Menopause Matters Forum
Menopause Discussion => Personal Experiences => Topic started by: racjen on April 01, 2019, 10:27:39 AM
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So I've been on mirtazapine for a month now and feeling better mood-wise i.e. no longer feeling suicidal, but still waiting for any improvement in the anxiety. I've noticed this month though that I've been able to tolerate Utrogestan for 8 days without getting depressed. But as soon as I stopped taking it the anxiety has gradually got worse and worse, till this morning (5 days later) it's been almost unbearable. So I'm now wondering if maybe my body can cope with (and even needs) continuous progesterone as long as it has the anti-depressant to cancel out the downside. Also that maybe it needs a lower dose of estrogen now for the same reason. IT seems bizarre, but it's as if the high dose of estrogen I need to not feel depressed causes massive anxiety unless it's balanced by progesterone, but then the progesterone has the effect of swinging things the other way and I feel really depressed. Christ, this is so complicated I just want to crawl into a hole and sleep till it's all sorted itself out (trouble is I'll probably emerge aged 90, could take that long...)
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Hi racjen
Had you high anxiety before you started mirtazapine?
Reason in asking it I used mirtazapine fir 18 months it helped with depression , I never suffered from anxiety until I used mirtazapine
I know we are all different and what I can't use other folk have no problems using but for me mirtazapine caused anxiety..
Hopefully you feel better soon
Kaz x
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Yes, the anxiety was the main problem right from the start - I did have depression as well but I think that was a result of coping with acute anxiety for months on end with nobody really taking it seriously. So I don't think it's the mirtazapine itself causing the anxiety - why would it start doing that suddenly after 4 - 5 weeks anyway, seems a bit of a coincidence.
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Hi racjen
I was just wondering if you had the anxiety before mirtazapine as I never suffered anxiety in my life until I was put onto mirtazapine, my SN got so bad I had to go for one to one counciing, I'm nit saying menopause wasn't playing a part with anxiety ..
What dose of mirtazapine are you taking ? I've been on 15 30 45 mg over a period of 18months but I'm if them now coming 2 years
Could you need your dose upped ? Or dropped ?
Kaz x
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Break through symptoms are worse than the condition very often >:( the thought that "Oh no, the drug isn't going to work" :'(
Any improvement racjen?
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No I've never suffered anxiety like this before menopause. I'm currently on 30mg, the psychiatrist did say I might need to go up to 45mg if no improvement after 6 weeks.
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Is that all at once or do you take the medication during the day? Psychologically I found that useful even though 'all at once' was recommended ::)
:hug:
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It's all at once, at bedtime, and since it helps with sleep I wouldn't want to be taking it any other time of day. I don't think it would make any difference anyway, ADs don't work like that. If they take a while to build up in the brain - 8 weeks or more before the effects are felt - how can spreading the dose in one day make any difference?
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It didn't take 8 weeks anytime for me, in fact the drug that finally 'worked' without side effects I had benefit from in 3 days :o :-*. After 8 years that pooped out in that depression broke through and the next took about 2 weeks B4 the brain felt good effect. I took it 3 times a day as it left me in control, after about 3 weeks I went onto twice a day and never looked back.
Anxiety was more difficult, hence the emergency as-necessary drug plus Betablockas at night. It really can be Trial and Error which I found so tiring :-\
Worse or better today? How were symptoms prior to each monthly period, all those years ago? Bloody Hormones >:(
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You clearly do react atypically to psychotropic drugs CLKD - for an AD to work in such a striking way within three days is pretty unusual, as is just upping the dose in an ad hoc way if you're feeling particularly depressed. Also your ability to take benzos on an 'as and when' basis for years without getting hooked. That emergency drug you can never remember the name of is lorazepam, which is a stronger, even more addictive type of benzodiazipine than diazepam. So forgive me if I say you may not be the best person to give out advice about such drugs on here - we've had this discussion before, and to be perfectly honest I think your attitude to ADs and anti-anxiety drugs is a bit misleading for the newbies on here.
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Hi Racjen
I just wanted to let you know I am thinking about you as I'm going through a similar thing, but on a different AD. I had to come off HRT suddenly as it made me itch so badly so the doctor told me to stop taking it. I had been having great success with Femseven Conti patches for 2 years but they discontinued them😥.
Anyway, decided to take Venlafaxine again as I took it a few years ago and it worked well for hit flushes and anxiety. I came off it after a year as I felt better and wanted to give HRT a try.
I started taking Venlafaxine 3 weeks ago - 2 weeks on a very low dose and I increased it slightly a week ago. It is renowned for making anxiety worse before it gets better and I had forgotten how bad it was on start up. I have been up and down over the last week but I had a really calm day yesterday and really thought I had cracked it. How wrong I was! My anxiety is through the roof today but I'm going to try and hang on in there until I speak to my doctor next week.
Just want to send you a hug and positive vibes that it will calm down soon for you.
Jules x
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I know we've the conversation previously but people need experiences from all sides. These medications work for me and many other sufferers that I am in touch with. I also have an obsessive personality ...... so could have become addicted but because I know that they work for me, I don't ever think that I will require more and more and ............ none of my therapists involved with my treatment have been worried about possible addiction. If I ever thought that I would need more I would hot foot it to my GP for advice who is aware of my altering the dosage as required: which fortunately is n't as often as in the past.
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But CLKD, what you don't seem to understand is that if, like me, you have acute anxiety for no reason every single morning, and someone offers you a drug that can relieve it temporarily, in that moment you just want it to go away so you take it. What you don't realise is that gradually it takes more and more of the same drug to make it go away (and that's not about thought, it's a physical fact, your body develops tolerance). Before you know it you're dependent, because if you try to come off it you get withdrawal symptoms which can be as bad as the original problem. I think you're talking about a different kind of anxiety. If I knew that, for instance, getting on a plane was going to give me anxiety then yes, I'd take the drug as a one-off to help with an occasional problem. I'm talking about an every single day problem - you try taking lorazepam for that and you'll be addicted before you know it. And medical staff are very very wary of prescribing benzos these days for this kind of problem, for precisely that reason.
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Hi racjen
Sounds like you're suffering with a severe progesterone withdrawl which commonly hits a few days after you stop taking it. It's the same reason that women get PMS, because your progesterone dramatically rises after ovulation then dramatically drops a couple of days before your period starts. It's not necessarily the high/low levels of progesterone causing the misery but the 'changing' of the level.
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Feeling really really depressed - feels like the improvements I saw on the AD have just disappeared and I'm back to that awful despairing feeling, can barely go out, just want to stay in bed. I don't know whether to just sit it out for longer, or try increasing the AD. My GP's not in till next Weds so I can't speak to her about it.
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Yes, I'm still on Evorel 100 patches with Utrogestan 100mg for 10 days a month. It's just really thrown me that the AD was helping, and then once I hit progesterone withdrawal I feel far worse again - I guess I was expecting that it wouldn't be so bad, but apart from anything else the AD meant I made it thru the whole 10 days of Utrogestan, which I've never managed before, so maybe the fall-out was always going to be worse. Weird thing is, I've had a bleed, finished a couple of days ago, and yet I still feel crap :'(. I think I'm going to go up to the higher dose of AD tonight - if my GP isn;t around till next Weds she can't expect me to just wait for permission.....
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How are you today racjen?
Have you considered reducing down to doing 7 days of Utrogestan per month? This is how much I take and it's the right balance for me.
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That's what I normally do GRL, mainly because I normally can't cope with more than 7 or 8 days. But this month it didn't affect me anything like so badly so I thought maybe the mirtazapine was somehow helping. Obviously a bad decision - despite having had a bleed several days ago I still feel really really depressed, have spent all morning in bed. Took the higher dose of AD last night but I guess that might make me feel worse for a few days too. Just whe I thought things might be starting to get better... :'(
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I find that upping my AD as necessary for a few days really helps my brain. It never makes me feel worse.
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Normally when you start an AD they warn you that you may feel worse for the first few days, until your brain's got used to it. The same thing can happen when you up the dose. It may not happen to you, but it does happen to plenty of other people.
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Has it eased yet?
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Has it eased yet?
No, still down in the pit :'(
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Thanks Birdy, helps to know I'm not the only one. I so envy people who get depressed or anxious, go to the doctor, get given an AD, take it for a few weeks with minimal side effects and then feel fine. I seem to know quite a few - why can't I be one of them?
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That's something that needs investigating surely racjen :-\. I had to try 5 B4 we found one that didn't make me really ill :-\ and that did me well for 8 years.
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How do you think they'll investigate it CLKD? In my experience of anxiety and depression it's just trial and error - they keep trying you on different ADs util they either hit on one that you're OK with, or you give up. And lots of other women on here are having the same experience. I don't know what you think they can do, because scientific knowledge of the idiosyncracies of the brain is still so sketchy,and we're all so different in our reactions - brain scans perhaps (that's a joke by the way?) You say yourself it took 5 tries before you found one that worked for you - were you asking for investigation after the first few didn't work? If it were that straightforward there wouldn't be so may women on this board suffering for months/years on end would there?
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Racjen. I am waiting to see if I can get wellbutrin. Instead of working on seratonine reuptake it works on dopamine reuptake.
I read about it and asked my phych if I could take it last time he suggested I go back onto ADs.
My physch said he wants to check with a colleague first as it's off license here so I wont know until next visit if I can get it. (He gave me escitalopram in meantime which I havent started.)
I wondered if it might interest you as it works in a different way to most SSRIS..
X