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[CLKD]

I've been on ADs since the 1980s. My current one is escitalopram - since 2004 - no problems at all.  10mg at night and 5mg in the mornings.  I feel hung over due to busy, involved, long dreams ......... but my head clears once I've eaten breakfast. 

Setraline is a newer medication but I know 2 people who get on well with it.  Don't look for problems ;-).

Glad your lad has accepted where we are now. ;-)

[charliegirl]

Interesting what Birdy said about the gut. I think I have IBS and it came on exactly with a huge drop in mood which would suggest a lack of seratonin in the body as it is made in the gut mostly. Depression and IBS tend to go together suggesting there is a link. The more I worried about being depressed the worse it got.

[Jeepers]

Hi,
I am just about to start AD - citalopran.  I’m nervous but last weekend I really didn’t want to live anymore. Life became too unbearable,  years of problems overwhelmed me.  Surgery went massively wrong 5 years ago left me disabled with 3 stoma bags,  lots of other problems came along.  My mental health detiorated during lockdown, then my mum died.  I hit a wall.
I haven’t taken them yet as I’m scared of the ‘ you get worse before you get better ‘ thing bit I will take them as I have no choice xx

Hi groundhog

So sorry to hear you are feeling so low, you have been through so much, and I am not surprised.
I have some sertraline in the cupboard. It was prescribed a year ago for my anxiety, and like you I have been too scared to take it, as it makes anxiety worse in the first couple of weeks I've heard
 Have you started the citalopram yet?

We are all here to support you GH

Sending love

Jeepers xx


 

[CLKD]

'as it makes anxiety worse' ........... not 4 everyone 

[groundhog]

Thank you Jeepers for your thoughtful post.
I haven’t taken them yet.  Don’t know why supposed I’m also afraid of getting worse before feeling better.  I hit a dangerous point two weeks ago though when I felt my head was somehow emptying as if it was switching off, blanking out everything.  Frightening.  But after a few days I felt more normal.  I think I will take them, they are there just waiting for me to be brave enough.  I don’t want to go back to the emptying head scenario.  Thank you again x

[Sickntired]

Interesting to hear others echo experience experiences.   Its truly horrific to feel that way and others without illness assume 'sadness' and being pessimistic etc etc is the only horrible feelings.  Sometimes they are pale by comparison.

[Bring me Sunshine]

So i wont go into my whole story it is on here but concentrating on the here and now.  As my oestrogen dipped in December 2019 the oestradose I was on at the time even on 4 pumps was doing nothing when the gel had always worked(oestrogel).  I paid to see a private meno lady who said change to patches absorption will be more stable not as much hit and miss as gel.  I did and increased and increased still low mood/social anxiety so dr said lets go on sertraline.  (I had had good experience of sertraline when my Dad had died and I got depression/following grief in 2013 took 2/3 months and I was all singing all dancing NORMAL that wonderful word.  When the menopause hit me at the end 2016/beginning of 2017 despite still being on the sertraline and being really mentally well for the 4 years following the depression I plunged into depression.  No amt of them adding in extra anti depressants went on mitrazapine/amitriptyline/ venlaflaxine helped one bit till I got on the right level of hrt and it took a while.  I came off the anti depressants 2018.  So fast forward to this year the gp said lets go on sertraline again you never know it could work now you are more post menopausal.  Didnt touch the depression one iota 6 months I gave it increasing up to 200mg so they changed me recently to escitalopram 20mg and referred me to the mental health team.  That appt after months of waiting was Monday.  She listened and took my case to the meeting and left a message today saying this is not a mental health issue this is post menopausal depression and needs a harder look at the hormone levels and will be writing to the gp and menopause clinic.  She also said that the antidepressants can act to make me depressed if not treating the right thing.  So there you go my story and I was one of the biggest fans of anti depressants but thats when they were treating my depression relating to bereavement.  Trouble is we are all so different what works for one person dosent for others.  I have been buying books on depression, racking my brains to think is it because my boys are growing up do I not like my husband any more looking for reasons for depression as so many people say no you dont get depressed with menopause thats very rare oh no it isnt.  Abit of my story dont give up searching for answers

[CLKD]

Tnx 4 the update Bring me Sunshine.  Certainly Dr Dalton did a lot of work in the 1970s/80s/90s about premenstrual depression and how it affects women to the point of killing people.  So hormones can have a devastating impact during The Change.  I do believe that ADs can help ease those symptoms whilst HRT is 'sorted' considering how long it might take to find a balance.  I was already on ADs and anti-anxiety meds when I went into peri and I think that helped me a lot.

Many medications can have the opposite effect as to what they were designed for, a friend goes hyper on betablockas for example. 

As with everything, we are all so different.  That's why it's Trial and Error and oh, at times, so hard.

[Sickntired]

Exactly.    We get fobbed off being told rubbish stock answers for everything.
I found an entire Pdf on the NewsomHealth site - menopause dr based in stratford upon avon .     It outlines reasons for meno depression and clearly states antidepressants shouldnt be offered for meno depression.    It seems almost a no brainer.  If its a hormonal imbalance causing the problem why treat with a medication thats meant to work with yr brain - basically....     Time and again the underlying unspoken sentiment,  in my opinion is 'youre all older women, your just neurotic/hysterical ' , thats what women got 200 yrs ago and the attitude i think if honest still prevails.    Guess im just angry cos depressed and irrational thanks to bleedin hormones.