Think ive been Traumatized.

[khodge]

Hello

 

I have been dealing with my condition for almost 3 years and for the past year and a half I have been seeking help and psychiatrists have been prescribing meds. And at first I was very skeptical but I decided to go ahead and give it a shot. But this past year and a half has been nothing but one med after another just causing side effects and some really bad adverse reactions (Some destructive and some life threatening) But drs kept saying that the meds could not be doing that and I am probably avoiding my anxiety. I have now stopped taking Zoloft a month ago as it was causing severe restlessness, depression and increased anxiety on top of my existing severe ocd. I felt alot better at first but the side effects still haven't left. and I feel like this whole experience has traumatized me to the point where im afraid to even talk to my psychologist out of fear he is going to push more meds on me. And after doing a little research (Knowing that the drs weren't correct) I have found that everything im going through is clearly adverse reaction. And I guess the small window of relief I had after stopping zoloft made me realize what was going on and how bad things were which caused a lot of stress about being back in that position and I shut down. I am just afraid that my current psychologist is not going to believe me and he is going to try to put me on medication and its making me not want to go back and see him. after looking back this past year and a half has caused me to become defensive and shutdown to everything, and to top it off im trying to make it through a lot of side effects from medication. I am 24 so I have been pushing myself to work but I feel like I just need a break but my mom neither understands what im going through. she cares and is willing to help but she doesn't understand, and I have avoided talking to my father after he said I was fine and need to man up. I feel like I don't know where to turn.

Edited July 26, 2014 by khodge

[MomWithOCDSon]

Khodge --

 

So sorry you're going through this, but I can totally relate even though my vantage point is as a parent of an adolescent/teenage boy going through this stuff, rather than going through it myself. But the frustrations are very similar, and the sense of feeling let down by nearly everyone and everything you try is the same.

 

As a mom, I made a lot of mistakes when my son was first diagnosed with OCD at the age of 6. I didn't press the PANDAS investigation when our current therapist poo-pooed it, even though my gut was telling me that there was a link with DS. When, at 7.5 years of age, we had to agree to try the first SSRI with our DS because therapy alone was not giving him sufficient leverage over the obsessions and compulsions, I again inquired of his ped, the therapist and our new psychiatrist at the time about PANDAS, but too quickly accepted their less-than-lukewarm (i.e., dismissive) responses.

 

When DS fell off a cliff, psychologically and emotionally at the age of 12, I allowed these same "professionals" to lead us down a path of constant "tweaking" of SSRIs and other psych meds . . . change the med, change the dose, change the med, change the dose, over and over and over again. The truly odd thing to me is that they would opine SO definitively about how is was appropriate to increase doses in a relatively short ramp-up period, and/or how it was appropriate to wean DS off one SSRI in the course of a single week and put him on another one, pretty much simultaneously, yet not one of these folks was, I came to find out, taking any of these substances themselves and was instead "relying upon the literature" with respect to appropriate timing on the tweaks.

 

I can now say definitively that the "literature" is absolute bull crap! At the time, DS was too stressed out and too overly-emotional to articulate how all this "tweaking" was making him feel, but now that he's older and healthier and more settled, and we've had another close family member go through some similar stuff but at an older, more mature age, we know that these so-called "innocuous" psychiatric substances -- these SSRIs -- can be far more impactful and tricky when it comes to tweaking and/or weaning than any of these doctors had a clue about. Horribly, horribly frustrating to realize, literally years later, what we had inadvertently subjected our DS's brain to . . . the onslaught of chemical "imbalance" and sort of "short-circuiting" that these substances contributed to! No wonder he just seemed to get worse instead of better!!!

 

From everything you've said, it sounds to me as though you are potentially 1) especially sensitive to serotonin, and 2) possibly suffering from some other underlying issues that render the "conventional" responses to OCD meds ineffective or even possibly more harmful than good.

 

But you are not alone! If your psych does nothing but push additional meds at you, then you need to find another psych. And I would suggest a medical (integrative) doctor, too. There is likely more here than meets the eye, and some other interventions beyond what is "standard" (aka, SSRIs) could potentially help solve this current riddle. In the end, my DS's turnaround came by virtue of the following findings:

1. We found a strep link and convinced his ped to give him an abx trial; the results were so dramatic, she stuck with us through extended abx therapy, and he improved steadily over the next couple of years.
2. I stopped taking the psych's word for things and started doing my own research (the forums here were a big help!). When the psych would prescribe a new SSRI and want the wean from the existing one to happen over the course of 2 weeks, with increases in the new med occurring over the following 2 weeks, I bucked him. And we slowed that schedule WAY down, as well as halving all the doses prescribed because we now knew that the "standard" dose was likely too much for DS.
3. We found supplements that supported DS as he healed and gained more control over his OCD: NAC, B6 and zinc, along with an antihistamine, were key for him.
4. We changed therapists . . . twice . . . until we found someone with whom DS truly connected and with whom he would engage enough in the ERP and homework exercises so that he could continue to gain ground.
5. We also, eventually, changed psychs to someone who was more open-minded, more up-to-date with respect to ongoing research in the field, and who wasn't as dismissive with our attempts to keep current with the research and OCD treatments as the previous psych (i.e., less egotistical, generally).

I'm not sure where you live and what your options are for seeking out more effective help, but please don't give up! You are young and have a lot of opportunities and joys yet to come! This forum and others like it are here for you and can help you network to some more effective treatments and a better outcome. Hang in there!

[Wombat140]

Have you been getting cognitive behaviour therapy at all, or only medications? Because CBT really does work for OCD. In fact, the statistics are that CBT alone works better and more often than medication alone (though of course you can combine the two if one isn't enough). The effects also last longer, whereas medication only works as long as you're taking it. And, of course, no side effects! Here in Britain CBT is one of the two standard treatments, alongside SSRIs; I don't know what the rules are where you are.

 

Best wishes, and I hope you feel better soon. OCD is a swine, but things can be done!

Wombat140

Edited July 28, 2014 by wombat140