Posted by yesac on July 23, 2003, at 10:29:38
In reply to Holy Smokes... » yesac, posted by whiterabbit on July 22, 2003, at 17:54:06
> Treatment-resistant depression, for sure. Have you thought about ECT?
Oh dear! I don't know about ECT just yet. Although they do have something new called transcranial stimulation I think, but it is currently only done somewhere in Tennessee. Something to think about though. God, I can just imagine telling my parents I've decided to go for ECT!
It's weird, how treatment-resistant I seem to be. There was one time I was telling my sister that I was going off Paxil, and she said "why?", and I said that it didn't work. She was like "what do you mean it doesn't work?" She just didn't get it that it was doing absolutely nothing for me, including no side effects. Interestingly, I did have some pretty bad withdrawal symptoms, but only for a week or so. Anyway - my doctor insists that there are always other things to try. That we haven't exhausted our options and that we never will. I know that some people go for years with no positive results, and then they finally find some weird combination that does it for them. Not that I want to go for years more, but I'm hoping it will be sooner than that, like really soon. I will say, however, that there is one drug that has truly helped me, and that is trazodone. Only for sleep, nothing else. But ever since childhood, I've had trouble sleeping, and two years ago I first started taking trazodone and it has been great to finally be able to fall asleep. It's not perfect, doesn't always work, but it's SO much better than before. But over the past couple of months, I have gone up and up on my dose, which I don't like. I used to take 50mg for a long time, and now I'm up to 225mg. Not sure what that's about.
It's true, Ativan as well as Risperdal really aren't antidepressants, but more as an adjunct to treat other symptoms that go along with it, especially anxiety and/or agitation. The reason he put me on them both was for the agitation, to help calm me and help me focus and just basically be able to chill out. I didn't stay on either of them very long because I just didn't particularly feel like they were doing much. Maybe if I took higher doses. But I didn't want to feel "zonked out".
> Does your psychiatrist seem to be on the ball? I like the guy I have now, he's Number Four. I mean, does your doctor seem to really listen when you talk? Maybe you've got something going on besides just depression.
>
> Have you ever suspected anything else, bipolar or ADD or OCD or whatever?I'm on #4 also. The first three were women, and I felt a little hesitant about going to a man, but he has been wonderful! I really like him a lot. He listens. We don't talk JUST about medication. He is willing to admit that they don't know everything, which is refreshing because I've known that all along and it's annoying for shrinks (or any doctor) to just act like they know everything. I could never have that kind of blind faith/trust. And he totally accepts that. Also, he's the first who is really available and willing to see me frequently. And he allows patients to call him at home, day or night, if you really need to. Maybe it's because he's in private practice, but to me he just seems amazing. But... I do have to "pay the price" literally. I am sort of holding out hope with him because this is the first time in my life that I've really been aggressively working on treating the depression.
I never really thought much about other diagnoses, but recently I have started to think maybe I have attention-deficit problems. I've taken a few of those online quizzes, with mixed results. The conclusion I've come to about that is that I don't have full-blown ADD, but I think I might have a sort of moderate form of it that wouldn't really be officially diagnosed as ADD. So I might mention that to him when I see him Monday. But it's hard to tell since some of the symptoms are intertwined with depressive symptoms. My ADD-ish symptoms are pretty much: fidgety, oh so fidgety; have always had a hard time reading/focusing, even though I have managed to push through because I do like to read; distracted always by every noise and goings-on around me; mind wanders in meetings and such, and I often find when it's over that I have absolutely no idea what they even talked about - in college I think having to take notes helped me focus in class; procrastination. Also, I definitely have a touch of social phobia too - not really severe - but it does affect my life. Mainly when it comes to speaking in front of people.
Well, Gracie, thanks for your help. I hope you are right that there is something out there for me, and I hope that I find it soon!
poster:yesac
thread:243271
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20030719/msgs/244485.html