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Hi I am 35 years old and have struggled with depression all of my life. 4 years ago I lost my husband to liver failure. He was in the hospital for 8 months on the transplant list but passed away before a match was found. Since that experience I have severe issues with depression and anxiety/panic attacks. Sometimes I feel like its under control but most of time I feel like every day is a struggle.
I currently take : 2mg Clonazepam at night to help me sleep and for its antianxiety effects, 200 mg of Setraline (Zoloft) for depression, 10mg of Abilify as a mood stabalizer (that one is new, only been on it 2 weeks), and up to 3mg of Lorazepam for anxiety (1mg at a time) throughout the day as needed. I have been seeing the same pyschiatrist for the past 5 years ( since my husband became ill in 2003). We go through this cycle on a regular basis where we try different combinations of meds (most recent switch was from Lamictal to Abilify).
My problem is that I constantly feel like I am on this roller coaster, some good days, some ok days, some really bad days - and we change the meds it seems every few months, find a combo that works for awhile, then either stops working or begins having interactions and side effects so I have to change again. The last switch was because my anxiety got worse as I increased the Lamictal trying to get to target dose. At this point I don't even remember what it was like to not take a ton of medication every day. I have seen the pyschiatrist 3 times in the past 3 weeks and I feel like there is a problem with the meds but I feel like we are just guessing as to which one is not working or interacting badly with another one, so we just keep going through this trial and error thing where we change one, doesn't work, change another, etc. I have taken so many different things I probably can't even remember them all.
Here's my question: Has anyone ever tried stopping (working down to zero, not stopping abruptly) all of their meds to get back to a baseline of taking nothing and then reassessing the meds and what needs to be taken? I know that because of my predisposition for depression and because of the extremely traumatic experience I went through that I will in all likelihood have to taken some meds for the rest of my life. But I don't want to be on a zillion different things every day from now on, I don't want to have to rely on sleeping pills for the rest of my life, and I hate how I feel currently. Could it potentially help me to work down off of everything and try starting from scratch - does anyone have any experience with something like that? My mother said she read about someone who did that and it helped but was hell to go through. I wanted to see if anyone had any first hand knowledge about doing something like that. I am seeing the pyschiatrist again tomorrow and wanted to get some feedback from people who might have experienced it before talking with him about it. Thanks in advance for any help.
Although I've not been on a regimen of as many meds as you are, yes, I've tapered off everything and started over.
The important thing is to do this under your doctor's supervision.
I used to take clonazepam at night for a sleep disorder and Xanax for anxiety during the day. Then my doctor and I talked about the long-term use of benzodiazepines such as clonazepam, Xanax, etc., and decided to work to eliminate them. What we ended up with is using Zanaflex (tizanidine) at night for sleep and at smaller doses during the day as needed for anxiety.
What has worked well for me for a combination of a sleep disorder, insomnia, and major depressive disorder is the Zanaflex along with Effexor XR. We chose the Effexor XR for an antidepressant because in affects both serotonin and norepinephrine.
Our bodies all react differently, but I hope it helps you to see what's worked for me.
