Anxiety -- How do you deal?

It might take a few tries to find the right therapist. One doesn't have to stick with the first one they find. Throughout my life, I saw maybe 6-8 therapists until I found the right one, the one with whatever you wanna call it, the right chemistry, or who asked the right questions, that made therapy actually work for me. Before that, through a combination of me not being ready for therapy and not seeing the right person, therapy just bounced off me. I can't gush enough about how much it helped me, really.

Interesting thing about side effects for medications. When they are doing the clinical trials, if someone ha something happen to them while in the trial, it gets noted as a possible side effect. Even if, for example, the guy who had the heart attack was 600 lbs, ate 6 deep-fried big macs a day with bacon-wrapped butter stick chasers. If it happened int he clinical trial, it gets thrown in as a possible side effect.

Peace, yeah, whatever gets you through the day and keeps you comfortable is something that works. I suggest starting with a psychiatrist because a good one can slot you into various treatment regimes based on what you're saying, not just how you are presenting. When you get into specialties, it's my opinion that you start getting the "I've got a hammer" problem - accupuncturists are unlikely to say "Well, this is not working as we expected, try talk therapy" and vice versa. I should emphasize that I have a really good psychiatrist and your experience could well be very different.

Mudbunny, I love that they do that with the side effects. It saved my life. I tried Naproxen once (I *think*, it might have been Celebrex, but definitely a high-end NSAID) for knee problems. It went fine for a day or two, and then driving home from work on a perfectly normal day, I decided I was going to put my car into a bridge abutment at high speed.

This bothered me for some reason, so against my better judgement, I stayed on the road. I made it home, calm and collected and matter-of-factly suicidal.

When I mentioned it to the doctor, he was seriously skeptical and recommended I continue with the medicine. I had to pull out the fine-print long form sheet from the 'script, and there under the "less than one percent" side effects was "suicidal ideation". I stopped taking the meds and within a day the feelings were completely gone.

So, for me, list every damn thing that happens to the test folks. I wanna know if they stub their toes more than usual, because somewhere, some iron worker is going to say "hmmm, makes your feet clumsy, maybe I should avoid this stuff" and not fall off a high beam at work.

(Now, bear in mind, suicidal ideation just puts the thoughts in your head. It's not a compulsion driving you to do it. But it's damned creepy to go through as a constant background thing. I don't think I was in *real* danger, but had I already been depressed or something like that, it would have been very very bad. And as it was, very unpleasant indeed to have to keep monitoring myself.)

Just as trying different therapists is important, so too is giving different medications a chance. It's alchemy, seriously. Ultimately, I have SSRI #1 for "not turn into rage-monkey" and SSRI #2 for "increase number of f*cks available for giving."

Maybe we should fold this into the Depression thread--or ask for a new subforum.

Well I got on the dreaded phone this morning before I could really think of what I was doing and got one stress-inducing thing mostly settled, so a small victory for me today. Yay!

Yes, the side-effect information on medications can be a two-edged sword. I get extremely anxious if I don't know every detail of what they are, but get anxious knowing what they are and imagining that they might happen to me. It doesn't help that I have a med phobia in general where I resist taking something so minor as cold medication until I'm at the point where if I feel like I'm dying anyway, I might as well help it along and get it over with.

Tiny steps.

I'm cool with it being a separate thread... a lot of people deal with both but for me they're two really distinct issues.

Depression comes and goes but anxiety is always looking out for me

Even though they share some symptoms, depression and anxiety are different things, and require different treatments. This is important enough that I've seen posters about it in doctor's offices.

bekkilyn wrote:

Yes, the side-effect information on medications can be a two-edged sword. I get extremely anxious if I don't know every detail of what they are, but get anxious knowing what they are and imagining that they might happen to me. It doesn't help that I have a med phobia in general where I resist taking something so minor as cold medication until I'm at the point where if I feel like I'm dying anyway, I might as well help it along and get it over with.

I know this feeling, I'm also way too anxious about medication. Haven't touched anything apart from normal OTC pain meds (Tylenol and the like) and flu shots in years, due to a totally irrational fear of taking any medication unless I literally have to take it to live.

H.P. Lovesauce wrote:

Maybe we should fold this into the Depression thread--or ask for a new subforum. ;)

Personally, I'm glad this got a separate thread apart from the Depression thread. I usually don't feel comfortable posting in the depression thread because what the people are going through in there sounds way, way worse than the anxiety problems I deal with. That might be a "devil you know" kind of thing, but still.

bekkilyn wrote:

Well I got on the dreaded phone this morning before I could really think of what I was doing and got one stress-inducing thing mostly settled, so a small victory for me today. Yay!

Yay!

Chumpy_McChump wrote:
bekkilyn wrote:

Well I got on the dreaded phone this morning before I could really think of what I was doing and got one stress-inducing thing mostly settled, so a small victory for me today. Yay!

Yay! :D

Seconded, yay!

And yeah, don't stress too much on meds. I went through maybe 4 before I found the right one for me.

clover wrote:

Depression comes and goes but anxiety is always looking out for me

Better than I could have ever said it.

Just got another scary phone call out of the way, which was probably the worst one due to complexity and time required. It's definitely not logical how anxious I get over these phone calls considering how people are pretty nice and helpful on the phone most of the time, so it's never as terrible in actuality as it is in my mind, but each and every time the anticipation of making the calls just get to me. Hopefully, I'll manage to get all of these calls out of the way and resolved before it gets close to project due dates and exams at school, which in itself is enough to make nearly anyone anxious even without other anxiety issues!

This week has been a bit better so far than last week. I really like the idea that was mentioned in an earlier post about changing one's environment to help reduce stress, so I'm going to make more attempts to do that in hopes that I can at least reduce some of the stresses of things that are more in my direct control.

Amoebic wrote:
clover wrote:

Depression comes and goes but anxiety is always looking out for me

Better than I could have ever said it.

Yeah, that was well put.

Anxiety over phone calls (and email - the bane of my existence) was once the final domino that sent me to inpatient. It's never about logic, so don't give yourself a hard time about that part!

bekkilyn wrote:

Just got another scary phone call out of the way, which was probably the worst one due to complexity and time required.

Yay for progress!!

***giant disclaimer, all my pharms are prescribed by my MD, always talk to your doctor about medications, etc***

::

I take it for other reasons, but I didn't realize until I just restarted it how good an anti-anxiety med Adderall is for me.

This is pretty much the only thing I take that isn't some kind of bio-replacement so it's my only "real" drug, but I'm going to have to be ok with that because I should probably be taking it for the rest of my life.

But hey, if it was good enough for Erdos it's good enough for me, right?

His biographer[/url]]Like all of Erdös's friends, [fellow mathematician Ronald Graham] was concerned about his drug-taking. In 1979, Graham bet Erdös $500 that he couldn't stop taking amphetamines for a month. Erdös accepted the challenge, and went cold turkey for thirty days. After Graham paid up — and wrote the $500 off as a business expense — Erdös said, "You've showed me I'm not an addict. But I didn't get any work done. I'd get up in the morning and stare at a blank piece of paper. I'd have no ideas, just like an ordinary person. You've set mathematics back a month." He promptly resumed taking pills, and mathematics was the better for it.

Bolded for a source of my own greatest anxieties.

I think its value is that it helps my executive functions keep up with the rest of my brain, because when those pieces are out of sync I end up unable to even answer phone calls or keep up with other basic sh*t because I'm in some kind of anxiety/confusion/ADD feedback loop.

Past couple of days I've been squirrellier than a big kiddie pool filled full of squirrels, stapled shut, and kicked down the stairs.

Being able to rationally handle phone calls, get the mail, or deal with any form of social media (except for forums like these) has been one of those things I've basically given up on.

I've got a work social thing where we're going go-karting tomorrow, most people are probably some flavor of excited about it but I'm trying my best not to think about it and drown my sorrows in video games, typing and seltzer water.

Demyx wrote:

I've got a work social thing where we're going go-karting tomorrow, most people are probably some flavor of excited about it but I'm trying my best not to think about it and drown my sorrows in video games, typing and seltzer water.

Oh man, my old job used to take us to the movies once a year. Movie theaters were always places of high anxiety for me because I would feel trapped at the theater. Many a movie was ruined by panic attacks.

But going there as a work function ... my week would be ruined.

I called (emailed) in sick once due to an employee social event that I couldn't bear to go to that day. Still don't regret not going for multiple reasons.

Tagging to come back with a better response than this, and to more carefully read over everyone's post, but here's my starter for 10:

You are more than welcome on the depression thread. Depression and anxiety are sides of a coin. You'll find friends there.

I get crippling panic attacks, I mean blackout poop yourself bad, and I've found some benefit in mindfulness meditation. The free app I started with is available at headspace.com.

Also: hugs.

garion333 wrote:
Demyx wrote:

I've got a work social thing where we're going go-karting tomorrow, most people are probably some flavor of excited about it but I'm trying my best not to think about it and drown my sorrows in video games, typing and seltzer water.

Oh man, my old job used to take us to the movies once a year. Movie theaters were always places of high anxiety for me because I would feel trapped at the theater. Many a movie was ruined by panic attacks.

But going there as a work function ... my week would be ruined.

I don't like watching movies unless it's a movie I really like (or one I "know" I'll like beforehand). Sitting for 2+ hours without any of my normal coping strategies available to me is unbearable unless the movie is good enough to actually distract me from my thoughts.

As of Monday, all my projects and final exams are over for the semester, so I've really been making an effort into creating a less stressful environment. All bills and financial obligations are paid for this month/year, and I've started decluttering and organizing computer files (after *years* of disarray), getting the house back in order, and as of yesterday, I took what is to be a daily walk in order to get back into exercising. I even remembered to bring my 3DS so that it will count my steps and I can get Nintendo coins as some additional motivation. I've also been studying for the Praxis 2 exam I plan to take in the middle of next year and have set up a system for that.

So this morning when I woke up, I had *nothing* short-term that I could possibly be anxious about. Long-term "what if" type of anxieties are still in the pot of course, but nothing at the moment that is *immediately* pressing and causing me distress. If I were an outside observer hovering over myself this morning, I probably would have to laugh because I seemed to be trying so hard to figure out what was going on. It was almost like I was anxious about not having anything immediate to be anxious about and I didn't quite know how to handle it!

So I think I'll continue with this plan and hopefully it will be able to chip away at some of the longer-term anxieties over time.

I've been watching episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and the one I saw yesterday involved Lt. Barclay who is prone to fears and anxiety. Counselor Troi said to him, "Commander La Forge said you seemed a little nervous this morning." and Barclay responded, "I'm *always* nervous. Everybody knows that!" I love the way he's able to move forward and have success despite his fears.

I've also had a lot of catastrophic thinking in my head lately. It's more my reaction to things than actual problems that gets me into trouble. I think I get stuck in a habit of anxious thinking. There must be a problem somewhere that I can keep from happening by worrying about it, my anxiety always tells me. But it's not worth that energy, I have to tell myself. It can be a struggle to keep from getting hooked.

I am a big fan of mindfulness meditation, so at least I'm aware of what's happening. But I doubt I'll ever be able to let go of my irrational worries entirely. I think I have to accept that worrying is part of my nature.

I agree with Maq: even though my difficulty is anxiety, not depression, I've received a lot of support in the depression thread. Lots of good people there, and depression and anxiety are so closely related.

Big hugs to you all.

bekkilyn wrote:

I've been watching episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and the one I saw yesterday involved Lt. Barclay who is prone to fears and anxiety. Counselor Troi said to him, "Commander La Forge said you seemed a little nervous this morning." and Barclay responded, "I'm *always* nervous. Everybody knows that!" I love the way he's able to move forward and have success despite his fears.

Barclay is THE BEST. I so love Dwight Schultz for playing such a great character so authentically.

Veloxi wrote:

Barclay is THE BEST. I so love Dwight Schultz for playing such a great character so authentically.

He is definitely one of my favorites!

bekkilyn wrote:

Counselor Troi said to him, "Commander La Forge said you seemed a little nervous this morning." and Barclay responded, "I'm *always* nervous. Everybody knows that!"

Sounds like a normal Monday for me :p

>_<

Zoloft is awesome. That is all.

Meds, and exit plans for non-essential stuff clogging up my brain and schedule.

I know I'm doing a lot more than I have the last few years, and there's more different stuff on my plate, but it feels like the plate is shrinking a bit also.

trim the fat trim the fat

You will get through this, clover, I promise. Strength.