Panic Attacks Support Group

What do you experience and what dosage you are on?

You welcome my friend)

Mike maybe is just anxiety my friend,your fear

Eat something before you take Citalopram you may have stomach problems,I am fine using in empty stomach but you are not probably...

Mike,

Please ask your Doctor if you can take the Celexa later in the day.

I think that your side effects will be less if you do. Let me know

Hey Angel and Slada.

Slada - I am on Citalopram 10mg and I take it around 10am in the morning. I always eat before taking the med or I will eat right after. I haven't had much side effects besides today. Today I just felt sick as soon as I woke up. I could of been something I ate the day before but I guess we shall see how I feel tomorrow. I had a slight/weird headache. I still have a headache but forgot to get some tylenol.

Angel - Yeah if I have the same symptoms tomorrow I will definitely probably switch to a night time schedule. I noticed that once I take it, I feel very tired, lazy, and today I felt very detached and sick.

I know celexa is not a benzo. I take celexa currently. I took lexapro for 3 years. angelonearth is correct. Meds are a personal choice and I never discourage ppl who wanna go that route. I went the drug route and I am still on drugs. You will get addicted or dependent to benzodiazepines if you take them long enough. I can tell you that from decades of personal experience with these meds. Benzos are truly a double edge sword. They work like pure magic when you 1st begin them with virtually no side effects, but over time in many people, they either quit working or don't work nearly as good as they once did and in some people, a switch to a different benzo will not even work even though all benzos are cross tolerant.

Dependence is simply a medical euphemism for the word addiction. When you become medically addicted to benzos, there is no drug seeking behavior because you are not taking the meds to feel good or achieve some high. You simply want to get rid of the panic attacks and anxiety and feel normal but the brain will still become addicted to these meds over time. This is neither good nor bad. It is just a physiologic fact you must be willing to accept if one chooses to use benzos long-term to manage anxiety disorders. My personal views on benzos have evolved over the years I must say. I use to always think xanax w/d for example could not be as bad as people said when I 1st began this drug many, many years ago. I said to myself with a slow taper, should be no problem if I ever wanna stop or need to stop for some reason.

I also use to think that one could take these drugs for a lifetime as I had read even from some prominent doctors (p-docs) in the panic and anxiety fields like Lee Granoff and William Kernodle who say that tolerance does develop to the sedative effects but never to the anti-anxiety / anti-panic effects over time and thus one could find a happy dose and stay on the same benzo / same amount for a lifetime. The cold hard reality is that most (not all) people at some point will start to run into tolerance issues after many years of benzo use. I don't care what the experts say. I am talking from personal firsthand experience after many years taking these drugs and not what some doctor says who has never taken the drug him(her)self and has had the personal experience.

My signature line says what I believe in my heart when it comes to benzos. After over 2 decades of use, they are virtually useless in my case. I still have to take a small dose of these drugs because I find it impossible to stop. Many people will tell you it takes years to even get back to baseline anxiety and panic after one has to stop taking benzos for whatever reason. You can ask anyone who is on a short acting benzo like xanax how they feel if they miss a dose by even a few hours. Your body, brain, and soul will scream out for this drug. Most people might forget to take other drugs for a day or two but you will never forget to take that benzo because you know what will happen and what you will feel if you do not. I do not blame you Mike84 for trying to manage without drugs.

The celexa, if it works for you is a much better long-term option to manage your disorder. Benzos are truly a double edge sword.

Post edited by: LostInCyberspace12, at: 05/15/2012 02:29 AM

PS - leaxpro is available generic now. It is still pretty costly but should decrease more over time. If the celexa does not work or the side effects are too bothersome, lexapro might be a better fit. Basically, all forrest labs did was rearrange a few drug molecules when the patent on celexa ended, and called it lexapro to keep the cash cow rolling. It is a process known as evergreening. My p-doc told me this personally. LOL It is said to be a cleaner drug than celexa with less side effects for some ppl, but personally I can't really tell the difference except the celexa saves me a lot of money.

Post edited by: LostInCyberspace12, at: 05/15/2012 04:05 AM

LostInCyberSpace,

You made this statement in your post.

"Dependence is simply a medical euphemism for the word addiction."

I strongly disagree with this statement.

So according to you that would mean that a Diabetic is Addicted to Insulin? How ridiculous does that sound? They are Dependent NOT Addicted.

What about a person that takes Blood Pressure Meds or someone that takes Thyroid Meds? These are all examples of Dependence NOT addictions.

These Meds are necessary to give a person quality of life and in many cases to save their lives.

Whatever the Medication is if it can give the person a better quality of life and allow them to function in a better way then how can you call that addiction? I guess we will just have to agree to disagree.

Definition of Euphemism: the substitution of an agreeable or inoffensive expression for one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant; also: the expression so substituted

No angel, that is not what I mean. I have seen others use this same analogy in other forums and I don't think it is a valid one. I am not against meds. Remember, I am still on meds but there are caveats that one should / must be made aware of esp. the psychiatric meds. I am mainly talking about the benzodiazepines because I have been on these meds for so long. What happened to me may not happen to you but what did happen to me with benzos happens to a lot of people. The drugs were magical in the beginning and gave me a better QOL and I was grateful for that, but now that I have become pretty much tolerant after so many years of chronic use, my life has been the exact opposite for the last 5 years. In my opinion and this is just my opinion, I would only use benzos as a last recourse. If you can get the SSRI's to work, they are a much better longterm option IMHO. If you are one of the fortunate few who can take these drugs for a lifetime without ever having to experience tolerance and w/d while still taking the drug, I say more power to you. Remember when I started these drugs over 20 years ago, I intended to stay on them forever because of how they made me feel. I am just talking about the benzodiazepines, no other meds. Now if I had it to do all over again in hindsight, I would seriously consider not taking benzos daily for years on end. You are right. These drugs when you initially begin them do give a a better QOL. There is no question about this. The biggest drawback to them is if you ever start to become tolerant. If this happens to you, that pill you once found to be magical will make you start to feel deathly ill. It is a very cruel, painful irony. I will try to refrain from using the word addiction. I think this conjures up images of the junkie on the street corner looking for his next fix. I will use the word dependent but benzo dependency is not something to be taken lightly.

I guess we all have weight the risk to benefit ratio and decide what is best for us. For me personally, psychiatric meds (benzos) have been both a blessing and a curse. I also think most people rely too much on the drugs alone to make them feel better. Drugs should always be used in conjunction with healthy lifestyle changes to give the best possible outcome for the longest period of time. Many people who are willing to do this can reduce their meds or even eliminate them and still have a good QOL. The person on HBP medicine and lipitor for his cholesterol who refuses to lose wieight, give up smoking, change his bad diet, etc. is only fooling himself if he thinks he can just stay on the meds and keep doing some of the very things which made him sick in the first place.

Post edited by: LostInCyberspace12, at: 05/15/2012 09:34 AM

Sorry I didn't read all of that but I know the taking Xanax for a long time is definitely not healthy. I guess that is why I was always scared of taking them and why my doctor doesn't want me using them...only for emergencies. Over the past month, I only took six of them and that was during my attacks three weeks ago. My remainder xanax pills ended up in the washer and dryer by accident. I still have 10 left for a safety net but thats it.

Update:

Woke up with a killer migraine today which made me feel nauseous. Not sure if its from the way I slept, a little hot, or if its a side effect. I took two Advil which was verified okay from the pharmacist.