Experience with Antidepressants

[WereBear]

My own experience was with Gabapentin for nerve pain from shingles. Worked on the nerve pain, and also seemed to lift my anxiety... for a couple of weeks. My diagnostician said such a reaction to psychiatric drugs is very common among autistics.

AND for two weeks of less anxiety, I had to taper off over 18 months according to my doctor's schedule! I did it in four months with the help of chelated magnesium: a mineral most people are deficient in.

I also found that going gluten free did me good.

The biggest thing I did was Niacin Therapy. I have lived with anxiety for so long I didn't know what it was like to not have it! Now, the greater clarity in my thoughts is related to the lifting of my mood.

 

[Buzzerfly]

I'm an NT and found antidepressants useful one time...to finish college. I took a low dose for about 3months, then I stopped when summer came. They helped me stop sobbing, got me out of bed to my classes and cut down on drinking BUT overall, I felt they gave me a kind of creepy, false sense of happiness. Now, my autistic husband was forced on them as a teen, and he found they literally made him depressed, whereas before he was just being realistic, and felt joy or pain naturally. Therefore, I think antidepressants, being a product made by the NT world for the NT brain may affect those on the spectrum negatively.

For energy, I recommend taking powdered magnesium and drinking more tea. And some people I've known on the spectrum find weed to be an antidepressant...to each his own though. Unfortunately, too much alcohol can eventually just weigh you down.

 

[Eric B]

I wonder as well about antidepressants. Without even having to get into my whole life story, as we all know, it's incredibly frustrating with both the social and physical problems, all of which are relatively "minor", which itself usually causes people to brush off the problems and point to "others [who] have it worse".
So I, in "midlife" am realizing that most of my frustration boils down to "having my own way". Which is embarrasing to say, because it makes you think of a child, who has to be told "you can't have your way". And I can clearly remember being "spoiled" to some extent as a child but then the world increasingly began saying "no", and sometimes, doing a total turnaround before, with bluntness such as "tough!" or "that's life".
Then, according to my type (as mentioned in the MBTI threads), everything has to "make sense", but a lot of things people do (including "rules"), don't, yet it often benefits them, while making life more complicated in general, and it's all about "power" (both in larger national politics and economics, as well as in more localized settings like the workplace).

So the answer for ASD is supposed to be "cognitive behavior therapy", but to me, it often gets on my nerves, and doesn't sound much different from anything I've heard before. It goes "there's your thoughts, your feelings and your actions, and it's being left with the horrible feelings, but only changing your "thoughts" and "actions", which just feels like more invalidation of the feelings (and whatever problem), as what's already done by life. Whether ASD, general "self-help", or even religious versions of self-help, it all sounds like just "psyching yourself out" to cope with "rolling with the punches". So I've just been getting angry about a lot of things in life, and overall depressed, about "the way life (itself) goes", it seems.

Someone (a previous counselor, likely) once mentioned the idea of antidepressants, but my wife is concerned that they won't be that simple, and of course, the possibility of side effects (which also concerns us regarding my job). I had a few years ago looked around online for psychiatrists, and those I saw charged $150-200 and didn't accept any plans, and as we didn't have the money, I dropped it for the time. But I'm still wondering if that might be the solution, and just got the idea to ask here.

 

[WereBear]

My own take, after considerable study, is that anti-depressants seem to do some people, some good. In others, they perform no better than placebo, and in another rough third, the side effects are considered far worse than how well they relieve the original problem.

I became skeptical of them when my physical overload symptoms were at their height and were baffling a series of medical professionals (before I realized what the problem was.) Prozac was always their last offer before practically throwing me out. Hardly a rigorous protocol, there.

For me, the overwhelming sense of caution about them is only increased when it comes to my fellow Aspies; because of my apparently common experience of my brain "adapting to them" and continuing to work the way it wanted in the first place. (Which is, let's face it, so much like my brain.) These things ramp up slowly and then have to be tapered off even more slowly, so it's high odds of months of wrestling with them... for nothing.

Before trying anything, I would advise anyone to read The Mood Cure, where I got much valuable information of easy supplementation we can do with nutrition. Also to see what we can change in our circumstances; which might be more flexible than we think when we have dug ourselves into a rut.

When the medical professionals admitted they didn't know what was wrong, and offered me Prozac to make me go away, I was not impressed. Turns out there was something wrong, which they could not figure out, and they didn't offer Prozac to fix me; they wanted to shut me up. It was as though they were wandering around Nazi Germany, giving everyone Prozac instead of joining the Resistance.

No. One thing does nothing, and the other actually addresses the problem.

 

[Aster]

I am having a good response to Saint John's Wort (Perika Brand, no I'm not an employee), Magnesium Glycinate, and Lemon Balm at the moment. Sam-e worked for me too but proved to provoke a little anxiety at higher doses. After all the trials of pharmaceuticals I've been on I am happy to have results on natural herbs and supplements.

 

[Full Steam]

I am having a good response to Saint John's Wort (Perika Brand, no I'm not an employee), Magnesium Glycinate, and Lemon Balm at the moment. Sam-e worked for me too but proved to provoke a little anxiety at higher doses. After all the trials of pharmaceuticals I've been on I am happy to have results on natural herbs and supplements.

St John's work is working for me too. I'm very happy with it.

Sam-e is next. I've tried a single pill and saw an effect.

Magnesium glycinate I've never tried, but I have a bad reaction to most magnesium. I might try it though.

I'll give lemon Balm a go too, thanks.

 

[WereBear]

I swear by chelated magnesium, which avoids what I call the Boxcar of Ex-lax effect.

Which sure isn't calming.

 

[texkag]

Well, I was put on prozac many year's ago, for the wrong reasons. I was depressed, so I thought, because of a decision I had to make, which basically tore me apart.

I put a lot of weight on. I constanstly needed to sleep and I mean: I would get up at 10 am and consider that too early and go for an "afternoon" nap, which lasted 4hrs or more.

I suffered blinding depression and blinding migrains. I could not understand how I could be outside on a beautiful sunny day and feel this sense of blackness pushing down on me, which just made me go into a daze.

I then got a sense that despite the dr upping the dose, that perhaps they are not such a good idea after all and so, tried to wean myself off them, but the whizzing sensation in my head, made me scared out of my wits and felt sure that if I looked at my eyes, they would be going mad!

Something clicked, after 16 year's of being on these tablets and I realised that I had no choice but to do cold turkey and for a month, I suffered dreadful panic attacks throughout the day. And then: NOTHING I could not believe that the headaches vanished and I suddenly did not need to sleep so much and I lost a bit of weight.

I finally came to the conclusion that the anti depressants were causing the depression, because since that time and before, I never experienced that kind of sensation, that I now know was depression.

After doing a lot of research, my finds concluded with: if one does not have a mental issue ie chemical imbalance, then those tablets will actually cause depression.

I thought I had a chemical imbalance, but what proved to be the fact was that it is my environment and past that causes me to suffer meloncholy.

I take natural anti anxiety tablets now and they work an absolute treat for me.

Seeing a psychiatrist tomorrow and will have to calm the nerves, because it is dangerous to have constant anxiety; causes the heart to beat too fast, which in turn can cause heart conjestion, which I discovered whilst being in hospital!

They assumed ( which was fair enough) that my rapid heart beat was connected to overactive thyroid and so, I was put on beta blockers and when I went back to the hospital for a check up, sure enough my heart was beating too fast and they wanted to continue with beta blockers, but guess what? My tension and blood pressure were normal and so, even the dr concluded it was ANXIETY causing the rapid heart beat all the time and not the overactive thyroid.

Sorry I deviated.

Thanks for your post, and thanks to Full Steam for starting this thread. My mother experienced many of the issues you have laid out for us and, to put it bluntly, was completely messed up by Prozac and other meds. I have suffered from depression since primary school. I have always managed to find a way out of them myself and have never turned to anti-depressants; partly because of my mother's experiences.
I slipped into the worst depression of my life since I was diagnosed last year and none of my normal strategies for it have helped. Having my upper spine and intercostal muscles in spasm makes things even harder. I went to the GP yesterday who told me that I had to access talking therapies the same way as everyone else. In the UK this means that I'll likely be seen by a counsellor with the bare minimum of a counselling diploma and who may have only recently qualified. They will have no specialist training in ASD, if they have any ASD training at all it is likely to be in connection to children. Throughout the conversation she kept pushing the idea of anti-depressants as the only solution despite the fact that, in her own words, they will take at least four weeks to work and also highlighting the fact that I will likely be waiting six weeks for a counselling appointment.
I eventually agreed to a prescription of Fluoxetine (an SSRI). Having perused the information leaflet that came with it I have decided that it is too much of a gamble to take. Like you Suzanne I believe that the root of my depression is primarily environmental. The stress of being a carer and beginning to recognize my own deficiencies have created a perfect psychological storm.
However, I believe that I must have the resources to battle this successfully. I have made it though other bouts of depression and I will find a way to escape this one. It's wonderful, however, to be able to listen to all of your advice and wisdom.

 

[Kalinychta]

I dislike medications intensely, and I'm particularly skeptical of SSRIs, but I was just watching that autism documentary called Neurotypical, and the father of a little autistic girl said that after they put her on anti-depressants, she was able to cope better.

Has anyone found this to be the case?

 

[Progster]

I dislike medications intensely, and I'm particularly skeptical of SSRIs, but I was just watching that autism documentary called Neurotypical, and the father of a little autistic girl said that after they put her on anti-depressants, she was able to cope better.

Has anyone found this to be the case?

Antidepressants help in that they can take the edge off anxiety. So if a person has anxiety issues, it can help them cope. However, they can also suppress emotion, so people feel hollow, empty and flat inside, it can affect their personality and some people prefer not to take them because of this.

 

[Kalinychta]

Antidepressants help in that they can take the edge off anxiety. So if a person has anxiety issues, it can help them cope. However, they can also suppress emotion, so people feel hollow, empty and flat inside, it can affect their personality and some people prefer not to take them because of this.

Yes indeed. I’ve read that they’re as effective as placebos, so I was just wondering about people’s personal experiences with them.

 

[Vindicator Phoenix]

Antidepressants calmed me down, but to the point where I only ever wanted to sleep.

As a caveat, I never had depression; I just thought I did, and persuaded psychiatric professionals to prescribe me pills.

I just noticed that the previous sentence was quite alliterative, and will admit that I changed the word, "convinced" to "persuaded," just to improve its P-supremacy.