anti-depressent

[Immortal Soldier]

Ouch well first let me tell you YES this is extremely common, even moreso with Zoloft because it has stimulant effects (which can make you shakey and anxious as shit the first month)

I can only respond based on my own experience with Zoloft.
I actually stopped it at the 2 week mark (which is where you're at now)

I had started taking it for panic disorder and the second week I was on it I was having panic attacks at least twice a day (when normally it would just happen a few times a week)

It got so bad I went to school one day, got out of my car, and as I was walking to class my heart started pounding like a mfkr, I started shaking, my walk got sloppy like I was drunk and I was more paranoid then I was before I started taking it.
I walked into the building that day, flushed the bottle in the school toilet and never went to class thats how out of control the shaking and anxiety was.
So with Zoloft I DID NOT have a good experience.

Now on the other hand, I have to say a lot of this depends on circumstances.

A year past by and I was still getting panic attacks. I had tried therapy, NLP, systematic desensitation (which actually made it worse) and one day I basically cracked and was thrown in a psych ward lol.

Im not crazy it just got to the point where I had tried so many things to stop the panic attacks but they still were happening.

Getting thrown in that ward was the BEST thing that could have ever happened to me.
The docs threw me on Lexapro and again the first 2 weeks were terrible like the Zoloft. But I was more depressed then anxious with the Lex in the begining. BECAUSE I was in a ward I was forced to swallow the meds. (I could have threw them up if I really wanted to) but I made it past the initial phase that I didn't with the Zoloft. And I'll tell you today Lexapro did something serious and permanent to my brain, but in a GOOD WAY (I guess I'm just fortunate)
I completey stopped having panic attacks and anxiety after about 2 months, and soon it got to the point where I had NO anxiety at all (I mean normal anxieties that serve purposes, like getting anxious if your late to go somewhere).
After a year the lex had literally wiped away all my panic attacks, but also ALL my anxiety.. which became a bad thing.
I just started not giving a fvck about anything, being late, being broke, putting on weight, I just didn't give a shit.

So I had to stop taking the Lex because it was making me lazy and too content with life.
But the amazing thing is after I stopped (the withdrawals were NOT fun) I never had a panic attack again. When I got off I was thinking "wow now the panic attacks are prob gonna come back 10 fold" but they didn't.

So the lex had a profound impact on the way I think, and even today my anxiety is finally under control.

Mental illness is a VERY sensitive topic because the majority of citizens dont suffer from them. So their way of understanding mental illness becomes a projection of weakness towards those who do suffer. Its all the ego at play. But the way I see it is this.

There is NO frame of reference for something called REALITY.
There are over 6 billion people in this planet which means there are also over 6 billion different realities.

This is why when you're deciding to take meds, I still think its better to listen to your doctor then your "friends". Cause lets face it, a lot of "friends" can be idiots, and how many of them are actually doctors themselves?

Noone knows a god damn thing about you but you. Zoloft was just too much for me to handle, but if it doesn't work the MOST IMPORTANT thing you can do is not make the decision to rule out ALL meds. You have to try another, and you have to give each one a fair chance till you find one that works, or none that work. Either way, you won't know till you try.

Wow man, that is good to know. Yeah like I said, I had a nervous breakdown, I always had anxiety and OCD I would worry about the littlest thing until my mind found something bigger/better to worry about then I would worry about that. Sometimes in social situations I would get anxiety if I didn't know people around. But in particular it was my OCD that finally caused the nervous breakdown. My OCD deals with thoughts and performing them a certain number of times in my head, in a certain pattern, and in a certain way. So if didn't my anxiety would kick in ten fold so I was literally prisoner to OCD and it got to the point that I didn't even realize it was odd (had since I was 10 or so)

So anyway I came down from classes to visit my parents for the summer, shit happened family problems, etc. and basically I was under house arrest (figuratively of course) for the past 3 months, the only time I went out was to workout and every once in a while I would go out with friends and shit (usually on weekends) so you can imagine i was going crazy just having to be in a house all-day. Anyway I started getting these uncontrollable thoughts as if there was another side of me and it just sent these troubling thoughts into my head on purpose because it would spark the anxiety, anger, etc. then I would get these headaches and I would have to sleep or something to get rid of them.

I finally went into a psychiatric clinic and was evaluated (I never wanted meds because I was against them) and they prescribed me this. Well before I got prescribed the Zoloft I was getting better, the thoughts were dying away becoming less frequent and my mind was taking over and saying how ridiculous those thoughts were and to ignore them so I thought in a week or two I should be fully rid of these stressful thoughts. Then I started the Zoloft at 50mg and I first started noticing the delayed orgasm side effect then I noticed whenever i yawned I would never get that "refreshed" feeling you get at the end then the anxiety started to come back in full force and my OCD which at the point was still the same managed to get worse.

So now I am like really pissed because 3 months ago my life was great I had everything under control (the anxiety/OCD/depression) and now the second I wake up its like another part of my brain basically tries to demoralize me with thoughts.

I really hope this gets better, I mean at this point in life I see nothing to live for if for the rest of my life I am going to have to worry and have stressful thoughts.

[skinnypunk]

I always worry about being labeled as being "depressed". I have actually filled out paperwork for background investigations with questions regarding depression and medications for depression. I think that it may hinder my career if I were to ever be prescribed anti-depressants or diagnosed with depression.