Antidepressants For Anxiety?

[Inwardly_Broken]

I started taking medication back in January. We are still trying to work on adjustments and which medication combination is best for me.

The first medication she placed me on was Prazosin to help with nightmares and sleep (this one works amazingly well for me).

The second medication she placed me on was Hydroxy-zine for sleep and anxiety. This one works well at night but doesn't help during the day (not sure why though). So, she decided to place me on Escitalopram (an antidepressant). I am not depressed, just have PTSD, but she said that antidepressants will sometimes help with anxiety. I didn't notice any changes, so she decided to double the dosage and place me on a fourth medication.

The fourth, and newest, medication is Lorazepam (which seems to be doing well--may need adjustments still). But the Escitalopram doesn't seem to be doing anything for the anxiety, despite doubling the medication.

Everyone is different. I was just curious if anybody else has been placed on an antidepressant to help with anxiety. If so did it work for you or not?

 

[Deleted member 1860]

I think that antidepressants can really help anxiety if the individual has anxiety that is caused by depression. In other cases I'm not so sure.

I am a pretty anxious person but antidepressants have no positive effect because I'm not "chemically imbalanced" depressed because of incorrect seratonin levels. Put me on an antidepressant and I go hypo manic.

But, everyone is different. It may just be that particular med isn't right for you.

 

[franciemarnie]

I was on an anti-depressant med for 25 years that kept down anxiety, but also all other feelings. I don't regret it, but I am glad to be off them to deal with what was going on down under.

Careful with the Lorazepam. If you take it every day for more than two weeks, you develop a tolerance and it doesn't work so well. If the dose is increased, again after a while you develop a new tolerance and so on. When you stop taking them anxiety increases temporarily. That doesn't happen with anti-depressants that I know of or took. Just anti-anxiety meds. At least the ones I know of.

Knowledge is power.

I hope your combo works.

 

[pamcoco]

Hi there and Yes. I am on Lexapro. I have odd side effects from all ssri's but that's a different subject ;-) Part of the reason my shrink placed me on this medication was for anxiety and ocd, besides for depression. He gave me Klonapin for the first 6 months because he said it takes that long for Lexapro to effect anxiety. It definitely works for me in that area.

 

[Em C.]

I have been put on anti-depressant meds for anxiety but it was other stuff too but not depression. Just so you know, Cipralex (escitalopram) takes AGES to work. It took like 2 months for me.

 

[Deleted member 19804]

Before I knew I had PTSD, I was medically treated for major depression with serious anxiety symptoms. They gave me Zoloft/sertraline and it was (and still is) doing an amazing job for me. The depression wasn't what hurt me the most, it was most definitely the anxiety. (I'd surpressed my trauma and therefore didn't know where the anxiety was coming from, which only caused it to increase.)

I personally experience very few side effects, but of course it's different for everybody. My psychiatrist told me that sertraline is a relatively light antidepressant, that is sometimes used in very small doses to treat children with ADHD.

One disadvantage is that it is addictive. I've slowly added up to the maximum dosage, but now even that doesn't always cover enough of the anxiety anymore. So quitting is going to be hard.

But asides from that, my experience with Zoloft/sertraline has been amazing. Before the fear was almost literally driving me mad, but now the PTSD symptoms are very manageable and the depression has almost completely disappeared (which of course is also thanks to therapy).

So I guess I'm saying that it's definitely possible to treat anxiety with an antidepressant. But of course your doctor will know best what kind of medication is best for you.

 

[Hashi]

I can't see how you can assess whether Escitalopram (the antidepressant) is helping with your anxiety if you're taking Lorazepam at the same time.

I've had anti-depressants suggested for anxiety, but rejected the idea because I've had such bad side effects and no benefit with every anti-depressant (prescribed for depression).

I know that if I'd been in the early days of taking a benzodiazepine that would have reduced the anxiety, so if you've been prescribed that I'm a bit lost as to why take an antidepressant as well.

I actually agree strongly with @franciemarnie, to be careful of the Lorazepam. Past experience of prescribing benzodiazepines in the UK led to widespread problems with tolerance, increasing doses, increasing tolerance, higher doses etc etc. In the meantime, dependency became a huge issue and withdrawal very difficult. Now, it's almost impossible to get a doctor to prescribe even a 2 week course.

Leaving aside my concerns (which your practitioner apparently doesn't share) about benzodiazepines, I can't understand the strategy of doubling an antidepressant and taking a benzodiazepine at the same time. How are you going to be able to know what effect each one is having? Especially when you're taking two other medications as well and only started in January so it's hard to see that's enough time for things to setlle down/start working.

Plus, anxiety can be a side effect of SSRI antidepressants. Especially in the early weeks of taking them.

 

[Inwardly_Broken]

Thanks for your input and advice everyone.

Hashi... I agree with your post. To address your first statement , "I can't see how you can assess whether Escitalopram (the antidepressant) is helping with your anxiety if you're taking Lorazepam at the same time." I was on Escitalopram for a month before taking Lorazepam. She told me that the Lorazepam was to be only used during panic attacks. The Lorazepam works okay for me but not as good as I would like.

I have another meeting with her this Friday. I will certain ask her about the tolerance issue with Lorazepam. Personally, I want to be taken off of the Escitalopram and now I'm starting to think about getting off of the Lorazepam.

Are there any other anti anxiety medications that help yall? Again, everybody is different but I'm new at this whole medication thing and I don't know much.

 

[Em C.]

I would get off the Lorazepam first personally. I've heard like everyone else that 2 weeks ( I heard of a month but that was really serious) is the max.

Escitalopram does take a while to have effect. A lot of the meds do. Don't change both at once because then you may have reactions and not know what it is from.

 

[franciemarnie]

I have tried most meds out there for anxiety. They were only good very short term, or to be used occasionally, which is difficult when you have PTSD and anxiety, panic, and triggered escalating extremes of emotion, etc. are every day occurrences. Withdrawal is awful the longer you take them. I don't recommend any unless you can just take one every so often.

I know you are asking for med recommendations, but I just want to say daily exercise and mindful meditation afterwards worked far better and had no side effects than any med I was given. It requires effort and isn't instant, but it's worth it.

That said - I understand the need and see the good use of them occasionally when symptoms are debilitating.

 

[Hashi]

I've also tried a lot of meds. The only thing I take now is diazepam (a benzodiaxepine) very occasionally for very particular situations, like once in three months for medical treatment, plus occasional betablockers (propranolol). I was prescribed 14 doses of the propranolol about a year ago and still have half of them. Just having them helps me because I know that I can take them if I really need to. It's like the opposite of building tolerance to a medication, I'm actually building my tolerance to not taking them. If that makes sense.

I'm wondering what you're doing besides meds. I've had horrible anxiety, it's so awful, and the best thing I did was ring an anxiety helpline. The person recommended doing deep breathing, counting the breaths, for a minimum of 20 minutes timed by the clock. Usually, no-one would keep doing it for that long, but it's important because for the first 10-12 minutes it either has no effect or the anxiety actually gets worse because it all surfaces. After that, things start to change and by 20 minutes I really start to calm down. I now keep doing it for longer, because I've found that past the 20 minute mark the effects are always extra positive. The helpline had other suggestions too, but that is their first and foremost one and it has made a big difference to me.

I also use DBT skills - which are a practical approach to things like distraction, distress tolerance and self-soothing. These also are a big help.

I do want to say that I understand how much we can need some sort of help and sometimes medication is that help. I'm definitely not against occasional medication for the biggest challenges. I also think it can be really helpful to allow work on other approaches like therapy and skills. What concerns me is when it's the main approach, and/or there's no sense of limiting it by time or occasional severity of symptoms.

Without taking any medication I can feel desperate on Monday and better by Friday - I'm very aware that if I'd been taking medication I'd probably attribute that to the drugs. Without it, I can see that how I feel changes for many reasons and it's really difficult to assess what impact even one medication is having.

 

[Inwardly_Broken]

I am very new with this entire thing: diagnosis, therapy, meds, etc.

I was diagnosed about 6 months ago. I started therapy soon after that. We strictly talk about some of my past but focus on what I need to once I move next month.

But towards the start of our therapy, my therapist told me of a drug (Prazosin) that she recently heard about that helps war vets who suffer greatly from nightmares/flashback like dreams. These vets get only a few hours of sleep at night and that was my case as well. On average I would get around 2 hours of sleep a night.

So, when I went to talk to a psychiatrist she gave me the Prazosin and Hydroxy-zine. At the second appointment, she gave me the Escitalopram, and the third appointment, she doubled the Escitalopram and gave me the Lorazepam.

I will certainly have to try the breathing thing. Thanks Hashi! And I am completely open to any other suggestions. Like I said, I am completely new with all of this.