote The PTSD Cup Explanation, a simple view of how PTSD causes symptoms in day-to-day life. This article is an update to that original piece. Regardless of the type of trauma endured, the PTSD Cup does not change, deviate or apply differently to your circumstance...

www.myptsd.com

 

[JAC1507]

Good for you. Best thing I ever found to help with coping is in the Articles section here (Big Blue bar at the top of the page.) I would also recommend that you go through that stuff. There's a lot of help there.

But start here.....

The ptsd cup explanation

Nearly a decade ago (2006) I wrote The PTSD Cup Explanation, a simple view of how PTSD causes symptoms in day-to-day life. This article is an update to that original piece. Regardless of the type of trauma endured, the PTSD Cup does not change, deviate or apply differently to your circumstance...

www.myptsd.com

Thanks so much for the response and suggestion, I never really looked into the other tabs so this is a good push into the right direction. I really appreciate your help with these resources! I hope you have a great weekend, cheers!

 

[Freddyt]

Thanks so much for the response and suggestion, I never really looked into the other tabs so this is a good push into the right direction. I really appreciate your help with these resources! I hope you have a great weekend, cheers!

Awesome - I wish I had had those resources when I started therapy. I found them AFTER the first Trauma and man they have helped since but its and amazing resource.