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Rant about if it's me being mentally ill or the DRUGS


[Ka...]

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If i'm suffering while tapering with terrible anxiety/depression/insomnia only to find out that all that awaits is some sort of original non drug induced anxiety/depression/insomnia condition-- that's going to make it near impossible for me to continue to function.  How will I find the will to keep on living if there's no real cure to what has happened to me in the past few years? I had only one real true acute 12+ hour anxiety attack when I was 19.  So they put me on drugs from that day forward.  If coming off of them will just be the return to the one experience I had pre-benzos, I don't see how I will have a happy life ever again..no relationship, no career or ability to work etc.  just suffering.  yeah, you can tell i'm depressed and worried tonight  :-\      ruminate,ruminate,ruminate, obsess, obsess is what I do all day every day thinking about how my life is over since i'm not happy on the drugs and I might not be happy off them either. Is this how one eventually becomes suicidal? I'd like to not get there.

 

I refuse to let the psychs guinea pig me through all the antidepressants again, did that in 03', 04' and 05'. was mostly a waste of time. I did it just because I felt i should be happier.. turns out I was happy just the way I was prior to that one endless anxiety attack as a teenager that put me on permanent benzo usage.  Then I was happy again for 6 years on the small klonapin dosage every night at bed.. then that peace was once again taken away in 08' and peace has not been returned since then, regardless of the switch to valium.  Anxiety/depression and worst of all anxiety induced insomina back and forth whenever the hell it feels like all week. and this wonderful restless feet, compulsive endless need to move and shake my feet all day until the valium knocks me out at night.

 

I hate my diagnoses of GAD they all give me.. "well you have generalized anxiety disorder, you'll probably need medication for the rest of your life, like a diabetic but that's ok."  no. no it's not ok!  "Here's your prognosis: you have generalized anxiety... to the experience of life.. of being alive. we can't expose you to your phobia as there is none, you're just.. from now on going to have a body that is perpetually full of adrenaline spikes and insomnia."

 

What kind of retarded medicine is that!?  My conscious mind is looking around and i'm not anxious about anything in particular, so why the physical and psychological symptoms regardless of that???  If our brains/bodies can literally do that to us, that is beyond cruel of the maker who created us.  Or I'm just one of the weak links that evolution weeds out because i'm defective.  I spend hours a day studying this stuff looking for the solution and if it's not the benzodiazepine family of drugs causing my life to be ruined, then I honestly don't know what I will do.. I'm not going to fight tooth and nail from the age of 26 onward till death just to feel "ok" sometimes.  I want to feel GREAT, and do great things, and have a great life full of LOVE, happiness, and just FUN. 

 

I freak out and rant when i'm scared and terrified about all of this, I hope it doesn't upset anybody but honestly my mother is tired of listening to it now, and she's all I have really as far as family. My aunt is also great but I don't like to bother her all the time when i'm feeling like this 3-4 days out of 7 every week. Thanks for letting me rant here.  If anyone wants to give me false hope, or even real hope I'm really needing it.  I cannot STAND the stigmas of "disorders" and labels, especially broad ones like GAD!!  :tickedoff:  life sentence bull S*** labels    My childhood wasn't the most stable, but whose was? I have plenty of happy non suffering friends who had it worse environmentally.  I had to grieve early for the loss of a dear grandparent, have a single alcoholic mother who loves me to death but is two different people when drinking/not drinking.  Through all of that I was never on drugs, never turned to destructive choices.  I was just a gentle, slightly negative, good humored,  slightly fearful kid.  I was known for my strength of MIND, and a survivor however.  Why am I now the crackerjack who is going to be living with a mental disorder my whole life?  screw that.  I don't deserve that. No one deserves that.

 

done blowing off anger and worry for the moment, :tickedoff:

~Kalidas

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Hi Kalidas, I am sorry your going through this, I know very well what it is like to be scared, anxious, not sleeping etc..I hope you find relief soon.

 

The "what ifs" are a nightmare to deal with, "what if" there is something beyond the benzo that is wrong and "what if" I am in a worse state after I taper..questions that would come screaming out of me in my darkest moments. I know that these thoughts will present themselves, they did with me for many months..I found that when I accepted what I was dealing with I was able to settle and gain some perspective..I have no control over the "what ifs" and "mights" ..I needed to deal with the present..It may be harder said then done...when dealing with anxiety we feed it by obsessing over bridges we haven't even come to as yet.

 

I was told once by a physician that I had possible bi-polar disorder, it was the first time he had seen me and I was having an anxiety attack from the early tapering stages, I am sure that I was a manic mess in the moment but it was a hasty label thrown at me. If you have been drugged since 19 after one full blown anxiety attack perhaps getting a second opinion on the GAD when you heal and minus the antidepressants may shed a completely different light on your diagnosis...

 

I understand about not wanting to burden your Mom and Aunt, I have put my family through alot in this process..they love us and go through it as much as they are able to understand.

 

I hope you find relief from the symptoms soon, I have suffered through the same for months...it has gotten better...

 

Take care,

 

Jacqueline

 

 

 

 

 

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Hi Kalidas,

 

You're more than welcome to rant, and I'm here to offer you not false hope but HOPE.  I'm horrified to know you were put on a drug like this at the tender age of 19, when you were not even fully formed as an individual.  That your development was arrested and stolen when you should have been growing, maturing and enjoying. 

 

We have no way of knowing who you'll be when you emerge from this nightmare, but I have a pretty good feeling that you're going to be a healthy, relatively happy person.  You are not this label, how could you be?  Who can make a diagnosis like this after one panic attack? 

 

The best thing for you to do is to continue your journey to get off of this drug and find out who you really are.  I can promise you that life after these drugs is wonderful, it really is.  And you shouldn't fear what happens next, because nothing is as hard as being on and withdrawing from these drugs.

 

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Jacqueline,

 

Thank you for your words, yes the what ifs are terrible and i've always been a "what if" thinker because I always consider all possibilities. I'm an idealist, so I have to think about all the bad things too if i'm to think about the best thing as well.  I've done the whole "bi-polar?" experience with doctors because my father has been diagnosed with it for 20 years but when you really study that mood disorder I think it's easy to tell if you do or do not have it.  Especially Type 1.  They just throw a label on and screw up your whole life though.  You'd think in med school or in grad school whether you're a psychologist or psychiatrist there should be learning about how people that are feeling anxiety etc. are going to take being labeled by things.  It can destroy you, and there may be no reason for it. 

 

Pam,

 

I will definitely be freaking out more if I start tapering, thank you for the hope.  As far as being put on klonapin and a couple of xanas at 19, i'm not really sure why it ended up being so many years.  I was so scared of having that night happen again and i'm a really good talker/persuasionist  and the PA that prescribed them for me was such a nice guy he just kept my refills coming indefinitely.  Especially while I trialed myself on many different anti depressants to see what would happen.  Apparently Remeron made me a happier person, noticed by others, but it made me gain 30 lbs. in a month.  Ultimately though even if it did slightly elevate my mood it would have eventually given out anyway.

 

The diagnosis of GAD didn't actually come around till 2008, prior to that psychiatrists all just wrote "possible panic disorder?" or "slightly depressed" on my records.  After my huge crisis in 2008 with the reduction in klonapin, my allergic reaction to a contrast dye, the being in the hospital and then throwing me on Seroquel, Inderal, and every benzo imaginable then i started getting the GAD diagnoses from like 5 doctors including the Mayo Clinic.  One psych labeleed me with cyclothymia, another one threw in OCD , panic disorder , AND GAD...eesh.  I just don't get how all of that could happpen.  I was never THAT anxious before all this.. anxious kind of personality more than some others maybe,  but not CLINICALLY messed up.  It all needs to go away, i'm seriously over it.  I hope my brain wasn't permanently altered and destroyed by being given this stuff in my adolescence and altering my peace of mind and happiness forever...

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Jacqueline,

 

Thank you for your words, yes the what ifs are terrible and i've always been a "what if" thinker because I always consider all possibilities. I'm an idealist, so I have to think about all the bad things too if i'm to think about the best thing as well.  I've done the whole "bi-polar?" experience with doctors because my father has been diagnosed with it for 20 years but when you really study that mood disorder I think it's easy to tell if you do or do not have it.  Especially Type 1.  They just throw a label on and screw up your whole life though.  You'd think in med school or in grad school whether you're a psychologist or psychiatrist there should be learning about how people that are feeling anxiety etc. are going to take being labeled by things.  It can destroy you, and there may be no reason for it.   

 

Pam,

 

I will definitely be freaking out more if I start tapering, thank you for the hope.  As far as being put on klonapin and a couple of xanas at 19, i'm not really sure why it ended up being so many years.  I was so scared of having that night happen again and i'm a really good talker/persuasionist  and the PA that prescribed them for me was such a nice guy he just kept my refills coming indefinitely.  Especially while I trialed myself on many different anti depressants to see what would happen.  Apparently Remeron made me a happier person, noticed by others, but it made me gain 30 lbs. in a month.  Ultimately though even if it did slightly elevate my mood it would have eventually given out anyway.

 

The diagnosis of GAD didn't actually come around till 2008, prior to that psychiatrists all just wrote "possible panic disorder?" or "slightly depressed" on my records.  After my huge crisis in 2008 with the reduction in klonapin, my allergic reaction to a contrast dye, the being in the hospital and then throwing me on Seroquel, Inderal, and every benzo imaginable then i started getting the GAD diagnoses from like 5 doctors including the Mayo Clinic.  One psych labeleed me with cyclothymia, another one threw in OCD , panic disorder , AND GAD...eesh.  I just don't get how all of that could happpen.  I was never THAT anxious before all this.. anxious kind of personality more than some others maybe,  but not CLINICALLY messed up.  It all needs to go away, i'm seriously over it.  I hope my brain wasn't permanently altered and destroyed by being given this stuff in my adolescence and altering my peace of mind and happiness forever...

 

This kind of thing really pushes my buttons, Kalidas. I started out with "simple" depression but the drugs for that led to benzos which led to more anxiety, loss of cognitive ability and memory impairment.  I got diagnosed with ADHD and Bipolar Disorder in addition to treatment-resistant depression.  I was put on anti-psychotics for years and got worse and worse until finally I couldn't hold a job any more.  I finally quit the doc that put me on all those drugs (eg, Lamictal, Seroquel, Lithium, Ritalin, Cymbalta, Effexor, Serezone, etc) and ended up on the very brink of agreeing to electroconvulsive therapy when I found out what damage benzos can do.  I decided to get off lorazepam instead of get ECT and after about 6 weeks of tapering, I was astonished to find my ANXIETY had actually DECREASED!  It was hard psychologically to get rid of my nearly 20 year crutch but it  wasn't helping me live a meaningful life anyway so really, it was the only thing that made sense to me. 

 

I think the labels they assign to us at different times gives them something to write in their notes (you know they aren't going to write "I don't have a clue!") and provides a diagnosis code for insurance reimbursement but that doesn't make the labels accurate.  And even something that was true at one time isn't necessarily true later on.  People change and circumstances change.  You are young and still have a chance at a great life.  Grab on to the hope being offered and start believing that you can live the life you were meant to live.  If  you didn't have "it" before you were put on psych meds and benzos, chances are you won't have it when you are off them.  At least, that's what seems to happen to everyone here who's been told they would always have to be on medication. 

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Jacqueline,

 

Thank you for your words, yes the what ifs are terrible and i've always been a "what if" thinker because I always consider all possibilities. I'm an idealist, so I have to think about all the bad things too if i'm to think about the best thing as well.  I've done the whole "bi-polar?" experience with doctors because my father has been diagnosed with it for 20 years but when you really study that mood disorder I think it's easy to tell if you do or do not have it.  Especially Type 1.  They just throw a label on and screw up your whole life though.  You'd think in med school or in grad school whether you're a psychologist or psychiatrist there should be learning about how people that are feeling anxiety etc. are going to take being labeled by things.  It can destroy you, and there may be no reason for it.   

 

Pam,

 

I will definitely be freaking out more if I start tapering, thank you for the hope.  As far as being put on klonapin and a couple of xanas at 19, i'm not really sure why it ended up being so many years.  I was so scared of having that night happen again and i'm a really good talker/persuasionist  and the PA that prescribed them for me was such a nice guy he just kept my refills coming indefinitely.  Especially while I trialed myself on many different anti depressants to see what would happen.  Apparently Remeron made me a happier person, noticed by others, but it made me gain 30 lbs. in a month.  Ultimately though even if it did slightly elevate my mood it would have eventually given out anyway.

 

The diagnosis of GAD didn't actually come around till 2008, prior to that psychiatrists all just wrote "possible panic disorder?" or "slightly depressed" on my records.  After my huge crisis in 2008 with the reduction in klonapin, my allergic reaction to a contrast dye, the being in the hospital and then throwing me on Seroquel, Inderal, and every benzo imaginable then i started getting the GAD diagnoses from like 5 doctors including the Mayo Clinic.  One psych labeleed me with cyclothymia, another one threw in OCD , panic disorder , AND GAD...eesh.  I just don't get how all of that could happpen.  I was never THAT anxious before all this.. anxious kind of personality more than some others maybe,  but not CLINICALLY messed up.  It all needs to go away, i'm seriously over it.  I hope my brain wasn't permanently altered and destroyed by being given this stuff in my adolescence and altering my peace of mind and happiness forever...

 

This kind of thing really pushes my buttons, Kalidas. I started out with "simple" depression but the drugs for that led to benzos which led to more anxiety, loss of cognitive ability and memory impairment.  I got diagnosed with ADHD and Bipolar Disorder in addition to treatment-resistant depression.  I was put on anti-psychotics for years and got worse and worse until finally I couldn't hold a job any more.  I finally quit the doc that put me on all those drugs (eg, Lamictal, Seroquel, Lithium, Ritalin, Cymbalta, Effexor, Serezone, etc) and ended up on the very brink of agreeing to electroconvulsive therapy when I found out what damage benzos can do.  I decided to get off lorazepam instead of get ECT and after about 6 weeks of tapering, I was astonished to find my ANXIETY had actually DECREASED!  It was hard psychologically to get rid of my nearly 20 year crutch but it  wasn't helping me live a meaningful life anyway so really, it was the only thing that made sense to me. 

 

I think the labels they assign to us at different times gives them something to write in their notes (you know they aren't going to write "I don't have a clue!") and provides a diagnosis code for insurance reimbursement but that doesn't make the labels accurate.  And even something that was true at one time isn't necessarily true later on.  People change and circumstances change.  You are young and still have a chance at a great life.  Grab on to the hope being offered and start believing that you can live the life you were meant to live.  If  you didn't have "it" before you were put on psych meds and benzos, chances are you won't have it when you are off them.  At least, that's what seems to happen to everyone here who's been told they would always have to be on medication. 

 

:clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: What you wrote Beeper makes me want to stand up and cheer. 

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Thank you for your post, Beeper very much appreciated.  I can't believe they almost pushed you to ECT.  I've seen the process during my psychology schooling (on tapes) and it's barbaric and a really nasty thing.  Thank god you didn't go through with that.  As far as having "it" before the benzos, the only "it" i knew I had was a tendency to be over emotional about things, and strong attachment issues.. but come on.. those things can be worked through without drugs.  I'm sure I would have gotten over whatever my problem was.  For all I know, that one attack I did have at 19 that landed me on the original klonapin, might have been from using the damn Nyquil for a month to force me to sleep earlier.  It might have been as simple as that. I hope it is. I'm trying hard to believe I can have the life I want, but I truly am scared that there is something wrong with me that will prevent me from having that life.  That because of environmental and biological circumstances I won't get to have that happiness.  I really hope that's not the case!!
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One of my favorite aphorisms is "Don't believe everything you think" and I think it applies to you with your thoughts of being incurably mentally ill under the valium.  None of us can know the future, K., but I know you want more out of life than what you have now.  I encourage you to keep gathering information, reading around the forum, asking questions but continuing to taper off the valium.  I think easily 1/3 of members at some point either think that they will never be better or are very bothered by obsessive thinking, so I think it has to be due to the benzos.  (Thus, the "Don't believe everything you think" above.)  It takes a lot of courage to keep moving forward when you have that kind of thinking going on but I know you can do it.

 

And yet another aphorism to spur you on:

 

http://i172.photobucket.com/albums/w39/peacebabyrox/courage.gif

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Hi Kalidas,

 

I agree with my other buddies and I fully believe that this isn't you...it's the darn drug!  Once you put some distance between yourself and benzos I'm certain that you will notice a change for the better in how you both think and feel.

 

These doctors certainly like there labels, don't they?  GAD is a cop out for the white coats in my opinion.  They barely listen to what you say but latch on to a few words here and there, which some overused text book they studied back when dinosaurs roamed the earth tells them you have an "anxiety disorder" Hmmmm!  How every convenient.  And guess what?  They just happen to have a nasty little drug at their finger tips that will make you feel okay for a short while, but it will soon turn on you and give you more problems than you could ever conjure up in your worst nightmare.  Then when these drugs have increased a mild amount of anxiety into a tornado of worry and angst and also given you depression and sleep issues in the bargin the doctors can turn around and say "See, I told you that you suffered from an anxiety disorder" as they merrily deny that the drug could have anything to do with our rapid downhill slide, along with denying that benzos create dreadful w/d side effects.  How can they be so blind!

 

Anyway, as I said, It's not you, hun, it's the drugs.  Just keep telling yourself that every time you feel that avalanche of worry about to descend.  One day you will be free from the benzo bind and life will be so much better.

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hi kalidas,

 

i think what is most important for you to focus on right now is a healthy taper for you and to realize you are going to have symptoms that will make you think you are a crazy, mentally ill person.  the fact that you had one panic attack indicates that you are probably NORMAL.  one panic attack does not a GAD make!  :pokey:

 

i also think some of your anxiety may actually decrease a bit as you taper because you're nervous about tapering to begin with.

 

please try to hold off on making any diagnosis for yourself until you are at least 6 months free and clear of these drugs.  if you stay the course on this, eventually your brain will readjust and you will find the balance you have been looking for.

 

leslie

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Hi Kalidas,

 

Personally, I think it's great that you are able to "see" your feelings so clearly in spite of some of the symptoms you are experiencing.  You are refusing to accept any labels put on you by someone else and that is truly a major step not only for your recovery but in shaping the course of the rest of your life.  You are drawing on that inner strength that is a part of all of us which usually begins with anger at our present situation.

 

I don't see your post as a rant as much as a legitimate expression of outrage which, under the circumstances could be long overdue.  Well done! :thumbsup:

 

All of us on this and other forums are on the same journey and I have every confidence that we will all get through it.

 

One of your fellow travellers,

 

Diana

 

 

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Hi everyone,

 

so my memory and thinking about things is so fast paced and anxious all the time I completely forgot I created this thread at the end of July...I just re read the whole thing and am so grateful for the replies it got.  So thanks to each of you for your thoughts and opinions.  I am..currently in the midst again of a down period of anxiety and depression covering my view of everything.  It arrived just in time for the new semester and as my complex relationship moved back into my house as a room mate.  So I feel pretty bad right now, and because of that it sends me into the thinking of "god, maybe the docs are right and I need to just get on the damn prozac, or lexapro or paxil or whatever the hell it is they keep shoving on me for my GAD and/or mood disorders."

 

  When all days feels mostly hopeless except for a window of "ok" here and there when I keep myself busy, it's hard to stay positive that's it's the benzos fault.  I've been nauseous since Sunday night on and off, but if it were Valium's fault why wasn't it affecting me all summer and prior?  I've had ups and downs during the summer but nothing as bad as my sick "anxiety/depressed" state that I fall into like i'm in now.  Like I was saying on the taper thread, it's almost like I have tolerance that is set off when 2 or more stressors occur at one time that affect me on some deeper psychological subconscious level.  Back when I was a teenager I didn't have this issue.  So perhaps, it IS still the benzos fault, but my tolerance to them only occurs when there's too much stress at one time??  If I am able to get off all benzos perhaps I will go back to being able to handle all the stress at once like I used to without doing anything but having a nice cry sometimes.  I used to enjoy my crying.  It felt good, it calmed me down.  Now crying is just like an apparent side effect of having bad anxiety and it revvs me up and I know it's going to be worse so I try not to cry. 

 

Right now my goal is to definitely try and not updose like what happened last year.  Last year at this time I ended up having to updose valium from 10 to 15 mg.  I don't want to go from 15 to 20 this year.  ugh.  I would trade for most bad things in the world to be free from this physiological and psychological distress!!!

 

 

thanks again everyone for your words, I completely forgot about this thread, I'd like to revive it with any other uplifting things that make me feel that i don't have a mood or anxiety disorder.

 

love,

~Kal

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  • 3 weeks later...

I can´t write any uplifting things, only I do know how horrible it feels to have a label. I was diagnosed with Emotional Instable Personality Disorder 25 years ago. Up until 10 years ago I didnt even want to KNOW what it was, I was so frightened, then I did start reading about it and the sad thing is I (and meanwhile all of my relatives) believe it. It is a like constantly carrying a heavy back pack on your shoulders. I do have emotional instability, and everytime I do, "wham" I go back to remembering "ah, yes, its your EIPD), which starts the whole cycle of suffering from a label, etc. etc. When I did a fast withdrawal from Benzo´s I had so called rage, which I read can be benzo rage, but when I tried to explain to my son it is from withdrawal he only said "I have always been like that" (not true) and it depresses me being stigmatized to top it all off. I wish I could erase this label out of my mind and the minds of all that know.

 

Elke

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