L glutamine for chemical anxiety.?

Anyone found Supplements or meds chemically induced anxiety as a result of withdrawal. Sick of people insisting it's OCD it isn't. If it was well over a year of therapy would of helped. I struggled with SSRI's for over 6 months just had adverse reaction to them. Therapy did nothing so it isn't OCD, it's chemically induced that almost mimics OCD type symptoms, more like constant fear rather than OCD. Just wondered if anyone found anything helped while your brain repairs itself, not really had any experience with anti psychotics. This seems get good write up.

Hi! I’ve tried all the non-benzo anxiety meds and the only one that works for me right now is gabapentin. I’ve had really good luck with it when nothing else worked for me. I’m on roughly 2400mg a day right now. Good luck!

Leann when you mentioned the state of constant fear it made me think of the Curable app, which is CBT targeted for the increased fear associated with emotional pain.  I can't remember if I mentioned it to you before.  It helped me with my pain which at the time I thought was psychogenic, but turned out to be ambien induced.  It's very targeted to help with psychological trauma too, and may help you manage your family issues.  It is free to try, then a nominal fee if you want to delve deeper.  All the expert interviews and podcasts on there are truly eye-opening:

 

https://www.curablehealth.com/

 

Best of all - no downside to trying....good luck!

Can you talk more about your anxiety. What your symptoms are, when does it occur. 

One thing that gets missed coming off even sleeping medication is that we are not used to the sensations caused by different feelings such as anxiety. Anxiety happens in real time. Our brain does not know what has caused a moment of anxiety.  It reacts the same no matter the cause which means the intervention or treatment is the same regardless of what has caused it. Anxiety is a normal human function n it’s there for a purpose. Anxiety means pay attention that there is something going on that’s causing unrest.

When we take sleeping pills or benzos we are accustomed to 1 or 2 feelings- calm, composed, not anxious, relaxed. That’s not what is a normal existence. Normal ppl hv the full range of human emotion and feeling. Not just 1 or 2. 

You don’t hv to be fearful of anxiety. It can’t hurt you. Nothing snot anxiety can actually hurt you. What can hurt you is your response to it.

Describe your anxiety versus calling it a name. Cuz it doesn’t matter the source, the treatments for it are the same. Skills are the best defense. One still is rumination. Ruminating is the most dangerous thing a person can do in these circumstances. If ruminating dsnt lead to action then it’s useless and causing more harm than any other factor.

Yes Serenity, rumination is a horrible mental habit which I was guilty of when I first experienced a minor back injury.  The pain was bad, but because I was taking (and then abusing) Ambien, the drug altered my mental and physical state. I began ruminating about the pain, catastrophizing the pain....it is quite common actually even without having a benzo on board.  That's where the Curable app helped.  It called my attention to all my maladaptive coping behaviors which were making it all worse.  I started using the app even before I realized I was in tolerance withdrawal to Ambien.  It helped me almost 80% in terms of coping with the pain.  THEN, I learned about benzos, and the final piece of the puzzle fell into place.  So for me it has been multi-factorial and stepwise, but the neuro-scientific lessons are life-changing. 

 

Also, KachinaBirdsong has used it and she said it helped her quite a bit as well.  I'm sure she could give you her impressions of it if you want to hear them

I’ve said before that Remeron helped me a lot. It helped immensely with the withdrawal induced anxiety when I was in acute. Two year taper for me with it’s own brutal withdrawal with my physiology so I am not sure whether it’s worth it or not but it did work.

Bit wary of describing it, just get load of people telling me it's OCD , not chemically induced, and I need therapy or I'll never recover. Tried that for OCD and recommended meds for months did absolutely nothing. I have thought the same about the sleeping pills. Have suffered emotional abuse fir years from my family, think all time was on zopiclone it dampened it down and never really dealt with it properly. My husband nearly died 5 years ago was the same thing, the zop probably didn't really let me deal with it. Have had lot of emotional stress recently, which has exacerbated things. I have had counselling in the past, but only helps up to a point. My mother was one causing the stress and not here any more so can't resolve things with her. It does seem take long time to improve, been 31 months will give it bit longer then maybe consider other meds. I will look at the app Deanna thanks.

 

Oh my goodness, Leann. That’s a lot of stuff. Next to anxiety, what is your next greatest complaint?

 

Yes Serenity, rumination is a horrible mental habit which I was guilty of when I first experienced a minor back injury.  The pain was bad, but because I was taking (and then abusing) Ambien, the drug altered my mental and physical state. I began ruminating about the pain, catastrophizing the pain....it is quite common actually even without having a benzo on board.  That's where the Curable app helped.  It called my attention to all my maladaptive coping behaviors which were making it all worse.  I started using the app even before I realized I was in tolerance withdrawal to Ambien.  It helped me almost 80% in terms of coping with the pain.  THEN, I learned about benzos, and the final piece of the puzzle fell into place.  So for me it has been multi-factorial and stepwise, but the neuro-scientific lessons are life-changing. 

 

Wow! I will def be checking that out. Our thinking is HUGE!!  Psych meds cause a person to be what the psych med can force in conjunction w each individual personality.  So the differences of symptom or pain complaints are so widespread. The thing is our brains do not know whether your in a house fire, escaping Afghanistan or withdrawing from klonopin. We tell it the source by what we choose to use to deal w it. But epinephrine for example in a clinical setting… your body dsnt know if it’s yours cuz your in a car accident, or whether I shot into your IV in the hospital for cardiac arrest. It dsnt know. It knows exactly what to do tho when our bodies see it. It increases heart rate n blood pressure which increases blood flow to vital organs like muscles needed to run. It shunts blood instantly by shutting down unimportant organs n increasing blood to the vital brain heart lung kidneys.  That’s why a person is pale. The skin which is the largest organ is the least important. So is the gut.  It makes all these changes instantly when epinephrine shows up. Every single time. That’s its only function … get blood too vital organs cuz I’m in some kind of emergency.  It has no idea the source.

A mom can release her milk simply by thinking of her baby. Thinking of her baby… wow… 😇 … that leads her to release pitocin then the pitocin causes an immediate flow of blood which then delivers her milk. Her baby dsnt hv to b anywhere near her. Similarly, a premie baby even 2 pounds on total life support can lay on their momma or papa chest n cut their recovery time significantly. They grow faster, get off oxygen quicker, gain weight quicker, wake up n interact w parent …. from sheer love. The moon is doing nothing to support her fighting baby. Medicine supports it n we let the body take care of the rest. 

That’s because we are body mind and soul. All 3 work in harmony. That means what we think matters. We actually hv control. If a thought is paying in front of you that’s not yours then you just disregard it. Classic active benzo wd is barbaric about riddling you w intrusive nasty evil thoughts. But that’s expected.

We are humans w free will.  That means we can control the thoughts we choose to act on. Thoughts are thoughts. A thought center hurt us literally. Only the action we take on them. Our responses to our ever changing environment matters.

I will go back and find a lecture I listened to about depression.  Ruminating is the most dangerous thing a person w dep can do. If ruminating does not lead to action then it’s useless n actually damaging.  Fear lives in the future. Anxiety lives in the past. It matters if your thinking in the present moment,  the past or the future. It matters if you hear hope and see beauty.

 

Also, KachinaBirdsong has used it and she said it helped her quite a bit as well.  I'm sure she could give you her impressions of it if you want to hear them

   

Sure!! Cuz it all matters. Not just one thing. Meds support diff body systems while we work. We hv to take meaningful steps in many directions. It all can work for a person. You won’t know until you jump in. You hv to dive in n not stop until you reached your own personal goal. That’s kinda the nuts n bolts coming out of benzo wd. It’s a lot of work. Suffering is a part of life. It’s work pushing thru but the rainbow at the end is amazing n def worth it.

God bless all of you.

Bit wary of describing it, just get load of people telling me it's OCD , not chemically induced, and I need therapy or I'll never recover. Tried that for OCD and recommended meds for months did absolutely nothing. I have thought the same about the sleeping pills. Have suffered emotional abuse fir years from my family, think all time was on zopiclone it dampened it down and never really dealt with it properly. My husband nearly died 5 years ago was the same thing, the zop probably didn't really let me deal with it. Have had lot of emotional stress recently, which has exacerbated things. I have had counselling in the past, but only helps up to a point. My mother was one causing the stress and not here any more so can't resolve things with her. It does seem take long time to improve, been 31 months will give it bit longer then maybe consider other meds. I will look at the app Deanuuuna thanks.

 

Oh my goodness, Leann. That’s a lot of stuff. Next to anxiety, what is your next greatest complaint

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anxiety only remaining symptom.  Come to conclusion little really helps, very common symptom, if you didn't have it before it will apparently eventually go, time is the only solution if it's largely chemically induced which mine is.  Am having to deal with withdrawl from SSRI's as well . Despite comments I've had it's anxiety not OCD , therapy and SSRI's would have made difference if it were a recognisable condition. Just  really considering other meds for bad anxiety as a last resort if gets to 3 years and I haven't improved

I think we tend to forget over time why we were lead to these drugs in the first place. When you first joined you told us that you had gotten in trouble with benzos initially because you used them as a crutch to deal with the anxiety of your husband’s health condition. Now you are telling us that you never had anxiety before.  I know that benzo withdrawal brings anxiety to a whole new level and some refer to this as chemical anxiety. I have experienced it personally and it is hellish. The anxiety I ever had before pales in comparison. Nonetheless I used to maintain that I never had any mental health issues and was only on benzos for insomnia. After three years of therapy my therapist and I figured out that anxiety and OCD was the cause of my insomnia. We have to identify and treat the conditions that lead us to benzos it the forst place. Taking pills without doing therapy is like recovering from surgery and taking your pain meds but refusing to show up to physical therapy. Also, if you have mental health issues whether caused by a drug injury or naturally occurring therapy is an ongoing thing that should not be given up on. Giving up on therapy is just giving up on yourself. Therapy will not fix that drug injury induced anxiety. But it will teach us to manage the pre existing anxiety that lead us to benzos in the first place. It also teaches us to deal with things that inevitably pop in in day to day life that overwhelm us in withdrawal. Stress flares up benzo symptoms. You have to learn to manage this. You have to be honest with yourself. Does anyone take benzos for 12 years for no reason? You really think you don’t at least have underlying anxiety?

I think we tend to forget over time why we were lead to these drugs in the first place. When you first joined you told us that you had gotten in trouble with benzos initially because you used them as a crutch to deal with the anxiety of your husband’s health condition. Now you are telling us that you never had anxiety before.  I know that benzo withdrawal brings anxiety to a whole new level and some refer to this as chemical anxiety. I have experienced it personally and it is hellish. The anxiety I ever had before pales in comparison. Nonetheless I used to maintain that I never had any mental health issues and was only on benzos for insomnia. After three years of therapy my therapist and I figured out that anxiety and OCD was the cause of my insomnia. We have to identify and treat the conditions that lead us to benzos it the forst place. Taking pills without doing therapy is like recovering from surgery and taking your pain meds but refusing to show up to physical therapy. Also, if you have mental health issues whether caused by a drug injury or naturally occurring therapy is an ongoing thing that should not be given up on. Giving up on therapy is just giving up on yourself. Therapy will not fix that drug injury induced anxiety. But it will teach us to manage the pre existing anxiety that lead us to benzos in the first place. It also teaches us to deal with things that inevitably pop in in day to day life that overwhelm us in withdrawal. Stress flares up benzo symptoms. You have to learn to manage this. You have to be honest with yourself. Does anyone take benzos for 12 years for no reason? You really think you don’t at least have underlying anxiety?

 

  Amen Jack. There’s so much work ahead. We can’t just sit n wait. That just goes against anything logical and reasonable.

 

 

Bit wary of describing it, just get load of people telling me it's OCD , not chemically induced, and I need therapy or I'll never recover. Tried that for OCD and recommended meds for months did absolutely nothing. I have thought the same about the sleeping pills. Have suffered emotional abuse fir years from my family, think all time was on zopiclone it dampened it down and never really dealt with it properly. My husband nearly died 5 years ago was the same thing, the zop probably didn't really let me deal with it. Have had lot of emotional stress recently, which has exacerbated things. I have had counselling in the past, but only helps up to a point. My mother was one causing the stress and not here any more so can't resolve things with her. It does seem take long time to improve, been 31 months will give it bit longer then maybe consider other meds. I will look at the app Deanuuuna thanks.

 

Oh my goodness, Leann. That’s a lot of stuff. Next to anxiety, what is your next greatest complaint

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anxiety only remaining symptom.  Come to conclusion little really helps, very common symptom, if you didn't have it before it will apparently eventually go, time is the only solution if it's largely chemically induced which mine is. Just considering other meds as a last resort if gets to 3 years and I haven't improved

Anyone tried this seems get good reports have calming effect.