Posted by garyengelm on December 14, 2007, at 16:12:55
I'm 39 y.o. and have suffered from periodic panic attacks since age 18, but they never interfered with my work as an RN x 14 years. After my brother passed away last Dec. 2006, I started getting GAD with terrible depression. I attributed the depression to losing my best friend in the world who was just 39 himself at the time. I had been taking Serzone 400mg/day klonopin 1mg bid, and metoprolol 12.5mg bid prior to his death, as I would get the situational panic attacks since age 18. The combo of meds worked well, but after my brother died, everything crashed.
I can't tolerate SSRI's, could be the Serzone being too much, but even just 1.25mg of Lexapro puts me into a Serotonin like Syndrome, mostly flu like symptoms, but not the typical stuff that goes away in 3 weeks, it's much worse and more severe.
My pdoc is a psychopharmacologist and started me on 25mg of Lamictal about 7 days ago. My depression is like gone, and that is great, but my Anxiety has gotten worse, way worse. I start trembling sometimes, and tapping my feet while seated in a chair. My pdoc wants to add a spec of Abilify for this, but said to try some Xanax first. I have Xanax for prn use, but the sedation I use to get from it, isn't there. It's like it doesn't do squat for the anxiety. I was taking like 0.5mg/day for a while, and now up to 1mg/day, but it still isn't helping much with the anxiety.
I'm not having panic attacks, and I'm not worrying about anything. I have read that Lamictal can cause anxiety, but I'm only at 25mg and my goal is to get up to at least 100mg. I'm scared if I taper up, the anxiety will get even worse. I have no signs of mania at all. I think the diagnosis might be right (Bipolar II) after reading the information at psycheducation.org. It's like me to a T. I don't think this is a co-morbid condition, so I'm asking anyone out there if this anxiety will go away, or is this gonna stay with me. I'm pretty sensatie to meds, but besides the anxiety, I've had only slight nausea and some diarrhea, and NO rash. Any thoughts or help would be greatly appreciated.
Gary **** BSN, RN
poster:garyengelm
thread:800817
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20071213/msgs/800817.html