Rumor-monger deserves to die

[Evil Alpaca]

What are you people implying? That I'm defensive?

I was implying that you were jumpy and hostile, but greatly amusing!

 

[shereads]

I felt discouraged, myself, when all these stories about the supposed bad effects of antidepressants started to come out.

Seriously, SlickT, I wouldn't be around to joke about antidepressants if I hadn't used them. They should probably be prescribed more cautiously, especially in kids and teenagers, but the fact that they aren't for everyone doesn't make them any less miraculous.

I'm glad the risks are being put out in the open, because people have a right to make informed choices. But if I had known there was a risk of some serious side effect when I agreed to try Prozac, it wouldn't have made any difference to me. I was out of options, all but the one I kept secret.

Not many years ago, the alternative for many people with disabling mood disorders was a padded room in Bedlam and an imaginary spider friend named Larry. I'll risk the Prozac.

 

[SlickTony]

We're saying that there is no causation concerning Prozac or antidepressants and acts of violence?

I think that when there appears to be, there are extenuating circumstances that of course the people putting down the Prozac don't get into. As I've no doubt mentioned on other threads, I've been prescribed Zoloft before; I definitely did not like what the literature that comes with it terms "sexual side effects," i.e., it's very hard to get off, even with yourself. Fine; I understand there's Wellbutrin; if I ever have to take antidepressants again, I'll ask for that.

 

[Kassiana]

My husband used to moderate a teen depression board (where teens with depression used to post and support each other). Some of them said their medications didn't seem to make a difference to their depression. Now we've learned recently that some drug companies have come out and admitted that their anti-depressants don't work on teens. I feel bad that I doubted those kids back then.

 

[shereads]

Fine; I understand there's Wellbutrin; if I ever have to take antidepressants again, I'll ask for that.

Celexa. Breakfast of champions.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I've tried them all: Prozac, Wellbutrin, Celexa, Remeron, Effexor, even Tofranil, way back when. I'm still taking wellbutrin and remeron.

I had a bad reaction to Effexor: everything made me angry. You can see how it might work on depression, because it makes you kind of self-centered and aggressive, kind of like stoking the dark side of your ego. There's a theory that says that depression is rage directed against the self, and the Effexor seemed to externalize it.

I could also see how something like that could make you suicidal or antisocial. It made me want to strike out. It also was hard to get off of. There were withdrawal symptoms, and I was kind of sick for a week or so coming off of it.

Personally, I liked the older drugs. You always knew you were drugged with them. With the modern anti-depressents you can't really tell. You feel like you're normal, but you're not. It can be a dangerous way to be.

---dr.M.

 

[Pure]

Let's not overlook the good effects of prozac in moderating a lot of raging libidos like sher's.

 

[Guest]

What are you people implying? That I'm defensive?

Of course not... there, there...

Wow. You do like to live dangerously, don't you carson?

 

[SlickTony]

You feel like you're normal, but you're not. It can be a dangerous way to be.

Here we have an example of how we're influenced by society's attitude toward mental and neurological problems. I dare say that all diabetics want, when they take medicine for their condition, is to feel normal and be able to lead a normal life. What is wrong with feeling normal?

 

[shereads]

Let's not overlook the good effects of prozac in moderating a lot of raging libidos like sher's.

I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you there, J. I left Prozac long ago for the greener pastures of Celexa, which is, if anything, a lit libido fuse. Get those pants down, mister! That goes for all of you misters. This is pants-free thread!

 

[Guest]

Celexa. Breakfast of champions.

Celexa made me feel too out of touch.

My doctor suggested it as a response to depression from grief. I was really fucking up at work, couldn't concentrate, couldn't focus, couldn't do anything.

But after I started the meds, I still fucked up just as much at work. The difference was that on Celexa I just didn't care.

So I stopped the meds. *sigh*

My kids (like SlickTony's) are on teeny doses of Zoloft because of the ADHD meds. We've tried many different types of meds, we've witnessed their behavior on and off meds, and we make sure they see an incredible child psychiatrist every other month.

It is necessary. They can't function without 'em.

 

[WarmVanilla]

Here we have an example of how we're influenced by society's attitude toward mental and neurological problems. I dare say that all diabetics want, when they take medicine for their condition, is to feel normal and be able to lead a normal life. What is wrong with feeling normal?

This is something I struggle with myself. I am one of those who aren't functional unless I'm on an antidepressant. I have fairly severe social anxiety disorder. If I'm not on medicines, I can't' go to the grocery store myself. With medicines, I was able to function as an assistant manager at a busy video store.

Still, as much as I know they help, I don't LIKE the idea of being on something. I guess it's a stigma I was raised with. My parents, to upset me, would tell me there was something not right with me, and I'd have to go see a shrink. Even now, therapy is a painful experience.

I'm just glad that Prozac doesn't have many side effects for me. I think it contributes to my insomnia, but at this point I'm not going to switch. I was on Paxil at first, and it made me weepy as hell. Transitioning off it was one of the most horrid experiences of my life, and cost me a great job, as I literally couldn't get out of bed.

It upsets me all the people who do the scare-tactic thing about antidepressants. They might be overprescribed, but they're still necessary to a great many people. It would be a shame if something kept anyone from getting the help they need.

(I'm sure I'm long-winded here. This touches a real nerve with me.)

 

[shereads]

When Prozac was prescribed for me (it was still the only popular choice back then) my doctor warned me that some users have difficulty reaching orgasm. I still wonder why he thought I'd care, in the state I was in. I barely had the will to live, much less have sex.

Prozac and the whole family of SSRIs are imperfect solutions to an illness that's only recently been recognized. Prescribing it correctly is a guessing game, because every one of these meds seems to work differently on different people. It saved my life, though. In fact, I only began to care about the sexual side effect from Prozac after Prozac made me feel confident enough to recover my interest in sex. I tried Wellbutrin for that reason, but I was one of a tiny percentage of people who had a bad response to Wellbutrin. (Wellbutrin is also prescribed as a smoking-cessation drug, under a different name.) Paxil made me queasy. Zoloft did nothing at all. Celexa, I only asked about because a friend had recommended it to me, and I've been taking it for three years without any side effects at all.

For people who do respond well to Celexa but experience a sexual side effect (with this drug, that happens mostly to male users), there is the option of planning for sex by skipping or postponing a dose. This is because Celexa, unlike Prozac, is fully eliminated from your system within a day. (Prozac was designed to have a sort of "half-life" in the body, on purpose, to guard against withdrawal symptoms in patients who couldn't be trusted to take the drug regularly. It can remain in the body for weeks.)

A caveat about Prozac and all SSRIs, based on responses by the medical community to recent news connecting Paxil/Zoloft with suicide in children and teenagers, and Prozac with suicide and/or violence in adults: bi-polar disorder can be misdiagnosed as depression, and can be made significantly worse when antidepressants are prescribed. Discuss the likelihood of such a misdiagnosis with your child's (or your) prescribing physician.

 

[Songcatcher]

I'm afraid I'll have to disappoint you there, J. I left Prozac long ago for the greener pastures of Celexa, which is, if anything, a lit libido fuse. Get those pants down, mister! That goes for all of you misters. This is pants-free thread!

YOU SEXY BEAST!!!

I'll be up-dating my sig-line shortly. I love you sher. I don't give a damn about the other woman.

 

[SlickTony]

What is the male sexual side effect with Celexa? Are the effects that much difference between males and females? What I noticed with the Zoloft--that's the only antidepressant I've ever had--was that not only could I not get off, I couldn't even keep an erotic thought in my head. It was very strange.

 

[sincerely_helene]

pfffft@ pansy anti-depressants. You people haven't lived until you've tried a good anti-pyschotic.

Now, would you be a dear and wake me after my 14 hour power nap?

 

[SlickTony]

Anti-psychotics? My son has some leftover Zyprexas. Are they any good? The neurologist took him off them because he was crashing as soon as he got in from school.

 

[sincerely_helene]

Anti-psychotics? My son has some leftover Zyprexas. Are they any good? The neurologist took him off them because he was crashing as soon as he got in from school.

In all seriousness and honesty, I am a little bit biased against medications of that nature in general. I have been on everything from ridilin, to zoloft, to seroquel.

I have had no experiance with Zyprexas, but my previous post was no joke. I couldn't seem to sleep enough while I was on the Seroquel. I suspect that might be the primary basis of how they work: you are so busy sleeping all the time, you forget to be pyschotic. I certainly hope the Doc weened your son off them, though. I foolishly discontinued use on my own and wound up in the hospital.

I'm currently drug free, aside from a mild tranq to help me sleep.

... And I'm happier than I have been in a long time, too.

 

[SlickTony]

He seems to be doing OK without them. The neurologist had prescribed them for two reasons:

1. He was having these intense meltdowns where he was just beside himself and we couldn't do anything with them.
2. To regulate his Circadian rhythms.
   [/list=1]
   However, the second reason never seemed to work very well for him because he was supposed to take them at 6:00 so he'd get to bed at a decent hour, and he was always forgetting to take them until after supper.
   
   But then we started having him take the Zyprexas at the prescribed time, and then he'd come home from school and crash. Currently all he's taking is Ritalin and the fluoxetines to counteract the depressive effects of the Ritalin, but the doctor wishes him to start on Topomax in addition to that. We've put that off, because he was on vacation, but we're starting him on it on Monday. He can start with the ones my husband was taking. His neurologist prescribed them for tremors, but they make you more sensitive than usual to heat and he decided he'd rather endure even-worse-than-usual handwriting than to wilt on the tennis court so he quit taking them.

 

[sincerely_helene]

He seems to be doing OK without them. The neurologist had prescribed them for two reasons:

1. He was having these intense meltdowns where he was just beside himself and we couldn't do anything with them.
2. To regulate his Circadian rhythms.
   [/list=1]
   However, the second reason never seemed to work very well for him because he was supposed to take them at 6:00 so he'd get to bed at a decent hour, and he was always forgetting to take them until after supper.
   
   But then we started having him take the Zyprexas at the prescribed time, and then he'd come home from school and crash. Currently all he's taking is Ritalin and the fluoxetines to counteract the depressive effects of the Ritalin, but the doctor wishes him to start on Topomax in addition to that. We've put that off, because he was on vacation, but we're starting him on it on Monday. He can start with the ones my husband was taking. His neurologist prescribed them for tremors, but they make you more sensitive than usual to heat and he decided he'd rather endure even-worse-than-usual handwriting than to wilt on the tennis court so he quit taking them.

1. 
   
   
   Eeps...
   
   Well, I'm going to try to avoid going off on another one of my many anti-medication tangents, and just wish you good luck with your son.

 

[SlickTony]

Thanks, Helene. He seems to be outgrowing the meltdowns, or managing them better, which probably contributed to the Dr. taking him off the Zyprexa.

You have no idea how many differents kinds of meds, though, he has started to help prevent migraines, which he now doesn't take because it was decided it didn't work. I wish that there weren't all these weird and Byzantine laws about people taking other people's prescriptions--maybe I didn't express that right. I wish there were some kind of exchange or clearinghouse for unfinished meds. I mean, they're so damn expensive, even with copays, I don't even want to think what they'd be out of pocket, and people who are poor and uninsured who could use them, but is there any way I can get this stuff from the top of my refrigerator, where they now currently live, to them? Not that I know of. We're told that unused medicines should be destroyed. Destroyed how? Flush them down the toilet? That way, they get into the water supply. They've tested the water in certain places and it's got measurable amounts of all the meds we're flushing.

 

[sincerely_helene]

Thanks, Helene. He seems to be outgrowing the meltdowns, or managing them better, which probably contributed to the Dr. taking him off the Zyprexa.

You have no idea how many differents kinds of meds, though, he has started to help prevent migraines, which he now doesn't take because it was decided it didn't work. I wish that there weren't all these weird and Byzantine laws about people taking other people's prescriptions--maybe I didn't express that right. I wish there were some kind of exchange or clearinghouse for unfinished meds. I mean, they're so damn expensive, even with copays, I don't even want to think what they'd be out of pocket, and people who are poor and uninsured who could use them, but is there any way I can get this stuff from the top of my refrigerator, where they now currently live, to them? Not that I know of. We're told that unused medicines should be destroyed. Destroyed how? Flush them down the toilet? That way, they get into the water supply. They've tested the water in certain places and it's got measurable amounts of all the meds we're flushing.

Have you tried getting them dispensed in smaller quantities until he is past the experimental stage?

 

[SlickTony]

That's a thought, but I feel like it would just lead to multiple charges...we'd still have to pay the full copay on each 'script.