giulia My story: I don't think I can heal (+ i need advice)

[giulia]

I have to be brutally honest: I don't believe I can heal.

 

I'll try to be as succinct as I can.

 

I was born with really bad anxiety and the religious environment I was raised in probably made it even worse. I always felt the world was a terrible place and me was a sort of punishment. I felt like there was no scape and i was doomed to be unhappy. My mother convinced me my unhapiness was lack of faith, but it was really just deep existencial anxiety.

 

 

I took my first pill when I was 10, it was prozac, didn't go well, so I stopped and simply moved on. Then, at 13, I was dealing with extreme social anxiety and feeling of loneliness and emptiness, as I was bullied and even with the few friends I had i never felt comfortable, I never felt accepted.

 

I visited a doctor and was on prozac once again, it obviously didn't go well, but this time I went along and switched meds. I am 21 now and have taken about 20 different meds. 

 

I never felt better, I kept going because i thought I was depressed, but the medication was making me that way. Within a year I started to present what would be the biggest burden in my life: cognitive impairment. It started as being a little forgetful and now I can't remember anything and it's having a big impact in my life. I'm a college student but most of the time I feel like I am wasting my time because i can't keep knowledge in my brain. I also developed severe attention issues and general brain fog. I have described these symptoms to many doctors and most of them didn't believe me, because they see me as a functional person, but in the last 3/4 years with the progression of the attention issues my doctor is convinced I have adhd, which I definitely do not, because i never had any of the symptoms as a child and for most of my teenage years.

 

In 2018 i was on desvenlafaxine and it was making me really depressed/anhedonic, so the doctor put me on not one, but two benzos. 

 

I started taking bromazepam everyday and Klonopin when as an "sos". But I didn't like bromazepam and so I just went along with taking klonopin sometimes. One day I was very socially anxious and i had to go to class, so I took the usual dose (it was very small, 0.5 mg) but this time I didn't feel calm, I felt terrible, I had my first panick attack and it lasted 4 days. It was really ugly. The doctor said it was abstinence and i thought so for a long time, but I don't get it, because it didn't happen after I didn't take it for a while. I spent idk maybe a moth without it and then when I did take it I felt terrible. (Also this whole thing happened in like 5 months, so I wasn't on benzos for a long time).

 

Anyways, I started taking bromazepam again (the medical advice was to quit cold turkey after a month) and also a new antidepressant: trintellix. My doctor told me it was one of the best antidepressants out there, so when I started to feel really good I thought well, it must be because of the meds.

 

But it scaled up and within a few days I could sleep 3 hours a night and it wouldn't make any difference, I could focus on one single activity for a long time and i felt so much joy, I listened to one of my favorite albums and i cried because i realized just how dead inside I was before, now I could feel with dept. Turns out it was hypomania (only found out 1 year after that). I then spent 2 years with meds that didn't work and now had this bipolar diagnosis (cyclothymic, to be exact).

 

I was taking 80mg latuda and was at rock bottom. I'd have extreme anxiety all day to the point I couldn't function and sometimes panic attacks at night. I started to believe my panic attacks were due to the medication, as It would happen just a little after I took it.

 

So I lowered the dose (extremely fast, in less than a month I was at 20mg) and then I started to take it every other day (English is not my first language, so I don't know if it is clear, but I would, for example, take it Friday, skip it Saturday, then take it Sunday, skip it Monday and so on) I still had really bad anxiety but I started to have a few "hypomaniac days" where I would be really excited and joyful, usually it was 2-3 days a week. I believe I was in this regimen for about 6 months.

 

I finally found a medication that worked, but i had to go through 3 weeks of absolute hell first. Then I was numb and anhedonic as usual but at least I wasn't sad or anxious. I was on 100mg lamotrigine. I think 1 month and a half after that I was extremely anxious again, so I had to increase the dosage. I'm now at 200mg. I was fine, then crashed again a few time after and was put on 150mg bupropion and then it went up to 300mg.

 

That's where I was for a few months: 200mg lamotrigine + 300mg bupropion. I started tapering about 2 months ago. I split my 100mg tab in 4 so I'm now taking 175 mg lamotrigine and 300 mg bupropion. I was pretty normal, until last week, where I started to feel anxious and depressed once again. I have very high tolerance, I feel like **** right now, almost like that phase when meds weren't. I don't think I can do this, I'm starting to doubt. I don't work, I'm a college student but the academic environment is really competitive and hostile. The main reason I want to quit meds is because of my memory. I want to get my memory back, even if just a bit, I also don't want to lose more than what I've already lost, because it seems like it keeps getting worse and I'm really scared for the future. 

 

I'd like to hear from people who were able to go through this while in college, also to get some advice on what to do, as I'm already in a bad place just by decreasing the dose a little bit.

 

[Altostrata]

Welcome, @giulia

 

On 5/18/2021 at 6:01 PM, giulia said:

I finally found a medication that worked, but i had to go through 3 weeks of absolute hell first. Then I was numb and anhedonic as usual but at least I wasn't sad or anxious. I was on 100mg lamotrigine. I think 1 month and a half after that I was extremely anxious again, so I had to increase the dosage. I'm now at 200mg. I was fine, then crashed again a few time after and was put on 150mg bupropion and then it went up to 300mg.

 

That's where I was for a few months: 200mg lamotrigine + 300mg bupropion.

 

Lamotrigine was the drug that "worked"? What do you mean by "crashed" after you were taking 200mg? How did you feel after adding bupropion?

 

Please stop changing your drugs while we figure this out. What exactly are you taking now, at what times of day and dosages?

 

To help us out, follow these instructions Please put your drug and withdrawal history in your signature You may need to use a computer to do this.

[giulia]

26 minutes ago, Altostrata said:

Welcome, @giulia

 

 

Lamotrigine was the drug that "worked"? What do you mean by "crashed" after you were taking 200mg? How did you feel after adding bupropion?

 

Please stop changing your drugs while we figure this out. What exactly are you taking now, at what times of day and dosages?

Hi!

Yes, lamotrigine was the drug that worked, by "crashing" I mean I was doing really fine at 200mg and suddenly went rock bottom once again. I feel fine with bupropion, i think it is a neutral drug, i don't see side effects, it just doesn't help with things my doctor thought it would help (attention, motivation). When it comes to depression/anxiety I think I'm really good, my anxiety is not completely gone, but at least I feel more alive than when I was on Lexapro and couldn't feel a thing. The thing is: considering my previous "normal" state (before meds) I think I'm doing maybe 30% better.

 

I won't change meds, i don't plan to, i see now it was a big mistake and i was under the advise of a doctor. When I wrote this post I was taking 175mg lamictal and 300mg bupropion. The thing is: I'm two weeks away from the end of the semester and i have a ton of stuff to do, i got depressed and anxious all again, it felt just like 2018-2019 when nothing would work. It's like a never ending panic attack. I couldn't write essays or read anything, so I got back to 200mg.

What also made me do that is because i read an article about withdrawal and how it can damage your brain basically and give you permanent new symptoms and i started to question if it is really the best option. I still want to get off meds, but i want to find something else that can help me like cbd or neurofeedback and do the tapering extremely slowly. It seems impossible for me to live everyday for maybe 3-5 years with the feeling I get when I lower my dosage. I have built really high tolerance. I'm scared.

 

I also will put a signature.

 

Thanks for the response

[Altostrata]

2 minutes ago, giulia said:

suddenly went rock bottom once again

 

What does this mean?

 

Yes, bupropion is stimulating, while lamotrigine tends to be sedating and dulling. So you are taking 2 drugs that oppose each other.

 

On Tuesday, you were taking 175mg lamictal and 300mg bupropion and today you're taking something else? What are you taking now?

 

This is a site for going off drugs. If this is not what you plan to do, not sure how we can help you. Given your history of going on and off drugs, up and down, it's likely your symptoms are adverse drug effects, including anxiety from too much lamotrigine or whatever.

[giulia]

4 minutes ago, Altostrata said:

 

What does this mean?

 

Yes, bupropion is stimulating, while lamotrigine tends to be sedating and dulling. So you are taking 2 drugs that oppose each other.

 

On Tuesday, you were taking 175mg lamictal and 300mg bupropion and today you're taking something else? What are you taking now?

 

This is a site for going off drugs. If this is not what you plan to do, not sure how we can help you. Given your history of going on and off drugs, up and down, it's likely your symptoms are adverse drug effects, including anxiety from too much lamotrigine or whatever.

 I'm sorry, I'll try to speak in a more formal way. By rock bottom I mean I was at my lowest point, the worst I could have ever felt, just the way I was when meds weren't working/when I was taking latuda. Anything below my current dosage will probably bring these feeling back.

 

I think bupropion and lamictal are working well together, maybe because bupropion isn't so stimulating, it just makes lamictal a bit less sedative.

 

I really want to stop taking these drugs, I just doubt I can. I want to have an honest opinion, I know no one can predict the future and i'm an unique person, but I'd like to hear different stories so I can know for sure I can really do this, I can really taper my meds until I am eventually free of them. When I said I was considering cbd and neurofeedback i meant as something that could improve some of my symptoms at least a bit and make the tapering process easier.

 

I have read many stories here, but i made this topic so maybe I can attract individuals with at least some similarity to my story. 

(I just watched your YouTube video. You are very brave! It just made me think that i will be living the never ending panic attack/depressive episode forever because of how many drugs I have quit cold turkey. I'm a very insecure person, I'm sorry if it seems like I don't wanna do this, because i do.)

[Altostrata]

I wasn't brave. I naively went off Paxil because it was making me miserable, and then I trudged through many years of protracted withdrawal syndrome.

 

24 minutes ago, giulia said:

By rock bottom I mean I was at my lowest point, the worst I could have ever felt

 

Not interested in formal, what I want to know is what are the symptoms for this.

 

24 minutes ago, giulia said:

I think bupropion and lamictal are working well together, maybe because bupropion isn't so stimulating, it just makes lamictal a bit less sedative.

 

 

If you like your drugs, you're not going off unless you want to.

 

It's unlikely any of your doctors will wake up and say, "Giulia, you've been on and off drugs, you've spent a great deal of your life coping with adverse effects of one or the other, in general they don't seem to help you -- here, I'll take the responsibility for guiding your taper off them so you can go on with your life drug-free." 

 

We do not make decisions for people to go off their drugs. It's up to you to decide. You might read the Introductions topics and the Success Stories forum and see what you think.